6 
duced by processes in dead matter, we do not know. In its es- 
sence, as consciousness or sensibility, I do not believe it to be the 
offspring of anything, but to be additional to matter and force ; 
the third fact of the universe, to which the two others are necessary. 
It spreads from place to place, whenever the conditions of matter 
and force are suitable for it. It is like a fire let loose, which now 
creeps through low cushions of moss and grass, now smoulders in 
old wood, then blazes high as heaven in fruitful meadows and tower- 
ing forests,—it dies out in the.earth, avoids bare rocks, and ceases 
abruptly as it strikes the edge of the water. But matter capable 
of displaying it there doubtless always has been, if not in one 
planet then in another; if not in one solar system then in another ; 
and so it penetrates the universe, derived from the great reservoir 
of consciousness—wherever that may be—perhaps all around us. 
The labor and time consumed in making the living world of to-day, 
is only. realized by those who can read the history of creation. 
What ages have passed since life began the struggle whose out- 
come is mind! What millions of attempts, so to speak, were 
made before the best working machine, man, the triumph of mental 
organization, was turned out! What immeasurable waste, from 
one point of view, was necessary before this result was achieved. 
Mountains of limestone bespeak the ruin of countless myriads of 
animals; coal and oil and other similar substances are the quintes- 
sence of forests and other cohorts of living things. Even the solid 
flint has been laid down in incredible masses by the gentle showers 
of the shells of minute plants upon the floor of the ocean, and 
square leagues of rocks in all parts of the earth are filled with the 
remains of the inhabitants of land and water. Tribe after tribe, 
nation after nation has fallen, and we ask as we wonder,— 
How many pleasures and pains lie buried with these millions? 
How many songs have been hushed? How many discordant cries 
silenced, before the relentless advance of the law of progress that 
has allowed no laggards. Such is the explanation of the heca- 
tombs of the past, such the lesson man finds set before him. In 
considering the time occupied in the creation of man, and the waste 
involved in the process, it is incumbent on us that the value of the 
result is not diminished through any fault of ours. In this view, 
the creation of exhibitions like the present one finds its best justi- 
fication. There is no more certain way of teaching of the future 
than by the knowledge of the history of the past. 
