and future Prospects. 5481 



of the universe. It mast be philosophical or nothing, and if philoso- 

 phical it of necessity excludes the miraculous. An English states- 

 man (such a statesman !) boldly declared, at a public meeting of 

 agriculturists (a class of persons not remarkable for philosophical 

 inquiries), that " the discovery of gold in Australia was simply 

 a merciful dispensation of Providence to meet the wants of a 

 superabundant English population." * But why not go further, and 

 say at once that the gold was formed there, a few years ago, in order 

 that it might be so discovered ? And why not say at once, for this 

 conclusion is aimed at, that it was expressly formed for the use of the 

 Anglo-Saxon race ? On the other hand, a similar discovery had been 

 made, a few years before, in California, by a section of the same race, 

 a very amiable, Christian, mild and gentle section of the great English 

 family, remarkable, above all, for a truly Christian philanthropy, and 

 who have turned the discovery to the best account. How are we to 

 explain this ? There is but one way : reject the hypothesis, and all 

 such, as a scandal to the era in which we live, a libel on human rea- 

 son and an outrage on common sense, t 



In support of the doctrine of a unity of all created beings, an unin- 

 terrupted scale of life from the commencement, we have had — 1st, the 

 theory that all living things are convertible into each other by exer- 

 nal circumstances; X 2nd, the same doctrine formuled in a more phi- 

 losophical way,§ and better adapted to the existing state of Science ; || 

 1 3rd, the theory that all species were formed as they were, and now 

 are, at first, and perhaps simultaneously, thus constituting species 

 everything in Nature, and viewing generic characters merely as the 

 result of modifications of species affected by time and circumstances, 

 or even as being in themselves of little or no moment in philosophy ; 

 lastly, H the theory that, admitting species or specialization to be the 

 great aim of Nature in the construction of the organic world, it is not 

 the sole aim, nor do specific beings solely form Nature ; that genera 

 or natural families form a portion of Nature's great scheme ; that per- 

 petuation by a parentage is generic as well as specific proved by the 

 fact of certain animals passing their lives and perpetuating their kind, 



* Speech of Sir John Pakington, as reported in the 'Times/ 1856. 



f Such ideas are peculiar to the Saxon race, and especially to that section of it 

 which we find in England where the " whitened sepulchure," lay and clerical, most 

 abounds. 



X Lamarck. § Goethe, Oken, GeofTroy. 



|| De Blainville. 51 Knox. 



XV. T 



