340 THE EVOLUTION OF LIFE. 



either as superfluous exercises of power, which is a derogatory 

 surrposition, or as exercises of power that were necessary 

 because species could not be otherwise produced, which is 

 also a derogatory supposition. 



§ 114. Those who espouse the hypothesis of special cre- 

 ations, entangle themselves in other theological difficulties. 

 This assumption that each kind of organism was specially 

 designed, carries with it the implication that the designer 

 intended everything that results from the design. There ia 

 no escape from the admission, that if organisms were severally 

 constructed with a view to their respective ends ; then 

 the character of the constructor is indicated both by the 

 ends themselves, and the perfection or imperfection with 

 which the organisms are fitted to them. Observe the con- 

 sequences. 



Without dwelling on the question put in a recent chap- 

 ter, why during untold millions of years there existed on 

 the Earth no beings endowed with capacities for wide 

 thought and high feeling, we may content ourselves with 

 asking why, at present, the Earth is largely peopled by 

 creatures which inflict on each other, and on themselves, so 

 much suffering? Omitting the human race, whose defects 

 and miseries the current theology professes to account for, 

 and limiting ourselves to the lower creation, what must we 

 think of the countless different pain-inflicting appliances 

 and instincts with which animals are endowed ? ISTot only 

 now, and not only ever since men have lived, has the Earth 

 been a scene of warfare among all sentient creatures ; but 

 palaeontology shows us that, from the earliest eras geologi- 

 cally recorded, there has been going on this universal carn- 

 age. Fossil structures, in common with the structures of 

 existing animals, show us elaborate weapons for destroying 

 other animals. We have unmistakable proof that through- 

 out all past time, there has been a perpetual preying of the 

 superior on the inferior — a ceaseless devouring of the weak 



