THE EVOLDTION-H^TOTHESIS. 347 



two changes being correlatiye. And as, on the one hand, 

 the hypothesis that each species resulted from a supernatural 

 act, having lost nearly all its kindred hypotheses, may be 

 expected soon to become extinct ; so, on the other hand, the 

 hypothesis that each species resulted from the action of na- 

 laral causes, being one of an ever-increasing family of hypo» 

 theses, may be expected to survive and become established. 



Still greater will the probability of its survival and estab- 

 lishment appear, when we observe that it is one of a particu- 

 lar genus of hj^otheses that has been rapidly extending. 

 The interpretation of phenomena as resulting from Evolution, 

 has been independently showing itself in various fields of 

 inquiry, quite remote from one another. The supposition 

 that the Solar System has been gradually evolved out of dif- 

 fused matter, is a supposition wholly astronomical in its 

 origin and application. Geologists, without being led thereto 

 by astronomical considerations, have been step by step ad- 

 vancing towards the conviction, that the Earth has reached 

 its present varied structure through a process of Evolution. 

 The inquiries of biologists have proved the falsity of the once 

 general belief, that the germ of each organism is a minute 

 repetition of the mature organism, differing from it only in 

 bullv ; and they have shown, contrariwise, that every organ- 

 ism, arising out of apparently-uniform matter, advances to its 

 ultimate multiformity through insensible changes. Among 

 philosophical politicians, there has been spreading the per- 

 ception that the progress of society is an evolution : the 

 truth that " constitutions are not made but grow," is a part 

 of the more general truth that societies are not made but 

 grow. It is now universally admitted by philologists, that 

 languages, instead of being artificially or supernaturally 

 formed, have been developed. And the histories of religion, 

 of philosophy, of science, of the fine arts, and of the indus- 

 trial arts, show that these have passed through stages as un- 

 obtrusive as those through which the mind of a child passes 

 on its way to maturity. If^ then, the recognition of evolu- 



