20 MAMMALIAN DESCENT. [Lect. I. 



but ' your young men, sliall see visions.' " Now, if one of 

 the briglit young soldiers in our rapidly increasing army 

 were permitted to see tlie whole web (woof and warp) of 

 organic life, he would everyw^here see glimpses of the 

 human face divine ; the features of the latest creature 

 would be traceable in the face of the earliest. 



Yet these t}qDes and foreshadowings of the great 

 Eeasoner, to be develoj)ed in the parturient fulness of 

 time, only reached their own little Pisgahs ; they looked 

 over towards the human territory, but they entered not 

 in. As for the direct ancestors of man, time has buried 

 them, and no man knoweth of their sepulchre to 

 this day. 



ADDEXDUM TO LECTUEE I. 



That which is biological in the foregoing Lecture will be con- 

 sidered and treated of from time to time in the succeedmg Lectures, 

 and also in the Addenda attached to them. But there is one thing 

 that may be brought in here, namely, the conceptions that the 

 Ancients held with regard to the Origin of the Universe, and especially 

 of living creatures. Amongst these the Jewish Bards stand first, far 

 in front, indeed, and moreover their poems have been worthily ren- 

 dered into what Swinburne truly calls "Divine English." 



I am, of course, well aware that Moses, and Job, and David were 

 not the only great and wise and good men who in ancient times sang 

 — "How the Earth rose out of Chaos." 



Whilst composing these Lectures, a friend kindly put into my hands 

 two invaluable works that have yielded me great pleasure and profit. 

 The first of these is A Manual of Buddhism,'^ by R. Spence Hardy; 



^ 2iid edition. London : Williams & Norgate, 1880. 



