1896.] Life Before Fostils. 189 



ern facts, indeed, which bear upon it, but few geological ones, 

 and none of absolute force. If we leave out of the question the 

 highly problematical " Eozoon Canadense," we find the first 

 known fossils at a comparatively high level in the rocks ; and 

 these, instead of being, as the theory of evolution requires, of 

 very simple organization, are of a degree of development which 

 indicates a very long period of preceding life existence. This 

 primeval fauna, indeed, contains representatives of every 

 branch of animal life except the vertebrate, and these not in 

 their simplest stage, but already divided into their principal 

 orders : the Ccelenterate class, for instance, yielding examples 

 of Actinozoa and Hydrozoa ; the Crustacean, of Trilobites and 

 Phyllopods ; and the Molluscan, of Gasteropods, Lamellibranchs 

 and Pteropods. 



This is the beginning of life as we know it. It is very far 

 from the beginning of life as evolution demands, or as the char- 

 acter of the rock strata indicates. Below the Lower Cambrian 

 beds, which contain these fossils, lie several miles of stratified 

 rocks similar in physical character to those above them, and 

 indicating, as Darwin says, " that during a preceding era as 

 long as, or probably far longer than, the whole interval from 

 the Cambrian age to the present day . . . .the world 

 swarmed with living creatures." 



Evidently we are not yet at the origin of life. We are miles 

 away from it probably — miles of rock strata, that is. Between 

 the simplest known microscopic creatures and the much devel- 

 oped Cambrian fossils an immense gap extends. The gap, for 

 example, between a diatom and an oyster is one that represents 

 ages of evolution ; yet it is much less in extent than the yawn- 

 ing gap which we find dividing the line of primeval life, and 

 which geologists have sought in vain to fill. Believers in 

 ■evolution — who represent about all living scientists and the 

 bulk of living thinkers — cannot but stand in some dismay be- 

 fore this strange circumstance, which must be proved away or 

 explained away before their theory can be fully substantiated. 

 Yet proof is not forthcoming, and only attempts at explanation 



