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REMARKS ON THE FIGURES OF PLATE XXvV. 
THE LUMBAR SERIES DOES NOT INVARIABLY COMMENCE AT THE SAME VERTEBRAL FIGURE. 
LAW is that general interpretation which an assemblage of relationary facts expresses with regard 
to those facts. Such a law is based upon the principle of analogy, and necessarily comprehends all 
those facts which manifest, however closely or remotely, a common conformity of character. Analogy 
is the basis of all laws, forasmuch as it becomes the principle of concentration ; whereas diversity is 
the dissolution of a law, and consequently repels all interest in its endless account, just in the same 
degree as it disintegrates and divides apart (as by an unnatural force) all those ge. which cleave 
Analogy is positive. Analogy is creation. 
naturally towards each other. Diversity is negative. 
Diversity is increation. Hence it must follow that as facts are analagous. creations, and of the positive 
_ condition, so should these be chosen as the only proper groundwork of a law, and because it is impossible 
to frame any law or generalisation upon nihil, or the absence of quantity, which is increation, and the 
negative condition. The skeleton forms, notwithstanding their diversity of character, still manifest this 
salient and positive creation of analogy, and the comparison of them to one another as entities explains 
the fact that their nonentities, or subtracted quantities, constitute their species, in the same way as a—b 
is a species in presence of a+d. The loss of quantity is the loss of that which, had it remained, would 
have found its counterpart in creation, but being nz// is equal to the species. All skeleton forms would 
be created in plus uniform condition, but for the metamorphosing act which, by the subtraction of 
greater or lesser degrees of quantity, renders them various as things of excess and defect. The law 
of form must hence be studied according to the evidence of unity or plus quantity passing under 
metamorphosis, and with this understanding we shall pursue our inquiries, not for the purpose of 
demonstrating difformity, but with the view of ascertaining how forms become varied to each other, 
for in the knowledge of this exists the state of a law. 
The mammalian cervix is an instance of where Nature 
generally practises her law of proportioning upon seven 
units of series. The mammal cervix usually contains seven 
vertebre, but this is all that can be granted concerning 
this region of the spinal series; for in despite of all that 
anatomists have said regarding this rule of development, 
still it must be owned that the exceptions to this rule are 
~ of too much importance to be passed over with the careless 
remark that.“ exception proves the rule.” Any rule well 
founded and philosophically understood can admit of no 
exceptions. 
It is a fact that even the mammalian cervix is very con- 
stantly encroached upon by the development of thoracic 
quantity, such as cervical ribs, which, whilst increasing the 
dimensions of the thoracic apparatus, diminishes at the 
same time the length of the cervix. 
It is a fact of still more frequent occurrence, that the 
human lumbar spine, to say nothing of other mammalian 
loins, developes an inconstant number of vertebral forms; 
and that when those forms are minus to the ordinary or 
normal number, the thoracic series are increased in num- 
ber; whereas, on the contrary, when the lumbar human 
vertebre are plus to the ordinary number, then we see 
that the thoracic figures are minus their normal series. 
In figs. A, B, Cy and D we see that the human lumbar 
spine varies considerably as to the number of its vertebral 
forms. Those vertebre are similarly marked in all the 
opposite figures, and a comparison of those units of series 
which bear similar marks will indicate the law of propor- 
tioning which renders them in such condition as they 
present themselves. 
In fig. A, the first lumbar unit, marked 1 / a, developes 
on the left side of us the autogenous or costal process 
fixed, and on the opposite side its fellow is produced in the 
articular form of a last thoracic rib. All those pieces of fig. 
A marked a, are serial homologues proportionally varied. 
