REMARKS ON THE FIGURES OF PLATE LII. 
THE LAWS OF SERIAL UNIFORMITY AND SYMMETRY MANIFEST THEMSELVES IN THE PRESENTIAL 
CHARACTERS OF ALL ORGANIC PRODUCTS. 
[eo a are samenesses or identical creations. All created forms are not homologous or 
identical with each other ; and, therefore, absolute specific difformity must reign somewhere amongst 
them ; and this has never been doubted, for there is no one who would characterise as uniform bodies 
a flower, a shell, and a golden ingot. As absolute special variety has, therefore, an actual existence, it 
must follow that uniformity does not encompass all creations; and for this reason it is required to 
define clearly the meaning of the term “uniform,” as distinguished from the term “special.” Uniform bodies 
are those which appear to be the exact repetitions of each other, both as to general cast and essential 
character. Specifically difform bodies are those which in no respect coftain any character, whether of 
essence or cast, in common. ‘T'wo or more bodies, which are thus difform as units, will, when severally 
repeated each after its own kind in series, still manifest two or more difform serieses; for being 
singularly various, multiplication can only render them plurally various; and just as a rectangular 
Tenet is various to a circle, so will the repetition or multiplication of a triangle on the one side, 
and of a circle on the other side, still only produce a plurality of triangles and of circles on onne sides. 
Uniformity can, therefore, alone characterise plural numbers of bodies, which are cast after the 
same mould and constructed of the like essential parts. The repetition of such bodies in series produces 
serial uniformity ; and the variety which is now and then apparent amongst such forms is mainly owing 
to the subtraction or metamorphosis of quantity. The serial repetition of form is the law of uniformity. 
The serial repetition of two or more difform bodies will produce two or more difform serieses, and 
when we say that the simple rule of repetition is that law which presides over the creation of -both 
these serieses, we by no means would thereby imply that both serieses were identically cast. 
When we speak of serial uniformity, as characterising the continuous order of the one entity, 
we isolate that uniform fact from all other serial creations, which are specifically difform to this 
particular one. When we speak of the serial uninterrupted order of the line of endo-skeleton osseous 
quantities, and call it a unity in proportional variety, the unity being plus and the variety being 
minus, we do not mean that all serial creations whatever, throughout the three kingdoms of entity, 
viz., the animal, the vegetable, and the mineral, are come of such a unity, and that they are 
rendered various by such a law of variety. Still it is true that every specifically distinct serial line 
is produced by the simple law of repeating the first unit throughout the same line, and this operation 
is creative of counterparts. 
The combined laws of symmetrical and serial homology, | laws of formation. Whatever be the character and consti- 
together with the law of proportioning minus from plus | tution of forms which take on the same serial order, 
quantity, here and there through series, govern organic | we discover plainly that the variety which is introduced 
nature in all its branchings. The vegetable as well asthe | amongst them, is no other than what may be effected by 
animal kingdom furnishes innumerable examples of these | the law of proportioning. Nature is uniform in the 
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