336 ON THE CLASSES OF THE 



ries to exist in Nature, than the possibility of stretching 

 a bow proves that it is always naturally stretched; than 

 the possibility, in short, of forming any sort of scale at our 

 pleasure, proves that the scale thus invented is that ac- 

 cording to which we have all been created. 



As no naturalist of the present day, as far as I am ac- 

 quainted, has any doubt of the non-existence of a sim- 

 ple progression in Nature, it may seem to be trifling with 

 the reader's time to take any pains to support a truth 

 which is so generally admitted. When however we ob- 

 serve metaphysicians of no common acuteness, day after 

 day, accounting such a series to be demonstrated, it may 

 be proper to consider their method of demonstration. 



No mode of argument, if correct, is so convincing as 

 by syllogism, and there is none in which, if incorrect, the 

 error is so readily detected. We shall therefore now ana- 

 lyze the syllogistical proof of a simple series in nature, which 

 has been given nearly as follows. 



1. Species of animals differ from each other in their 

 material structure. 



2. Man in his organization is a species of animal. 



3. Man is the most perfectly constructed of all known 

 animals. 



4. Therefore we ought to refer every species of animal 

 to man, as the type of that perfection from which it more 

 or less recedes ; — in other words, there is a simple scale in 

 Nature. 



The naturalist is the first to perceive that there must 

 be some error in this reasoning, because he knows by ex- 

 periment the conclusion to be false. Some first-rate zoo- 

 logists have therefore supposed the above consequence 



