OF THE ANNULOSA. 563 



the corresponding points of which agree in some one or 

 two remarkable particulars of structure. Suppose also, 

 that the general conformation of the animals in each series 

 passes so gradually from one species to the other as to ren- 

 der any interruption of this transition almost imperceptible. 

 We shall thus have two very different relations, which must 

 have required an almost infinite degree of design before 

 they could have been made exactly to harmonize with each 

 other. When, therefore, two such parallel series can be 

 shown in nature to have each their general change of 

 form gradual, or, in other words, their relations of affinity 

 uninterrupted by any thing known — when moreover the 

 corresponding points in these two series agree in some one 

 or two remarkable circumstances, there is every probability 

 of our arrangement being correct. It is quite inconceiva- 

 ble that the utmost human ingenuity could make these two 

 kinds of relation to tally with each other, had they not been 

 so designed in the creation. Relations of analogy consist 

 in a correspondence between certain insulated parts of the 

 organization of two animals which differ in their general 

 structure. These relations, however, seem to have been 

 confounded by Lamarck, and indeed all zoologists, with 

 those upon which orders, sections, families, and other 

 subdivisions immediately depend. Now, such can be no 

 other than relations of affinity, since it is clear that the 

 affinity between two neighbouring groups must become 

 greater instead of less, as our ideas of them become less 

 general and more simple. Every person is, I believe, 

 aware that it is a relation of affinity which places the dog- 

 next to the wolf, as well as the Mammalia near to Birds ; 

 but then it is with the same ease perceived that the affi- 

 nity in one case is much stronger than that in the other. 



