15.3 



THE GEOLOGIST. 



He concludes in the following manner :— " The results arrived at repose 

 on the momentaneous state of our positive knowledge of the fossil world. 

 New discoveries may modify them, and perhaps even change some of their 

 details. But the general laws which we have established are based now 

 on too large an amount of facts to permit doubt of their reality, or fear lest 

 some exceptions of inferior importance may refute them entirely. We cannot 

 pretend that JN'ature, although actually following the indicated method dur- 

 ing creation, has never made an exceptional step, for reasons which remain 

 to us unknown. The phenomena in question are not of a nature to be 

 able to be assigned to fundamental laws, with the same certainty and ri- 

 gour as physical or chemical facts, which can be calculated according to 

 the laws of attraction and affinity, or perhaps the causes which have pro- 

 duced them are too complicated to permit us to recognize them perfectly. 

 If the same rigorous law was the sole cause of all these facts, the know- 

 ledge of extinct populations which the fossil remains in the earth's strata 

 furnishes to us would always remain defective, as we shall be never certain 

 of knowing all the facts, which are of such importance to enable us to 

 formulate exactly the expression of our belief Whether the results to 

 which we have at present arrived satisfy us or not, we have only searched 

 for truth, and announced what we have discovered. Even when construct- 

 ing a priori a series of theoretical laws, we have not sought to establish a 

 preconceived opinion ; our object was to establish a method which would 

 lead us to reply to all the questions in relation to our problem. Before 

 accepting these theoretical laws, we were bound to make rigorous obser- 

 vations, which we see confirmed by facts. For our motto has been for 

 many years, and ever will be. Nature will teack." 



If the principles actuating such noble sentiments as these were practised 

 by all palseontologists, England might hope for a brighter future in its 

 scientific world than promises to dawn upon us for many years. 



The Theology of G-eologists, as exemplified^ in the cases of the late Hugh 

 Miller and others. With an Appendix on the Nature and Properties 

 of the Torhanehill Mineral, hy llugh Miller. By William Gillespie, 

 Author of ' The Necessary Existence of Grod,' etc. etc. Edinburgh : 

 A. and C. Black. 



It is wellnigh impossible to conceive the present creation devoid of man 

 as its governing spirit. We almost inseparably associate the idea of animal 

 life with intelligence and reason. Were they thus united in the palseozoic 

 ages ? If this conjunction be necessary, it must have existed from the 

 dawn of life, — and so, we by no means prejudge the question as to man's 

 antiquity, or the existence of a pre-Adamic race. 



If the further researches of animal psychology should substantiate such 

 a connection as we have indicated, we may expect to arrive at as strange 

 conclusions regarding psychical life in the geologic aeons, as those which the 

 researches of Cuvier and Owen into the animal structures of the past have 

 revealed. In thus anticipating deeper glimpses into the economy of the 

 past than any yet attained from the mere study of fossils, we by no means 

 wish to resuscitate the fantastic dreamings of some cosmogonists of the 

 sixteenth century ; but would only remind geologists that animal psycho- 

 logy is as truly an inductive science as any observational one. Laws inse- 

 )arably linking the physical and psychical life of organized beings may yet 

 )e established : and these will extend over past as well as present life. The 

 psychologist, then, may yet include fossils under his cognizance. And 

 the conclusions he may arrive at regarding the instincts and habits of the 



