190 
LECTURE ON THE CREATION AND GEOGRAPHICAL 
DISTRIBUTION OF ANIMALS. 
DELIVERED BEFORE THE TRURO SCIENTIFIC INSTITUTION. 
By Mr. W. F. Karkeek, Truro^ CormoalL 
I KNOW not anv branch of science more interesting: to man- 
kind in general, including all ages and descriptions, than the 
history of living beings, or, as we commonly call it, the natural 
history of animals. This pleasing subject occupies us at the 
first dawn of reason, amusing our earliest infancy, and supplies 
a fund of solid instruction and rational entertainment to our 
riper years and more developed faculties. In its boundless 
extent and variety are included matters within the compre¬ 
hension of the least cultivated understanding; and others, to 
which the strongest mind and most enlarged science are not 
more than adequate. 
The wisdom and power of the Almighty are most wonderfully 
displayed in the infinite diversity of the forms and organs of 
animals; the nice adaptation of these to their several functions ; 
the beauty and elegance of some, and the extraordinary form¬ 
ation of others ; the variety of their motion, their geographical 
distribution, and their pre-eminent utility to mankind in every 
state and stage of life. And when we reflect on and endeavour 
to estimate their countless numbers, and further consider the 
manifold attributes and characteristics of those only which are 
familiar to us, we cannot but wonder at and reverence their great 
Creator. He made every living thing after its kind,” formed it 
with organs and senses peculiarly adapted to its natal station, 
and for its destined purpose endowed it with instincts and faculties 
to obtain its own subsistence, to guard its life, and to perpetuate 
its species. The more we study their forms and structures, we 
shall discover that, from the monstrous leviathan of the deep 
to the smallest insect that lives in the waters—from the unwieldy 
but sagacious elephant to the more minute animal that moves 
on the earth—there are regular and systematic gradations— 
there are uniformity, harmony, and infinite design. 
“ These are thy glorious works. Parent of good ! 
Almighty ! thine this universal frame. 
Thus wond’rous fair; thyself how wond’rous then ! 
Unspeakable, who sitt’st above these heavens. 
To us invisibly, or dimly seen 
In these thy lowest works.—Yet, these declare 
Thy goodness beyond thought, and power divine.” 
^‘The history* of the animal kingdom naturally commences 
* Kirby’s Bridgewater Treatise. 
