Is Man a« Finality of Organic Evolution? , 73 
with the fish, has developed into the reptile, the bird, the quadruped and man. 
Nor does method.end here, nor the method which had its first announcement 
on the morning of animal existence. J have already alluded to the varied 
conditions under which animal life presents itself; the various ends with refer- 
ence to which animals have been modified — some to swim, some to fly, some 
to climb, some to burrow, some for exalted powers and active habits, others 
for a degraded and sluggish existence. Each fundamental type has been 
moulded and warped and adapted to these varied ends and conditions of being. 
At the same time the grand characteristics of the type have been conserved 
even in its extremest modifications. The modifications of the fundamental 
plan to adapt it to these varied ends are class characters, and we thus find 
that Nature has herself grouped the members of each branch into classes. 
This method is as old as the animal creation. Not only did each creature 
which played its part in the primordial fauna conform to one of the four fun- 
damental types of structure, but it also conformed to the characteristics of one 
of the pre-conceived class modifications of that type. Each class-group is com- 
posed of different grades of animals, constituting so many different. orders 
within the limits of the class. This gradation of ordinal types was also recog- 
nized in the organization of the earliest animals; thus the whole plan of cre- 
ation was mapped out to the mind of the Creator from the beginning. 
We shall see as we,proceed that every step in the evolution of continents and 
the establishment of a home for the coming man, was a monument in a defin- 
ite direction, effected by forces chosen from the first, and shaped always with 
reference to exigencies which were to arise in the far distant future. We shall 
see how the simple animal forms of the primeval ocean embodied in themselves 
germs which were capable of unfolding into the richest variety of adaptations 
and the most exalted capabilities. There can be no nobler, no more instruct- 
ive and inspiring employment than to stand where we do, at the end of this 
long history, and, looking back upon it, catch its method and reproduce in 
our own minds the sublime conceptions of the Architect of the world. To 
him that has glanced over this long line of organic history and observed 
how the ascent from the seaweed to man has been effected, step by step in 
regular succession, can not fail to start the inquiry: “Is man destined to be 
the last term of this series of improving types”? Science affords some inti- 
mations which tend to assure us in the possession of the dignity which we 
now enjoy as the archontes of terrestrial existence. 
In the first place, all geological preparations and ideas converge in man. 
The world seems to have been designed with the view of stimulating to 
activity the powers of a thinking being. The universe is a rational pro- 
duct, and every department of it and every isolated object sustains an intel- 
ligible relation to other parts and objects. We are not left to infer, or even 
to know, that intelligent design is locked up in the secret plans of creation; 
but what is more suggestive, as well as more satisfactory, is the fact that this 
intelligence is potent ‘before our eyes; so that we read, as it were, a reve- 
lation of the thought embodied in the works of thevisible universe, as much 
of that which is not at once manifest yields to investigation, while a stimulus 
to investigation is found in the hints and suggestions which Nature seems 
intentionally to have dropped along the pathway of him who follows the 
beckoning of his thoughts. Not only were these germs of thought planted 
from time to time during the whole progress of the past creation, and not only 
is man the first creature capable of responding to the stimuli to mental activ- 
ity, but more, this mentality, while it differs qualitatively from the highest 
endowments of the lower animals, is in itself the highest’ possible grade of 
endowmer.. It is qualitatively identical with that infinite intelligence whose 
‘presence and supremacy are recognized throughout the universe. It is a fair 
presumption that when the course of animalization has attained the point 
