therefore of the first living beings could only offer to the view the
bringing together of some of the elements of the soil; this is not the
matter in question. The primitive cellules were to all appearance
alike. Weighed in scales, opened by the scalpel, placed beneath the
microscope, they would have offered no appreciable difference; I grant
it: it is the supposition we have agreed to make. Therefore they were
identical, say you. I deny it, and here is my proof: If the cellules had
been identical, they would not have given, in the successive development
of their generations, the diverse beings which people the world, and the
relations which unite them. Alike to your eyes, the cellules differed
therefore by a concealed property which their development brought to
light. You have told me as a matter of history how the organization of
the world was manifested by slow degrees; you have given me no account
of the cause of that organization.

It is said in reply: "We do know the origin of those developments which
you refer to a supposed intelligence. The living beings are transformed
by the action of food, climate, soil, mode of life. They experience
slight variations in the first instance; but these variations are
established, and increase; and where you see a plan, types, and species,
there is really only the result of modifications slowly accumulated.
Nature disposes of periods which have no limit, and everything has come
at its proper time, in the course of ages." They are always proposing to
us to accept of time as the substitute for intelligence. I am tempted to
say with Alcestis:


Time in this matter, Sirs, has nought to do.[127]