extremely curious, but still obscure and unsettled field of
investigation. He has elaborately cleared up many points, and
successfully, we think, answered some weighty objections, but we are not
yet converts to his theory of organic development. One passage we shall
extract; after adverting to the facts established by powerful evidence,
that during the long term of the earth's existence, strata of various
thickness were deposited in seas composed of matter worn away from the
previous rocks; that these strata by volcanic agency were raised into
continents, or projected into mountain chains, and that sea and land
have been constantly interchanging conditions. He continues:--

"The remains and traces of plants and animals found in the
succession of strata show that, while these operations were going
on, the earth gradually became the theatre of organic being, simple
forms appearing first, and more complicated afterwards. _A time
when there was no life_ is first seen. We then _see life begin, and
go on_; but whole ages elapsed before man came to crown the work of
nature. This is a wonderful revelation to have come upon the men of
our time, and one which the philosophers of the days of Newton
could never have expected to be vouchsafed. The great fact
established by it is, that the organic creation, as we now see it,
was not placed upon the earth at once; it observed a PROGRESS. Now
we can _imagine_ the Deity calling a young plant or animal into
existence instantaneously; but we see that he does not usually do
so. The young plant and also the young animal go through a series
of conditions, advancing them from a mere germ to the fully
developed repetition of the respective parental forms. So, also, we
can _imagine_ Divine power evoking a whole creation into being by
one word; but we find that such had not been his mode of working in
that instance, for geology fully proves that organic creation