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It is in the fossil structures which are heaped around and beneath us in every direction, that we find the great master-key to unlock the secret history of the earth. They are "as documents which contain the evidences of revolutions long antecedent to the creation of the human race, and they tell of many successive generations, of which the creation and extinction would have been equally unknown to us, but for the recent discoveries in the science of Geology." And the study of organic remains is indeed truly said to furnish a connecting link between terrestrial conditions and states of life, separated by incalculable periods of time. It embraces at the one end, the earliest dawn of life upon the globe, and a state of terrestrial condition, and of animated nature unlike the present, while at the other, it communicates its results to the gradually increasing storehouse of modern science; and in this study we are brought," says the Rev. Professor Buckland, "into as immediate contact with the events of immeasurably distant antiquity, as with the affairs of yesterday."

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Among the important inferences at which we arrive from the examination of fossil organic structures, the leading and most interesting conclusions. are the following; which are thus stated by Dr. Mantell, in his recent work, "The Wonders of Geology.”

First, That the extinction of certain forms of animated existence is a law which is not only in operation at the present moment, but has extended

218 INFERENCES STATED BY DR. MANTELL.

throughout the period comprised in our present researches, and we trace its influence from the partial extirpation of certain existing species, to the entire annihilation of species and genera that once were cotemporary with man, as well as to those which are known to have lived and become extinct long prior to the existence of our race.

Second, that while, in the modern marine and fluviatile accumulations, the remains of existing species of animals, and of man and his works are entombed; in the ancient deposits of water-worn materials, those of large mammalia alone, and those chiefly of extinct kinds, are imbedded.

Third, That these animal remains principally belong to extinct pachydermata, related to the elephant, hippopotamus, and sloth, with horses, deer, and other ruminants, and that these had for their cotemporaries, bears, hyænas, tigers, and other carnivora, belonging to extinct species.

Fourth, That there was therefore a period immediately preceding the existence of man, when the earth teemed with large herbivorous animals, which roamed through the primeval forests unmolested, save by beasts of prey. Numerous species and entire genera have been swept away from the face of the earth, some by sudden revolutions, others by a gradual extinction,—while many have been exterminated by man.

Lastly, That these vast deposits, whether formed in the beds of lakes or rivers, or in the estuaries

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and basins of the ocean, have been elevated above the level of the waters, and now constitute fertile countries, supporting the busy population of the human race.

CHAPTER X.

The Study of Organic Fossils considered, and the proofs they contribute to the evidences of Design in Creation briefly reviewed.

Of the results which have attended the researches of Geology, none can be more curious or interesting, more splendid or important, than the discovery that numerous races of animated beings, most of which were unlike any known forms in existing creation, inhabited our planet before mankind were placed upon its surface; or than the restoration, at this distance of time, of the animals and plants which successively inhabited the earlier surfaces of the globe; their relics, in the character of sparry or marble sculptures, or fossil bones encased in the solid rock, beneath the thin stratum which marks the comparatively short past duration of the existing order of nature, being preserved in a fossil state, as if to invite the wondering inquiry, and advance the instruction of mankind.

220 FACTS ANNOUNCED IN ITS CULTIVATION.

The facts, that previously to the creation of man, the earth was inhabited, during a long succession of ages, by many different races of animals, which races were successively created, and after long duration extinguished from its surface, to be followed by new races, differing often as much from preceding kinds as from those which now inhabit the globe, and that its surface has been visited by great changes of condition, as also that many convulsions have occurred upon it, are facts very startling in themselves, and for which the previously received opinions formed upon the Mosaic account of the Creation and Deluge, had not at all prepared the student of fossil nature. Those facts are, nevertheless, established upon evidence too clear, too infallible and valid, to admit of the slightest reasonable doubt.

But the great value and importance of these results arise from the proofs contributed in the relics of the several by-gone creations, thus shewn to have had existence upon our globe, that they were derived from the direct exercise of Divine power, and formed, sustained, and regulated, as obviously as are the members of existing creation, upon those principles, and with that all-wise and benevolent adaptation, which declare the boundless wisdom, goodness, and perfection of their Creator.

As the study of organic remains has exhibited the point at which life had its first beginning upon the globe; so, it has contributed proofs that every variety of organic structure placed on it in that beginning,

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and in the successive creations of subsequent times, was "created in the fulness of perfection and complete adaptation," a perfection originally complete in the first-created structures, and perpetuated to the last, and therefore neither requiring or gaining one feature of completion from any duration of their races, or any renewed exertions of creative power. And while these facts enforce the conviction that all organic life originated in the direct fiat of Omnipotence alone, and that, "without Him was not anything made that was made," so their repetition through all the defined and differently characterized periods of organic life, and through the monuments of the thousands of ages during which it has existed on our planet, equally convince us of the constant superintendence of the Creator, whose hand we trace in all.

It is the exalted result of these investigations to discover throughout the fossil world, as in existing nature," an Omnipotent architect, and His constant provision for the wants of the terrestrial inhabitants, not only visible in the period in which He laid the first foundations of the globe, but also throughout the long series of changes which he has caused subsequently to pass over it." And while the "clusters of contrivances" by which every living species in nature is adapted to its own peculiar condition, are familiar to every comparative anatomist, the Geologist is enabled, by the study of the fossil world, to demonstrate that they began not, with