are as a day," than the traditional theory of a Creator constantly interfering to supplement and amend His original Creation by supernatural interferences. It is evidently important for all who desire to arrive at truth, and to keep abreast of the culture of the day, to have some clear conception of what historical and geological records really teach, and what sort of a standard or measuring-rod they supply in attempting to carry back our researches into the depths of prehistoric and of geological time. I have therefore in this work begun with the historic period, as giving us a solid foundation and standard of time, by which to gauge the vastly longer periods which lie behind, and ascended from this by successive steps through the Neolithic and Palæolithic ages, and the Quaternary and Tertiary periods, so far as the most recent discoveries throw any light on the mysterious question of "Human Origins." If I have succeeded in stimulating some minds, especially those of my younger readers, and of the working-classes who are striving after culture, to feel an interest in these subjects, and to pursue them further, my object will have been attained. They have been to me the solace of a long life, the delight of many quiet days, and the soother of many troubled ones, and I should be glad to think that I had been the means, however humble, of introducing to others what I have found such a source of enjoyment, and enlisting, if it were only a few, in the service of that "divine Philosophy," in which I have ever found, as Wordsworth did in Nature, "The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse, The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul Of all my moral being." PART I.--HISTORY. CHAPTER I. EGYPT. Historical Standard of Time--Short Date inconsistent with Evolution--Laws of Historical Evidence--History begins with Authentic Records--Records of Egypt oldest--Manetho's Lists--Confirmed by Hieroglyphics--Origin of Writing--The Alphabet--Phonetic Writing--Clue to Hieroglyphics--The Rosetta Stone--Champollion--Principles of Hieroglyphic Writing--Language Coptic--Can be read with certainty--Confirmed by Monuments--Manetho's Date for Menes 5004 B.C.--Old, Middle, and New Empires--Old Empire, Menes, to end of Sixth Dynasty--Break between Old and Middle Empires--Works of Twelfth Dynasty--Fayoum--Thirteenth and Fourteenth Dynasties--Hyksos Conquests--Duration of Hyksos Rule--Their Expulsion and Foundation of New Empire--Conquests in Asia of Seventeenth and Eighteenth Dynasties--Wars with Hittites and Assyrians--Persian and Greek Dynasties--Summary of Evidence for Date of Menes--Period prior to Menes--Horsheshu--Sphynx--Stone Age--Neolithic and Palæolithic Remains--Horner, Haynes, and Pitt-Rivers.