These are some of the reasons why the various varieties of animals are supposed to have descended from common ancestors and to have undergone endless changes of form; changes as strange as anything that was ever written into a fairy story or acted out in a Christmas pantomime. There are other things quite as convincing and even more thrilling to read about, such as the little theatre in the chicken's egg where strange, changing shadows re-enact the drama of ancient life; but these I am here passing by because my pages are running out and I want the rest of them to speak of what seems to me to be the greatest lesson of this whole book; the greatest and most useful and happiest lesson Science or any kind of book can teach; namely, that not only is the universe governed by Laws and Mind, but that all these laws act together as one Great Law and are working out one general result, the constant advance of all things toward a higher life. HOW MAN HAS RISEN AS HE DESCENDED As there was a period in human history when there were no human beings on earth higher than the cave-dweller, so there was a time when the highest forms of animal and vegetable life were minute creatures and plants consisting only of a single cell. It is such low forms of vegetable life that make the scum on the still waters of a pond. Step by step, in both the animal and vegetable world, rose the higher forms. The descent of man from lower forms of life used to be considered by many people as a thought that degraded humanity, but it is the most promising fact in all nature. The striking thing is, not that we are related in some way to the apes and the cavemen but that such a creature as an ape or a caveman should have helped develop such a beautiful thing as a little child. This progress has not been steadily upward. The world of life, like the surface of the globe itself, has had its ups and downs. Wonderful nations like Greece and Rome have risen and flourished and passed away, but they left the best of themselves, the part that time cannot destroy. The Greeks taught us literature and art and the grace of life. The Romans gave us a science of government and a solid way of doing practical things, such as the building of good roads and bridges. The great lesson of history is that civilization and human liberty and all the things that make life worth living have not only survived the fall of empires but stand to-day on higher and firmer ground than they ever did before. THE WORLD THAT MOTHER MADE