How grand, yet how simple the whole of this process--for a God only to conceive and do, and yet for man, after all, to trace out and ponder upon. Truly must we be in some way immediate to the august Father, who can think all this, and so come into His presence and council, albeit only to fall prostrate and mutely adore. Not only are the orbs of space inextricably connected in the manner which has been described, but the constitution of the whole is uniform, for all consist of the same chemical elements. And now, in our version of the romance of Nature, we descend from the consideration of orb-filled space and the character of the universal elements, to trace the history of our own globe. And we find that this falls significantly into connection with the primary order of things suggested by Laplace's theory of the origin of the solar system in a vast nebula or fire-mist, which for ages past has been condensing under the influence of gravitation and the radiation of its heat. _II.--History of the Earth's Crust_ When we study the earth's crust we find that it consists of layers or strata, laid down in succession, the earlier under the influence of heat, the later under the influence of water. These strata in their order might be described as a record of the state of life upon our planet from an early to a comparatively recent period. It is truly such a record, but not one perfectly complete. Nevertheless, we find a noteworthy and significant sequence. We learn that there was dry land long before the occurrence of the first fossils of land plants and animals. In different geographical formations we find various species, though sometimes the same species is found in different formations, having survived the great earth changes which the record of the rocks indicates. There is an unbroken succession of animal life from the beginning to the present epoch. Low down, where the records of life begin, we find an era of backboneless animals only, and the animal forms there found, though various, are all humble in their respective lines of gradation. The early fishes were low, both with respect to their class as fishes, and the order to which they belong--that of the cartilaginous or gristly fishes. In all the orders of ancient animals there is an ascending gradation of character from first to last. Further, there is a succession from low to high types in fossil plants, from the earliest strata in which they are found to the highest. Several of the most important living species have left no record of themselves in any formation beyond what are, comparatively speaking, modern. Such are the sheep and the goat, and such, above all, is our own species. Compared with many humbler animals, man is a being, as it were, of yesterday.