Vestiges of the Natural History of CreationChambers, Robert
Science
Vestiges of the Natural History of Creation
Chambers, Robert
Creation; Evolution (Biology)
more clear than that ambitious aggression has led to the civilization of
many countries. Such is the process which seems to form the destined
means for bringing mankind from the darkness of barbarism to the day of
knowledge and mechanical and social improvement. Even the noble art of
letters is but, as Dr. Adam Fergusson has remarked, “a natural produce of
the human mind, which will rise spontaneously, wherever men are happily
placed;” original alike amongst the ancient Egyptians and the dimly
monumented Toltecans of Yucatan. “Banish,” says Dr. Gall, “music,
poetry, painting, sculpture, architecture, all the arts and sciences, and
let your Homers, Raphaels, Michael Angelos, Glucks, and Canovas, be
forgotten, yet let men of genius of every description spring up, and
poetry, music, painting, architecture, sculpture, and all the arts and
sciences will again shine out in all their glory. Twice within the
records of history has the human race traversed the great circle of its
entire destiny, and twice has the rudeness of barbarism been followed by
a higher degree of refinement. It is a great mistake to suppose one
people to have proceeded from another on account of their conformity of
manners, customs, and arts. The swallow of Paris builds its nest like
the swallow of Vienna, but does it thence follow that the former sprung
from the latter? With the same causes we have the same effects; with the
same organization we have the manifestation of the same powers.”
MENTAL CONSTITUTION OF ANIMALS.
IT has been one of the most agreeable tasks of modern science to trace
the wonderfully exact adaptations of the organization of animals to the
physical circumstances amidst which they are destined to live. From the
mandibles of insects to the hand of man, all is seen to be in the most
harmonious relation to the things of the outward world, thus clearly
proving that _design_ presided in the creation of the whole—design again
implying a designer, another word for a CREATOR.
It would be tiresome to present in this place even a selection of the
proofs which have been adduced on this point. The Natural Theology of
Paley, and the Bridgewater Treatises, place the subject in so clear a
light, that the general postulate may be taken for granted. The physical
constitution of animals is, then, to be regarded as in the nicest
congruity and adaptation to the external world.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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