ies, so far
as it means anything, means evolution of some sort. Finding the relation
between these terms--distinguishing the _same_ which reproduces itself,
and the _different_ which introduces a new term--that is, determining
the law of apparent evolution--is the problem presented to science.

The astronomer found Bode's law to all appearance violated by the
omission of a planet between Mars and Jupiter. He could see no reason
for the law, but if the planets had been placed by an intelligent
Creator, some order of arrangement must be discoverable according to
which their position was determined. The Creator being intelligent, it
is impossible to conceive them placed fortuitously. There must then be a
link between Mars and Jupiter, because the law once established cannot
be broken. The same law may be observed in the arrangement of leaves
around the axis of a plant. If intelligence arranged them they must be
arranged in some order, for intelligence never performs the least act
without a purpose. Each leaf or pair of leaves is not a mere duplication
of the previous leaf or pair of leaves. The relation which subsists
between any two sets in the series expresses the idea of the Creator,
and this must be constant. Completing the series as indicated by
different plants, we may assume that if any term is apparently wanting,
it is only because it has not been discovered. In neither of these cases
would it be asserted that any physical evolution had taken place--the
terms form a series of which each term is equally determined by the
operation of a fixed law; and yet it is an operation precisely analogous
to that which in the case of animals presents every appearance of a real
evolution. Take, for instance, a series of animals, presenting at one
period of time the simplest and most rudimentary forms, and at another
the most complex and highly organized; we cannot do otherwise than
conceive these two extremes as related by intermediate terms, through
the operation of some law which holds good throughout the series. The
relation subsisting between any two, must be the same as that subsisting
between any other two similarly situated, or a departure from that
relation which is itself governed by a definite law discoverable from a
comparison of two sets of terms. The application of this law is so
universal and so rigid that we need not hesitate to interpolate a
missing term, and confidently assert that it either does exist or has
exi