re still looking for some explanation of animal origin on
natural grounds; and was derided quite as much as Lamarck's work by the
adherents to the old traditional belief. Scouted by the great majority
of naturalists, who still clung with tenacity to the notions of their
predecessors, stigmatized as atheistic and abominable by theologians, it
was first read with eagerness, and then put aside; and though it went
through many editions, it is now almost forgotten. But this book was the
beginning of Darwinism. It says:--

"We have seen powerful evidence that the construction of this
globe and its associates, and, inferentially, that of all the
other globes in space, was the result, not of any immediate or
personal exertion on the part of Deity, but of natural laws
which are expressions of his will. What is to hinder our
supposing that the organic creation is also the result of
natural laws, which are in like manner an expression of his
will?"

Referring to the Deity as the great motive-power of all the universe,
the author says:--

"To a reasonable mind the Divine attributes must appear, not
diminished or reduced in any way, by supposing a creation by
law, but infinitely exalted. It is the narrowest of all views
of the Deity, and characteristic of a humble class of
intellects, to suppose him acting constantly in particular ways
for particular occasions. It, for one thing, greatly detracts
from his foresight,--the most undeniable of all the attributes
of Omnipotence. It lowers him towards the level of our own
humble intellects. Much more worthy of him it surely is to
suppose that all things have been commissioned by him from the
first, though neither is he absent from a particle of the
current of natural affairs in one sense, seeing that the whole
system is continually supported by his providence.... When all
is seen to be the result of law, the idea of an Almighty author
becomes irresistible, for the creation of a law for an endless
series of phenomena--an act of intelligence above all else we
can conceive--could have no other imaginable source, and tells,
moreover, as powerfully for a sustaining as for an originating
power."

He sums up the hypothesis which he seeks to sustain thus:--

"I suggest, then, as an hypothesis already countenanced by much
that is ascertained, and l