at, while
these harmonious relations underlie the whole creation in such a manner
as to indicate a great central plan, of which all things are a part,
there is at the same time a freedom, an arbitrary element in the mode of
carrying it out, which seems to point to the exercise of an individual
will; for, side by side with facts, apparently the direct result of
physical laws, are other facts, the nature of which shows a complete
independence of external influences.

Take, for instance, the similarity above alluded to between the fauna of
the Arctics and that of the Alps, certainly showing a direct relation
between climatic conditions and animal and vegetable life. Yet even
there, where the shades of specific difference between many animals
and plants of the same class are so slight as to battle the keenest
investigators, we have representative types both in the Animal and
Vegetable Kingdoms as distinct and peculiar as those of widely removed
and strongly contrasted climatic conditions. Shall we attribute the
similarities and the differences alike to physical causes? Compare, for
example, the Reindeer of the Arctics with the Ibex and the Chamois,
representing the same group in the Alps. Even on mountain-heights of
similar altitudes, where not only climate, but other physical conditions
would suggest a recurrence of identical animals, we do not find the
same, but representative types. The Ibex of the Alps differs, for
instance, from that of the Pyrenees, that of the Pyrenees from those of
the Caucasus and Himalayas, these again from each other and from that of
the Altai.

But perhaps the most conclusive proof that we must seek for the origin
of organic life outside of physical causes consists in the permanence of
the fundamental types, while the species representing these types have
differed in every geological period. Now what we call typical features
of structure are in themselves no more stable or permanent than specific
features. If physical causes, such as light, heat, moisture, food,
habits of life, etc., acting upon individuals, have gradually in
successive generations changed the character of the species to which
they belong, why not that of the class and the branch also? If we judge
this question from the material side at all, we must, in order to judge
it fairly, look at it wholly from that point of view. If these specific
changes are brought about in this way, it is because external causes
have positive perman