have laughed at it already, laughing now all the more, and
laughing heartily at it now though he may never have before.

It begins by tracing the genesis or original formation of _Space_ to a
single point, in the same manner as the elder Darwin had, in his
'Zoonomia,' traced the whole organized universe to his six Filaments. It
represents this primeval Point or _Pinctum saliens_ of the universe,
after '_evolving itself by its own energies_, to have moved forwards in
a right line _ad infinitum_ till it grew tired.' Whereupon, 'the right
line which it had generated would begin to put itself in motion in a
lateral direction, describing an area of infinite extent. This area, as
soon as it became conscious of its own existence, would begin to ascend
or descend, according as its specific weight might determine, forming an
immense solid space filled with vacuum, and capable of containing the
present existing universe.'

Thus slow progressive points protract the line,
As pendant spiders spin the filmy twine:
Thus lengthened lines impetuous sweeping round,
Spread the wide plane, and mark its circling bound;
Thus planes, their substance with their motion grown,
Form the huge cube, the cylinder, the cone.

It then proceeds as follows:--

'SPACE being thus obtained, and presenting a suitable _nidus_ or
receptacle for the _generation_ of _chaotic matter_, an immense deposit
of it would gradually be accumulated; after which the filament of fire
being produced in the chaotic mass by an _idiosyncrasy_ or _self-formed
habit_ analogous to fermentation, explosion would take place, suns would
be shot from the central chaos, planets from suns, and satellites from
planets. In this state of things, the filament of organization would
begin to exert itself in those independent masses which, in proportion
to their bulk, exposed the greatest surface to the action of light and
heat. This filament, after an infinite series of ages, would begin to
ramify, and its viviparous offspring would diversify their forms and
habits so as to accommodate themselves to the various _incunabula_ which
nature had prepared for them. Upon this view of things, it seems highly
probable that the first effort of Nature terminated in the production of
vegetables, and that these being abandoned to their own energies, by
degrees detached themselves from the surface of the earth, and supplied
themselves with wings and feet, according as their different
prope