es of
the antediluvian age who browsed half a dozen trees for breakfast,
crunched a couple of oxen for luncheon and a whole flock of sheep
for his dinner, been consulted on a similar problem, he would have
replied, without hesitation, "I exhaust the uses of the world.
What animal can there be superior to me? beyond a question, my
race shall possess the earth forever!" The mastodon could not know
any uses of nature except those he was fitted to experience, nor
imagine a being with the form and prerogatives of man. Therefore
he would not believe that the mastodon race would ever be
displaced by the human. We labor under the same disqualification
for judgment. There may be in the system of nature around us
adaptations, gifts, glories, as much higher than any we enjoy as
our noblest powers and privileges are in advance of those of the
tiger or the lark.

It is a remarkable fact that the mature states of the antediluvian
races correspond with the foetal states of the present races, and
that the foetal states of embryonic man are counterparts of the
mature states of the lower races now contemporaneous with him.
This great discovery of modern science, though perhaps destitute
of logical value, suggests to the imagination the thought that man
may be but the foetal state of a higher being, a regent
temporarily presiding here until the birth and inauguration of the
true king of the world, and destined himself to be born from the
womb of this world into the free light and air of the spirit
kingdom!

The resources of God are inexhaustible; and in the evolution of
his prearranged ages it may be that there will arise upon the
earth a race of beings of unforetold majesty, who shall disinter
the remnant bones and ponder the wrecked monuments of forgotten
man as we do those of the disgusting reptiles of the Saurian
epoch. But this is a mere conceit of possibility; and, so far as
the data for forming an opinion are in our hands, it is altogether
incredible. So far as appears, the adaptation between man and the
earth is exhaustive. He is able to subdue all her forces, reign
over all her provinces, enjoy all her delights, and gather into
his consciousness all her prophecies. And our practical conviction
is absolute that the race of men is the climax of being destined
for this earth, and that they will occupy its hospitable bosom
forever with their toils and their homes, their sports and their
graves.2

The other question is this: Wa