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Show UNIFORMITY OF 'filE SYSTEM. 156 . . d. Tl arison here msbtute Is animals of higher m:d~rs.. :t ~o:l;cn we attempt to draw between things so dissim~lar, lla beyond all reasonable . we stram ana ogy 8 uch mfcrcnccs, .1 · e that there was a con- ' u easl y con eel v bounds. '" e may f · tl succession of . phenomena presiderable departure rom le t'c world when so new and 'b' d · n the organ ' viously exln Ite . 1 • se as the union, for the first . Ircumstance aro ' . d fi . ex traordmary a c . ll t l faculties capable of m e mte time, of moral and mte ~c ula tur·e llut we have no right · th the amma na · improvement, WI 'mt'lar deviations from analogy l th were any s1 to expect t lat e.re . proaressive scheme, at former correspondmg steps m a o d -~ny imilar circumstances occurre • . ' perwds, when no 5 f: d'fficult question may arise out th r and a ar more I . . But ano e ' . ar·atively of modern ongm. d · · tl t man IS comp of the a I~Isston la f the human species, it may be asked, Is not the ~nt:rference t~e antecedent course of physical events, such a deviatiOn fromf l i ct tends to destroy all our conthat the know led1e o . sue~ :hea order of nature, both in regard £dence in the um ormtty o~ If uch an innovation could take to time past and futu~e .been :xclusively inhabited for thouplace after the ea~th ~a . 1 by should not other changes d f b mfenor amma s, w . · ? san s o ages Y d ted happen from time to time as extraordinary nnd un~:~t~e~nto supervene, differing in kind If one new cause wasbpe -" . ei·ation why may not others f ny e1ore m op ' . and energy. rom a. . different epochs? Or what security have come mto actiOn at t . hereafter? If such be the l t tl may no anse · have we t la ley . f one period even though we tl e expencnce o ' . · case, how. can 1. 11 the ossible effects of the then existmg are acquamted with a h? h can refer all natural pheno· causes be a standard to w IC we ' . d :> mena of other per:o ~. . uld be unanswerable, if adduced Now these obJectwns wod' " the absolute uniformity · 1 was conten mg 10r 'f ag·amst one, w 1o · f sublunary events-1 ' 11 t · of the successiOn o . al throughout a Ime . d . d lge in the philosophic for example, he was dispose dtoGm uk sects who represented reveri.e s of some Egyptian an rele d m' aterial worl d as all the changes both of the mora £a~ each other in their repeated at distant intervals, s~ ~s to o ;o: they compared the former connexion of placel ~n t tl::~ronomical cycles, and not course of events on our g o e o ffi . to be under the only did they consider all sublunary a airs RECENT ORIGIN OF MAN. 157 influence of the celestial bodies, but they taught that on the earth, as well as in the heavens, the same identical phenomena recurred again and again in a perpetual vicissitude. The same individual men were doomed to be re-born, and to perform the same actions as before ; the same arts were to he invented, and the same cities built and destroyed. 'l'he Argonautic expedition was destined to sail again with the same heroes, and Achilles with his Myrmidons, to renew the combat before the wal!s of Troy. Alter erit tum Tiphys et altern quoo vehat Argo Dilectos heroas ; erunt etiam altern bella, Atque iterum ad Trojam magnus mittetur Achilles*· The geologist, however, may condemn these tenets as absurd, without running into the opposite extreme, and denying that the order of nature has, from the earliest periods, been uniform in the same sense in which we believe it to be uniform at present. We have no reason to suppose, that when man first became master of a small part of the globe, a greater change took place in its physical condition than is now experienced when dis~ricts, never before inhabited, become successively occupied by new settlers. When a powerful European colony lands on the shores of Australia, and introduces at once those arts which it has required many centuries to mature; when it imports a multitude of plants and large animals from the opposite extremity ofthe earth, and begins rapidly to extirpate many of the indigenous species, a mightier revolution is effected in a brief period, than the first entrance of a savage horde, or their continued occupation of the country for many centuries, can possibly be imagined to have produced. If there be no impropriety in assuming that the system is uniform when disturbances so unprecedented occur in certain localities, we can with much greater confidence apply the same language to those primeval ages when the aggregate number and power of the human race, or the rate of their advancement in civilization, must be supposed to have been far inferior. If the barren soil around Sidney had at once become fertile upon the landing of our first settlers ; if, like the happy isles * Virgil, Eclog. 4. For an account of these doctrines, see Dugald Stewart's Elements of the Philosophy of the Human Mind, vol.. ii. chap. 2, sect. 4 1 and Prichard's Egypt. Mythol., p. 177. |
