LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. OF" Mrs. SARAH P. WALSWORTH. Received October, 1894. Accessions No. ~* - Cla^s No. sn Book S 148 Clay st. n Francisc THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING: OR, THE POWER, WISDOM, AND GOODNESS OF GOD, ILLUSTRATED IN THE MULTIPLICITY AND VARIETY OF HIS WORKS. BY REV. HOLLIS READ, V A 'COMMERCE AND CHRISTIANITY," ETC. " Who by searching can find out God." NEW YORK : 0. SORIBNER, 124 GRAND STREET. 1859. Kf ENTERED according to Act of Congress, in the year 1859, by CHAELES SCEIBNEE, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Southern District of New York. JOHN F. TKOW, Prinlor, Stereotyper, and Electrotyper, 377 & 379 Broadway, Cor. White Street, New York. PREFACE. IN offering to the public another volume, the writer would fain acknowledge the generous reception which his former publica- tions have met. If these gleanings from a Pastor's study of which the present volume is another instalment have not the merit of illustrating some of the great themes and princi- ples which most vitally concern man here and hereafter, and which display the wonder-working hand of Infinite goodness, skill and wisdom, then let them die the death of all abortive books. The present volume is the result of long and careful inves- tigation a patient collocation of facts from a great variety of sources an attempt so to combine amusement and instruc- tion, the useful and the entertaining, as to challenge the lovers of fiction to the field of facts as not the less marvellous. He believes he has collected, within a tangible compass, an amount of varied and interesting knowledge on the subjects treated which will spare the reader the trouble and expense of search- ing through more libraries and books than are likely to fall in his way. The writer will esteem it recompense enough, if he may contribute any appreciable amount of influence to arrest the current of the reading world in its strange revellings in 4 PREFACE. the mazes of romance. He has endeavored to make a read- able book of FACTS, which " are stranger than fiction." It is a book from the world and for the world we live in conducting the reader through the museum of the Great King contemplating the Monarch on his throne his royal attire the crown-jewels in all their beauty the concave of his Palace studded with ten thousand gems the robes of glory he wears his footstool wrought in all the skill and wisdom and variegated beauty which can please the taste or minister to the pleasure or profit of man. But we have done more than to survey the exterior of the Temple. We have essayed to enter the audience-chamber of the Great King, to search out God in the holy of holies of the upper Sanctuary. Who is this God that worketh so won- drously? Can we form any conception of such mental re- sources of such sleepless activities of such power, benevo- lence and skill ? In our profoundest searches, when we have seemed to discover much, a voice from the inner Temple seems, in contempt of all human knowledge, to respond : " Lo ! these are but parts of his ways ; but how little a por- tion is known of him." The character of the writer's books already before the pub- lic and the success they have secured, he fondly hopes, will bespeak for the forthcoming volume the same generous re- gard. CKANEVILLE, N. J., Sept., 1859. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. PAGE Crystal Palaces The Universe a Magnificent Palace Endless Variety of the Divine "Workmanship No two Objects alike The Insatiable Desires of the Mind Its Love of Novelty and Variety, ...... 9 CHAPTER II. VARIETIES GEOLOGICAL : The nice adjustment of particles composing the Earth such as to secure all our various Soils Productions Minerals and Metals Coal, Iron Iron annihilated, and what then ? . . . .24 CHAPTER III. VARIETIES GEOGRAPHICAL : Cosmogony The Earth as a Uniform Lump The Earth as Variegated : Land, "Water, Mountains, Plains How many things a Man requires in the Common Affairs of Every-day Life : Food, Apparel, House, and Implements of Labor, . . . . . . .89 CHAPTER IV. THE ELEMENTARY PARTICLES of Things Varieties Chemical The same law of Variety pervades the Atomic "World " Ultimate Molecules," or Elementary Particles The Particles composing a Kay of Light or Drop of Water, . 55 CONTENTS. CHAPTER V. PAGE The Vegetable Kingdom : No two Trees, Plants, Shrubs alike No two Leaves, Flowers, Seeds, or Fruits The Natures, Qualities, and Uses, how different. The Abundance of Vegetable Productions All formed of a few Elemen- tary Substances. ......... 74 CHAPTER VI. THE ANIMAL KINGDOM The Scale of Life -The "Vast Chain of Being 1 ' The Animal World a Counterpart of the Vegetable, . . . . 90 CHAPTER VII. THE ANIMAL KINGDOM: Species of Animals Individual Varieties Organs of Locomotion Legs, Wings, Eyes, Ears, Noses Clothing Habitations- Weapons of Defence The Feathered Tribes, . . . . .104 CHAPTER VIIL The Animal Kingdom The Microscopic World : Variety of Temperament Sa- gacity Activity Precocity Productiveness Migrations of Animals Fish- es, .. . 123 CHAPTER IX. MAN His Physical Varieties External Form Color of Skin Mechanism The eye Organs for Breathing; Digestion, Secretion; Nerves, Blood-vessels Voice Upright Position The Wrist and Hand Jenny Lind's Voice, . 142 CHAPTER X. Human Skill and Workmanship, . . . . . . .163 CHAPTER XL MAN : All sorts of Men to make a World Characteristics and Idiosyncrasies, . 175 CHAPTER XH. VARIETIES INTELLECTUAL : Many Men of many Minds, or all sorts of Minds make a World, , . . . . . . . .186 CONTENTS. CHAPTER % PAGB Man and Ms Varieties, in his endlessly-diversified conditions of life, . . 204 CHAPTER XIV. ASTRONOMICAL VABIETIES: No two "Worlds alike Differ in Form, Bulk, Mo- tionInhabitants Moral Varieties among Worlds Kedemption the Grand Moral Variety of our "World, . . . . . . .215 CHAPTER XV. How it takes all sorts of Saints to make a Heaven, . . . . .241 CHAPTER XVI. VARIETY IN DIVINE TEUTH, as suited to produce Variety in Christian Character and Experience, . . . . . . . . .256 CHAPTER XVII. How various the dealings of Providence by which men are brought to the Sa- viourand how various the manner by which the means of grace in dif- ferent individuals are made effectual, ...... 269 CHAPTER XVIII. Man's varied wants : Food Clothing Habitation Luxuries. Land, Sea, Mine, Forest, Kiver taxed to supply these wants. Mental Wants, Moral "Wants, . 283 CHAPTER XIX. MAN designed and adapted to a high State of Civilization in this Life, and a high State of Exaltation and Glory in the Life to come : or, THE MODEL MAN, . 298 CHAPTER XX. THE SAME SUBJECT : Examples of extraordinary development among men, as pledges of his high future destiny Nature, Providence and Eevelation in- dicate this same high destiny Man capacitated to appropriate the pro- visions made for his progress, . . . . . . .811 CONTENTS. CHAPTER XXI. THE MIND OF GOD : The Infinitude of the Perceptions and Ideas in the Divine Mind, .329 CHAPTER XXII. The Divine Complacency The Happiness of God in the Contemplation of his Works and his Ways, and his own Attributes and Character, . . . 845 CHAPTER XXIIL God in all and over all Giving Life and Breath and all things Inspired De- scriptions of God How such views of God should affect us, . . . 363 CHAPTER XXIV. CONCLUSION : The claims of Natural Eeligion The origin of False Keligions Their Philosophy and History Keasons for one common universal Keligion, and that Christianity, . . . . . . . .884 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. CHAPTER I. Crystal Palaces The Universe a Magnificent Palace Endless Variety of the Divine Workmanship No two Objects alike The Insatiable Desires of the Mind Its Love of Novelty and Variety. THE present is the age of Crystal Palaces. The people of one nation are vying with those of another which shall raise the most magnificent dome and construct the most superb pal ace for the- " exhibition of the skill and industry of all nations." As you pass through one of these stately edifices, you are as- tonished at the skill and power as seen displayed in the struc- ture and dimensions of the building itself; and yet more at the variety and multiplicity of the objects it contains. Here are the products and specimens of the skill not only of all na- tions, but of every variety and degree of "individual taste and talent. Here are met the most rare, the most ingeniously wrought, and the most valuable, useful and ornamental fabrics that are to be found on the face of the earth, or made by the hand of man : " Shawls from India, robes from Russia, and the bornoose from Africa, and linens, and silks, and fabrics of the finest texture and the most wonderful workmanship." 10 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. The Universe is the Palace of the Great King. The skill and power engaged in the rearing and fitting up of this wonder- ful palace as far surpasses all human skill and power as the Creator surpasses the creature. This is Heaven's exposition of arts for all nations and for all the principalities and powers for all the orders of intelligent beings which inhabit the Uni- verse. In beauty, variety and multiplicity of objects ; in exu- berance of the imagination, and in the exquisiteness of the workmanship, it surpasses the utmost stretch of all human con- ception. We invite the reader to accompany us into this august Pal- ace, and to contemplate some of its wonders.. As we enter the great Temple, we find ourselves encompassed on every side by the works and productions of Nature in forms infinitely diversi- fied. It would seem as if even Divine skill had been exhausted in the formation of the multiplicity and variety of objects pro- duced. In our proposed visit to the Palace, we will make the spe- cial object of our researches the variety of the Divine Work- manship. As we pass from one department to another, we shall meet nothing more profoundly to admire than the endless variety which pervades the whole. We contemplate with wonder the magnitude of the works of the Great Architect ; or the multiplicity of these works ; or we penetrate into the wonders of the microscopic world, and we are filled with wonder no less profound. Indeed, I scarcely know whether the student of Nature the more profoundly ad- mires the. magnitude, the multiplicity or the minuteness of the Divine workmanship. In the contemplation of either he can only wonder and adore, but cannot comprehend. VASTNESS OF THE UNIVEESE. 11 Directing his thoughts to the vastness of the material universe, to the inconceivably great quantity of matter which composes the countless number of worlds which fill infinite space, he finds himself conducted to the outermost limit of human observation, and even of human conception ; yet he meets no evidence that he approaches any limit of creation. We can form no adequate idea of material existences. When he has traversed space as far as he can by the aid of the most powerful telescope ; and when he has exhausted all his capabilities of calculation, he seems scarcely to have crossed the threshold of God's great material Temple. He can make no adequate estimate of the amount of material which God has called into existence. Were he to travel through space millions of millions of miles, and take his station on the remotest star, the least twinkling ray of which reaches us, he would see space beyond him equal to that which he had already traversed, and equally radiant with shining worlds. His own native earth is in comparison but as a grain of sand on the sea-shore. He can form no conception of a Being possessed with power adequate first to bring into existence, and then to reduce to law, and govern so many and such vast worlds. But if we pass from the magnitude to the minuteness of God's works, we are, if possible, lost jin still greater wonder. It comports more readily with our preconceived notions of the Infinite One, that he should do magnificently great things than that he should do exquisitely little things. We expect Omnipotence to exert great power, and to work on a magnifi- cent plan. But when we descend into the microscopic world, and contemplate the teeming, countless millions of minute liv- ing beings, and animalcules, so minute that myriads are not 12 THE PALACE OF THE GEEAT KING. larger than a grain of sand, and may inhabit a drop of water, and when we see these minutest of all living atoms, finished with a most exquisite touch of skill and beauty, our admiration of the Divine workmanship is, if possible, raised still higher. We now become sensible of a skill and delicacy of workman- ship which transcends all our highest conceptions of the Great Architect. The microscope reveals to the astonished eye an invisible world of living beings ; and all these, though their existence may not be detected by the naked eye, are endued with organs for locomotion, for hearing and seeing ; with nerves and blood- vessels, and the means of procuring and digesting their food and reproducing their species. And they present every con- ceivable variety of motion, form, size and color. How wonderful the skill that decked the wing of one of these marvellously minute little atoms of creation, and set the blood coursing in its veins. And wonderful as the discoveries of the microscope are, there is no intimation that they approach a limit. As at the other extreme of creation, every new power added to the tele- scope opens new fields of space still radiant with shining worlds; and then beyond the scope of telescopic vision lie un- tra versed fields, which, if viewed with a more powerful tele- scope, would reveal new systems and groups of worlds ; so no power that has hitherto been applied to the microscope has failed to reveal new worlds of animalcules. Every new dis- covery only serves to confirm the conjecture that a more power- ful instrument would unfold new worlds of wonder beyond. While we mean by the Universe, which we have called the Palace of the Great King, the grand summary of all the worlds MULTIPLICITY AND ENDLESS VARIETY. 13 which God has made, and all the endless multiplicity of objects, animate and inanimate, vegetable and mineral, with which the Great Architect has furnished these worlds, yet we do not pro- pose to launch forth into so boundless a field for illustrations of our present theme, but shall confine ourselves chiefly to one small world, and for obvious reasons we shall select the planet with which we happen to be the best acquainted. The globe, called Earth, shall serve as the Palace through whose strangely diversified products of art and skill we will make a few desul- tory excursions, seeking illustrations of the wisdom, goodness and power of God: not so much from the magnitude and minuteness of his works as from their multiplicity and endless variety. Yet we shall not overlook the broad, starry concave of this earthly palace the great dome of Heaven, studded with ten thousand stars, and thence stretching off into bound- less space as far as thought can travel. As we compare the heavenly bodies, system with system, star with star, and planet with planet, we shall discover the same infinite variety pervading the whole. The field of illustration is as broad as the entire arena of nature's works. The mineral, the vegetable, the animal worlds, are replete with examples to our purpose ; so is the condition and history of man, the ordinary dispensations of Providence, and the means of man's recovery from the fall. All indicate the profuse expenditure of the Divine goodness so to diversify and beautify his works and to vary his ways, as the most effectually to secure the happiness of his intelligent creatures. Who but God would have thought of the ten thousand ways he has adopted by which to make man happy ? Our subject is a pleasant one, and well suited to ministei 14 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. to the entertainment of the observant mind. But we have, in the following chapters, a higher aim. We hope to raise the mind to Nature's God, and to present him as a kind, benevo- lent, infinitely wise, and wonder-working Father, who is ever busy, even in the most inconceivably minute, and apparently insignificant domains of creation. We most devoutly wish to leave impressed on the mind of the reader the sentiment that such a God is worthy of the profoundest homage, of unbounded admiration and unfeigned love. Such contemplations on the workmanship of the Divine hand can scarcely fail to give us the most exalted idea of the skill, and wisdom, and benevo- lence of the great Author of creation. He not only makes and finishes every thing with an exquisite touch, which will bear the closest scrutiny, and creates an endless number of objects, from the most inconceivably minute to the most stupendously grand, but he makes all things in such strange and endless diversity. No two objects have ever been found to be alike. And not only no two objects that exist at any one time are alike, but judging from the only premises we have on the subject, we may reasonably raise the query whether any two objects that ever existed from the beginning of creation, or that ever shall exist, are precisely alike. So exhaustless are the conceptions of the Divine mind, and so boundless his skill and power, that no two individuals of any species of animals, vegetables, or minerals, or any created existences, are ever found to be alike'. In the human race, for example, though so marked uniformity everywhere characterizes the race that there is no fear of mistaking the human animal for an animal of any other species, yet no two individuals that now live, or ever did, or ever shall live on the globe, are alike. And, RESOURCES OF THE DIVINE MIND. 15 perhaps, if due examination could be made, it would be found that in no one particular are they alike in no organ, or feature, or member, or development of mind, or of moral qualities or affections. And such being the fact in respect to all the races of beings with which we are acquainted, we are justified in the inference that it is so throughout the boundless realms of creation. Variety is an essential characteristic of the works of the Divine hand. It equally decks the wing of the tiniest insect that sports in a single drop of water, and is met in the form, and motion, and magnitude of the hugest orb that rolls through space. But what an idea does this give us, at the very outset, of the exhaustless resources of the Divine mind ! The Author of the whole magnificent machinery of nature, and He that up- holds and directs the whole, and makes all its numberless parts, the minutest as well as the mightiest, to harmonize, must at the same moment have the whole, in all its infinite details, present to his mind. We wonder at the capabilities of the man who can with ease attend to all the details of a great business who can plan, meet contingencies the most un- expected, direct the minds and labors of a great number of men, and make agencies the most various and apparently adverse all harmonize to achieve his one great aim who can, at the same time, dictate a correspondence to agents abroad, and foresee there the casualties of business or trade, and meet contingencies which may occur thousands of miles distant who has within his own measure a sort of omniscience and omnipo- tence. His active, busy, intelligent mind is the main-spring that sets in motion and directs every wheel of the great manu- factory, or that guides, in all its thousand details, the great 16 THE PALACE OP THE GEEAT KING. mercantile house. It is his mind that guides the hand of every clerk, agent or workman. By night and by day, whether corporeally present or absent, his power is felt, his watchful eye is there he has, as it were, diffused himself through the whole. But all comparison fails to illustrate the never-ceasing, the infinitely comprehensive activity of the Divine mind. The globe which we inhabit is but one of a countless num- ber of similar globes, some of which (as Jupiter) are fourteen hundred times larger than ours ; or if compared with the sun, or some other fixed star, its magnitude falls into insignificance, the sun being one million three hundred thousand times larger than the earth. Yet for a moment suppose our globe the only world which God has made, still what an idea do we get of the Eternal Mind. We select the period when he was about to enter upon the creation of our world. A perfect conception of the whole scheme must have lain in the mind of the Eternal One : the exact quantity of matter of which it was to consist ; the struc- ture of the whole, so as to form the dry land and the ocean, the river and the mountain, the plain and the valley, all in their relative proportions and influences on one another ; the placing of every particle, even the minutest, so as to form the rock, the soil, the endless variety of trees, shrubs, plants, grains and grasses ; as also, the mineral, the metal, and the precious stone. He must, too, at the same time, have seen and determined the shape of every leaf, the tint of every flower, the form, and size, and properties of every particle of inani- mate matter, and the number and variety, the organs and functions of all grades of animal life all were vivid and per- ITS NICE CALCULATIONS. 17 feet conceptions in the mind of the Creator while as yet they were not made. We are lost in utter amazement when we attempt to form any idea of God as the author and the controller of the wonderful system of nature. Both in their original creation and in their subsequent control, what a vast multiplicity of objects required a constant attention ; what nice calculations to have adjusted in their respective places every body that rolls in grandeur over the boundless fields of ether, and every minute speck that floats in the air ; and to have adapted each to the other, so as to secure the balance of the whole, and preserve the harmony of the universal systepa. For the size and weight of the tiniest flower that decks the solitary glen, and the number and dimensions of the minutest insect, as well as the location of a mighty river, or the structure of the loftiest mountain, or the hollowing out of the channel of the sea, are equally the work of the Almighty, and equally require his sleepless care. Nothing short of Omnipotence and Omniscience could do either. And what a boundless field has God opened in the infinite diversity of his works for the unrestricted scope of mind, whether in the present state of existence or in the next ! He has been pleased to vary his works so as to please the eye, to gratify, to regale the mind, and to improve the heart. Variety, I have said, everywhere characterizes the Divine workmanship. The number of species and sub-species, where there is a marked difference, is immense ; but the moment you attempt to search out varieties of the same species you find yourself treading on the confines of infinitude. Here there will be found no two objects alike, not two blades of grass from the same root, or 18 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. two leaves of the same tree, or two peas from the same stock. So endlessly diversified are the ., -/st ct-jamon objects of nature, that you may ransack the three kingdoms without finding two the same. Variety is the order of all things. And love of variety is but coextensive with the endlessly diversified means and objects of its gratification. There is the love of variety in taste, in seeing, in hearing, in smelling and in touch. How would either of these, senses tire with sameness 1 Who could endure seeing, tasting, smelling or touching the same objects perpetually ? But there can be no such satiety. The provisions for the gratification of the senses are as varied as their wants. The eye which is never satisfied with seeing, is regaled with a succession of diversified objects ; the taste with every needed variety. And so we may say of the ear or of any other organ of sense. Sounds are vastly more diversified than even the objects which produce them : as the same object may generate different sounds as well as different degrees of sound. Indeed, the mind, through the organs of sense, may expatiate forever amidst new natures, combinations and relations, and never return and retrace its steps for the want of new objects. Nor need we stop here. We may pass from man's circum- scribed and transient state here to his higher and holier state hereafter, and we shall probably find the same principle not the less delightfully operative. The anthem sung in those blessed mansions, is, " Great and marvellous are thy works, Lord God Almighty." And not only. is it probable that no two objects belonging to our little planet are alike, but the same strangely wondrous feature, doubtless, characterizes the boundless fields of creation. God probably never cast two things in the same mould. INNATE LOVE OF NOVELTY. 19 And, as a divine arrangement, this love of variety in the future world and the provisions made for its gratification, are certainly not less interesting than that of which I have spoken. Indeed, it is but the exact and beautiful counterpart of that variety. Man, both as to his mind, and his moral tastes and aspirations, is so constituted as to be continually reaching after some new thing. He feels an insatiable desire for novelty. And this propensity is observed to increase in proportion as man advances in civilization and knowledge. The untutored savage has very little of it. Its development is sometimes de- nominated curiosity sometimes inquisitiveness, or the love of knowledge. It is the natural outgoing of the mind for some new thing. This was a characteristic of the refined Athenians and of the "strangers" the philosophers and literati per- chance that resorted to this renowned spot of ancient civiliza- tion and learning. " They spent their time in nothing else, but either to tell, or to hear some new thing." The desires of the mind are insatiable, and increase in proportion to their gratification. When it has traversed one field, however im- mense and varied that may be, it instantly craves another. The acquisition of one science or an acquaintance with one art only sharpens the mind for another ; and the greater its ac- quisitions, the stronger its desires for further conquests. Bacon or Newton had a thousand ungratified desires in respect to the acquisition of knowledge, where the mere ignoramus has one. And we are constrained to believe that the same increased and inciting desires characterize the highest created intelligences in the universe, and the same boundless fields invite their eternal researches. This reaching forward continually after some new thing or 20 THE PALACE OF THE GKEAT KING. something not yet attained to this dissatisfaction with any present acquisitions or enjoyments this love of variety, is a constituent element in the mental and moral constitution of all intelligent beings, both men and angels an essential part of their being ; and it forms for man a connecting link between his present and his future state of being. And not only so, but it indicates what shall be the mental, and (if I may say so) the physical character and condition of that state of being, and what, in fact, the enjoyments and employments of the blessed above. Through all the endless multiplicity of objects here the mind may wonder and the heart expatiate and return dissatis- fied. Were it possible that a single individual of our race should visit every nation and tribe every nook and corner of our globe, and become perfectly acquainted with the geography, the history, the botany and mineralogy of each in a word, were he to know all of every science and art, and of every thing that may be known in this mundane sphere, and in this corporeal state, would the eye be satisfied with seeing, or the ear with hearing ? would the mind be satisfied, and the aspirations of the soul find their fulness ? Or rather, would not such a mind feel that all its past acquisitions were no more than pre- liminary to the acquisitions to be made in the boundless field of eternity ? At every step of his stupendous progress till he reached the grand acme of all possible human knowledge, his desires for something unattained were sure to keep in advance of his acquisitions, so that when he had arrived at the grand climacteric of all that may be known on this earth, these long- ings for new fields of knowledge were found to be increased in a ratio equal to all former acquisitions. It is only in the future abode of the blessed that all these THE HEAVENLY FIELD. 21 desires can be gratified, and the soul, so singularly capacitated, shall find a boundless range for its expanded and ever expand- ing faculties and susceptibilities. But will the spirit, thus endowed, when emancipated from the disabilities of earth and time, have a field for the further expansion and the perfect gratification of these insatiable de- sires for something new ? The following pages, we trust, will afford at least a partial answer to this interesting inquiry. The great theme of contemplation and research and admiration among the blissful inhabitants of heaven, is the " works " and the " ways " of God ; or rather GOD as seen and known in his works and ways. In proportion, then, as our facts and reason- ings go to show that the works of the Divine hand are bound- less in extent, and strangely and endlessly diversified, they will furnish a pleasing evidence of the benevolence and wisdom of the Deity ; first, that he should so singularly endow the hu- man mind, and then, that he should, with such exhaustless liberality, fit up the universe with such a rich and boundless profusion of objects, and in all that unending variety, which can, to endless ages, give to the mind its full fruition of knowl- edge and bliss. But, as a matter of fact, does the human mind in its pres- ent condition, give signs of being possessed of faculties which shall require any greater range for its employment and gratifi- cation than it now has ? It undoubtedly does. We have only to reflect for a moment how much the mind of the intelligent man and the advanced scholar does grasp and retain in his present condition. When he has traversed in his investigations all the nations and countries on the face of the earth, and has stored his mind with ten thousand facts and ideas relating to 22 THE PALACE OF THE GBEAT KING. the history, traditions, manners, customs of .every nation and tribe, and has become acquainted with the whole circle of human sciences, arts, literature, inventions and discoveries, he feels no confusion no repletion no lack of capacity for more knowledge. All he has acquired has only sharpened his appe- tite, and enlarged his capacity for still greater supplies. From all we know and can discover of its capacities here, we can con- ceive of no limit beyond which the human mind may not go. Such capacities can find their counterpart only in the infinite multiplicity and the endlessly diversified character of the entire creation ; and with an endless duration for their study. Ask Newton, Locke, Edwards, if, irr their respective fields of research, and after their vast accumulations of knowledge, they seemed to be nearing a boundary beyond which they did not care to pass, or beyond which their exhausted capacities did not seem sufficient to carry them. They will rather tell you that they seemed scarcely to have embarked at all on the boundless ocean. They stood upon the shore, surveyed tke illimitable expanse before them were impelled by increasing- ly strong desires to launch away ; and never before did they feel themselves so capable of adventurous voyage. They needed only to be emancipated from the bondage of corporeity, in order to enter upon their eternal range in fields which know no bounds. I design in the present essay to speak of varieties geolo- gical and geographical ; varieties physical, mental and moral. Man, in his diversified relations and conditions, will furnish a rich and interesting field of illustration. The whole boundless world of life, animal and vegetable, is as varied as it is exten- sive. The " ways of God " another name for Providence OUR FIELD OF ILLUSTBATION". 23 are, as we shall see, as varied as his works. And varieties as- tronomical will not form the least interesting portion of our as- signed task. Heaven's star-spangled concave is set with gems, which, in their sublime variety, equal the whole number of stars that shine in the firmament. And not the less to be admired, as we shall see, are the means which the God of Nature has provided for the production and support of variety both in the mental and moral as well as in the animal and vegetable worlds. Different soils and sur- faces, different climates and conditions of the earth, all com- bine to produce such a variety of vegetation ; and this variety of vegetation, combined with soil, surface and climate, goes, in turn, to increase animal varieties. And not only variety is a characteristic of all created things, but we everywhere discover a singular tendency in nature to produce variety. We shall begin with varieties geological. CHAPTER II. VABIETTES GEOLOGICAL : The nice adjustment of particles composing the Earth such as to secure all our various Soils Productions Minerals and Metals Coal, Iron Iron annihilated, and what then ? WHEN we speak of the creation of our world, and the fit- ting it up for the habitation of man, we may still have very in- adequate notions of the work in question ; and we are per- haps in more danger of overlooking the wisdom and benevolence involved in th& plan than we are the power engaged in the exe- cution. All had to be formed with the nicest regard to pro- portions, adaptations and adjustments. We admire the skill of a mechanist who can so arrange even a few scores of wheels as to secure some unusually beneficial end. Such a machine may extend over a few square perches of ground and may ac- complish eminently beneficial purposes. How much profound thinking how many nice calculations how many experi- ments has our machinist been obliged to perform, and how many failures to experience, before he could bring his work to any thing like a tolerable state of completeness. At its best estate it would have no perfection ; and the power and the quantity of matter employed, would be but as a grain of sand compared to the power and quantity of matter employed in the structure and motions of the earth only. But what is this when compared with the structure and successful operation of a THE PKOPOBTIONING OF THINGS. 25 machine as boundless and complicated as the whole MATERIAL UNIVERSE ! The exact size, weight, motion, velocity and density of every star and planet, and every particle of matter, however small, were all calculated and determined on before a single thing could be created the exact distance of one from another, and the precise relation of every separate particle to another and to the whole how many particles should compose the leaf of the violet what should be the precise mechanism of the eye of the molecule, or what the dimensions of the planet Ju- piter. A failure of any single part, however minute, would derange the entire system. But we propose to ourselves in the present chapter no such adventurous range. Not the structure of the Universe, but the structure and some of the compositions of the earth, will suffice for our present illustration. Had the earth, all below the surface, been formed one ho- mogeneous mass, and the surface one uniform soil, and its po sition in its orbit, and the inclination of its axis to the equa- tor been such as to produce but one uniform season, however salubrious that season might be, and however rich that soil, and however precious the material of which the bulk of the earth should be composed, the earth would be almost a useless and altogether an uninteresting ball. Very few of the pur- poses served by the earth now would be realized at all. A few beasts and birds and insects might roam over the earth and find an abode and food congenial to their several species. And a sparse human population of savage men might live a meagre life, but could never attain to a state of civilization. Arts, sciences, commerce would be almost, if not entirely unknown. 2 26 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. There could be neither the resources nor the inducements for commerce ; and where men and manners and soil and scenery and productions were all of the same uniform stamp, there would be as little inducements to travel. Uniformity in the structure and composition of the earth, and uniformity of sea- sons and climates, would produce an equally uniform stagna- tion in all human affairs. But how different the result of the actual condition of the earth. And this result is secured by the endlessly diversified character of its workmanship. Variety in structure, in compo- sition and arrangement has produced all our varieties of soils, of climates and seasons ; of minerals, metals and precious stones ; of treee, fruits, plants and vegetables ; of animals of every size, grade and condition ; and these in their turn fur- nish the materials and wants of commerce, and the inducements to travel. As we look over the surface of the earth, the first thing that arrests our attention is its inequalities. It is everywhere singularly variegated. It is thrown into ridges, hills and mountains, or scooped out in deep ravines and gentle valleys. It is intersected by rivers and streams, and dotted with lakes and smaller reservoirs of water. You may travel the world over, and everywhere meet with landscapes to admire, yet no two of these shall be alike not even two features shall be the same. Each has its peculiar beauties and deformities its own peculiar features its peculiar shape, contour and composition each affords a distinct lesson of study for all who " take pleasure " in the " manifold works of the Lord." But if we direct our attention to the material which com- poses the surface itself, we discover still clearer marks of a be- DIVERSITIES OF SOILS. 27 nevolent design by a wise designer. The surface of the earth is the soil which gives birth and nourishment to all the endless varieties of vegetation which compose the vast vegetable kingdom. The surface of the earth, and to a considerable ex- tent below, seems everywhere strongly instinct with vegetable life contains the vegetable principles or stamina of vegetable life : so that if the entire vegetation of the earth were cut off and quite annihilated, and all present seeds destroyed, there is that in the surface of the earth, and often found at a considera- ble depth under the surface, which would vegetate and deck the earth again in her varied robes. But it is the singular composition of the soil which de- mands our attention at present. For it is this which is one of the chief qauses of the singularly diversified vegetation of which we speak. Like all the other works of God, the soil of all portions of the earth presents a general uniformity of char- acter. It is everywhere composed of essentially the same earths and mineral substances, and possesses the same general properties, to administer to the vegetating process and the growth and maturity of plants. Yet these same materials (the earth, the clay, sand, lime, marl, iron and various other ingredients) are skilfully mixed, and all their proportions so nicely compounded and varied, as to produce every conceivable variety of soil. What consummate wisdom, so to compound essentially the same ingredients as to form a soil of so diverse a character, and capable of giving existence to, and nourishing so diversified productions ! And this endlessly-diversified vege- tation, in turn, gives support to, and is, in a sense, the cause of, the equally diversified races and species of animals. A little change in the composition of the soil a little difference 28 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. in the proportions of lime, or clay, or sand, or iron, produce a soil as differently adapted to vegetation. We cannot here too profoundly admire the wisdom and beneficence of the Author of this arrangement. It is the basis of a scheme of arrangements in the animal kingdom, and in its bearings on the progress and happiness of the human race, which we shall have occasion yet more profoundly to admire. In the first place, this variety of soil, in connection, as we shall see, with differences of climate, fills the earth with God's riches. It supplies, in the greatest profusion and variety, all God's great family of living beings with food, apparel, shelter and luxuries. And not only does it supply these means of subsistence and comfort on the spot where they are needed and indispensable to the support and comfort of life, but, in con- nection with a kindred variety of composition met in the earth below the surface, it lays the foundation and supplies the re- sources of all our commerce, and of the intercourse of the peo- ple of one nation or tribe with those of another. Commerce, which has been called the " great civilizer," and which is cer- tainly one of the most influential agencies of human progress, is, in its simplest idea, no more nor less than the great ex- change-trade of the world, which could have no existence ex- cept in the diversified productions of the earth. Its most simple idea is that of the exchange of the productions of one part of the globe for those of another. But of its reasons and advantages we will defer the consideration to its proper place. But we should quite overlook a very essential cause of Na- ture's profuse and varied vegetation, if we did not allude, at least, to the wonderful arrangement of evaporation. It is this which gives vitality, growth and vigor to every vegetable pro- EVAPOEATION AND ITS USES. 29 duction ; and which in turn secures, not only the continuance and prosperity, but the very existence of all animal and vege- table life. But for this stupendous circulation of the watery fluid through every vein and artery of the great body we call our globe, no vegetating process would be possible, no combi- nations of soils, no conditions of climate, could produce even the most stinted vegetation, or the most dwarfish animal ex- istence. In vain would you select the most favored soils, and consult never so wisely the character of climates, and sow your seed and cultivate with the most sleepless care, if the waters above and the waters beneath did not constantly minister to your aid. You would soon learn that it is only " through the scent of water it will bud and bring forth boughs." But this healthful, life-giving arrangement is wholly de- pendent on another, not the less wonderful. It is evaporation. The rivers run into the sea, yet the sea is not full. For, by a process as wonderful as it is grand, these same waters return, drawn up into the atmosphere by means of evaporation, satu- rating the whole expanse of the atmosphere in the form of vapor, and after serving essential and beneficial purposes to animal and vegetable life in their vaporous state, they descend in refreshing showers on the earth, prepared, after having per- formed their benevolent mission here, to repeat their benefi- cent circuit through ocean, air and earth to the end of time. The magnitude and extent of this singular arrangement, as well as its godlike beneficence, is but imperfectly understood and but scantily appreciated. " From the whole surface of the ocean," says Dr. Dick, " there arises, every twelve hours, no less than thirty million cubic feet of water, which is more than suf- ficient to supply all the rivers on the earth. This immense body 30 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. of water is formed into clouds, and carried over every part of the continents ; and again it is condensed into rain, snow or dews, which fertilize the earth. Should this process pause, we might wash our clothes, but centuries would not dry them, for evaporation alone produces this effect; vegetation would wither ; rivers would swell the ocean ; the operations of nature would cease." So close is the connection between this process and vegetable and animal life. "Praise the Lord, for he causeth the vapors to ascend from the ends of the earth." But it is time that we go below the surface yet we no sooner descend than we meet, in depths "which no fowl knoweth and which vulture's eye hath not seen," the same characteristic. Out of a few simple elementary substances the Divine Architect has formed the richest variety of minerals and metals for the use of man. At one moment you strike on a rich bed of coal, extending over acres, and in some parts of the world, as in America, over hundreds of square miles, and containing enough of this truly valuable substance to supply the demands of the whole world, for fuel, and all the purposes of manufacturing and locomotion for ages to come. Next you hit upon a bed of iron, which being, like coal, a substance in- dispensable to the comfort and advancement of man, and de- manded in exhaustless quantities, is found very universally diffused, and in the greatest abundance. Another of earth's great internal varieties we meet in the shape of stones and rocks. These are yet more common than either of the substances named, and of the most varied and ex- tensive use to man. And, different from coal or iron, stone exists in almost every conceivable variety, from the hardest, the quartz, the flint, the granite and the marble, down through all METALS AND MINERALS. 31 grades and qualities, to the soft soap-stone, the fibrous asbestos and the singularly lamellated mica, all useful in their way, and capable of being used in a great variety of ways for building and ornamental carved work for fences and furnaces for roads and bridges for paving and flagging walks and streets as a flux for the fusing of metals a manure for the soil* for the construction of a great variety of vessels and utensils in daily use, and for numberless and nameless purposes in the common pursuits of life. And the quantities found in the earth, and in those colossal mountain-piles above the surface, are wisely proportioned to the extensive demand. We scarcely need enumerate the various other useful sub- stances which are discovered to exist in the same earth, and which have all been found there, and carefully stored away and from the beginning kept in reserve for the use of civilized man ; and many of them kept in reserve for man when he shall ar- rive at a higher state of advancement than he has yet reached. Lead, copper,- tin, zinc, sulphur, mercury gold, silver, dia- monds and precious stones all these and numerous others, are met as the varied forms into which matter has been moulded by the plastic hand of Nature for the service of his creature man. And, no doubt, new substances remain yet unrevealed in the arcana of nature, which, when brought to light, shall as effec- tually minister to the same purpose. Nor would we omit to notice the wise regard had throughout the whole to the differ- ent quantities which has been provided of each kind how the quantity is proportioned to the demand, or the need man has of it. If gold or silver had been made as abundant as iron or coal, it would have been of very little service. You could neither use it for fuel, nor convert it into steam, nor give it 32 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. shape or form for building pavements, roads or bridges. Or if iron and coal had been formed only in the limited quantities in which silver and gold exist, it would be, if possible, still' more disastrous. It would be practically the same as if they did not exist at all ; and man in such a case could not have advanced beyond the rude condition of the savage. We cannot even form any probable estimate of the whole amount of coal or of iron which the entire earth actually con- tains. Yet we are able to say from facts already known, that the amount is enormous. It is, we believe, well ascertained that there are, in the United States of America, at least, 163,000 square miles of coal fields. And as geological surveys and mineralogical researches are extended from year to year, the area, vast as it already is known to be, is continually enlarg- ing. The quantity of coal which lies beneath the surface of a single square mile, or even a square acre, is vastly more than one would at first suppose. To say nothing of the great coal fields of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois and Missouri, which abound in coal, beyond any credible estimate that we can make in tons or car-loads, we are astonished at the estimates which we see made, from time to time, of the amount of this article contained in some particular field of quite limited ex- tent. Such an estimate we recently saw made of the quantity of coal contained in two counties in Virginia. Mr. Eidgeway, civil engineer and geologist, estimates the amount of merchant- able coal in Hampshire and Hardy counties at 1,560,000,000 tons at the lowest calculation. And within the same area of coal-grounds, he locates 375,000,000 tons of " nodular argilla- ceous iron ore ; besides 135,000,000 tons of the siliceous fossil- iferous " variety of iron ore found in the rocks of the Knobby Mountains. COAL AND IRON IN THE SAME FIELD. 33 What is noticed here in reference to the comparative ex- tent of coal and iron fields the two occupying nearly the same extent is found to be true in reference to most of our coal and iron grounds. They are not only nearly similar in ex- tent ; but, what is worthy of notice as another instance of benevolent design, they are, to a considerable ' extent, identi- cal. Coal and iron are generally found in the same fields an arrangement not only favoring the easier transportation of the two articles to all parts of the country and of the world the same facilities of conveyance serving for the two but, in the absence of other fuel, the coal becomes invaluable for smelting the iron and otherwise preparing it for use. There is infinite wisdom and benevolence in so proportion- ing these various substances precisely as to meet our wants. There is no useless profusion of silver or gold or precious stones ; there is no lack of the substances which we need in the greatest abundance. The one we have by the acre and the mile ; the other, by the pound and the pennyweight. We have seen how the diversified character of the earth's surface becomes the means of feeding, clothing, housing, -and in every way administering to the necessities and luxury of God's great and varied family of living things ; and we have seen, in a like diversified character of the many useful sub- stances found in the bowels of the earth, the materials, and the means of carrying on, and, in a sense, the origin of every use- , ful trade and handicraft of man of every human improvement of the whole manufacturing interests of the world and of a great part of human activity. How soon would the din of the world's business be hushed and the ponderous wheel of human activity be arrested, if the earth should for a single 2* 34 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. year refuse to yield her useful minerals and metals. Indeed, what disaster would follow, if a single one should be refused. The great machine would be deranged, if not effectually stopped, if but one were wanting. We select iron, the most useful and therefore the more striking, yet but one of the many useful in- gredients which the earth yields for man. Yet were some convulsion in nature to annihilate our coal, or copper, or lead, or zinc, we should, in like manner, find ourselves brought to a complete nonplus in the great arena of life's business. So familiar are we with the use of iron, as an article that abounds almost as a matter of course, that we are scarcely in a position fully to estimate its value ; yet we can easily see that without it man could scarcely take the first step towards civilization. Suppose for a moment, then, that some mighty magician had the power, by one motion of his wand, to annihilate all the iron, of every kind and combination, now in use or in the mine, in the whole world that henceforth iron should be no more ; what would be the consequence ? The disaster would doubtless be vastly more extensive and calamitous than you may at first suppose. You are a hardware merchant, or a machinist ; or you have an interest in a mine, or a foundery, or a railroad, or a steam- boat or may belong to almost any craft, or trade, or calling. You have, as we will suppose, of an evening, made your last entry in your book of accounts, and are complacently giving yourself up to a pleasant revery on the progress and prospects of the age : " It is a wonderful age ! What vast mechanical opera- tions now keep the world in motion ! what stupendous manu- factures ! what an array of shipping begirds our great emporiums of trade! what majestic steamers plough our inland waters and IEON ALL ANNIHILATED. 35 bridge our oceans ! what a wonderful concatenation of railways checker our land in every direction ! with what lightning speed news is communicated a thousand miles distant! what mining and smelting, and casting of metals, and hammering into every conceivable article of use or ornament! and what crowded warehouses ! It is a wonderful age ! " But your pleasant revery is suddenly disturbed : A messenger hastily enters and announces that every manufactory of the world, of every size and power, has ceased to act, and ceased to be. All their varied and costly machin- ery has vanished into air, and those huge structures are dis- mantled and tumbling to the ground. The 30,000,000 cotton spindles of the world have forever ceased to twirl all the great and all the small manufacturing interests of the world have died, not to be revived every wheel turned by steam or made of iron has stopped, and the wheel is gone. All our thousand and one labor-saving machines are no more al- ready is the dial of human advancement turned back some centuries. And what has caused this disaster? Nothing, nothing except the failure of the IRON, of which all this vast array of machinery is composed. This one article subtracted, and all the machinery in the world would fall into ruins. While he was thus speaking, there came another, who de- clared that the 25,000 miles of railroads in America, and the 30,000 miles in England and on the Continent, are di- vested of their rails and become useless that all our long trains of richly-laden and heavy-burdened trains shall be seen winding their way, as a vast thing of life, no longer that all our commodious, beautiful cars, and powerful locomotives, out- stripping the wind in their speed, have fallen to the ground 36 THE PALACE OP THE GREAT KING. that all our canal-boats and steamships are only confused masses of planks and timbers, with no connecting bolts or bands or stanchions that not a carriage, or wagon, or dray or barrow, remains for the locomotion of man or freight, but all things are thrown back into the savage state, when men moved from place to place on foot, and transported whatever was to be moved on their backs. And again, why all this ? Nothing has disap- peared but that very common and cheap article called iron. Without this, railways are nothing ; cars, carriages, sailing ves- sels and steamers, can have no existence without the strong bands and bolts of iron. While he was yet speaking, there came also another, who said that all our 100,000 miles of telegraph lines, divested of their connecting, intelligence-conveying wires, stand useless and alone ; that the boon we had hoped for from the genius of a Morse, should never be realized. But the calamity stops not here. While the last bearer of sad tidings was yet speaking, there came another also, who said that all the tools, and utensils, and labor-saving con- trivances of the farmer and the mechanic had instantly dis- appeared axes, saws, planes, chisels, augurs; hoes, shovels, ploughs, harrows ; chains all had gone except their handles or frames ; and henceforth agriculture could be pursued no further than could be performed by the unassisted hand, or by rude implements of wood ; and the mechanic would be aided only by such tools as could be wrought out of stone. While he is yet speaking, another, with saddened visage, enters to proclaim that the desolating calamity has entered our houses, and spread its ruin about our firesides that most of our cooking vessels have vanished, that our stoves are no more, THE WORLD AT A STAND. 37 that our knives and our forks, our pocket-knives and our razors, and most of the furniture of our houses that our weapons of war and implements of peace are nowhere to be found ; yea, more frightful still, the doors of our houses are falling down for the lack of hinges, the floor-boards are springing from their fastenings, the boards falling from their sides, and the shingles flying from the roof. All these things, and vastly more, would follow were we deprived of the use of iron. The world would at once seem to be brought to a dead stand at least would be thrown back into a state of barbarism. Nothing would remain that would deserve the name of agriculture, or manufacture, or commerce. Navigation would be unknown ; the art of printing, a very meagre affair; and the mechanical arts nothing worthy the name. And all this for the lack of iron. And so we might say, though in a different degree, of other metals and minerals. Copper, lead, zinc, lime, granite, and, more than all, coal. Each holds a place as an agent of human advancement, which, if left vacant, human affairs would be thrown into the saddest disorder, if not arrested. Without coal, iron would to a great extent be useless ; and without lime, and granite, and marble, and the harder and softer strata of rocks, many other resources of nature would exist in vain. Nothing less than Omniscience could have so anticipated the wants even of the present advanced condition of the world, and have provided iron, and coal, and stone, in such superabundant supplies as to meet such a demand ; and not only this, but to meet the vastly increased demand of a coming age. Such fields of coal and of iron as are met with in America ; and such mines of lead, and copper, and zinc ; and such piles of 38 THE PALACE OF THE GEE AT KING. marble, and granite, and other valuable stone as our lofty mountains contain, fully bespeak the foresight and the benevo- lent design of God. He delights in the prosperity of his people, arid he has undoubtedly provided every resource which the race can need as it shall exist in a vastly advanced con- dition. CHAPTER III. VARIETIES GEOGRAPHICAL : Cosmogony The Earth as a Uniform Lump The Earth as Variegated: Land, "Water, Mountains, Plains How many things a Man requires in the Common Affairs of Every-day Life : Food, Apparel, House, and Implements of Labor. A GEOGRAPHICAL survey of the earth equally impresses on the mind an idea of the singularly diversified character of Nature's works. As the eye glances over the surface of our globe, it sees it beautifully diversified with sea and land, mountain and plain, hill and valley, river and lake ; and we at once discover such an arrangement to be replete with that benevolence which the Creator has everywhere shown towards his creatures. And the result of such an arrangement is, that boundless variety of vegetable productions and animal life, which everywhere regales the eye of man with an endlessly variegated scenery that administers to the varied tastes and supplies the numerous wants of all living creatures that occu- pies the mind on a thousand different objects, and continually presents new scenes of pleasure and new reasons for praise. Had it been the design of the Former of the earth simply to have added another to the countless number of worlds which previously existed a globe that, like other planets, should run its destined rounds about the sun, reflecting the light of that luminary, and blending its own with the stars of the fir- 40 THE PALACE OF THE GEEAT KING. mament there had been no need that the earth should be more than a mass of one uniform substance, the sea and the dry land mingled in one chaotic mass ; no need that the waters should be gathered together in one place, and the dry land appear. All might have been one uniform, unbroken, dead lump, without hill or valley, lake or river, shrub or tree, flower or fruit ; without soil, climate, or atmosphere ; without mineral or metal. It could still have performed its journeys about the sun, and twinkled as a star in the heavens. But it was the design of Infinite Benevolence to make the earth a fit habitation for an inconceivable variety of living beings ; and especially to carry out purposes of infinite moment in respect to his creature man. Hence the profuse expenditure of the Divine skill in fitting up the earth as we now find it. In the one case, the earth would have been one unbroken desolation. No towering mountain or fertilizing river would have broken the monotony of the view ; no sloping hill or smiling valley could have greeted the eye ; no tribes of animals gambolled over the fields, or animated the crust of the earth, or sported in the waters. No living verdure could have smiled in the meadows, and no gushing plenty been poured into the lap of every living thing. Such seems to have been the condition of our earth when first brought to notice by the sacred historian. It "was with- out form and void, and darkness was on the face of the deep." Yet it was probably as well fitted then as it is now to act its destined part as a planet in the great system. It then possessed the same bulk and weight, and the same motion and velocity in its orbit about the sun. But the Sovereign Euler had other designs : He would fit up the earth to be a suitable habitation THE EAETH A FORMLESS LUMP. 41 for man, and make it, too, the theatre for the most wonderful display of his wisdom and goodness as a creator and governor, and his superabounding mercy as a Saviour. Our idea may be presented thus: A highly intelligent stranger from a neighboring world visits our planet at the two different periods referred to. We will suppose him endowed with such locomotive powers that he may with ease transport himself almost instantaneously to any portion of the earth's surface, and whose organs of vision are such that he can, from any one point, survey at the same moment a whole continent. Our heavenly visitant shall first alight upon our earth at the close of the "first day." Heretofore it had been one chaotic mass, "without form and void;" waste and empty, and darkness covered its unseemly face. This darkness had now been scattered, and the waste and dreary ball was now revealed to the light of heaven. But what a scene to behold ! What a field to traverse ! He wanders from equator to pole, and from pole to equator, and all is but one dead lump of uniformity. There is no sea, no dry land ; no rivers or moun- tains, no gushing streams or smiling fields ; no sporting ani- mals or singing birds ; no forests or cooling shades, or fragrant flowers; no picturesque landscape or change of scene; no busy towns and pleasant villages; no din of busy men or children playing in the streets though possibly there might be a few stunted, monotonous shrubs, and a few dwarfish, starveling animals to browse upon the tasteless herbage, and to drag out a cheerless life ; and a few tribes of more dwarfish, savage men, to starve out a miserable, monotonous existence on what they might, with their hands as their only weapons, seize of these famishing animals ; yet such a covering of the 42 THE PALACE OP THE GBEAT KING. earth, such animal existences, would do little to gratify the eye of the spectator. All would be dreariness and desolation. No pleasant landscape would greet the eye, no sweet music the ear ; nothing to gratify the taste, and no varied objects over which the mind might expatiate, and reason, and compare. And for food, no more than the scantiest pittance which could possibly meet the sheerest necessity. The whole surface of the earth was then a "desolate, dreary, hideous waste, without order or beauty, inhabitants or furniture." Yet in this chaotic mass lay mingled all the elementary principles, all the essential ingredients out of which have been formed all the boundless multiplicity of objects which now minister either to the wants or the luxuries of God's great family of living beings. But what a change the moment this huge lump of clay was taken in hand by the Divine Potter ! Wonderful indeed is the transformation now effected by the skill and the benevolence of the Great Architect! What shapes and forms of matter, and what modes of life; what exhaustless provision made for the sustenance and happiness of every grade of life ; what wise and benevolent adaptations of one thing to another ; and out of a very few elementary or simple substances, what a countless number of objects have been formed, and into what an inconceivable variety of animal, and vegetable, and mineral, and metallic existences has matter been moulded! Now we see it shaped into a colossal mass and piled up in the form of a huge mountain that towers above the clouds ; now it gilds the wing of the smallest insect. In one instant it is moulded into the framework, and muscles, and sinews of the huge elephant ; in another circulates in the invisible minute particle of blood that circulates in the veins of THE EAKTH FITTED UP FOR USE. 43 the millions of monads that sport in a single drop of water or recline beneath the shade of the down of the rose-leaf. Water, air, gases, odors, perfumes, are but different forms or com- binations of matter of a few elementary substances ; yet what can differ more than a metal dense as gold or a rock as hard as granite, and the perfume from a single particle of musk, which is so subtle as to fill a room for years. But we will accompany our illustrious stranger, as he deigns his second visit to this terrestrial ball. Time had rolled on the earth as impelled by the hand of Omnipotence, had been performing his annual rounds, and, as he had been witness, the Divine Architect had all this time been moulding and shaping, creating and transforming, till the earth was made to exhibit its present and beautiful aspect. By means of some mighty convulsion, of which we can form no adequate idea, the waters had been gathered together in one place, and formed the sea ; the lofty mountains had ascended from beneath, and the hills and the valleys were formed ; and by a series of com- motions which agitated every separate particle of matter, rocks, soil, every species of earth, mineral and metal, were formed, particle finding its kindred particle, while a stupendous chemi- cal process was going on ; and all in obedience to the Divine fiat even the minutest process is watched over by the Om- niscient eye. The result of the process is the incomprehensi- ble variety which characterizes every created thing. We will first survey the expanse of waters ; and what wis- dom at once appears in their distribution. Though there be essentially but one body of water, yet how is this one great body divided into oceans, seas, lakes, creeks, bays, harbors, rivers ; and all these so disposed of and arranged in reference 44 THE PALACE OP THE GEEAT KING. to the land as to subserve the most effectually the purposes of evaporation, irrigation, and commerce. Not only is the ocean itself one of Nature's great varieties, but it is in all its details full of beauty and variety. The ele- ment that composes the ocean its general characteristics the color, motions and phosphorescent appearance of the ocean its tides, and rolling billows when agitated the beauty and singularity of many portions of its bottom, especially where ornamented with coral formations the unique mode of travel on water and the altogether novel world of living beings which are met in the deep, distinguish the great water-world from the dry land. Here we meet a new order of life, new modes of subsistence, of habitation, and of locomotion. And though the ocean contains caverns deep and dark, into which no human eye has penetrated, and which are full of the mon- sters of the sea, and of every living thing that swims or creeps, both small and great ; and though from the nature of the case we can know very little of the inhabitants of the deep, yet we know enough to be able to affirm that the same love and law of variety governed the Divine mind in the creation of the sea and in all that pertains thereunto, as in the creation and the fitting-up of the dry land. Life appears here likewise in the greatest possible variety, and in the most lavish profusion. But we will rather betake ourselves to the dry land, where we shall meet a more familiar, if not a more obvious illustration of our theme. As we pass from the equator to either pole, we meet a cli- mate varying with every successive degree of latitude, and we meet correspondingly changing seasons, vegetation and animal life. And man, too, though a native of all lands and climates, DIVERSIFIED VEGETATION. 45 differs in a thousand peculiarities as you meet him in different latitudes : it may be only in stature, or the color of the hair, or hue of the skin, or contour of the face. We see the different portions of land, continents and islands, so shaped and so ar- ranged in their relation one to the other, and to the surround- ing waters, and so curiously scalloped with capes, and promon- tories, and peninsulas, and so tastefully intersected with rivers and streamlets, and dotted with lakes and lesser reservoirs of water, as to excite a never-ceasing admiration. All is con- structed with a singular love of variety. Nor does the interest cease when we come to inspect the several continents separately. Not a square rood of the whole not a square yard that does not present a thousand varieties. We are at first struck with the variety of the external features of a continent as a whole. It is diversified with mountains and hills, and gentle risings of every conceivable length, height and declivity. Some towering above the clouds and clad in everlasting snow ; some belching forth, in terrific grandeur, volumes of fire and smoke, and rivers of liquid rock ; some clothed in trees of evergreen and waving gracefully to the breeze ; others as bleak and rude as if beaten by the storms of a thousand winters. Some are covered to their very sum- mits with the rich products of the husbandman, and, sloping beautifully to the plain, bear on their bosom fertile fields and richly-laden orchards. It is, too, diversified with plains and valleys, groves and forests, rivers, creeks and streamlets of every possible description ; with cascades, lakes and ponds ; and with a soil and productions as various as climate and lati- tude. Tropical grains, fruits, flowers, spices ; vegetables, min- erals and metals, are succeeded by their kindred varieties in a 46 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. temperate zone ; while, as we pass further northward, we are again greeted with new varieties not less pleasing or useful. Again, we find each continent divided into a number of states or kingdoms, and inhabited by different tribes of men. All these nations and tribes differ in respect to government, laws, institutions and political economy. Perhaps no two of them speak the same language : at least they differ in dialect, in the tone of the voice, in the features of the face, and in the hue of the skin. And they differ more in manners and cus- toms ; in their food and the manner of preparing it, and of taking their meals ; in the style and material of their cloth- ing ; in the fashion and workmanship of their habitations ; in their occupations and ways of working ; in their modes of thinking, and the manner of expressing their thoughts ; and in their religion and modes of worship. Some people have their food served on a table spread with dishes sit in chairs, and eat with knife, fork and spoon ; others sit upon the ground, and eat from the common dish, or trencher, or loaf, with their fingers. Some eat with silver forks, others with steel forks, and a vastly greater number eat with no forks at all. They deem it more sensible to use the more flexible forks which nature has very kindly appended to the end of their hands. Some people sit in chairs, others sit on their heels, others sit cross-legged, others don't sit at all, but recline. Some men wear hats, of every conceivable shape and size ; some wear caps as multiform ; and more wear turbans. Or if the inquiry turn on the vegetable, mineral or animal productions of the different portions of a continent, we shall discover the same varied profusion, to meet the wants and to minister to the tastes and luxuries of man. Each climate ha,. PEOFUSE SUPPLY OF MAN'S WANTS. 47 its own peculiar productions, differing from those of any other climate. Were we able to enumerate all the various kinds of grains, meats, vegetables and fruits which compose our diet, and the variety of drinks which we may enjoy as the indige- nous productions of our own soil, we should have some faint idea of Heaven's bounty towards his creatures. And we get the same impression when we contemplate the boundless profusion which God has created by which to supply the wants of man in respect to clothing, habitation, and the various means of improvement. How many different fabrics, suited to the dif- ferent seasons of the year, and to his convenience, comfort or luxury, are provided in a single region of country ; and how many different materials for the Construction of his house ; and how many more for weapons of defence and the implements of his craft, and for all his labor-saving machines. And if we here bring into the account the idea ofl the ex- change of commodities the idea of a commerce, which adds to the productions of each individual country the productions of every other country, we then get a vastly enlarged idea of the profuse benevolence of Heaven towards man. Except it be on mature reflection, we have but a very in- adequate conception of the multiplicity of productions and ma- terials which we use in our common every-day life ; and of the varied labor and skill which are forced into our service either to supply our necessities or to minister to our luxuries. It is, however, only for the civilized and more advanced state of man that the Universal Father has provided such bountiful and varied resources. Man in his savage condition needs little, and appropriates little to his use. Had Providence had re- spect to man only in his barbarous condition, and had he been 48 THE PALACE OF THE GEE AT KING. pleased that he should remain in that condition, he would have formed neither the mine nor the quarry, the field bearing its rich and varied harvests, nor the cattle on the hills ; nor would he have endowed man with such diversities of gifts, and with such a versatility of genius and talent. So multiform and so multifarious, indeed, are the supplies provided for all man's wants and wishes, that the most fertile imagination can scarce- ly conceive of one which Nature has not provided for, either in the shape of a direct product, or in the inventive genius, or the artistic skill of some secondary agent who can produce it. We will call up a few instances by which to illustrate the thought. We will take for our first example a common labor- ing man, a mechanic or a farmer ; and we shall see that his simple wants imply an amount and variety in the provisions God has made for his support, which we did not at first an- ticipate. And, further, we will suppose this individual to need only a house and its furniture, food and apparel, modes of con- veyance, and the tools and implements of his calling. Yet we shall see how he seems to be taxing the industry and skill of the world to supply only a part of his wants. I shall not at- tempt to enumerate all the ways and means by which these wants are supplied, but may name enough to give force to the above remarks. We will first take the man, cap-a-pie, as he stands ; and then, as he eats, sleeps and works. We begin with his hat : how many materials enter into its fabric its body of fur and wool its lining of silk, leather and paper its sizing, band and buckle, of materials brought from different quarters of the globe. How many persons are en- gaged in trapping the beaver, and preparing the fur how many in growing the wool (after that pastures had been made HOW MANY HANDS MAKE A MANS COAT. 49 by the Hand divine with a befitting soil to rear the grass that fed the sheep), and in carding and preparing the wool for the felt how many in cultivating and feeding silk-worms, and winding and weaving and coloring the silk how many persons engaged and how many materials used in tanning, dyeing, and preparing the leather, and in making the paper. And when all the materials for the structure are made ready, then how many operations are performed, and how many persons em- ployed in the manufacture itself: to say nothing of the different minerals and metals and woods used either in dyeing and manu- facturing, or in the form of implements, vessels and tools. In the preparation of his coat a like variety of agents and materials are employed : the growing of the wool, the carding, spinning and weaving the fulling and dressing of the cloth, and the cutting, sewing and making the garment. And to all these we have to add, as not the least in the account, all the metals and minerals, and the numerous other substances which compose the machinery used for the various manufacturing operations to which I have referred. Could we annihilate every field, and mine, and quarry, and every substance which con- tributes to the structure of a man's coat, we should at once put out of existence most of the great motive powers that keep the world in action. "We should produce a chasm a great gulf, which human progress could never pass. Almost every clime has made its contribution to form the coat. A suitable soil, the product of the Divine skill, fed the sheep that gave the wool that made the coat. Coal, iron, l$ad, tin, zinc, and I know not how many other substances and agents, combined to form the garment. And so we may say of the cotton and linen garments 3 50 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. which go to make up the remaining portion of his wardrobe. The materials were cultivated in lands on the other side of the globe, and could not serve their present purpose until they had been transferred here not till the large merchantman or the steamer had been constructed out of materials that again taxed every field and forest and mine, and employed a great amount and variety of skill and labor for its construction and outfit. His shoes, also, were not fitted to his feet till the ma- terials of which they were made had passed through a great variety of operations, and a yet greater variety of materials were employed. And if we put into his pocket a watch, a knife and a pen- cil, we shall meet in his garb a still further representation of the exuberant provision which nature has made for the comfort of man. Every continent has contributed, and every substance ministers to his well-being. But he must be housed he must eat, sleep, move from place to place, and work. How many kinds of wood enter into the structure of his house ; how many metals and miner- als common stone and marble, clay, sand, lime, hair ; glass, paint and cordage. And his furniture is composed of a still greater variety of materials. We should find no end in an at- tempt to trace out, and trace up to their origin, all the sub- stances used by the cabinetmaker, the upholsterer, the carpenter, the carpet-maker, and the various artificers of all the woollens and linens and cottons and silks ; of the china and glass and porcelain ; and of kitchen utensils, stoves, and all manner of implements, vessels and appurtenances, in and about his house, good and bad, clean and unclean. But his food levies, perhaps, a still more extensive contri- FOOD AND LOCOMOTION. 51 bution on the productions of the whole world, than either his house or his apparel. Though each individual country furnishes to its respective population all the absolute necessities of sub- sistence, yet the comforts of the civilized man's table, and es- pecially his luxuries, are the product of every land. How many fields and grazing grounds supply his breadstuff's and meats. Seas and rivers yield him fish. Tropical lands supply tea, coffee, sugar, sweetmeats and spices ; and temperate climates, a great variety of delicious fruits and vegetables. The forests afford him game ; the sea, salt ; and every land, something that ministers to the palate. Again, would we know what a variety of materials are re quisite to enable a man to move from place to place in a car- riage, railway car, or a steamship, we must first be able to analyze the structure of one of these locomotive conveyances, and to enumerate the number and variety of materials, metallic, animal and vegetable, which enter into the structure. And in like manner we might speak of the implements with which the man works, and the various devices by which he saves muscu- lar labor. Until we descend to particulars, we have but a very inade- quate conception of the immense multiplicity of things which God has made, and of the immense number which we use in the common affairs of life. " Oh Lord, how manifold are thy works ; in wisdom hast thou made them all : the earth is full of thy riches." We may here quote the glowing language of another.* " Wherever we turn our eyes in the world around us, we be- * Dr. Dick, in the " Philosophy of Religion." 52 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. hold innumerable instances of our Creator's beneficence. In order that the eye and the imagination may be gratified and charmed, he has spread over the surface of our terrestrial habi- tation an assemblage of the richest colors "which beautify and adorn the landscape of the earth, and present to our view a picturesque and diversified scenery which is highly gratifying to the principle of novelty implanted in the human mind. On all sides we behold a rich variety of beauty and magnificence. Here spread the wide plains of fertile fields, adorned with fruits and verdure ; there the hills rise in gentle slopes, and the mountains rear their snowy tops to the clouds, distilling from their sides the brooks and rivers which enliven and fertil- ize the plains through which they flow. Here the lake stretches into a smooth expanse in the bosom of the mountains ; there the rivers meander through the forests and the flowery fields, di- versifying the rural scene, and distributing health and fertility in their train. Here we behold the rugged cliff; there we are charmed with the verdure of the meadow, the enamel of flowers, the azure of the sky, the gay coloring of the morning and the evening clouds. In order that this scene of beauty and magnifi- cence might be rendered visible, He formed the element of light, without which the expanse of the Universe would be a boundless desert, and its beauties forever veiled from our sight. It opens to our view the mountains, the hills, the vales, the woods, the lawns, the flocks, the herds, the wonders of the mighty deep, and the radiant orbs of heaven. It paints a thousand different hues on the objects around us, and promotes a cheerful and extensive intercourse among all the inhabitants of the globe." A geographical survey of the earth introduces us at once TIII: i,or\i>i i - Kicmcs OK NATI I:K. 53 into the cxhaustless storehouse of Nature's riches. We can never cease to admire the unbounded liberality of the Di\ un- hand when employed to supply the wants of man through the varied resources which the earth is made to produce. The strangely varied surface of the earth which geography pre- sents; diversified climates and soils; the different elevations and depressions of land ; mines of every metal and mineral ; and, indeed, all the singularly varied productions of the land, and the sea, and the inhabitants of the air all conduce to magnify the wisdom and skill of the wonderful Architect ; and to direct all eyes, and to raise all hearts to the great bountiful One who opens his hands and all the \\aiits of all his creatures are liberally supplied. These thoughts are but the echo of the inspired utterances of the royal Psalmist. In the one hundred and fourth psalm, he celebrates the glorious attributes of Jehovah, as displayed in the creation of this globe, both land and water the stock in;-; the land and the sea, respectively, with a superabundance of living creatures the provision made for their subsistence both as to food and water, and the arrangement made, by means of day and night, for the labor, refreshment and protection of man. "He sendeth the springs into the valleys which run among the hills. They give drink to every beast of the field : the wild asses quench their thirst. By them shall the fowls of the heaven have their habitation, which sing among the branches. Ho watcrcth the hills from his chambers : the earl h is satisfied with the fruit of thy works. Ho causeth the grass to grow for the cattle, and herbs for the service of man : that, he may bring forth food out of the earth ; and wine that maketh glad the heart of man, and oil that maketh his face to shine, 54 THE PALACE OF THE GEEAT KING. and bread which strengtheneth man's heart. The trees of the Lord are full of sap, the cedars of Lebanon which he hath planted, where the birds make their nests. The hills are a ref- uge for the wild goats and the rocks for the conies." How strangely benevolent all these arrangements, by which the wants and conveniences of all his creatures are so timely and bountifully provided for. Who has not admired the provision made to supply animals of every grade and clime with fresh water f The great reservoir is salt, yet it sends forth sweet streams into every nook and corner of the earth. The Great Architect has perforated this ball in every conceivable direc- tion with water-courses, through which he sends to every door the needed fluid. The inhabitants of the wilds, the rovers in the desert, the tenants of the rocks, all receive in due time their supply of this indispensable beverage. CHAPTER IV. THE ELEMENTARY PARTICLES of Things Varieties Chemical The same law of Yariety pervades the Atomic "World " Ultimate Molecules," or Elementary Particles The Particles composing a Eay of Light or a Drop of Water. " MEASURED on the vast scale of the universe, the globe we in- habit appears but an atom ; and yet, within the compass of this atom, what an inexhaustible variety of objects is con- tained! what an endless diversity of phenomena ! what won- derful changes are occurring in rapid and perpetual succession ! Throughout the whole series of terrestrial beings, what stud- ied arrangements, what preconcerted adaptations, what mul- tiplied evidences of intention, what signal proofs of beneficent design exist to attract our notice, to excite our curiosity, and to animate our inquiries ! " We are amazed at the monuments of the divine power and wisdom which we behold in the bound- less firmament of the heavens. No human intellect can com- prehend such grandeur ; no imagination can measure it. Yet not the less wonderful are the manifestations of the same di- vine attributes, as seen displayed in the less magnificent and the more minute operations on our own planet. We have taken a hasty survey of our world as a whole, and as seen through the eyes of the geographer. We have seen * Bridgewater Treatise, by Peter Mark Koget. 56 THE PALACE OF T3E GREAT KING. into how many tens of thousands of shapes, and forms, and na- tures, matter has been moulded, so as to produce a countless number of objects, all fitted to gratify the taste, to please the eye, to minister to the appetite, and to meet the wants and ne- cessities of man. This will appear still more obvious, as we shall, in a subsequent chapter, consider more in detail the vegetable and animal kingdoms. But let us pause here for a few moments and humbly seek admittance into Nature's secret laboratory, and try to gain some little acquaintance at least with the primordial materials the elementary particles of which all this singularly diver- sified world of beings is made. While the telescope has thrown open to our view illimitable fields of space before untraversed, all radiant with sparkling worlds, and beyond these, still unex- plored fields, of whose extent we can form no conception, the microscope, on the other hand, has brought within our range of vision u the more diminutive objects of creation, and revealed to us many of the secrets of their structure and ar- rangement." But our concern at present is not with structures or arrangements, however inconceivably minute these may be. There is not a grain of sand, there is not an animalcule so small that it has not its component parts, and is made up of original materials. We are here conducted back a step be- yond any structure or organization of matter ; and here open to our view wonders more wonderful, if possible, than we get by any survey we are able to take of the vastness of the starry heavens. Philosophy teaches that " there exist worlds far removed from the cognizance of every human sense, however assisted by the utmost refinements of art; worlds -occupied by the elemen- MOLECULES I DIVISIBILITY. . 57 tary corpuscles of matter, composing, by their various con- figurations, systems upon systems, and comprising endless diversities of motions, of complicated changes, and of widely extended series of causes and effects, destined forever to remain invisible to human eyes and inscrutable to human science." All matter, whether it be moulded into a metal or a mineral, or whether it compose a vegetable nature, or the bone, muscle, blood-vessel or vein of a living thing, is composed of an infinite number of molecules. As an instance from the mineral king- dom, Dr. Thomson has shown that an ultimate molecule of lead cannot weigh more than the STOYO o-o^o-o^/oo-o- of a grain ; and the ultimate molecule of sulphur no more than the 270 TT.-O o oYo o oYo O-Q- 5 and that the size of a molecule of lead cannot exceed 8 8 1T,4 9 2,0 Uoo 0,0 00 f Cubic lUck The vegetable kingdom presents us with examples of the extraordinary divisibility of matter quite as remarkable. But we pass by these that we may quote a paragraph to illustrate the same idea from the animal kingdom.* "Animalcules have been discovered whose magnitude is such that a million of them does not exceed a grain of sand ; yet each of these creatures is composed of members as curiously 9rganized as those of the largest species ; they have life and spontaneous motion, and are endowed with feeling and instinct. In the liquids in which they live, they are observed to move with astonishing speed and activity ; nor are their motions blind and fortuitous, but evidently governed by choice, and directed to an end. They use food and drink, from which they derive nutrition, and are therefore pro- vided with a digestive apparatus. They have great muscular power and are provided with limbs and muscles of strength and flexibility. They are susceptible of the same appetites, and obnoxious to the same passions. Must we not conclude that these creatures have * Dr. Wm. Front's " Bridgewater Treatise," pp. 23, 24. 3* 58 THE PALACE OP THE GREAT KING. hearts, arteries, veins, muscles, sinews, tendons, nerves, circulating fluids, and all the concomitant apparatus of a living organized body ? And if so, how inconceivably minute must these parts be. If a globule of their blood bears the same proportion to their whole bulk as a globule of our blood bears to our magnitude, what power of calculation can give an adequate notion of its minuteness." But we are not at present concerned with the formations of things, however infinitesimal these may be, and however much, by their inimitable skill and strange variety they may enhance our admiration of the Great Architect. We are now concerned with the elementary particles out of which all things, even the minutest structure or organization, is formed. Though we shall find enough to excite our profoundest wonder and devoutest adoration when we shall attempt to enter the great storehouse of Nature, and contemplate the immense number and variety of objects which God has made, from the hugest globe that rolls through interminable space, to the minutest molecule that forms a grain of sand ; and our arith- metic shall fail in the attempt to enumerate even the manufac- tured articles which the eye, aided by the telescope on the one hand and the microscope on the other, is able to survey ; yet we shall not be the less amazed as we attempt to examine the raw material, if I may so speak, out of which all these things are made. Here we find ourselves amidst worlds of wonders yet more incomprehensible. If we shall be able, in any degree, to look in upon the great universe of primordial particles (the atomic chaos of things), we may gain some more definite idea of those wonderful operations which first gave to matter its present endlessly varied forms ; and the no less wonderful operations which are constantly taking place in every particle of matter ELEMENTAEY PARTICLES. 59 about us. Such a view will introduce us into what Paley calls the " concealed and internal operations of the machine." We ask what is matter in its original form, in its elemen- tary principles or particles ? and whence and by what means all these endless forms and shapes, and all these endlessly varied natures and conditions in which we find matter at present ? We have referred to a globule of the blood which flows in the veins of one of those living atoms, a million of which sport in a drop of water. Now we know that blood is a substance a compound substance and that each of its component parts is in turn composed of an infinite number of " ultimate molecules," or elementary particles. We cannot conceive of the existence of an object so small as one of the myriads of original particles of a globule of human blood ; what then must be the size of one of the indefinite number of particles which form a globule of the blood of one of the animalcules referred to above, a "million of which are not larger than a grain of sand ; " or of one of those monads which have been brought to light by the microscopic researches of Professor Ehrenbergh. According to his compu- tation, a cubic line, which is about the bulk of a drop of water, contains 500,000,000. Each one of these he represents as endowed with organs of life, of motion and digestion has muscles, veins, arteries, sinews, and nerves. We ask not what is the size of a globule of their blood, but of one of the im- mense number of particles of which that globule is composed. Light and heat are now conceded to be substances, every ray of which is composed of an infinite number of particles. And how minute indeed must be the particles of light, that, though they come from the sun with a velocity equal to 200,000 60 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. miles in a second of time, yet, notwithstanding this tremendous velocity, they strike harmless on an object delicate as the human eye. Were not the particles almost infinitely small, the strongest eye could not endure the light for a moment. Had particles of light been made of such a size that a million should equal a small grain of sand, they would probably, with such a velocity, pierce the eye with the most excruciating pain. And not only so, but such rays would perforate the very crust of the earth, and tatter to atoms every 'living thing. And so subtle are the particles of this form of matter that it readily passes through certain solid substances, some of them the most solid. It passes through one of the densest bodies with perfect ease. And heat, so minute are its elementary particles, that it readily insinuates itself through the densest forms of matter, not excepting gold, acting on every separate particle of what- ever body it pervades, and expanding the whole. Heat is pos- sibly a compound substance, a union, as some affirm, of elec- tricity and magnetism. And what are electricity and mag- netism ? If they are material, what can estimate the size of their elementary particles ? And if Newton's hypothesis of light be the true one, its composition exhibits an exquisitely ingenious variety of work- manship. According to this hypothesis, "the molecules of light may be regarded as little magnets, revolving rapidly around their centres while they advance in their course, and thus presenting alternately their attractive and repulsive poles." That is, every elementary particle of light is a sort of infinitesimal miniature and representative of those great stellar bodies in the concave of the heavens that revolve about their axis, and at the same time move on in their respective "WOKDEBFUL TELOCITY OF LIGHT. 61 orbits with the most astonishing velocity ! Were our sun the only fountain of light for the universe, we should still attempt in vain to form any conception of the infinite divisibility of matter, and the exquisitely beautiful workmanship implied in the idea above. But when we come to reflect that boundless space is thickly studded with these great light and heat-giving bodies millions of fixed stars or suns ; and that every ray of light which emanates from each one of these immense bodies is composed of millions of normal atoms, each one of which is itself, as it were, a sun revolving about its axis, and at the same time moving on its course at the rate of 200,000 miles in a second of time, we find ourselves attempting to get an idea of the handiwork of God, which surpasses all description or conception. The reflection contained in the following paragraph is suffi- ciently apt, and the remarks and assertions respecting the ele- mentary particles of light are, at least, sufficiently wonderful, to be appended to what has just been said. The theory seems not to differ essentially from that of Newton ; but the theory is supposed to be verified, in the manner which exceeds all human conception ; and, to the untaught in the wonders and mysteries of creative wisdom and skill, it transcends all human credibility. * f What mere assertion will make any one believe that in one second of time, in one beat of the pendulum of a clock, a ray of light travels over 192,000, miles, and would therefore perform the tour of the world in about the same time that it requires to wink with our eyelids, and in much less than a swift runner occupies in taking a single stride ? What mortal can be made to believe without demonstration that the sun is almost a million times larger than the earth ? and that, al- 62 THE PALACE OF THE GKEAT KING. though so remote from us that a cannon-ball shot directly towards it, and maintaining its full speed, would be twenty- years in reaching it, yet it affects the earth by its attraction in an inappreciable instant of time ? Who would not ask for demonstration, when told that a gnat's wing, in its ordinary flight, beats many hundred times in a second ; or that there exist animated and regularly organized beings, many thousands of whose bodies, laid close together, would not extend an inch ? But what are these to the astonishing truths which modern op- tical inquiries have disclosed, which teach us that every point of a medium through which a ray of light passes, is affected with a succession of periodical movements, regularly recurring at equal intervals, no less than five hundred, millions of mil- lions of times in a single second ! That it is by such move- ments communicated to the nerves of our eyes that we see ; nay more, that it is the difference in the frequency of their re- currence which affects us with the sense of the diversity of color. That, for instance, in acquiring the sensation of red ness, our eyes are affected four hundred and eighty-two mil- lions of millions of times ; of yellowness, five hundred and forty- two millions of millions of times ; and of violet, seven hundred and seven millions of millions of times per second! Do not such things sound more like the ravings of madmen than the sober conclusions of people in their waking senses? They are, nevertheless, conclusions to which any one may most cer- tainly arrive, who will only be at the trouble of examining the chain of reasoning by which they have been obtained." A drop of water appears a very simple thing ; yet the gentle- ' men of the microscope discover it to be made up of twenty-six millions of primary particles, among which play an incredible VAPOK, SNOW, AND HAIL. 63 number of animalculae. The snow-flake appears as an object scarcely less simple. The casual observer is satisfied when told that this snow-flake is congealed or crystallized particles of water in the vapor state. But the philosopher sees in it a world of interest beyond this. He sees the water indeed beau- tifully crystallized ; but when he comes to apply a magnifying power, he lays open to his vision a singular display of beauty and variety. The particles assume every conceivable form. The vapor, which when frozen, produced the snow, is water whose particles are separated and diffused by heat. A flake of snow may therefore be regarded as a collection of these dif- fused particles of water frozen and crystallized : each particle forming a distinct crystal, and the several crystals displaying as many distinct and beautiful varieties. Captain Scoresby, who gave much attention to this subject, has given a delineation of a great number of these crystals. While each is exquisitely beautiful, no two are alike. Or if the water of the atmosphere be condensed into drops, and in its descent congeals and falls in the shape of hail, a somewhat similar phenomenon is observed. These hail-stones assume an endless variety of forms endless, as far as human observation extends. Some are round, others angular, or pyramidal, or flat ; sometimes they are stellated with radii ; and it is yet to be discovered if there be two hail-stones of precisely the same size or shape. But we would pass from the great chaotic mass of un- wrought material to the ingenious working-up of this material by the plastic hand of Nature. But before we would quit Na- ture's great storehouse and pass on to Nature's great workshop, we would raise a single suggestive inquiry. It relates to the 64 THE PALACE OF THE GEE AT KING. size and form of the primordial particles of which all existing things are made. Are they all of the same uniform size and form, as some have affirmed ; or does not this vast and limit- less .primordial universe of which we have been speaking, pre- sent the same wonderful diversity of dimensions and shapes as the microscopic or the telescopic universe of made objects does, or as does the visible world about us ? To assume that the same law of variety does not pervade the whole atomic world, is to presume that the original, and the most wonderful, and most numerous portion of God's works is not in analogy with all his other works with which we are acquainted; for, in all things which fall within unassisted human vision, and as far as telescopic or microscopic vision ex- tends, there is no exception. Variety is there the order of creation. And we are probably safe in the conjecture that if microscopic vision shall ever be able to examine the forms and dimensions of the primary particles of things, these will be found to be subjected to the same general law of variety. The idea is perfectly incomprehensible, yet incomprehensible only because we cannot comprehend infinity. We readily admit the idea that infinite skill and power can create objects in infi- nite number and variety, though we cannot comprehend how much is included in the term infinite variety. So that how- ever beyond human conception it may be, yet it may neverthe- less be true that of all the countless number of particles that compose the universe, no two are alike. However great this num- ber may be, it is something less than infinite. If infinite variety be possible, certainly the variety in question is at least as pos- sible. We can form no definite conception how the particles composing a drop of water should contain twenty-six million INFINITE DIVISIBILITY. 65 varieties, and that there should exist in that drop five hundred millions of monads, containing as many more distinct varieties. And more difficult is it to conceive that each of the sixty-two millions five hundred thousand of teeth that lock together the five millions of fibres which compose the crystalline lens, (the hard central part of a codfish's eye,) should be formed of an in- definite number of molecules ; and that these should constitute so many varieties, that no two should be alike. And yet more difficult is it to comprehend how no two particles of light, which emanate from the sun, and which in all past time have, or in all future time shall, emanate from our sun, and not only from our sun, but from all the suns that shine in the universe, are alike. This is a step further in advance towards infinity than we are able to go ; yet our surmise here has to plead for itself the analogy of all we do know of the Divine workman- ship. The foregoing illustrations find confirmation in the philoso- pher's well-known doctrine of " Infinite Divisibility." Every substance is doubtless divisible (in theory) till we arrive at the primordial particles of which it is composed. This is to us at least, infinite. The following paragraphs from the " Scientific American " give some just idea of the subject we are consider- ing : "Divisibility is a property possessed by all bodies, and means their capability to be separated into parts. " It was formerly a question among philosophers whether matter was capable of being divided ad infinitum^ or whether there was a limit beyond which matter could not be divided. The question is incapable of direct solution, and fortunately science does not require that it should be known ; but the extent to which subdivision has been carried in the arts is prodigious. In the gilding of buttons, five grains of gold, which is applied as an amalgam with mercury, is 66 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. allowed to a gross ; so that the coating left must not be more than the 110,000th part of an inch in thickness. If a piece of ivory or white satin be immersed in a solution of nitre-muriate of gold, and exposed to a current of nitrogen gas, it will be covered with a sur- face of gold not exceeding the ten-millionth part of an inch in thick- ness. " A single grain of blue vitriol will give an azure tint to five gal- lons of water. In this case, the copper must be attenuated ten mil- lion times, and yet there is sufficient in each drop of water to give it color. Odors are capable of still further diffusion ; a single grain of musk has been known to scent a room for twenty years. " Animal matter, likewise, exhibits many instances of wonderful subdivision. The milt of a codfish, when it begins to putrefy, has been estimated to contain a billion of perfect insects, so that thou- sands of these little lives could be lifted on the point of a needle. One of the infusorial animalculae found in duck-weed is ten million times smaller than a hemp seed ; and another, discovered in ditch water, appears in the field of a microscope a mere atom, endowed with sentient life, and millions of them play, like sunbeams, in a single drop of liquid." " Among the curiosities shown at Alnwick Castle, in England, is a vase, taken from an Egyptian catacomb. It is full of a mixture of gum, resins, &c., which give forth an agreeable odor to the pres- ent day, although probably fully 3,000 years old ! " But enough of this great chaos of atoms of this endlessly multitudinous universe of molecules. We now enter the great workshop and try to catch a glimpse of how things are made, as well as out of what they are made. The idea which has been advanced is, in the language of Dr. John Pye Smith, that " the original act of creation provided the primordial particles, by a combination of which all material and all organized matters have been formed." These particles, then, mingled together in- one great chaotic mass a great dead globular lump, empty and waste, " without form and void " were, at the period when Moses commences his history, endowed HOW GOD CEEATED ALL THINGS. 67 with certain " repellant and adhesive forces," perhaps assisted by, if not composed of electricity and magnetism, which in their singular action worked out all the formations of things as we see them. We call these forces, with which every particle of primeval matter is endowed, and which seem to act on every particle separately, " the laws of nature." Through the mighty agency of these forces forces so quiet in their operation, and so invisible to the eye of art or science, that we know of them only by their agency He that said " Let there be light, and there was light," holds at ready command every separate parti- cle of matter in the universe. We may at least suggest the inquiry whether, when God said " Let there be light," this was not the fiat which sent on their mission the potent energies of light and heat (including electricity and magnetism) in the first great moulding process among the heretofore chaotic elements of nature. The great forming and vivifying agency was now set in motion, and henceforward matter is seen to assume endlessly varied forms. And as these mysterious forces (the laws of nature) are kept in action under the guidance of Omniscient benevolence, they produce all those endless changes, forms, varieties, natures and conditions, and all the multiplicity of objects which constitute the entire universe of matter, and determine the condition of the whole world of life. The Creator and constant controller of all things, can have occasion to form nothing so subtle or minute, nothing so huge or ponderous which he cannot form out of such material. Did he foresee that the comfort and future progress of his creature man would require an ocean here and a river there ; here a bay, or a creek, or a refreshing stream, and there a mountain, 68 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. a valley or a meadow, lie had only so to control these forces at his command, as to produce the desired end, and it was done. When the vivifying and all-adjusting Spirit moved on the face of the chaotic mass ; when the Creator took in hand first to fit up this globe of ours for the habitation of man, or to readjust its surface at the time of the deluge, he made just such an al- lotment of particles as was needful to form the waters and the dry land in due proportions, and ordered just such a retreat of the waters after the flood, and such a subsidence of solid mat- ter such elevations and depressions of the land as should se- cure the location of every river, lake, sea or streamlet in pre- cisely the right place. And so in the formation of every con- ceivable variety of soil, of every meadow, forest and mine of every metal or mineral, and of every living thing. It was Omniscient forethought that brought together just the right particles to form in its respective place the diamond, the silver, or the gold ; the iron, the coal or the precious stone ; or to give being to the monster of the deep, or to the tiniest mite that lives. One adjustment of particles produces a hard body, another a soft, or a porous, or an elastic body ; one, a ductile, another, a malleable body. One arrangement produces a body which will freely transmit the rays of light, as glass ; another con- struction produces a translucent body which transmits rays but imperfectly. An ingenious composition of particles in one body reflects only the red rays of light, and consequently the body appears red. Others reflect only the blue, or the green, or the violet rays, and appear of a corresponding color. Some reflect all the rays, and are consequently white ; others reflect no rays, and are black. We here discover the causes of all the COLORS : QUANTITIES AND QUALITIES. 69 varied colors and tints of color which please the eye and beau- tify the landscape ; and of all the fragrant odors by which we are regaled, and all the sweet flowers and delicious fruits which we enjoy, and the endless varieties of food which the earth yields us and of all different natures and varieties of every created thing. All is the result of that Omniscient forethought and exhaustless benevolence which orders precisely such a col- lection of every individual particle as is needful to produce such a result. Whence the pure white of the lily, the blush of the rose, or the tinge of the apple 1 Whence the gold, the diamond, the plumage of the peacock, or the gilding" of the in- sect's wing ? It is the peculiar composition of those substances which makes them capable of reflecting the right sort of rays to produce these colors. Not the minutest particle took its place in that rose-leaf, or in that insect's wing, by accident. But we would present the thought in one other aspect. We refer to the regard had in the moulding of things into their destined forms, to quantities and qualities. A due ad- justment of these to each other, we at once perceive is of es- sential importance ; and such an adjustment as actually exists, could have been the result of nothing short of Infinite Wisdom. In all the countless multitude of things which God has made, there is found to be the most exact regard had to the quan- tities and qualities of matter which enter into each. If these were varied from what they are in the least possible degree, the thing made would be another thing from what it is. What is a good now would be an evil. How different, and indeed how disastrous, if the component parts of water, or of air, had been different from what they are ? Had there been in air a greater proportion of oxygen (the 70 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. very principle of flame), the atmosphere might ignite, and the whole earth be encircled in a conflagration ; or were the oxygen of the air to be diminished in any considerable degree, it would not be capable of supporting life or flame at all ; and not only so, but the nitrogen of the atmosphere, if increased above what it is, would be altogether destructive to life ; and in like man- ner in relation to water. If the ingredients were not com- pounded in precisely the quantities they are, this element would subserve none of its present purposes. It would not be water. By reducing the quantity of oxygen, it would become inflammable ; and by increasing its hydrogen, if nothing more disastrous, its specific gravity would become such as to make it of no use in navigation, and probably as useless for any other practical purpose. Similar remarks might be made in respect to any, or all created things ; but for the nicest calculation in respect to the exact number and character of primordial parti- cles that enter into the composition of each, it would not be what it is, but something else. And there is a like dependence on the quality. Suppose the familiar substances referred to, air and water, were to change as to their component natures, what calamities would follow ? Were, for example, the important fluid, water, to be- come sour or sweet, heavier or lighter, or any thing but what it is ; or were the air of the atmosphere to acquire odor or color, or to become opaque : by either of such changes, slight as they appear, the whole of the present economy of nature would be changed. Again, " if the qualities of the acid exist- ing in the common salt of the ocean were to become so modi- fied as to quit the alkali with which it is at present asso- ciated, and to combine with the limestone composing our rocks, NATURE'S GREAT LABORATORY. *7l while the carbonic acid, thus set free, was diffused through the atmosphere : in such a case a large part of the solid crust of our globe would rapidly disappear and become dissolved in the waters of the ocean, which would thus be totally unfitted for their present purposes, while the liberated carbonic acid would instantly prove fatal to animal life." Such are but specimens of the disastrous results from changes apparently the most trifling ; and we can scarcely conceive of any change which would not produce similar results. Our very useful article called common salt, owes its utility and its existence to the fact of its being a composition of two ingredients in precisely the proportions in which we find them. The excess of the one over the other would entirely change it, and make it any thing but common salt. Were water either of a greater or less spe- cific gravity, it would be of no use in navigation. If water were a lighter substance, vessels would not float ; if heavier, no power of wind or steam would propel them through it. In like manner, marble, coal, iron, gold, silver would instantly lose their identity and cease to be of service, if the character of their structure were changed. We can scarcely contemplate the God of Nature in a more interesting light than when we regard him as the original Creator of all matter and as the great Architect. He first, out of nothing, called into being the material not in masses or tangible forms as we now see them, but infinitesimal molecules or primordial particles monads infinitely small and infinitely numerous, and probably of infinite variety and out of these he made an endless variety of objects, mineral, vegetable, and animal ; and these are endowed with natures and properties, and are adapted to uses and modes of existence and life the 72 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. most diverse conceivable. In the view we have now been tak- ing, we approach the wonderful Architect in the great labora- tory of Nature's Temple, and as we contemplate his incompre- hensible skill, wisdom, and power in his primordial creations, and then witness the exuberantly varied and seemingly opposite results which the plastic Hand produces, by the compounding and organizing into every conceivable shape and size what has been significantly termed the "ultimate molecules" of the original creation, we are overwhelmed at the idea which it gives us of the capabilities of the eternal Godhead. We can only praise, and adore, and wonder, but we cannot compre- hend. The view we have been taking of the nature and structure of the material creation, suggests a reflection as to the forma- tion and development of the new spiritual creation or the spiritual life. Is the origin of the new life in the soul, its growth and maturity, and final perfection ; is it absolutely, on the part of the Omnipotent Spirit, a new and positive creation, or is it a bringing together and concentrating, and giving life to moral influences and impressions which before ex- isted ? the germination of seed previously sown, the quicken- ing into life of agencies and influencies before existing? While this detracts nothing from the power and necessity of the quickening Spirit, it is analogous to the working of the same creating and all quickening Spirit in the creation of the natural world. But not to insist on this idea, the analogy appears more obvious as we contemplate the growth and maturity of Christian character, and the fitness for citizenship in heaven. Here the whole spiritual structure is made up of little things. The little events of every-day life, the little impressions and THE PRIMORDIAL ELEMENTS OP CHARACTER. 73 influences which act on the mind or heart ; the numberless little opportunities and circumstances for the benefit of others or for self-improvement, or for self-discipline, are, when collected, combined and moulded by the plastic hand of the life-giving Spirit, the primordial elements which make up the sum total of a man's character, and determine his eternal destiny. Death works no change in character ; nor is the future destiny of the soul determined by a few great leading religious or irre- ligious acts, but by the whole web of life which web is made up of ten thousand little shreds of every-day character. 4 CHAPTER V. The Vegetable Kingdom : No two Trees, Plants, Shrubs alike No two Leaves, Flowers, Seeds, or Fruits. The Natures, Qualities, and Uses, how different. The Abundance of Vegetable Productions. All formed of a few Elementary Substances. IT would seem but an obvious inference from what has been already said that God never made two objects alike. For whether it be things earthly or heavenly, or things under the earth whether we ascend to 'the boundless regions of the telescopic universe, or descend to the innumerable millions of living things and of primordial molecules, which form the no less wonderful microscopic universe, we find no two objects alike. We turn to the vegetable kingdom, and what endless varieties meet us here. How many kinds of trees, shrubs, plants, vines ! The earth is constantly yielding her endlessly varied productions. What a variety of foliage, flowers, and fruits regale the eye with their varied beauties, and gratify the taste. How many kinds of grasses and vegetables all varie- gate the same little spot of ground, and all contributing to the subsistence, the health, and luxury of a correspondingly diversified family of living creatures. Not less than 100,000 species of plants and vegetable productions are enumerated by naturalists ; including individuals or real varieties amounting to many millions. And then if we admit into the account the COMPOSITION OF PLAOTS. 75 fact that each of these individual varieties contains its unknown number of varieties, the aggregate will be inconceivable. We take for an example a single apple-tree, which is but one of the varieties named. No two apple-trees are alike. There are consequently as many varieties of this species of tree as as there are individual trees. And not only so, but there are no two leaves, or buds, or blossoms, or fruits, or seeds of an individual tree that are alike. Our arithmetic would seem to falter before we should arrive at the number of varieties which grow out of a single species of plants ; and much less can we form any just conception of the number of actual varieties which result from the 100,000 species of vegetable productions. If we can form no definite conception of the number of varieties which range under one species, but find ourselves lost in the calculation in what to us is infinity, then we can only set down the whole grand aggregate of all the vegetable varieties at 100,000 infinities. But we have no need to generalize or deal in incompre- hensibles. We may come to matters of every-day observation. It will add interest to our contemplations of the subject before us, if we bear in mind while contemplating it, that all plants, all vegetable organizations, are compositions of nearly the same component substances ; and these are very few and very simple. All the endless varieties which exist are produced by changes, apparently slight, in the amount and arrangement of the original particles. The principal and almost the only in- gredients which enter into the composition of all the vast mul- tiplicity of vegetable productions which cover the earth, are oxygen, carbon, and hydrogen. All plants owe "their peculiar character essentially to carbon, and their endless varieties to 76 THE PALACE OF THE GEEAT KING. the differences in its quantity, and to the modifying influence of the hydrogen and oxygen with which it is associated." The gnarled oak the hardest wood or the rankest plant that grows, is formed of essentially the same materials as the most delicate flower that blossoms. The difference is in the infinite skill and taste employed in the workmanship of the two. One collocation of particles has formed the giant tree ; another, the modest violet, or the down on the most minute and delicate flower. It is quite impossible for us to conceive how, simply by a little change of arrangement, and a little variation in the amount and proportions of materials, such an endless multitude of objects, and such a countless variety, can be produced objects, though all composed of the same three or four simple substances, yet so differ in appearance and composition as to seem to have little or nothing in common. We have no need to go into any nice physiological ex- amination of the vegetable world. Were we to attempt to search out all the various compositions, natures, properties, functions, and uses of plants, we should almost at the outset find ourselves overwhelmed in infinitude. We could not num- ber one of a thousand of the varieties which would press upon us. The most superficial view a glance of the eye or the use of the taste or the touch will verify the remark. You open your eyes on a landscape, and what variety meets you simply in the external forms of things in size, shape, and color. We select the single property of color. We can scarcely meet a more beautiful illustration of our subject. The prevailing color of the whole landscape is green. But how many shades of green do you at once discover ? You begin to VARIETIES IN THE LA1ST>SCAPE. 77 compare the green of one species of tree with that of another ; of one shrub, or vine, or creeping plant with another. You fix on a grass plot and say it is all green ; or you contemplate the leaves of a single tree, and declare that each leaf is surely of the same shade of green ; and equally positive are you that every spire of the same species of grass on the same little plot is the same green ; yet as you examine a little more minutely, you begin to doubt the perfect identity of color even here ; and as you bring a glass to the aid of your vision, you soon discover that the color of no two leaves of the same tree, and no two spires of grass on the same patch is precisely the same ; and we know that there are not two of the same form. The same remark would doubtless be found true of any other color. You would find no end to your attempt to enumerate all the dif- ferent shades of red, or black, or yellow, or orange, or violet, as they are found blended in the same scene. It is quite possible that you would discover as many varieties of color as there were number of objects contemplated. And the taste and touch may be found to detect another series of varieties in the same landscape, scarcely less limited. Select either of the three qualities expressed by the terms sweet, sour, bitter, and apply the taste, and you will detect every conceivable variety of the quality in question, if not a different variety in every leaf of the same tree, (which is not impossible if the taste were sufficiently delicate to discrimi- nate ;) yet every different species of plant will offer a different degree of sweetness, acidity, or bitterness. Nothing sooner arrests the attention of the observer than the abundance of vegetable productions the exuberant provision, in every conceivable variety, which God has made to supply 78 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. every possible want of man or beast. The whole face of the earth, and almost every object which belongs to the earth, is strangely instinct with vegetable life. And most of this vege- tation is spontaneous. Cultivated or uncultivated, sown or not sown, the mountains and the prairies, the hills and the valleys, and every crevice, nook and corner, will be found covered with verdure. And not only where there is a soil will there be vegetation, but the rock, the bark of the tree, the rail of the fence, and the roof and sides of the old building, if un- disturbed by friction, will put forth their verdant crop. And not only do the moss, the fungi, and the vegetable mould find place and nutriment on the rock or on the wood, but some species of plants vegetate on the surface of the water, and others on the surface of the snow, and others, again, on the bodies of some kinds of animals. The red snow, which is some- times met in the arctic regions, is found on examination to be not snow of a crimson color, but Nature, true to her own law, " be fruitful and multiply," produces, under circumstances so hopeless, a minute and singular vegetation, causing it to take root, without soil or genial sunshine, and to derive its nourish- ment from the cold surface of the snow ; and what is yet more remarkable, brick walls, tiled roofs, and even glass, when not kept constantly clean, afford, if not a soil, a surface for the growth of vegetation. The first plants that gain a footing on these surfaces usually look like a green or yellow powder. These in time decay, forming a little soil, on which others of a little less diminutive growth take root and find nutriment ; and so one generation succeeds another till a sufficient portion of soil has accumulated to afford life and growth to more per- THE MONARCH OF THE FOREST. 79 feet plants. And, at length, if the surface be large enough, shrubs and trees will succeed to the places of their diminutive progenitors. Placing under your microscope a piece of vegetable mould, you behold a forest of beautiful trees, every plant of which is several hundreds of times smaller than a fine needle. We may assume that one of these minim trees, the tallest branch of which does not tower high enough to overlook the finest silken thread, stands at the lowest extreme of vegetable organiza- tion. From this point we ascend through every imaginable grade of vegetable life, from plant, shrub, flower and tree, of every possible form, size and color, to the sturdy oak, the princely pine, and the goodly cedar ; and thence again through less numerous but more noble races to the august monarch of the great vegetable empire. In most imposing contrast to our little tree of mould, sits, like a monarch of oriental magnifi- cence and slothful ease, the majestic banyan tree. This' noble tree, whose broad and wide-spread top is beau- tifully interlaced with a thousand branches, and roofed with a thick and heavy foliage, and laden with fruit that serves as food for various tribes of animals, rests upon one main trunk of great size, while its broad branches are supported by a great num- ber of lesser trunks : some of the latter being as large as com- mon forest trees. The whole covers some acres of ground, and an army of seven thousand men have been known to encamp under it. One of these trees, on the banks of the Narbuddy Kiver, is said to inclose a surface of two thousand feet in cir- cumference when measured round its principal branches. The large trunks of this tree are three hundred and fifty, while the 80 THE PALACE OF THE GEEAT KING. smaller ones exceed three thousand. This is Nature's noblest specimen of workmanship in the vegetable kingdom.* But we were speaking of the prodigality of Nature in the profuseness of her productions. Production is her law ; and in obedience to this law (if not an attempt to overstep it) we meet a tendency in vegetable life to extend kself, which has not left uninvaded the domains even of animal life. Some species of plants, as I intimated, find a foothold on the bodies of animals, and derive their nourishment from the same. They have been found, in the West Indies, vegetating on the bodies of living wasps. This was formerly believed to be a fact only in refer- ence to the bodies of dead animals. It is now admitted that several kinds of plants of the mushroom species, vegetate on the bodies of living insects and not on the wasp alone, but on the sphynx and the May-bug. And other kinds of plants have been known to vegetate in the stomachs of living * The trunks of the banyan tree are matters of much curiosity. The main trunk occupies the position and serves the purpose of the trunk of any tree. And when the tree is young and small it is the only trunk. But as the branches begin to extend and need a support they let down little strings like roots, which continue to descend till they reach the ground. There they take root, grow with the growth of the branch they are to support, and at length become a collateral trunk. In like manner every principal branch lets down its support and each branch, as it ex- tends and requires it, supplies itself with a supporting trunk. Around the imperial banyan, the pride of the luxuriant East, we may range the stately pine, the noble oak, the teak, the maple, the walnut, and a liberal variety of flower and fruit-bearing trees, all generously con- tributing to the use and luxury of man ; some for ornament, some for food or fuel, and all for purposes which enter substantially into the great business of human progress. SOURCES OF VAEIETY. 81 animals. An instance of this kind was singularly illustrated some years ago in the case of a codfish. There were found in its stomach three gneiss pebbles, on each of which was found growing a plant of the fucus kind, of a deep green, and nearly two feet long ; on another, a plant one-third as long was grow- ing ; and another of three inches in length. Though we can make no definite estimate of the actual number of real varieties in the vegetable kingdom, we may adopt a mode of illustration not the less pleasing and much more satisfactory. We may contemplate the diversified charac- ter of the Divine workmanship in its relation to the conven- ience and comfort of man. We shall here see the whole ar- rangement to be fraught with Heaven's beneficence. Next after the singular profusion which everywhere abounds, the manner in which such rich profusions are made to meet the wants and wishes of man, attracts attention. Every season produces a peculiar variety so does latitude, or elevation above the sea. The hill and the valley, the dry land and the marsh, the sandy and the clayey soil, each gives life and growth to a vegetation peculiar to itself. Or the lati- tude and elevation may remain the same, yet a difference of soil will produce a different vegetation. It is interesting to follow up the vegetable products of the season. From the early spring to late autumn, what a delightful succession and variety we will say first of flowers I We should impose on ourselves a task if we were to attempt simply to enumerate but the various species which appear in beautiful succession, week after week, during the season, and in a single locality. From the first welcome of the dear little violet to the blushing adieu of the last rose or dahliah, we are never left a day or an hour with- 82 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. out these delightful summer visitors. And not only have we occasion to admire in what beautiful variety one generation af- ter another joyfully passes before us, but when we stop to con- template individual varieties we find we had not numbered one of a thousand. We look upon a bed of carnations or violets and we count it as one variety ; but as we begin to examine and compare, we find no two individual blossoms alike ; and we soon make the discovery that there are as many varieties as there are individual flowers. Or we look in upon the great and beautiful family of roses, and we not only meet scores of varieties, but every individual of the same variety differs from his fellow. We go into the fruit orchard when in full blossom, and admire a scene so beautifully variegated by the blossoms of the apple, the pear, the peach, the cherry, the plum ; but we no sooner begin to discriminate than we discover that each individual apple, or peach or plum-tree presents its own pecu- liar beauties ; and when we come to apply a yet nicer discrim- ination, we are still more surprised to find that no two of the ten thousand blossoms on the same tree are alike. This mul- tiplies varieties beyond all conception. But we stop not here. Though not one blossom in ten, and often not one in a hundred or a thousand, produce seed or fruit, but are merely the lovely expression of the Divine Goodness in adorning the fields and groves, and perfuming the air for the happiness of man, yet there follows a corresponding succession and variety of seeds and fruits. In our temperate climate, from the first welcome of the delicious strawberry to the final exit of the late pear and the frost-peach, we have a pleasant and con- tinuous succession of summer fruits. Strawberries, cherries, raspberries, harvest pears and apples, currants, gooseberries, A POETKAITURE OF THE DIVINE MIND. 83 plums, and a great variety of melons, and the whole series of summer fruits, supply our tables in their season ; and then fol- low, during the autumn and winter, a no less rich, and a yet more permanent supply of apples. Or if we extend our views within the tropics, a new world of floral beauty and variety, and new and yet more profuse supplies of fruits, regale the taste. Every country, every section, according to its latitude or height, has its own peculiar flowers and fruits. And if what was asserted of flowers be true (as it undoubt- edly is) of fruits and seeds, then we may expect to find no two apples, or peaches, or cherries on the same tree alike ; and we again have varieties which no man can number. " The vegetable kingdom," s^ays the author of the " Sacred History," "expands everywhere before us an immense por- traiture of the Divine Mind, in its contriving skill, profuse imagination, conceiving genius and exquisite tastes; as well as its interesting qualities of the most gracious benignity and the most benevolent munificence." We cannot too profoundly admire "that exuberance of imagination and taste, and the sense of eloquence and beauty," which are displayed by the Maker in forming and diversifying the vegetable world. All these wondrously strange diversities of organization are " en- tirely the creation of his choice the inventions of his rich and beautiful fancy. Their attractive shapes and quantities, and the abundant gratifications and important uses which we and our fellow-animals derive from them, explicitly show that kindness as well as goodness actuated his mind when he pro- jected and made them. They have been all individually de- signed: and special thought must have been employed on each; both in fixing their specific differences of form and 84 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. products, and in perceiving what particular combinations and variations of arrangement would effect in every one its ap- pointed end and use." But the Divine Goodness is not exhausted when He has supplied man with a choice variety of luxuries. What has been said of flowers and fruits, may apply with equal truth to Nature's varied supplies of grains, vegetables, nuts, spices, aro- matics and narcotics; some of which are produced in nearly all countries, and others, the products of their respective regions, according to their distance from the equator or their elevation above the sea. Not only are man's wants liberally supplied and a never-failing provision made for his domestic animals, and for the wild tenants of the forest and all the winged tribes of the limitless domains of the air, but his table may be spread with a luxurious variety. Every demand of necessity would have been heeded if but one kind of grain, and but one vegeta- ble had been provided for him. But, instead of this, his Heavenly Parent has been at the utmost pains to provide for him every variety which even taste can crave, and pleasantly to season the whole with spices and salt and withal to perfume the air about him that he may be happy and gratified in all his lawful desires. And not only has the Great Benefactor provided man food in such varied abundance, and provided for his luxuries " wine that maketh glad the heart of man, and oil to make his face to shine " but he has been in like manner bountiful, in the provision made in vegetable organizations, for his clothing, for his dwelling, and for the various purposes of every day life. The fibre of one plant supplies his linen, that of another, his NEW SUBSTANCES. 85 cordage.* One tree produces a beautiful fibrous substance, which, when spun and woven into a great variety of fabrics, serves a thousand purposes in the domestic economy ; while from another exudes a gum, which, when melted and prepared, furnishes us shoes to protect our feet from the wet and cold ; and serves many very important purposes in the arts of life. Other trees yield pitch, resin, gums ; some for medicines, some for luxury, or suited to be used in the arts. From one tree exudes a healing balsam ; from another a saccharine juice called sap, which is boiled down to a palatable sugar. The cow- tree of South America yields a substance, when the tree is gashed, which resembles and which is used for milk. The juice of one plant produces indigo, that of another, sugar ; and others yield all the varieties of essences. And what a variety of oils have we from the olive, the palm, the castor bean, and the peanut. Nor are vegetable lard and butter unknown. Whether for food or clothing, for medicine or luxury; * It is a matter of no ordinary interest to watch the appearance of the new substances which, from time to time, are added to the number of articles already in use, as new substances for fuel, light, food and cloth- ing. As an instance of the latter, I may refer to a report which recently appeared of a very " timely discovery " of Mr. John Blanc, of New Orleans. He has "discovered a process of converting thirty different varieties of plants, which grow wild in enormous quantities in different sections of the Union, into flax of great strength and beautiful texture." He makes " flax " from the stalks of the cotton plant from the century tree or wild Manilla of Florida from the wild holly-hock, which supplies a fibre of ten or fifteen feet long from the golden nankeen, which is a natural nankeen color, and from more than a score of others. The pro- cess of preparation is represented as " simple and effectual, preserving all the strength of the staple." 86 THE PALACE OP THE GEE AT KING. whether to be used in the arts or in the prosecution of science, or merely to gratify the taste or please the eye, the Great Archi- tect has so strangely compounded the few simple materials of which all vegetable organizations are formed, and given them so many different forms and natures, as scarcely to leave a want of man unheeded. We betake ourselves to the forest, and here we meet the same wisdom and benevolence in Nature's adaptation to meet the varied wants of man. If one forest were but a vast collection of stately pines ; another, of oaks or maples, or sycamores or cedars ; however useful each might be in its place, yet how completely would such an ar- rangement fail to meet man's necessities and convenience and how much would it detract from the present beauty of our forests. But how variegated and beautiful our woodlands, as Nature has formed them. One tree is clothed in a robe of blossoms more gorgeously arrayed than Solomon in all his glory ; an- other yields you a pleasant gum, or a healing balsam, or a re- freshing beverage, or a delicious fruit ; another, sturdy and gnarled, shall form the rib of some noble ship ; or tall and straight and branchless, shall proudly carry the top-mast-sail. Another is fitted to cheer the winter's evening as it blazes on the domestic hearth. Here are met trees and shrubs of every degree of hardness, and softness, and elasticity, suited to be wrought into all sorts of utensils, vessels and furniture, as needed in every imaginable department of common life. What an endless variety of woods ! what diversities of forms, of fo- liage and colors ! One of the most beautiful scenes in nature, and one which as beautifully illustrates my idea, is the variegated foliage of SEEDS HOW PEESEEVED AND DISPEESED. 87 an American forest after the first frosts of autumn. The name- less varieties of colors, and the inimitable blending together of every imaginable tint, extending over a vast forest, presents to the vision a view which is indescribably beautiful. Or I might refer, as another matter of pleasing interest, to the great variety of ways in which the seeds of plants are ma- tured and preserved, and then dispersed so as to reproduce all the present varieties of plants. What we term fruits, are but the different contrivances of Nature to protect, or aid in the dispersion and the future germination of the seed. Seeds are produced in every variety of form, size, color, taste and con- sistence. But what is a mafter of yet greater interest, is the great variety of ways in which they are protected and scat- tered. Some are singly ensconced in a hard, ligneous shell, secure from all but a few species of depredators. Others, includ- ing nearly the whole variety of our fruits, are incased in a pulpy substance of greater or less bulk and consistence, which, when matured, falls to the ground and forms of itself a sort of mould in which, without the aid of man, it takes root and reproduces its kind. The seeds of others are inclosed in a very light ball which is tossed about by the wind ; and others are furnished with winged appendages, or attached to a downy substance, or strung on fine hairs, by which they are wafted abroad ; and others still are found in seed vessels, or pods, or a bristly burr, which, on becoming dry, burst open with a force that scatters them around. Both for the purpose of appropriating an additional authori- ty to confirm what has been said in the present chapter, and to add further illustrations, I shall transcribe a paragraph 01 two from Dr. Dick's excellent book, entitled the " Christian 88 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. Philosopher." Of the great number of 'species of plants which are known, and, as he suggests, of the perhaps greater number in regions unexplored, yet to be classified, he says : " Every one of these species of plants differs from another, in its size, structure, form, flowers, leaves, fruits, mode of propagation, color, medical virtues, nutritious qualities, internal vessels, and the odors it exhales. They are of all sizes, from the microscopic mush- room, invisible to the naked eye, to the sturdy oak, and the cedar of Lebanon, and from the slender willow to the banyan tree, under whose shade 7,000 persons may find ample room to repose. A thousand different shades of color distinguish the different species. Every one wears its peculiar livery and is distinguished by its. own native hues ; and many of their inherent beauties can be distin- guished only by the help of the microscope. Some grow upright, others creep along in a serpentine form. Some flourish for ages, others wither and decay in a few montfis ; some spring up in moist, others in dry soils ; some turn towards the sun, others shrink and contract when we approach to touch them. Not only are the dif- ferent species of plants and flowers distinguished from each other, by their different forms, but even the different individuals of the same species. No two flowers can be found in which the shape and shades are exactly similar. Of all the hundred thousand millions of plants, trees, herbs, and flowers, with which our globe is varie- gated, there are not, perhaps, two individuals precisely alike, in every point of view in which they may be contemplated ; yea, there is not, perhaps, a single leaf in the forest, when minutely examined, that will not be found to differ, in certain aspects, from its fellows. Such is the wonderful and infinite diversity with which the Creator has adorned the vegetable kingdom. " His wisdom is also evidently displayed in the vast profusion of vegetable nature in adapting each plant to the soil and situation in which it is destined to flourish in furnishing it with those ves- sels by which it absorbs the air and moisture on which it feeds ; and in adapting it to the nature and necessities of animated beings. As the earth teems with animated existence, and as the different tribes of animals depend chiefly on the productions of the vegeta- ble kingdom for their subsistence, so there is an abundance and variety of plants adapted to the peculiar constitutions of every in- DOMAINS OF VEGETATION ENLARGING. 89 dividual species. This circumstance demonstrates, that there is a precontrived relation and fitness between the internal constitution of the animal and the nature of the plants which afford it nourish- ment ; and shows us, that the animal and the vegetable kingdoms are the workmanship of one and the same Almighty Being, and that, in his arrangements with regard to the one, he had in view the necessities of the other." Every year is enlarging the domains of the great vegetable world not only in bringing new species and new varieties to our acquaintance, but teaching us new uses of those already known. Substances once considered useless, if not poisonous, are now numbered among the useful articles ; and some of them have been installed among the essential articles of every day life, either for food, clothing, or in the useful arts. We may close this chapter with a reference to a very singu- lar species of tree found on the island of Goa near Bombay. It is, in some of its characteristics, quite unique. It is called the " sorrowful tree," because it only flourishes in the night. At sunset no flowers are to be seen ; and yet, half an hour after, it is quite full of them. They yield a sweet smell ; but the sun no sooner begins to shine upon them than some of them fall off", and others close up ; and thus it continues flow- ering in the night the whole year. " Grace in the soul of the believer," says one, " is just such a flower. In the dark night of affliction it is fresh and fragrant, puts out its bloom and seems full of immortality; but when the sun of prosperity arises and shines upon it, and it is surrounded by earthly com- forts, then for the first time its divine life withers ; it collapses and shuts up its leaves." CHAPTER VI. THE ANIMAL KINGDOM The Scale of Life The " Vast Chain of Being" The Animal World a Counterpart of the Vegetable. IN the brief survey taken of the vegetable kingdom we have seen how, by the most singular variety and profusion, the great Parent has provided for all the varied wants and happi- ness of his creatures. And not only is vegetable life met in every region of the earth, and in every nook and corner where animal want, or appetite, or pleasure can require it ; but such is the exuberance of vegetable nature that " heaths, deserts, uninhabitable islands, and mountains," have been made to pro- duce their peculiar vegetation though such vegetation may contribute, at present, little or nothing to either the wants or pleasures of man or beast. But as we turn to the vast arena of living things we shall discover reasons, not only for the exhaustless profusion and the endlessly varied character of vegetable life, but for a no less intense admiration of the correspondingly profuse and varied productions of animal life. Every department of vegetation is to be regarded as the very counterpart of, and as suited to its respective tenants. The verdant field is the pasture- ground of flocks and herds, and of all the teeming armies of insect-life that feed on its surface. Every forest is the roam- ing ground of its own wild tenants. " The trees of the Lord UNIFORMITY OF NATURE'S LAWS. 91 are full of sap" full of foliage and flowers and nutritious fruits for the use of man and beast, bird and insect " the cedars of Lebanon which he has planted, where the birds make their nests." Every leaf is a play ground and a pasture ground for the numerous tribes that roam and feed and sport on its surface. Every flower, vocal with the songs of its merry ten- ants, is the resort or the residence of numerous families of liv- ing creatures that seek pleasure or perfume or nectarine sweets, or a floral shade or shelter, in its soft and quiet bosom. Every variety of flower has its own peculiar inhabitants that seek in it protection, food or pleasure. Indeed, we shall everywhere discover a beautiful correspondence between the animal and the vegetable worlds. The one is made for the other. We may here remark, once for all, that while the laws of Nature have been so framed by the Great Architect as to secure a specific variety throughout the wide domains of all organized beings, it is a fact, not the less interesting, that the same laws as certainly secure a general uniformity throughout the entire range of animal and vegetable life. There every- where appears a unity of design and composition. Every species of animals or of vegetables is made after the same model, yet how unlike! Every tree or plant has the same general form, structure and functions of life and growth. Every member of the great family of man, every individual horse, sheep, or dog, conforms to one original pattern. A deviation from this makes a monster. And not only does every indi- vidual of every species bear the unmistakable mark of a general uniformity, but every member and function presents the same marks. Though the ears, nose, eyes or hands of no two indi- viduals are alike, yet no two vary so much that you are in the 92 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. least danger of mistaking them as the corresponding members of any other animals, or to lead to doubt whether they are shaped after the same model. We are in no danger of mistak- ing the nose of a dog or a pig for that of a man. Nature's laws of uniformity are as rigidly adhered to as those of variety. In the contemplation of animal life, the first thing that arrests the attention is the gradation of being which we at once discover. This in itself presents another very interesting and extensive series of varieties, and may claim some special consideration. " Vast chain of being ! which from God began, Nature's ethereal, human, angel, man, Beast, bird, fish, insect ! what no eye can see, No glass can reach ; from infinite to thee ; From thee to nothing." Our capacities are at present too limited, and our field of observation too narrow, to attempt to comprehend such a chain or scale of being as is here suggested. Should we take our position at the point or link marked "man," and attempt to look downwards through every descending grade of being to the most imperfect specimen of life to the scarcely organized and the scarcely vital monad, which forms the last link of animate existence; and from the same point were we to attempt to reach upwards, through all the principalities and powers, and thrones and dominions, and whatever grades and orders of intelligences there may be between man, the first in order among intelligent creatures, to the last and highest of finite beings to the great chasm which separates the finite from the Infinite, we should seem to stand between two in- GRADATION OF ANIMAL LIFE. finities : the infinitely high and the infinitely low. Yet neither is infinite, except to our lack of comprehension. Either end of the " vast chain " lies within the boundaries of the finite ; though probably no human conception, in its present range at least, is able to reach to either end. The researches of natural- ists assure us of the existence of such a continuous chain of being, though it is interrupted by chasms, produced perhaps by the extinction of certain species, or quite as often by our ignorance of the existence of the apparently missing links. Certain it is that the number and the length of these chasms are diminish- ing with every new discovery into the great universe of life. But we will take our position at the foot of the scale, or as near the foot as the present state of microscopic research will allow, and try to get at least some imperfect idea of the grada- tion up as far as Man. And what an illimitable field of varied life here stretches out before us. He that sung so well of man has expressed it thus : " Far as creation's ample range extends, The scale of sensual, mental powers ascend ; Mark how it mounts to man's imperial race, From the green myriads in the peopled grass." But we must not forget that the great chain of being does not end when we arrive at the lowest link of animal existence. Animal and vegetable life singularly interlace. There are connecting links which join the two. And then when we have traced down every grade of vegetable life from the most perfect to the least perfect, we shall, at the lower end of the chain, again find our connecting links uniting the vegetable and mineral kingdoms. 94 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. " The smallest microscopical objects which can be supposed to be organic are points, or gelatinous globules, or threads in which no distinct organs, interior or exterior, can be dis- covered." We thence ascend to a class of zoophytes* which bear distinct marks of organization, called porifera or the sponge-makers, or a slightly higher order still, called polype, which construct the coral. Both of these bear strong resem- blance to vegetable growths. From this point of half animal half vegetable organization we may ascend the scale through every conceivable grade, from the senseless polype that vege- tates rather than lives, to the most perfect human organization and intelligence. We shall see how, in form, size, organiza- tion, activity, instinct and intelligence, these rise in beautiful order, one above the other. Passing by the teeming worlds of microscopic life, in which, did the present state of science admit of the requisite investiga- tion, we should doubtless meet the same gradation of being, from the little invisible speck which is half monad half mole- cule, to the equally invisible mite of exquisite form, organiza- tion and color, and full of activity and pleasure, we need only trace up the gradation from the lowest form of visible life from the torpid, senseless, shapeless muscle to the perfectly organized, the active, intelligent being called man. As we ascend through all the numberless grades of creeping things ; through all the aquatic and insect tribes, and through all the varieties of birds and beasts of every wing and hoof till we arrive at the eagle, the dog, the monkey, the beaver, and the * "A term expressing animal plants or vegetating animals, and defined to mean composite animals efflorescing like vegetables," as the sponge, coral, and polypus. MAN AND HIS GEADE. 95 elephant, we shall find we have passed every imaginable grade of animal life in reference to form, size, physical organization, locomotive capabilities, sagacity, instinct and intelligence, find we pass on to man, who stands at the head of all mundane beings, the most perfect in all physical and mental endow- ments, and yet doubtless constituting the lowest link in the chain of intellectual and immortal beings. The gradation in question admits of a wide range of illus- tration. Take hearing, seeing, instinct, strength of muscle, activity whatever attribute of life or endowment you will, and the gradation appears in all these respective lines : " What modes of sight betwixt each wide extreme, The mole's dim curtain and the lynx's beam : Of smell, the headlong lioness between And hound sagacious on the tainted green : Of hearing, from the life that fills the flood To that which warbles in the vernal wood." And what different degrees of instinct guide the brute creation until, in some animals, it seems scarcely inferior to human reason. Or take hearing, seeing, power of muscle, or what attribute of life or animal endowment you will, and you may trace a gradation in each respective line. It is instinct that guides the half-vegetable polyp to deposit his secretion so as to form the coral or the sponge. It is instinct, in its higher office, that teaches the bird to construct her nest. More skil- ful yet, the bee, moved by the same singular impulse, builds her cells and deposits her honey. And, in a yet higher func- tion, instinct impels the beaver, with a sagacity and calculation almost human, to construct his dam and to erect his house. We have alluded to connecting links how the mineral and 96 THE PALACE OF THE GKEAT KING. the vegetable kingdoms so interlace : one species of the one so running into a species of the other, that you can scarcely deter- mine where the one ends and the other begins. Some vege- tables contain mineral substances ; others appear like mineral bodies. Some minerals possess certain forms and properties of vegetable productions : coral is an instance of the former. Though while in the art of forming it presents a rare connection of the animal and mineral kingdoms, yet when constructed and examined as a mineral substance, it presents some striking points of resemblance to the vegetable organizations. The coral often takes the form of trees, groves, gardens, flower-beds, and almost every sort of vegetable organization. There is a liberal interchange of properties between vegetables and minerals. The former become petrified, and the latter are converted into soils, and become incorporated with animal life. But if we look at the other end of the chain of vegetable productions, we shall be still more impressed, as we approach the uncertain line of demarcation between the vegetable and the animal kingdoms, with the very accommodating disposi- tions of the two. We speak not now of the well-known near approach of certain species of vegetables to certain species of animals in point of form and .organization, but father of a singular sort of interchange of productions between the two kingdoms ; or, at least, of attempts on the part of the lower kingdom to overstep its bounds, and to usurp the province of its superior ; an aspiration not unnatural, of the lower order to occupy a higher position in the scale of being. Hence certain vegetables are found to yield animal products, and thus to take the place of the animals whose peculiar properties they INTERLACINGS OF DIFFERENT NATURES. 97 assume. We have vegetable milk, butter, lard, oil, wax, wool, leather. The palo de vaco has undertaken to play the cow ; the myrica to imitate the bee ; a tree in Guayaquil to produce wool ; other trees yield oil, lard, and other animal substances. Nor do we meet these singular interlacings of different na- tures only on the confines of the two kingdoms, but between different species of the same kingdom. They are discovered to exist between fishes and quadrupeds ; between fishes and birds ; between quadrupeds and birds ; and between the brute species and man. The frog, the turtle, the alligator, may be cited as instances of nature's attempts to make the fish per- sonate the quadruped; the flying squirrel, the bat, and the flying opossum indicate the aspirations of legs to become wings. And the same lofty aspirations have possessed certain of the finny tribes, as is seen in the case of the flying-fish. Dragons occupy the transition ground between birds and reptiles. On the other hand, we meet with birds, as the ostrich, the casso- wary and the dodo, which, in their nature and habits, approxi- mate to quadrupeds. Though furnished with wings they can scarcely fly at all, but walk or run like the horse or dog. Other animals, some in one respect, and some in another, essay to overstep the boundaries which separate rational and brute na- tures. The elephant invades the territories of man in his " half reasoning " capabilities ; the monkey in his organization and some of his habits and instincts ; the beaver and the dog, in respect to sagacity and social proclivities. Or we might select a single species and we should not lack examples by which to illustrate our idea of a continuous scale of being. Take the horse, the dog, the cat, or any species of our domestic animals, and what different degrees of 98 THE PALACE OF THE GEE AT KING. sagacity, instinct and activity ! One is stupid and comparative- ly senseless ; another shows a degree of intelligence that is scarcely less than human. But the scale is more distinctly marked, and vastly more extensive, in the animal man. He being an animal capable of indefinite improvement, and en- dowed with reason, and possessed of an indefinite number of wants which science and civilization and his social habits in- duce, and having a vastly wider scope for the exercise of his powers, physical and intellectual, presents a correspondingly wide diversity in all the developments of his mind and in his physical condition. There are, consequently, almost as many grades of men as there are individuals of the race. We begin at the foot of the scale ; where we meet the Es- quimaux or the Hottentot, the most besotted savage, and from this point we ascend, through every degree of advancement, to the climax of human culture and elevation. Wealth, position, mental culture, society and civilization, fortune or personal enterprise and industry, or the cultivation of the moral affec- tions, or all these combined, have ranged men in every imagi- nable grade in the scale, from the most beggarly elements, of humanity which form the lowest state of the race, to man in the highest type of his earthly development. The eminent Christian philosopher occupies such a position ; whose mind and heart are together cultivated in the highest degree, and whose well-sustained position gives him power among men. What a vast chasm between our savage and such a man as Moses, Luther, Newton, Wilberforce, Washington ; or rather the man who should combine in one (as is possible) the peculiar excellences of all these men. Not till we shall be able to count up every intermediate link trace out and define, and WHEEE DOES THE GRADATION CEASE? 99 assign a place in the scale to every individual man, from the lowest to the highest, may we know the number of the links or the length of the chain when contemplated only within the sphere of human life. Regarded as a Divine arrangement designed to produce re- sults of the most useful and benevolent character, we cannot too profoundly admire this gradation of being. We see all things and beings most beautifully fitted, each to its place and work ; all alike necessary to make up the great whole, and to accomplish the great ends of their Divine Author. The end- less diversities of gifts, graces, endowments ; capabilities, pow- ers, susceptibilities, as secured by the singularly diversified character and condition of man, are but so many different adaptations to fulfil the equally varied duties of life: each infinitely varied, yet all beautifully harmonious in the accom- plishment of the same wise purposes. But does the gradation cease when it has passed from man into the regions of celestial life 1 Shall we not find those be- ings of a higher intellectual grade, rising, in ascending scale, one class above another *? And where is the upper end of this chain ? To believe that all those higher Intelligences, which we are wont to call by the general term of angels, are all of the same order and station, and that glorified men differ not in this respect, would be to contradict the whole analogy of things known. And more than this, we have intimations in the sacred Word, that the same analogy does run through all the heavenly hosts. We read of angels, archangels, principat- ties, powers, thrones, dominions, seraphim, cherubim, and the " mighty angels " all which seem to be distinctions of grade. The names of a few angels are given from which we seem to 100 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. get a clue also to tlie orders that exist among them. Gabriel means the power of God ; which seems to designate him as the one approaching nearest to God in respect to power. Michael, means Who is like God ; pointing out perhaps some more gen- eral resemblances in his character to the high and holy One. Speaking of the inhabitants of that blessed world, the Apostle says there is one glory of the sun, another glory of the moon, another of the stars, and that one star differeth from another in glory. Here are distinctions obviously recognized, different degrees of excellence which would seem to imply distinctions of office and rank. Yet we have a still stronger probability, in the nature of the case. All these higher and holier beings are intelligent creatures. They have minds that are doubtless subject to the general laws of mind. They have duties and employments are continually putting forth activities and employing their vast energies of mind ; and, like all intelligent beings, derive their happiness very much from the exercise of their mental powers. Without a succession of new objects, new scenes, new trains of thought, the mind would sicken with satiety and disgust. But the different degrees of mental power and capability is but a different degree of capacity for action ; and this the only true foundation of a difference of rank. Once put the inhabit- ants of the celestial world on a level as to powers of mind and capabilities of action, and you would probably hush, into one dead monotony, the infinitely varied praises of heaven and ar- rest the ten thousand times ten thousand holy activities in which the inhabitants of that blissful world are engaged. One class of those wonderful beings are, perhaps, distinguished by HEAVENLY GRADATIONS. 101 their extraordinary locomotive powers, by which they may be able to visit with the celerity of light the remotest star that sparkles in the universe. Another class may as far excel in astronomical investigations, or the knowledge of other worlds, so that they may guide the researches of others as they essay to search out the " marvellous works" of God, and make these the theme of eternal praise. Others, possessed of a taste and ca- pability, not so much to gauge the dimensions of other worlds, and to grasp the magnitude of the material universe, as to search into the nature, and to study the design, the uses and adaptations of things, unfold, in other interesting aspects, the wonders of creative skill and power. While another class are employing the vast powers of their minds in studying the won- ders of Providence : or, with some peculiar qualifications for the delightful task, the endless, exhaustless theme, they launch forth on the boundless field of the " manifold grace " of God, and from age to age of duration eternal, penetrate into the mysteries of redemption. What various labors of love are to be performed ; what er- rands of mercy to be executed ; what various works of praise to be performed ; what Divine truths and heavenly sciences to be studied; and how are all the "ways" and the " works" of God to be searched out, and lessons of heavenly wisdom, and motives for praise and adoration, to be jdeduced from them ! These are some of the surmises, founded however on the analogy and the nature of things, which induce the belief that the same scale of being which we discover to extend up from the most imperfectly formed mineral substance to the connecting links which unite the mineral and vegetable kingdoms, and thence through all the whole range of vegetable life ; and by 102 THE PAX ACE OF THE GREAT KING. an easy transition into the great world of animal existence, and thence onward through a regular ascending gradation to man, is continued from the lowest in the scale of superhuman intelligences to the most highly endowed Being that surrounds the throne or falls at the feet of the Great I AM. But beyond this our surmises may not attempt to reach. Here we suppose this wonderful chain of being ends. Yet here we find ourselves involved in a singular kind of mystery. We may not for a moment compare finite with Infinite. Here is a chasm, an impassable gulf that they that would pass may not. Yet there has been a singular interchange of the Divine and human natures. The Man of Nazareth was God. The Man at God's right hand sits as God's coequal, to receive and to take to the throne with himself men of an earth-born race. They are, in a sense, while yet in the flesh, " partakers of the Divine nature," and are destined to become such in a much higher sense. We are left here to an interesting conjecture as to how much is implied in the promise of heirship with God, and joint heirship with Christ how much is implied in the idea of being like Christ, and of being perfect as God is perfect. We do not know what relations there may be between the finite and the Infinite. Though the finite can never reach the Infi- nite, yet we know not what approximations may be made to it. When we connect the idea here suggested with the fact (a fact, at least, as far as we know) that the human mind is capable of infinite progress, we are lost in our conjectures as to what, after the laps 3 of countless ages of eternity, may be the final destiny of nmn. Divine Inspiration affords occasional hints of something very much like what I have here intimated. "In Christ UNION WITH THE DIVINE NATURE. 103 dwelletli all the fulness of the Godhead bodily ;" and of all the adopted sons of God, it is said, " of his fulness have we all received." " Ye are complete in him who is the head of all principality and power." In another place the same Apostle, speaking of such as are "strengthened with might by his Spirit, according to the riches of his glory in whose hearts Christ dwells by faith rooted and grounded in love ; that is, all true believers," he says, are "filled with the fulness of God." The expression here used, the fulness of God, may fail, like all other terms used to describe the future blessedness of the saint, to convey a full and definite idea to the mind as at pres- ent capacitated. It conveys a higher idea than we can at pres- ent comprehend an idea in respect to the relation of glorified humanity to God, as glorious and ecstatic as it is mysterious and indefinite. He that leaned on Jesus' bosom reached after the identity, and his faith seemed to grasp it, yet, while impris- oned in the clay, he could not gauge the height and the breadth and the length of the riches and honors and pleasures reserved in heaven for the righteous. "Behold," says he, "what man- ner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God. It doth not yet appear what we shall be : but we know that when he shall appear, we shall be like him ; for we shall see him as he is." A most extraordi- nary announcement, intimating, no doubt, the wonderful, the unutterable destiny of poor fallen humanity. CHAPTER VII. THE ANIMAL KINGDOM: Species of Animals Individual Varieties Organs of Loco- motionLegs, Wings, Eyes, Ears, Noses Clothing Habitations Weapons of Defence The Feathered Tribes. IN our visit to Nature's great Museum we have allowed the eye to take a cursory glance over the whole " vast chain of being," from the most imperfectly formed object to the noble creature man, and thence onward through all the orders of higher in- telligences to the highest and holiest angel that bows before the throne of the Great ETERNAL. We will now turn aside and look in upon a single department of the great Palace. We recur to the animal kingdom, and limit ourselves at present chiefly to the brute creation. As we traverse this wide field of research we shall, as we pass from object to object, especially note, as displaying the peculiar beauty of the Divine workmanship, the singular vari- ety which characterizes the whole. We have seen what a beautiful succession and gradation of life there is from the most imperfectly organized, jelly-like polype to the noble elephant, or the sagacious dog or monkey ; each seeming to rival, in sagaci- ty and reason, man himself. Every link in this vast chain is a variety. But this is but the beginning of animal varieties scarcely more than a variety equal to the number of species. SPECIES OF ANIMALS. 105 But the moment you descend to sub-species and individuals, the number of varieties are multiplied beyond all computation. Here we might spend our threescore years and ten, regal- ing each successive moment with some new variety. Not less, all told, than 250,000* species of living animals, exclusive of fossil species, have been enumerated, including, in all, some billions of individuals or actual varieties. Man alone, in each successive generation, affords a specimen of 800,000,000 indi- vidual varieties. And were we to descend to details, this im- mense number would need to be increased by the aggregate of all the varieties of each individual man ; physical, mental, moral, social ; varieties of form, structure, size ; of taste, tem- perament and condition ; of genius, habit and aptitude. Sup- pose the entire race of quadrupeds only, were for a moment to occupy the field of our vision, what an idea should we get of the manifold wisdom of God in moulding matter into so many living forms. Allow the mind to run down through all the * It is estimated that there are 20,000 vertebrated animals ; there are probably 2,000 species of mammals, 6,000 of birds, and 2,000 of reptiles. There are probably 8,000 or 10,000 species of fishes, and more than ] 5,000 of mollusks. It is difficult to estimate the number of species of articulated animals ; it is supposed there are from 60,000 to 80,000 species of insects alone, and at least 100,000 of all the species belonging to this department, including microscopical animals, while some estimate it at double that number. Of the radiata, or fourth great division of the animal kingdom, there are about 10,000 species, making about 250,000 species of living an- imals, to say nothing of fossil species. In the gallery of zoology of the Jardin des Plantes at Paris, it is estimated that there are more than 200,000 specimens of the animal kingdom, among which are 2,000 of the mammalia of 500 different species, and 5,000 of fishes of about 2,500 species. 5* 106 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. intermediate grades, from the huge, "half-reasoning" elephant to the insignificant mole, contemplating their respective form, size, color, nature, habits, dispositions .and uses, and what an idea will you get of the diversified character of the Divine workmanship ! But would we avail ourselves of the happiest illustrations of our subject, we must descend to species, sub-species and in dividual*. In almost any race of animals we meet a great variety of forms, statures, colors, but they are the most numer- ous in the domesticated animals. Take for examples, the dog, the horse, the ox, goats and swine. The dog affords a fine specimen, not only of the usual variety in animal life, but, be- ing as he is the companion of man in all lands and latitudes, he affords an equally good specimen of the tendency of provi- dential arrangements to produce variety. The hairless, smooth, unctuous-skinned dog of Egypt is scarcely more like the shaggy fur-clad dog of the cold regions of the north, than the northern sheep is like the southern goat.- Whoever will have the curi- osity to run down the line of dogs, from the bloodhound to the lady's pet-dog or poodle, inclusive, he will not lack an inter- esting illustration of our theme. But a cursory survey of this kind would at once lead us into the inquiry as to the origin of dogs, whether from some one species, as the shepherd's dog, the present varieties origi- nating in climate, condition, usage, circumstance ; or whether their origin shall be traced to the fox, the jackal or the wolf, or to each of these sources. But whether the original type be one or many, no animal offers more varieties. The water dog is covered with curly hair almost as thick as the fleece of a sheep ; the Turkish dog, like DOGS, OXEN, GOATS AND HOENED HOESES. 10 V the Egyptian, is totally destitute of hair. Then there is the gaunt greyhound, with long and slender nose and legs, and remarkable for his swiftness and the quickness of his scent. Another species of hound is of a thick, robust form, with a short, obtuse nose, less swift, but not of a less keen sense of smell. But we should not soon find an end of the varieties of this species of animal. In form, size, color, dispositions, apti- tudes, and the various ways in which they serve man, they bear a no slight resemblance to our own race. The horse and the ox kinds furnish exceedingly interesting varieties. Between the noble Arab and the contemptible pack- horse of Northern Germany or South America, how varied the gradations. In size, form, structure, qualities, capabilities, color, temperament, how varied. We meet the long-legged ox of the Cape of Good Hope and the short-legged cattle of England cattle with long horns and short horns with all sorts of horns and no horns. In Crete and Sicily, the cattle and sheep differ from those of most other countries in the number and size of their horns. In Paraguay we meet a breed of oxen without horns. A writer (Azara) has stated that the lack of horns in the bovine kind, is sometimes compensated by the fact that horses are sometimes seen rearing above their ears a pair of horns. In India, we have often seen sheep furnished with four horns each. The goat tribes furnish fine specimens of variety. A breed near Jerusalem, presents a grotesque medley of color, as black, white, gray, with ears remarkably long. About Aleppo are two kinds of goats, one like the English, and the other some- what larger, with ears a foot long and proportionally broad. In few races of animals has Nature been more lavish of he* 108 THE PALACE OF THE GEE AT KING. ingenuity in variegating her works, than in the swine tribes. This very common and numerous species of animal, was un- known in America till after its discovery by the Spaniards, yet already, how one breed differs from another, and how all differ from the original stock. The European swine which were first carried by the Spaniards to the Island of Cologna, degenerated into a monstrous race, with toes which were half a span in length. The hoofs of swine elsewhere, have been found divided into five clefts. While, on the other hand, swine with solid hoofs were known to the ancients, as they are found to this day, in some parts of England. And different breeds of sheep afford varieties equally remarkable. Some have a coating of wool as fine as silk, others, a covering as coarse as hair. Some have two horns ; some, as the Icelandic, three, four, and even eight ; and more have none at all. And these horns assume every conceivable form. And what variety in the appendages called tails. Some range within reasonable limits of such appendages ; others are hugely large. The Syrian sheep drag after them a caudal weight of fifteen pounds, and sometimes five times that weight. The domestic foiql is a good example. It is large or small, tall or dwarfish single or double-combed of every conceiva- ble color and plumage tufts of feathers on its head yellow, white or black legs, or legs covered with feathers or bare, and rumps or no rumps. The coverings and habitations of animals furnish another pleasant variety in their history ; among the most obvious of which we meet hair, wool, fur, bristles, feathers, quills, scales and shells ; and we find them constructing for themselves, or appropriating to their use, every imaginable form and kind of THE BEAVER AND HIS HABITS. 109 dwelling : some dig burrows in the earth ; others seek a habi- tation in the clefts of rocks, or in the cavities of decayed trees, and others absolutely construct cabins or houses with no incon- siderable skill and labor. The subject is a very curious one and worthy of some reflection. The various skill employed, the various materials used, and the various structures produced, affords an apt illustration of our general idea. We can name but a few instances. The beaver is perhaps one of the most extraordinary. These wonderful animals, at present scarcely known in our latitudes, yet still inhabiting more northern regions, collect in communities of 200 or 300 in the month of June or July, pouring in from every quarter, as to an appointed rendezvous, by some common summons or by some singular impulse. The place of assemblage is always the bank of some water. If it be a lake or pond, and not subject to risings or fallings above a common level, they make no dam, but immediately set about constructing their habitations. If a dam be needful, they be- take themselves to its construction in a manner quite astonish- ing. First, they fell a large tree across the stream as the basis of their work, and then by the aid of smaller trees, cut to the right length, and boughs and earth, or stones, they con- struct a dam which, for strength and solidity, is all but incred- ible. This being accomplished, the community at once divide themselves into separate families, each constructing for itself a domestic dwelling, which they build near the margin of the pond, on piles driven down for the purpose. On these they erect a round or oval house of great solidity ; one, two and sometimes three stories high, with two doors, the one affording a passage to the land and the other to the water. 110 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. The varied styles of architecture employed by different species of birds, in the construction of their nests, the different materials used, and the different locations and positions selected, have been greatly admired. No two species con- struct their nests of precisely the same material. Some use mud or clay ; some sticks, grass, hair, moss, feathers, or bones cemented together; and no two build in the same place. Some choose the cavities of trees, or the branch, or some slen- der twig of a tree, or the trunk of the tree ; others select the cleft of a rock, or build in some sheltered place on the ground, or attach their nests to a wall or chimney, or the rafter of a barn, or the cross-piece of a bridge. The kingly eagle selects the lone peak of some lofty mountain, constructs a substantial platform, designed to last for years, of sticks of five or six feet long, supported at each end by a rock or tree, and covered with successive layers of heath and rushes. The surface which contains the eggs is flat, not hollow like the nests of other birds. Quite in contrast to this, the magpie and the titmouse build nests which are not only hollow like the nests of most birds, but are protected by a curiously wrought dome, and entered by an opening in the side. " Some form their pensile nests in the form of a purse, deep, and open at the top ; others, with a hole in the side ; and others, still more cautious, with an en- trance at the very bottom, forming their lodge near the sum- mit." The tailor-bird, not willing to trust its nest even at the extremity of a twig, fixes it to a leaf. It picks a dead leaf, and with its bill for a needle and some fine fibres for thread, sews it to a living leaf, which, lined with feathers, gossamer and down, serves as a nest. The mason-bee constructs its cells and covers them with a BEES, WASPS AND ANTS. Ill ro.igh, substantial mortar, composed of sand and a secretion from its own body. The bee called the wood-piercer perforates a dry or decayed tree, first in the direction of the heart, and then extending twelve or fifteen inches at right angles up- wards. These long holes are subdivided by partitions com- posed of particles of wood cemented by a secretion from the animal's mouth. In each compartment an egg is deposited, together with the necessary provision for the young one when hatched. Another species of these " solitary bees " construct cells somewhat similar under ground, and having in like man- ner provided for their future offspring, leave them, as in the case above, to take care of themselves. Most people are aware of the ingenious devices by which various kinds of wasps construct their habitations, build their cells and provide for their young ; all, however, are surpassed by the skill and sagacity of the honey-bee. The various species of ants have each a style of architecture, and use a species of building material peculiar to itself. Some construct a habitation below the surface of the earth ; some drill holes in trees and form their nests there ; others build on the trunks or branches of trees ; while others still, as the termites, erect palaces, partly below ground, yet extending above the surface twelve or fifteen feet. These " ant hills," met in tropical regions, are built with an astonishing degree of skill and labor. They contain a great variety of apartments, and, as seen from a distance,, might be taken for the huts of the natives. As nearly related to the above, we have the various modes in which different animals nourish or provide for their offspring. The mammalia nourish theirs from their own body. The do- domestic fowl scratches for hers. Most birds bring food to 112 THE PALACE OF THE GEEAT KING. their young in their bills. Bees and wasps of different kinds provide stores for their young beforehand. The wood-piercer, to which I have referred, builds the cell and fills it with pro- vision for the young ones, deposits her eggs, and exercises no further regard for either eggs or young ones. The young of some species are from the very first capable of providing for themselves. Again, we discover among animals a curious variety in modes of procuring their food. Some seek it, labor hard for it, and prepare it at great expense ; others have it brought to them all prepared, without any care or trouble to themselves. The toad patiently waits till the heedless fly comes within the in- fluence of its suction, when it is drawn in and devoured. The chicken, with his delicate nippers, picks up the seed or bug it has disinterred with its claws. The domestic animals depend for their supplies on the care of man. The tenants of the forest and the birds of the air procure their daily supplies in all sorts of ways and by all sorts of means. And there is also as great a diversity in modes of appro- priating food or bringing it to the mouth. Most animals ha,ve no other prehensile organ but the mouth itself, whether it be a bill, or jaws, or snout or proboscis. A few, as the squirrel, the monkey, can bring their food to their mouth by their fore-paws acting as hands. Some animals, by means of their claws and bill or teeth, first tear their food and separate it into small por- tions and then convey it to the mouth ; others can appropriate nothing except what they can swallow whole ; some are sup- plied with a spoon, or a knife, or a fork, or a hook ; others, as the elephant, with a flexible arm. The wood-pecker darts his long tongue into a crevice of the wood, and thence extracts his EYES AND MODES OF VISION. 113 food. Some tribes of animals, as vinegar eels, having no mouth, seem to take their food by absorption. There is also a like variety in modes of vision. Some see through eyes, some without them. - And there is no stereo- typed fashion in the matter of eyes. In few things has Na- ture's love of variety been more capriciously displayed. Most animals have eyes which are so numerously supplied with delicate muscles that they may fix on almost an infinite num- ber of points in more than half a hemisphere, without chang- ing the position of the head. Some have eyes in different parts of the body. One species of butterfly, and that by no means among the largest, is reported by the wise men of the microscope to have " nearly 35,000,000 eyes." These are dis- tributed over every part of the body, and thus, whatever may be the position of the insect, " no danger can approach unper- ceived, as a sentinel keeps watch in every quarter." Other insects, as the beetle, the silk-worm, and several kinds of flies, have two fixed eyes or protuberances, which are supplied, some with two, some with eight, some with a hundred or a thousand lenses, which are capable of seeing in every direction. The whole surface of these protuberances, as seen in the fly, is covered with a multitude of small hemi- spheres, placed with the utmost regularity in rows, crossing each other in a kind of lattice-work. These little hemispheres have each of them a minute transparent convex lens in the middle, each of which has a distinct branch of the optic nerve ministering to it ; so that the different lenses may be con- sidered as so many distinct eyes. Mr. Lewenhock counted 6,236 in the two eyes of a silk-worm when in its fly state ; 3,180 in each eye of the beetle ; 8,000 in the two eyes of a 114 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. common fly. Mr. Hook reckoned 14,000 in the eyes of a drone fly, and in .one of the eyes of a dragon-fly there have been reckoned 13,500 of these lenses; in both eyes 27,000 ; every one of which is capable of forming a distinct image of any ob- ject, in the same manner as a common convex glass. There are 27,000 images formed on the retina of this little animal.* Mr. Lewenhock having prepared the eye of a fly for the pur- pose, and so adjusted it in respect to his microscope that he could look through both, in the manner of a telescope, looked at the steeple of a church, which was 299 feet high, and 750 distant. He could plainly see through every little lens the whole steeple inverted, though not larger than the point of a needle. When he directed it to a neighboring house, he saw not only the front, but the doors and the windows ; and could discern whether the windows were open or shut. " Such an exquisite piece of Divine mechanism transcends all human comprehension." Similar remarks might be made in respect to the teeth, ears, noses, and snouts or bills of animals. Some have teeth both on the upper and lower jaw ; others only on the lower. In some each stands separate ; in others they stand continuous and united. Some teeth are straight, others hooked ; some slen- der and pointed for tearing, biting, or holding only ; others firm and blunt, for chewing and grinding. The palate of some fishes is nothing else than a bony plate studded with points which perform the office of teeth. And more curiously varied yet would be the portraits of the ears and noses of every species of animal. But to pass that singu- lar appendage called the ear, wondering how it were possible * Dick's Christian Philosopher, pp. SO, 81. THE FOOD OF ANIMALS. 115 there could be so many distinct patterns of one and the same thing, we will pause a moment at that anterior extremity of the animal called the nose, snout, or bill. And what an endless variety in shape, structure and use. There is the proboscis of the elephant ; the snout of a certain fish ; the rooter of the swine ; the peculiar bill of the stork ; the spoon of one bird and the drill of another. And so we might go through the whole catalogue of beasts, birds, fish and insects ; we should recog- nize in this curious variety, the wise and benevolent provisions by which every species of animal is fitted to its place and mode of life. The same benevolent arrangement appears again in the di- versified predilections of different animals for different kinds of food and different modes of life. Perhaps there is not a substance, either vegetable or animal, dead or alive, which does not serve as food for some species of animals. Every kind of flesh, fish, fowl and insect, is peculiarly adapted to the taste of some animal. Even what is poison to one is food for another. What is avoided and rejected by one is sought and eagerly de- voured by another. Some carniverous animals will feed on nothing but dead carcasses ; others select some particular part of the fresh carcass ; others will appropriate no part but the blood. Infinitely diversified as are the productions of vegeta- ble nature, there is probably not a grain, fruit, leaf, grass or plant, which is not adapted to meet some animal want. And so we may say of all kinds of flesh. There is no such thing as a useless order of beings, whether herb, insect or larger an- imal. Each has its place and use in the great system of life and activity though it be the most noisome insect or the bit- terest herb. Strike one from existence and you have not only 116 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. mutilated the great machine, but you have annihilated a whole order of beings by annihilating its means of subsistence. And the annihilated order, serving, as it did, as the sustenance of another order, that is in turn annihilated ; and so on from or- der to order, till the whole vast series would at length disap- pear. Open the volume where you will, the wonders of Philoso- phy afford profuse examples of a character such as are adduced above. I quote the following : " The polypus, like the fabled hydra, receives new life from the knife which is lifted to de- stroy it. There are 4,041 muscles in a caterpillar. Hook dis- covered 14,000 mirrors in the eyes of a drone ; and to effect the respiration of a carp, 13,300 arteries, vessels, veins and bones, &c., are necessary. The body of every spider contains four lit- tle masses pierced with a multitude of imperceptible holes, each hole permitting the passage of a single thread ; all the threads, to the amount of a thousand to each mass, join together when they come out, and make the single thread with which the spider spins his web ; so that what we call a spider's thread consists of more than 4,000 united. Lewenhock, by means of micro- scopes, observed spiders no bigger than a grain of sand, which spun thread so fine that it took 4,000 of them to equal in mag- nitude a single hair." Again, we discover, as we allow the eye to pass over Na- ture's great Menagerie, curious varieties in modes of locomotion. Some walk upright, some on two, four or more feet some hop some crawl. Others move by continued contortions of the body and spinal motions, propelling the body forward, as the serpent ; some move by elevating the centre of the body, draw- ing up the hinder part, and then protruding the forward part OEGANS OF LOCOMOTION. 117 of the body. Some are rowed by fins ; others soar on their wings as borne on the air. Some roll as a wheel. Others, as the nautilus and the argonaut, are able to raise a sail and make the wind their locomotive power. Or the apparatus that at one time serves as a sail, may be gathered up and used as an oar. Dr. Nordmann, in his curious examinations of animalcula, speaks of one species which he discovered in the intestinal canal of a very singular little insect that infests the eye of the perch, as possessed of a very unique locomotive power. When separated from the membrane which inclosed them, they im- mediately turned round on their axis with great velocity, and then jumped a certain distance in a straight line, when they again revolved, and again took a second leap. The oyster, till recently supposed to be without the power of locomotion, manages to change locality, though at a very indifferent speed, by squirting water from his shell, by which means he agitates the water about him, and thus propels him- self forward. Another bivalve, the muscle, moves itself by a sort of tongue, capable of contraction and elongation, and serves as an arm and a foot. The snail, with his house on his back, moves on at a pace and in a manner peculiarly his own. And the organs of locomotion exhibit an equally interest- ing variety : legs of every shape and structure, and in all num- bers ; fins of every conceivable pattern ; and wings from the mere extension of the skin of the bat, or the flying-squirrel, to the long, perfect wings of the swallow, or of the noble eagle. Some animals are furnished with two legs, some with four, some with twenty, a hundred or a thousand. And some wend their way over the earth with great swiftness without 118 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. legs. Some, as I have said, move over the face of the water by means of sails. There is a single instance of a species of insects called Molluscans, which have but one leg. But this one leg serves the purpose, too, of a hand ; which, at one time, spins the fine silken thread by which it is attached to the rock, or it serves as an auger to bore the rock and prepare its lodgment there, or it is used for certain purposes as a trowel. Some animals are prepared with organs for climbing, others for burrowing, others for perforating trees for food or a habitation : or for ensnaring an enemy, or tearing to pieces a victim. The varied structure, uses and adaptations of legs, is a curious affair. The legs of insects that swim are peculiarly fitted to it, either by being expanded somewhat like an oar, or by having a dense fringe of hair upon them. The water-boat- man swims on his back by means of singularly formed legs. The little whirligig swims by the help of his legs, which are paddle-shaped. Some insects, by means, it may be, of some peculiar secretion which repels water, are able to walk on its surface as readily as upon a solid substance. Another class have legs of so peculiar a structure that they can fold them upon each other and pack them into a very small surface. This is particularly the case in a species of woodlouse, which rolls itself up into a ball precisely resembling a bead or a pill. But the delusion is easily detected, as the girl learned, when having found in the garden, as she supposed, a large number of round, black, shining beads, streaked with white, undertook to form them into a necklace. The point of her needle soon brought out a protruding head, which quite spoiled the rotun- dity of the bead. THE MOTION OF ANIMALS. 119 Indeed, we can scarcely contemplate a subject of more pleasing interest than the motions of animals by what organs performed and to what end and how varied. Now we see various species of living beings, hugely great and beautifully small, gliding through the waters, with an ease, rapidity and grace quite astonishing. Then we behold the bird of every wing, with equal ease and grace, sailing through the air ; as- cending above the clouds, or diving to the earth, or poising itself in mid-heaven to say nothing of all the endlessly varied motions of all that creep or" walk or run upon the face of the earth, or under the earth. But our wonder is vastly increased when we attempt to enter the interior of one of these living machines, and examine the singularly varied arrangements and provisions by which these endlessly diversified motions of sentient beings are pro- duced. Every motion of every hand, foot, finger, joint, eye or tongue ; of every fin, wing, paddle or sail, is produced by its own peculiar set of joints, muscles and tendons, according to the species of the animal and the character of the action to be produced. Hundreds of muscles are employed in the motions of the eye alone. In moving it up or down, or to either side ; in dilating or contracting the pupil ; or adjusting the eye for a near or remote vision, different sets of muscles are employed : and so in all the various and peculiar motions of the fingers and wrists of the human body or in the more delicate (and sometimes involuntary) motions of breathing, tasting and smell- ing. Every distinct motion has its peculiar organs. What forethought, contrivance and skill are displayed in this mat- ter of vital activity! What nice calculations as to bones, nerves, muscles, tendons, joints, and all the varied apparatus 120 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. which secures, or directly produces motion. We admire the genius that contrives, builds and successfully sets and keeps in motion a great and complicated piece of machinery. How many wheels, arrd bands, and wires ; cogs, coils, screws, pins, loops, and all sorts of appurtenances of all forms, sizes and uses, are combined to secure the successful working of the whole machine. But what is this compared to the mechanism of an animal body, which secures, with perfect ease, and oftentimes by con- trivances inconceivably delicate, the ten thousand motions of the living machine. It is a "harp of a thousand strings." Strange that it keeps in tune so long. Again, as we look over the great arena of animal existence, we discover a variety none the less interesting in modes and instruments of attack and defence. Among the more obvious and powerful weapons of warfare with which nature has fur- nished its creatures, we see horns, hoofs, antlers, teeth and claws. Bees, wasps, and some other insects are armed with a sting. The king of the feathered tribes smites his enemy with his wing. The monarch of the deep strikes with his tail. With this mighty weapon he might sink a ship. The king of the woods awes into obedience the tenants of the forest, or executes vengeance on his enemies, or siezes and tears his victims of prey, by means of claws and teeth. One kind of fish, called the sword-fish, is furnished with a weapon of defence or attack in a long sword-like snout. The cuttle-fish eludes the pursuit of his enemy, by enveloping himself with a black fluid which he has the power to emit from his mouth. Cattle when at- tacked by a bear or other rapacious beasts, will form a close phalanx and show a formidable array of horns. Under similar MODES OF DEFENCE. 121 circumstances, horses will form a close line and give an enemy a broadside of heels. Some animals, as the porcupine and hedgehog, are defend- ed by a singular coat of armor. They are armed on their sides and back with spines or quills, which prove formidable to dogs, wolves or any animal that should attempt to capture them. These animals, too, have the power to roll themselves up like a ball, and in this form they present a phalanx of spears which no animal will knowingly attack. The defence and security of some animals lie in their strength ; of others, in their swiftness ; of others, as the fox, in their cunning. Many seek protection by burrowing in the earth. Oysters, clams, and all the various species of shell-fish, are furnished with a hard, calcareous covering, within which they have the power to ensconce themselves and remain secure from every attack. The spider ingeniously weaves his web, and not only sits in the centre secure from harm, but entraps his unwary victim. The ant digs a hole in the sand and then conceals herself in the bottom till her prey falls in, and she devours it. Other animals have the power of slaying their prey by infusing a poison into their veins and producing almost in- stant death. But one of the most singular and effective modes of self- defence remains yet to be mentioned. It is that of the North American skunk. This animal, when attacked, or threatened with danger, is able to discharge on its assailants, " an intol- erable stifling stench," which is quite sure to give the assailant the worst of the battle. Perfectly confident in the potency of his munitions of war and feeling quite safe behind his intrench- ments, the skunk is one of the most fearless animals to be met. 6 122 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. So unsuspicious is he of danger, that he seems to invite attack , but woe to the assailant, man or beast, who dares to encounter the artillery of such a foe. Sometimes an inexperienced dog is seen to attempt to seize this formidable foe ; he finds him- self utterly discomfited, and runs away howling and endeavor- ing to thrust his nose into the ground. I had designed to make a more special reference to the feathered tribes. This department of Natural History is everywhere rich in beautiful varieties. You may trace them up, through a most charming succession, all the way from the exquisite little humming-bird to the heaven-daring eagle note the songsters of the morning, not only as to size, form and plumage, but as to the diversified character and sweetness of their notes, as in the compass of their music they pass through two, and sometimes three octaves. And how they differ in sprightliness, beauty, and a thousand distinctive characteris- tics. You may traverse, and search every meadow, river, island and shore, till you have seen every bird of every wing, and you will but find Nature's love for variety yet more and more beautifully illustrated. " The feathered tribes form one of the most beautiful and striking features of creation. Their varied and often brilliant plumage, and infinite diversity of form and size and color, with their peculiar powers of flight, often accompanied with the precious gift of song, combine, with their habits, instincts and endearing associations, to render them objects of special in- terest." CHAPTER VIII. The Animal Kingdom The Microscopic "World : Yariety of Temperament Sagacity Activity Precocity Productiveness- Migrations of Animals Fishes. WE have no need to stop at the boundary beyond which the unassisted eye cannot reach. We may plunge deep as we will into that world of wonderful workmanship which the micro- scope alone reveals, and survey its boundless domains of ani- mal life, and we shall find that our principle will hold to the uttermost verge of microscopic vision. The same never-failing variety pervades all this exquisitely delicate workmanship. In the brief survey already made in the field of animated existence, we have had occasion to admire, not only the " mul- titudinous races " that people every element and clime, and all the ever-changing, ever-varied forms and natures which meet the eye in every region of animal life, but we had occasion to admire no less profoundly the endless profusion of living beings with which every object teems. Earth, air, water, is instinct with life. Vegetables, flowers and animals themselves, both dead and alive, supply habitations and food for their various tribes of living beings. " What profusion of being is displayed in the wide expanse of the ocean, through which are scattered such various and such unknown multitudes of ani- mals." And in the yet broader and deeper expanse of the 124 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. atmosphere, what a boundless field of animal existence ; and how varied and multitudinous, from the kingly eagle down through every imaginable diversity of form, size, habits, char- acter and pursuits, to the minutest living speck that floats in the air. And if we traverse every region of the globe, " from the scorching sands of the equator to the icy realms of the poles, or from the lofty mountain summits to the dark abysses of the deep ; if we penetrate into the shades of the forest, or into the caverns and secret recesses of the earth ; nay, if we take up the minutest portion of stagnant water, we still meet with life in some new and unexpected form, yet ever adapted to the circumstances of its situation. Wherever life can be sustained, we find life pro'duced. It would almost seem as if nature had been thus lavish and sportive in her productions with the intent to demonstrate to man the fertility of her re- sources, and the inexhaustible fund from which she has so pro- digally supplied the means requisite for the maintenance of all these diversified combinations, for their repetition in endless perpetuity, and for their subordination to one harmonious scheme of general good."* But the moment we pass the line which divides the visible from the invisible, and enter the domains of life revealed by the microscope, we find ourselves amid worlds before unknown. And nothing more astonishes us at the first discovery, than the strange profusion of life that now meets us at every turn. The microscope has here revealed worlds of wonders which a century ago were not suspected to exist. It is found that all things teem with life. "These less than the least of all * Roget's Bridgewater Treatise. Vol. i., p. 25. MICROSCOPIC TRIBES. 125 the creatures " that are visible to the unassisted eye, inhabit the water, float in the air, are found in the blood and fluids of the body, in the tartar of the teeth, in animal and in vegetable substances, in vinegar and in paste, in fruits, grains, seeds and flowers ; in the dry sand, and on every green leaf. And not only are tribes of living beings found in the blood, the brain and the intestines of larger animals, but other tribes have been discovered to inhabit the eyes of different animals and the gills of fishes. Quadrupeds, birds, reptiles and fishes have each their eye-worms. Dr. Nordmann, the German Naturalist already quoted, has made some very curious obser- vations here more especially his discoveries m the eyes of different species of the perch. In a single eye of this fish he sometimes discovered as many as 360 of these animalcula. So numerous a family feed, revel and rest in the single eye of a little fish. Other tribes make their habitations on the gills of fishes. The little minute speck of life which the Doctor dis- covered on the gills of the bream were not the less remarkable in respect to number and size, but more wonderful in relation to form and structure. Among the varieties of shapes, colors and structures of these minim hosts, he mentions a very singu- lar one, to which he gives the name of Diplozoon, or double animal. Unlike the compound insects, which have several mouths protruding from one stem or body, giving it the ap- pearance of a vegetable growth (another connecting link), these double animals, like the Siamese twins, are formed of two distinct bodies, united in the middle, so as to present the ap- pearance of a St. Andrew's Cross, each half of the animal con- taining precisely the same organs. Nor does the series of life in this singular locality stop here. 126 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. The same indefatigable observer has discovered that "these little pests, small as they are, have parasites of their own." He observed " little brown dots or capsules " attached to the intestinal canal, which, when opened, there issued forth living animalcula, which not only presented unique forms and struc- tures, but were singularly curious in their modes of locomotion. As already noticed, when speaking of the motions of animals, they, on being set at liberty from the membrane that contains them, immediately turn round on their axis, then jump a cer- tain distance in a straight line, when they again revolve and again take a leap. So replet* indeed is every thing with this animalcula life as to have given rise to the theory that, in like manner as the earth and every inanimate thing is formed of an endless number of infinitely minute particles, so every animal organiza- tion is constituted of living atoms ; so minute indeed that mil- lions might graze on a single leaf or revel in a drop of water. - But, as is known in reference to the magnitude of creation that no increased power of the telescope approaches any limit of creation in that direction, so, in relation to the other extreme, as, with microscope in hand, we plunge into the regions of in- visible minuteness, no investigations have indicated any limit of creative power here. As the astronomer, with every new power of his instrument, finds himself introduced into new fields of ether, all resplendent with worlds, and sees evidence that illimitable fields lie beyond the reach of every increased power of his telescope, equally, no doubt, the habitations of worlds as mighty and resplendent as those within the range of his vision, so the practical naturalist informs us, that with every improvement of his microscope he is introduced into new WONDEES OF THE MICBOSCOPE. 127 fields of life, and discovers new wonders of living minuteness; and still " those that defy all present methods of assisting the sight and consequently remain undetected, may far exceed those we know." And the same writer supposes these minim animals out-number, " beyond all statement of numbers," the whole aggregate of all the other animals that people the globe that they " probably enter into us, circulate in our blood, nestle between our teeth, are everywhere busy," but they remained hidden from all human observation till the invention of the microscope raised the veil and introduced us to these new worlds of wonders. But we are not at present so much concerned with either the profusion of created things, or with the minuteness and the exquisitively beautiful workmanship of the Divine hand, as we are with the strangely diversified character of these works. Of this we seem to have illustrations more and more profuse and beautiful, as we descend from the less to the more minute. The enthusiasm of naturalists, as they enter these enchanting fields, would lead us to suppose that all we have seen of variety in the larger types of animal life, as already referred to, afford, at best, but meagre specimens, compared with those furnished by the teeming millions of insects and animalcula which inhabit the crust of the earth, or by the creeping things of the ocean. These present a variety surpassing all our powers of conception if regard be had only to color, size and form. But if all the marked diversities of adaptations, uses of parts, dispositions and activities be admitted in tothe account, the field is vastly widened. Astonishing discoveries have been made among the innumerable worlds of animalcula and ephemeral insects. Thou- sands have been discovered in a single drop of water, and tens 128 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. of thousands on a single leaf. Each is a world teeming with its own population. But what more excites our admiration is that all its puny tribes are distinguished by even a greater variety, if possible, than characterizes all other material things. An ingenious naturalist gives the following result of his ex- amination of a single strawberry plant : " The insects which I observed, were all distinguishable from each other, by their color, their forms and their motions. Some of them shone like gold, others were of the color of silver or brass. Some were spotted, some striped ; they were blue, green, brown and chest- nut. The heads of some were round like a turban ; those of others were drawn out in the figure of a cone ; here it was dark as a tuft of black velvet, there it sparkled like a ruby." The wings of some, he says, were "long and brilliant, like trans- parent plates of mother-of-pearl ; " others, " short and broad, resembling net-work of the gauze." Such may be taken as a specimen of the variegated inhab- itants of those diminutive worlds, which, on account of their extreme minuteness, elude the naked vision of man. Another ingenious observer, as he contemplates "-the amaz- ing varieties " of the microscopic world, says of the strangely diminutive forms of life which pass within the vision of his in- strument : u One is a long and slender line ; another, an eel or a serpent ; some are circular, eliptical or triangular ; one is a thin, flat plate ; another, like a number of reticulated seeds ; several have a long tail, almost invisible, or their posterior part is terminated by two robust horns ; one is like a funnel ; another like a bell, or cannot be referred to any object familiar to our senses." Other singular peculiarities are also described. Some of these minims of life possess the most wonderful con- MOTIONS OF ANIMALS. 129 trol over their own size and forms. Some can change their figure at pleasure. They may extend themselves to an immod- erate length, and then contract to almost nothing. Now they are seen curved like a leech, then coiled like a serpent ; now inflated much beyond its usual bulk, then flaccid and almost vanished. Some are opaque, while others are so transparent as to be scarcely visible. And the motions of these wonderful tribes, present varie- ties not the less interesting. Some are said to swim with the velocity of an arrow ; others drag their bodies with seeming difficulty, and some seem to exist in perfect rest. One is seen to revolve on its centre, or the exterior part of its head ; others move "by undulations, leaps, oscillations or successive gyra- tions." Indeed, it is affirmed that there is no kind of animal motion, or mode of progression that is not practised by ani- malcula. We may indulge a moment's glance at another of these in- visible worlds of beauty and variety a world circumscribed within the limits of a single carnation, as laid open by the microscope and described by the pen of Sir John Hill. Dis- tending the lower part of the flower, and, under a full light, adapting his microscope to take in, at one view, the whole base of the flower, he discovered "troops of little insects frisking with wild jollity among the narrow pedestals that supported its leaves, and the little threads that occupied its centre. The base of the flower had become a vast plain ; the slender stems of leaves become trunks of so many stately cedars ; the threads in the middle seemed columns of massy structure, supporting, at their top, their several ornaments j and the narrow spaces between were enlarged into walks, parterres and terraces. On 6* 130 THE PALACE OF THE GEE AT KING. the polished bottoms of these, brighter than Parian marble, walked in pairs, alone, or in larger companies, the winged in- habitants. These, from little dusky flies (as seen by the naked eye) were raised to glorious, glittering animals, stained with living purple, and with a glossy gold that would have made all the labors of the loom contemptible in the comparison. " I could, at leisure, admire their limbs, their velvet shoulders, and their silver wings ; their backs vying with the empyreal in its blue ; and their eyes, each formed of a thousand others, out- glittering the little planes on a brilliant ; above description, and almost too great for admiration." Such pictures, to those not accustomed to look into those worlds of wonder through the microscope, may seem overdrawn. We are assured, however, by those who are in the habit of making such investigations, that the vegetable and animal world are full of just such scenes. And as world after world of these microscopic wonders pass in review before us, we know not which the most profoundly to admire, the power, skill and wisdom engaged in the creation, arrangement and control of the numberless and immense worlds that fill boundless space, or the beauty and exquisitely delicate workmanship of the in- finitesimal tribes that inhabit the microscopic worlds. We may institute no comparison between the most fin- ished and delicate works of art and the common works of nature. No hand can paint like the hand divine no colors are so brilliant and indelible no texture so fine no work- manship so exquisite. As we descend the scale into those wonderful worlds revealed by the microscope, we seem im- pressed with the idea that the God of nature has undertaken to exhaust his skill and power in the production of an endless STRUCTUEE OF INSECTS. 131 number and variety of infinitely small creations. As in point of duration God is from everlasting to everlasting, so in refer- ence to power, wisdom and skill in workmanship, he' works from infinite to infinite the vastness of the material universe on the one hand stands over against the infinite variety and the endless profusion and the infinitesimal minuteness of his works on the other. The moment we descend to details we are, in this respect, astonished at the investigations of the naturalist. There ap- pears an exuberance of skill and workmanship which we were not prepared for. In confirmation of this we can scarcely quote the annals of natural history amiss. We may take the following : In the body of an insect about an inch in length, a French naturalist is said to have enumerated 306 plates com- posing the structure only of the outer envelop ; 494 muscles for putting them in motion ; 24 pairs of nerves and 48 pairs of breathing organs. On a single wing of a butterfly have been found 100,000 scales. So thin are the wings of many insects that 50,000 placed over each other would only be a quarter of an inch thick ; and yet, thin as they are, each is double. The house-fly's wing has a power of 600 strokes in a second, which can propel it 35 feet, while the speed of a race-horse is but 90 feet a second. We well know what an exquisite piece of mechanism the eye is ; and as two eyes seem quite sufficient for all the necessary purposes of vision, we are quite astonished to meet with small and insignificant insects with thousands of eyes, or rather, the protuberances called their eyes are found to contain thousands of lenses, every one of which is capable of producing a distinct image of as many objects at the same time. Why should the silk- worm, the 132 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. beetle, and the common fly have their six or eight thousand eyes ; and the drone, the dragon and the butterfly more than twice as many ? why but for the love of infinite skill and power to extend itself? As in the works of grace, so in the works of nature there is a strange outflowing and overflowing of the Divine goodness. < We are amazed at the exuberance of the skill of workman- ship displayed in some of these specks of life. But we have no need to dwell on the minute, nor to confine our remarks to variety in form, size or structure. There is among animals a no less striking variety of temperament, sagacity, activity, pre- cocity and productiveness. How varied the natural disposi- tions of animals. Compare the tiger and the lamb ; the vul- ture and the dove ; the serpent and the fish. No two animals are tempered alike not to say animals of different species, but individuals of the same species. How kind and pacific are some ; how restive, fierce and refractory are others ! But the distinction is more prominently marked in the creature man at least it is more observable in him. Here no two are attem- pered alike. Some seem to have a similar disposition in some particulars, while in other respects they are totally unlike. They run parallel to a certain Doint, whence they diverge and perhaps do not meet again. Animals differ no less remarkably in respect to intelligence, sagacity, ingenuity and skill. From the lowest grade of zoo- phytes or vegetable animals to the highest in the scale of in- telligence there is every imaginable variety. It will serve our purpose quite as well to refer only to some of the higher orders, and those more familiar to the common reader. What varied skill and ingenuity are employed by different ARCHITECTURAL SKILL OF ANIMALS. 133 species of birds in the construction of their nests, and by dif- ferent animals in forming their habitations. No two species of animals, birds or insects construct their nests or build their habitations of the same material, or in the same form, or after the same order of architecture. Though all mechanics of some craft, no two species are of the same craft. Some play the carpenter, some the mason or the woodcutter, miner or com- mon laborer. The wasp is both a papermaker and a mason, and, at the same time, like the honey-bee, an excellent geome- trician and builder. Thin and frail as the paper layer of the wasp's nest is, it is constructed in a manner and of a material to make it water-proof. But more remarkable still is the architectural skill and power of some kinds of ants, especially those called termites or white ants. These diminutive insects erect habitations which for dimensions and internal structure are quite wonderful. They show themselves well skilled in masonry understand the construction of the arch, and know how to form a cement and mortar which is perfectly secure against all injury by water. The ant-hill is a pyramid often ten or twelve feet high, the external covering consisting of a dome, " with a smooth sur- face of rich clay, excessively hard and well built." The inte- rior of the building, -which is fitted up with great labor and skill, is divided " with wonderful artifice and regularity into a vast number of apartments" labyrinths, galleries and subter- raneous passages. In the centre and under the grand dome are the royal apartments, and about these nurseries, maga- zines for provisions, and various chambers for the accommoda- tions of their gentry, soldiers, and different sorts of laborers. 134 THE PALACE OP THE GREAT KING. Some one has pleasantly illustrated the various skill and aptitudes of different animals by characterizing their trades and mechanical operations somewhat as follows : " Beasts, birds and insects are good mechanics, skilled in business and building operations ; and what they do is done with despatch and neatness. The caterpillar is a silk-spinner, far excelling any other in his line of business. Indeed, we could by no skill or art of ours supply the place of this won- derfully-endowed creature. The honey-bee is a professor of geometry. He constructs his cell so scientifically that the least possible amount of material is formed into the largest spaces with the least waste of room. Not all the mathematicians of Cambridge could improve the construction of his cells. Nor can the best hermetical sealers preserve provisions so well. " The mole tunnels like a skilful engineer. The nautilus is a navigator, hoisting or taking in sail as he goes, or casting anchor at pleasure. The glow-worm is a lamplighter. The beaver is a wood-cutter, or builder, and a mason ; and a good workman at all these trades. He fells trees with his teeth, and, having built his house skilfully, plasters it with his tail- trowel. The swallow is a fly-catcher singing birds are ama- teur musicians, excelling in harmony ; and the otter and heron are fishermen, though they use neither line nor net. The otter we seldom see, for he works his traps mostly under the water ; but the heron may be often seen standing with his long, thin legs in the shallow part of the stream, suddenly plunging his long bill below the surface and bringing up a fish. The marmot is a civil engineer. He does not only build houses, but constructs aqueducts and drains to keep them dry. The ant maintains a regular standing army. SAGACITY OF DIFFEKENT CLASSES. 135 Wasps are paper manufacturers. Caterpillars are silk-spin- ners. The squirrel is a ferryman. With a chip or piece of bark for a boat, and his tail for a sail, he crosses a stream. Dogs, wolves, jackals and many others, are hunters. The black bear and heron are fishermen. The ants are day- laborers. The monkey is a rope-dancer. " The fox is a dealer in poultry, and sometimes a whole- sale dealer ; as the farmers and farmers' wives know to their cost. Not satisfied with chickens and ducklings, he must needs push on his trade among the full grown cocks and hens ; and many a good fat goose is carried to his meat-cellar. ' A wily trader in his way Is Reynard, both by night and day.' " Other classes of animals show much sagacity in the pre- cautions they use against danger. Among these are the marmot, the monkey of Brazil, and the wild horse. When grazing, or sleeping, or engaged in pastimes, they are known to place a sentinel to watch and give alarm against approaching danger. When the marmot sentinel perceives a man, an eagle, a dog, or any other foe near, he alarms his companions by a loud whistle, and is himself the last that enters the hole. Brazil monkeys are said quietly to sleep on the trees after having stationed one of their number as a sentinel to warn them of the approach of the tiger, or other rapacious animal ; and if this sentinel is found sleeping, his companions in- stantly tear him in pieces for his neglect of duty. And the same precautions are taken by troops of wild horses when sleeping. One of their number remains awake, and gives notice of any approaching danger. 136 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. We must be content with, a single instance of the many we would like to quote, of the peculiar sagacity used by some classes of animals to entrap their prey. In Kamtschatka, an animal called the glotton employs a singular stratagem for killing the fallow-deer. He climbs up a tree, carrying with him a quantity of that species of moss of which the deer are very fond. When a deer approaches near the tree, the glotton throws down the moss. If the deer stops to eat the moss the glotton instantly darts down upon his back, and after fixing himself firmly between the horns, tears out its eyes, which so torments the animal, that, either to put an end to its torment or to get rid of its cruel enemy, it strikes its head against the trees till it falls down dead. The glottons on the river Lena sometimes kill horses in the same manner.* The honey-bee is in many respects particularly a clever little animal. Both her social and civil relations abundantly imply this. Bees preserve a very perfect community, and main- tain a no less remarkable form of government. And the skill with which they conduct their labors is proverbial. But nothing is more remarkable than the sagacity they show in discerning any approaching change of the weather. " More surely than the instruments of science" they descry the shower at hand, and hasten to the shelter of their home. No animal, perhaps, has been awarded more credit for sagacity than the dog. He is capable of almost any training, and sometimes seems to dispute the province of rationality with man. To the many clever feats which are constantly detailed of this sagacious animal, the following, which recently * SmeUie's Philosophy of Natural History, p. 239. QUANTITY OF LIFE. 137 came to my notice, may be added : Mr. Meriam, the celebrated meteorologist of Brooklyn, recently lost a valuable dog by death which he had taught to watch the striking of the clock at night, and wake him every hour for the purpose of making his hourly registrations of the barometer and thermometer. Again, we discover in the quantity of life or activity of different species of animals or animals of the same species, another pleasant variety. The lowest animal matter is scarcely distinguishable from a vegetable mass. And after ascending several grades you still meet with animals of perfect organiza- tion, yet with scarcely vital energy or the principle of life enough to enable them to move from place to place. \Yith little nerve or muscle, strength or activity, and capable of very little pleasure or pain, they have scarcely more than a vege- table existence ; while sporting about them in all the smiling exuberance of vitality, are other tribes of animals, which live more in twenty-four hours than their sluggish, torpid neighbors do in a month. They use so much more nerve and muscle enjoy or suffer so much more burn in the lamp of life so much more of the oil of vitality. How much more of life is there about a tiger than a turtle a humining-bird than a snail 1 ? M. Delisle tells us that he observed a fly not larger than a grain of sand, which ran three inches in half a second, and in that space made the enormous number of 540 steps. If a man were able to walk as fast in proportion to his size i. e., able to take as many steps of two feet long in the same time, he would in the course of a minute run more than twenty miles, leaving express railroad engines far in his rear. The locust, the grasshopper and the flea can leap 200 times their length ; the frog hops 250 times his length. Some spiders can leap 138 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. upon their prey two feet. Were a man of six feet in length to leap in proportion to the grasshopper, he might be seen strid- ing over the earth at the rate of 400 yards at a stride. Similar remarks apply to individuals of the same grade or species. What different degree of vital energy in two animals of the same class. One is so sluggish as to feel it a task to gather his own food ; the other abounds in vitality, and leaps about spontaneously for no other reason than the pleasure of distending and contracting his own muscles. Man, however, supplies the happiest illustration of this sort, for he is a mental and moral, as well as a physical being. Some persons have so little life about them as to be scarcely capable of self-preservation. When they have put forth the utmost stretch of their vitality, they can with difficulty perform acts which rank them among the living. This is one extreme, between which and the other there are many gradations or varieties, some putting forth more activity, accomplishing more labor physical, mental or moral in one day than others do in six. The mental energy of some men and the bodily vigor of others is prodigious, while the current of the vital energy runs so sluggishly in others that nothing moves them but compulsion, and this only while the coercive force is operative. Perhaps in nothing do men differ more than in the quantity of life which they possess. The diversified condition of animal life, in its infancy, is worthy of remark. In some instances, as in the young of the robin, the sparrow or the human infant, there is scarcely more than life in the abstract, vigor, activity and intelligence being scarcely at all developed, and these are not all capable of self- preservation. Of this extreme, naturalists furnish more striking PRODUCTIVENESS OF ANIMALS. 139 illustrations that I have yet adduced. The American opossum is said often to produce sixteen young ones in one litter, which, when first born, do not weigh more than a grain each. Blind and almost shapeless, and perfectly helpless, they are now snugly stored away by the mother in a sort of pouch provided by nature for the purpose, where they are nourished till they attain the size of a mouse, which does not take place till they are fifty days old, when they begin to see. And it is some time after this before they wholly leave the pouch. The kan- garoo, and the houla of New Holland, nourish their young in the same way. On the other hand, we meet the young partridge, the off- spring of the domestic fowl, and the foal of the horse, with their instincts and activities almost perfectly developed at a day old. The young partridge will not wait to divest itself of the incum- bent shell before it seeks safety by flight, at the approach of danger. Again, there is a striking difference in the productiveness, and in the length of life of different species of animals. In- deed, productiveness is somewhat in proportion to length of life and to size. The elephant may live 2, 3, and 400 years. Other tribes of animals are ephemeral others flit through life in one hour perhaps in a few moments. In six years a pair of elephants might double their num- ber a pair of sheep become 64 and a pair of pigs 119, 160. The power of production in some of the smaller animals, especially of the finny tribe, verges on the incredulous. Natu- ralists tell us of the tench, the codfish, the shad, the house- fly, producing their hundred thousands some, their millions yearly. 140 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. bo prodigiously prolific are herring, pilchard and some other kinds of fish, that they are taken by the millions of mil- lions annually, without the least sensible diminution of the supply. Twenty millions have been known to be taken at a single fishing. At a fishing-ground in Norway (Gottenburg) 700,000,000 have been taken in a single year. And this is but an item in the amount taken by the English, Dutch and other European nations. But why such endless variety in animal life why such ex- haustless abundance ? It is the provision which a benevolent Father has made for his creatures especially for his creature man. What varied and superabundant provision for his food, his clothing, and for every possible want! But man would fail to realize the richness and fulness of these provisions, if his own skill and power, together with the instincts of certain animals, were not engaged to bring the various bounties of Providence to every man's door. But for commerce on the one hand, and the migrations of certain animals and fishes on the other, our supplies would still be comparatively limited. As an example of the latter, take the herring, the shad and vari- ous kinds of fishes, to say nothing of migrating birds and beasts, which, at certain seasons of the year, feel an irrepressi- ble prompting to take up their line of march and to pass over large portions of country, everywhere made a prey, to minister to the wants of man and beast. Our most abundant and valuable fish are the cod, the mackerel, the herring, the shad and haddock. These are all migratory fish. Impelled by a singular instinct, they are made to move forward in countless numbers, visiting the shores of various islands and continents, and offering them- MIGRATIONS AND THEIR USB. 141 selves, as it were, in vast holocausts to the appetite of man. By means of this singular providential arrangement, immense quantities of food, ^delightfully variegating our bill of fare, are, at different seasons of the year, poured into our markets and introduced to our tables, which ordinary commerce could never bring. One of these vast migrating bodies after another pass along our coasts or ascend our rivers, linger for days, for weeks, perhaps, till they have regaled us with a pleasant variety, if not satiated our appetites ; then they move on unconsciously but liberally, to serve the equally rapacious appetites of some other shore. The migrating shoals of herring "consist of millions of myriads, and are many leagues in width, many fathoms in thickness, and so dense that the fishes touch each other." How truly wonderful are these great migratory expeditions, when contemplated simply as a providential device for dis- tributing the bounties of Heaven to the different portions of his great family, not only supplying their wants, but spread- ing their tables with new and choice varieties. CHAPTER IX. MAN His Physical VarietiesExternal Form Color of Skin Mechanism The eye Organs for Breathing; Digestion, Secretion; Nerves, Blood-vessels Voico Upright Position The Wrist and Hand Jenny Lind's Voice. WE are now brought to a portion of our illustration which is both more familiar, and of higher interest. Man is not an exception to the universal variety which pervades all nature besides. While we met no lack of diversified workmanship or varied development in the lower grades of animal life, we may be sure of meeting more numerous and interesting va- rieties in the species, man. We have not found our interest decrease as we have descended from the larger and better known specimens of creative power and skill, t6 the most mi- nute and the less known. The great monarch of the deep, whose play-ground is the ocean, is not more perfectly formed than, the animalcule whose ocean is a drop of water. And the huge elephant does not exhibit a mechanism more highly wrought and admirable than the little tenant that sports un- seen in the tiny flower. As we pass into the domains of man we shall meet with illustrations yet more to be admired. For, of all animals, man is the most extraordinary, and furnishes the happiest illustra- tions of our theme. In proportion as the endowments of man exceed those of MAN AS A PHYSICAL BEING. 143 any other animal, and his relations are more extensive, and his duties more varied, and his moral wants and destinies of higher order, and as his needful training for his future state of being, implies exercises on his part and dispensations on the part of Providence very different from any thing known among the inferior races, in the same proportion we shall find man's his- tory to be vastly more diversified in all its developments. Man has not only a physical nature, more curious and complicated and variegated than any other animal, but he has an intellectual and a moral nature, which presents varieties of structure and endowments yet more interesting. We shall take occasion to make each of these aspects of humanity topics of illustration. The first and most obvious view we can take is to consider man as a physical being. The most superficial glance is enough to indicate the field of illus- tration here open before us. What disparity in stature, in muscular development and in bodily organization. What variety in color, in tones of voice, in the contour of the face and the expression of the countenance : and how varied the general appearance, the gait and movements. I spoke of color : the hue of the skin varies very nearly according to position on the globe; climate, elevation, soil, winds, temperature and exposure to heat, (natural or artificial,) food, habits, employments, have great influence in determining the color of the skin. Natural causes, of themselves, if given a sufficient time to act, seem quite adequate to produce the difference which exists. Widely as the African differs in his character from the European, we can conceive, from what we know, of similar changes produced in other races of men, when subjected to similar influences, during comparatively 144 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. short periods of time ; of differences quite as striking as we meet here. Portuguese and Jews are found on the Malabar coast of India quite as black as the native Hindoos, though the former have been residents there scarcely more than three centuries. They have neither the thick lips, nor the crisped hair, nor the facial contour of the negro ; yet these peculi- arities of the negro, did the field admit of the needful investi- gation, would probably be found to be no more than legitimate effects of peculiarities of an African climate, soil, temperature and productions. How unlike in a thousand respects are the different races of man ! The Caucasian from the Malay or Chinese the African from the European ! Place by the side of the giant Patagonian the dwarf of Terra del Fuego, or the fair Briton by the side of the crisp-haired and thick-lipped African. But we shall find our subject amply illustrated if we confine ourselves to the same race. We can scarcely select examples amiss. We will first look for a moment at the framework the machine itself of the wonderful structure of the human body. In many of its leading features it does not essentially differ from the organization of other species of animals. Like them it has flesh, bones and joints, and systems of nerves and blood- vessels. There is in all the properly-formed animals the most ingenious specimens of machinery ; bones have their joints and hinges ; blood-vessels their valves ; the heart its forcing pump ; the eyes their pulleys. It cannot but excite our amazement that a framework of so small dimensions as that of the human body should contain so much machinery ; that so many dif- ferent sorts of apparatus should, in so small a compass, be able to produce so many different ends. We not only meet with THE FBAMEWORK OF MAN. 145 hinges, joints, valves, the forcing pump and the pulley, but in the same frame we discover a most ingeniously contrived and constructed system of blood-vessels, and another system of nerves, and a third of secretive organs, all in the same body ; then a complete and ingeniously contrived digestive and nu- tritive apparatus; then a no less wonderful apparatus for respiration ; and finally, the yet more mysterious and delicate organs and capabilities of seeing, tasting, smelling, touching and feeling ; all of which systems presuppose different sets of muscles, nerves, and other appliances more delicate and skil- ful than we can possibly conceive. " How complicate, how wonderful is man !" And what in these respects is true of man, is found to be true of an insect a thousand times less than man. We cannot too profoundly admire these wise arrangements of our beneficent Creator. A mere glance at a few well known anatomical facts will serve further to illustrate the varied skill, the diversified workmanship, and the profuse benevolence which appear in the mechanism of the human frame. The support of this framework consists of 245 bones of various forms and uses, and all adapted to their respective purposes. Each bone has not less than forty distinct scopes or intentions. Variously attached to these bones are 446 muscles, by which the numberless motions of the body are produced ; the same muscle, by means of its several intentions, producing as many different motions; and each standing ready every moment to receive the mandates of the will and to execute its appropriate function. " Every breath we draw, whether we be in motion or at rest, asleep or awake, a hundred muscles, at 7 146 THE PALACE OF THE GKEAT KING. least, are in constant action. In the act of breathing we re- spire at least twenty times every minute; the heart exerts its muscular force in propelling the blood into the arteries sixty times every minute ; the stomach and abdominal muscles are every moment in action ; and the curious little bones of the ear are ever ready to convey sensations of the softest whisper to the brain. So that, without a hyperbole, or the least ex- travagance of expression, it may truly and literally be said, that we enjoy a thousand blessings every minute, and conse- quently sixty thousand every hour, and one million four hun- dred and forty thousand every day."* Contemplated, simply as a complicated and delicate piece of machinery, the corporeal part of man is a matter of ceaseless wonder. The contrivance of the whole ; the forethought and calculations needful to the construction of such a machine ; the multiplicity and variety of the parts ; all made so beauti- fully to fit and harmonize as to subserve purposes equally numerous and varied ; and the exceeding delicacy of some of the parts exhibiting a skill and niceness of finish which as far transcends all human skill as the infinite is removed from the finite ; these are some of the wonders which appear in man's earthly tabernacle. What we are accustomed to call the human system is a series of distinct systems, each one perfect and independent in itself, yet acting in such perfect harmony with every other as to seem but a unit. At the same instant we find ourselves, almost without an effort, exercising all the complicated and varied organs needful to produce sight, hearing, smelling, the * Dick's Philosophy of Religion, p. 43, Am. edition. THE STRUCTURE OF THE EYE. 147 sensations of taste and touch, breathing, and I know not how many more interesting and curious functions. And so skil- fully contrived and collocated are the multiplicity of bones, muscles, nerves, tendons and membranes requisite to the per- formance of these functions, that they are constantly performed, and many, and sometimes all of them at the instant, without the slightest confusion ; and the whole may pass as the most commonplace occurrence, without a thought, or even con- sciousness on our part. But the moment attention is directed to the apparatus and the modus operandi, the means and the manner of either of these very common operations, we are not a little amazed at the ingenuity and benevolence therein dis- played. Before the image of a simple object can be painted on the retina of the eye and the object be seen, what a singular piece of machinery has to be constructed, and then by how many in- genious contrivances it is made to perform its office. The eye has been justly esteemed the master-piece of me- chanical skill. It is a little ball lying easily in its soft, oily bed, and safely esconced in its bony cavity, so supported by muscles as readily to retain its position, yet to turn in every direction. It ifc composed of different coats, humors, and lenses, and supplied with an endless number of minute nerves, veins and arteries, lymphatics, glands and other delicate con- trivances all so formed and adjusted' as to admit, through a small aperture called the pupil, the countless millions of rays of light which proceed from the object viewed. So perfect is this little piece of machinery, that the rays of light from every point of every object in a landscape, miles in extent, enter the pupil of the eye all at precisely the same instant are re- 148 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. fr acted by the humors converge on the retina (which is but an expansion of the optic nerve) where the image is formed, and all at the ' selfsame instant a picture of the object thus is conveyed to the brain ; that is, an act of seeing is performed. And so perfect is the machinery that the eye passes from one object to another from one broad landscape to another, and instantaneously and without the least perceptible effort except simply moving the eye excludes the existing image on the retina and the millions of rays which form it and admit as many more from the new series of objects, and by the same interesting process, paints a new picture. But the most extraordinary part of the whole, is the me- chanical arrangement so subtle indeed as to elude the sight of the keenest research by which the eye can instantly change from the sight of a distant object to that of one near. In other words, how the eye instantly adjusts itself to act as a telescope, or as a microscope. This is probably effected by some exqui- sitely delicate machinery, which renders more or less convex the cornea of the eye, as a near or remote object is to be viewed. Yet the moment we attempt to gain a conception of the appa- ratus by which such an optical phenomenon can be produced, we find ourselves at our wit's end. "Wonderful as is the act, and as complicated and exquisitely nice as is the machinery which produces vision, this is but one of the many mechanical processes which are constantly, and at the same instant, going on in the human frame. The exer- cise of the other four senses, the act of breathing, of digestion, of nutrition, the process of secretion, the circulation of the blood, and the mysterious workings of the nervous energy, all have a distinct series of apparatus,- and their independent ope- WHENCE MAN'S FEE-EMINENCE? 149 rations. And the greater portion of the machinery by which each of these operations are carried on, is too minute and sub- tle to come within the cognizance of the acutest human skill. We can form no adequate conception of the profuse and varied workmanship involved. And not only so, but there are other provisions and adap- tations equally wonderful, before one of these results can be realized. An ear, no matter how curiously wrought, not adapt- ed to catch the sound from the vibrations of the external air, or an apparatus for breathing not fitted to inhale and receive the same atmosphere ; or an eye not adapted to the light, or the delicate organs of smell without the corresponding odor, would be of no account. What varied wisdom and skill were engaged in all those external contrivances, adaptations and provisions necessary to secure results so common as to seem to us but our own spontaneous acts. But the design of this chapter was rather to treat of varie- ties of a more obvious character, illustrating not the less strik- ingly the manifold wisdom of the Creator. In three particulars man differs in his structure from all other animals. These are his upright position, the organs of speech, and the peculiar structure of the wrist and hand: and these are the three things which give man the pre-eminence, and dominion over the brute creation, and give him control over the mineral and vegetable kingdoms. Nearly all animals have the power to emit sounds as ex- pressive of internal emotions, if not of thoughts ; and this faculty is exercised by organs strikingly analogous to those by which speech is produced by man. It might puzzle the anatomist to discover, by any examination he is able to make, 150 THE PALACE OP THE GREAT KING. why the cat, the dog or the horse may not articulate as well as man. He detects no organ wanting, yet the brute cannot articulate. Speech, whether it be of man, or its imitation by the brute, is produced by a wind-instrument called the trachea or wind- pipe, in connection with the act of respiration. It is a beauti- ful Eolian harp : its exquisitely delicate machinery is so ad- justed in the aperture through which passes the vital breath, that it emits sounds more varied, more harmonious, and of a more living significancy than the most perfect human instru- ment. It discourses sweet music, or speaks in tones of joy or sorrow ; in accents of manly eloquence, or scathing satire, or honeyed persuasion, or burning rebuke. So delicately wrought and so readily modulated is this wonderful piece of mechanism, that it is fitted to express not only the greatest variety of sounds, but the greatest variety of thoughts and emotions ; and so self-adjusting is some of the exceedingly delicate machinery attached to it, that it can al- most instantaneously pass from the solemn to the gay from anger to hilarity it can express every imaginable shade of like or dislike, of pleasure or pain, of love or hate. Compared with this, what is the most perfect specimen of human skill ? Man constructs an instrument, which, by means of a great variety of stops, keys, screws and various other ingenious appliances, produces a great variety of sounds, notes, high and low, gay and plaintive. But how inferior this to the^production of the Divine Hand, which is so formed as instantly, by a self-adjust- ment, to produce such a variety of sounds. The entire machinery employed to produce articulate sounds is very various and complicated. The tongue, the lips, MAN'S ORGANS OF SPEECH. 151 the jaws and teeth, the palate, the nose and throat, together with a great variety of muscles, bones, nerves, blood-vessels and secretions, and some of them more exquisitely delicate than it is possible for us to conceive, all lend their aid and beauti- fully blend their actions to produce the wonderful phenome- non. The difference in this respect between man and many kinds of animals, seems to be not that animals are destitute of organs of speech for some of them do speak but that man possesses these organs in greater perfection. There is, in the one case, a finish in the workmanship, a perfection of skill, which is wanting in the other. The one is a musical in- strument with every key, screw, chord and string exquisitely formed and combined by a master's skill, and which, like a thing of life, utters the language of the soul ; the other is an instrument of the same form and parts, yet of coarser finish, and so differently combined as to utter no intelligent sound. We do not here forget that man has an intelligent soul, and that language is the utterance of thought. We speak now only of the physical structure, which we see admirably adapted, though at an infinite expense of skill and workmanship, to the great and benevolent end for which speech was given. Had we the exquisitely nice perception to discern the thousand little contrivances and adjustments in the form of muscles, nerves, bones and tendons which are so exactly adapted to the throat, the lips, the hollow of the mouth, the nose and all the parts which combine to form the human voice, and to produce artic- ulate sounds of every conceivable variety, and were we able to compare these with the corresponding and less perfect organs of the inferior animals, we should gain some appreciation of the 152 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. exuberant skill displayed in this part of the physical struc- ture of man. A similar line of remark might have been pursued in rela- tion to the machinery by which other functions are performed ; as the touch, taste, smell or hearing ; breathing, digestion, nu- trition or any other function of the body. In vain do we essay to scan the wonderful apparatus by which offices so complicat- ed and curious are performed. Such mechanism equally tran- scends all human conception of mechanical skill. Not less than 100 muscles are employed in the simple act of breath- ing. Man's erect posture and the upright position of his face, is another peculiarity of his structure, to which we need but to allude. The a'dvantages we possess on this account are abun- dantly obvious. Other physical distinctions peculiar to man, and which give him the advantage over all other animals, is the structure of his legs and feet ; and more especially of the hand and wrist. The leg and foot are composed of bones, muscles and ligaments, so put together as to form just the requisite support to an erect body, and to give the ease and facility of action which the erect body requires, and secure variety and elasticity to all his movements. The leg of no other animal is to be compared to that of man, for the universality and diversity of its actions. But we design no more than simply to direct attention to this point. I named one other peculiarity of the physical man the mechanism of the wrist and hand. Without this peculiarity, man might have the reason of an angel, yet his reason would be of no great practical benefit to him. He might possess wis- THE HAND AND WRIST OF MAN- 153 dom and skill tenfold more than he now does, and, with only the hoof of the horse, or the claw of the eagle, or with the hand of the monkey, he could never rise ahove the condition of a better sort of brute. The anatomy of the hand and wrist (and a similar, though less perfect structure of the ankle and foot) has not failed to attract admiration. The chief peculiarity of structure here, is met in the fact that each finger is formed of three bones in- stead of two is furnished with a nail instead of a claw, and that each is so placed in relation to the thumb that it freely acts with the thumb. On this simple arrangement, apparently so simple, yet secured only by consummate skill and contri- vance, depends the peculiar flexibility of all the motions of the fingers. It is only by this means that we can grasp an object that we can lay hold of even the smallest object that we can hold the pen, ply the needle, grasp the sword, use the me- chanical instruments, strike the musical key, or cultivate any one of the useful or ornamental arts of life. But this beautiful design, benevolent as it is, would be quite frustrated, were there not a like peculiar formation of the wrist. We need here only say that the bones are articulated, or connected together by two kinds of joints, the one called a hinge-joint, as the joint that enables us to move the hand up- wards and downwards ; and the other, the socket joint, formed by the insertion of the head of one bone in a socket of another. This joint is seen more perfectly in the wrist. It is this which allows us to move the hand from side to side, and to turn the palm upwards. The combination of these two kinds of joints in the one at the wrist, and a like combination at the shoulder, give all that variety and ease of motion to the arm, hand and fin- 7* 154 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. gers which so happily distinguishes man from every other living animal, and, as an obedient and fit instrument, makes man lord of this lower creation. Could we minutely inspect all the bones, joints, ligaments and articulations all the mechanical powers and contrivances which make the human hand the organ it is, we should see reason as never before, to admire the workmanship of the Divine Hand. It is a most perfect specimen of mechanical skill. But there is another class of varieties not to be overlooked here ; more obvious than any we have named, yet not the less interesting. I refer to external features, organs and develop- ments. I have spoken of the marked variety which characterises the human voice. Articulation is produced by the same or- ganic structure ; yet you never heard two voices which did not differ. There is such a perceptible difference in the tone, the modulation, the quantity or quality of the voice, or in some indescribable something about the utterance or the mode of ut- terance, that it is oftentimes a more sure criterion by which to distinguish a person, than his form or features. And if I mis- take not, a little attention to sounds, as uttered by the brute animals, would convince one that no two birds, even of the same species, sing alike, or two cocks crow alike, or two dogs bark or two horses neigh, in precisely the same tone of voice. And not only the voices of no two members of the human fam- ily are alike, but probably the voices of no two that ever lived were precisely alike. Of such variety we can form no concep- tion, yet it seems but analogous with the order of the Divine workmanship, as far as we are acquainted with it. 155 Before dismissing the subject of the human voice, I had designed to refer to a familiar and very extraordinary instance of its mechanism. The voice of Jenny Lind, considered sim- ply as a piece of mechanical skill, was a very extraordinary pro- duction. We may take it as an intimation in one line of the capabilities of humanity, its capabilities of song a premature development of the music of the upper Paradise a develop- ment analogous to the extraordinary productions occasionally met in the vegetable world, and as rarely met in other depart- ments of the animal world. The following curious and interesting article, on the "Me- chanism of JENNY LIND'S Voice" is copied from a late English paper, but originally appeared in the New York Tribune : " The voice of this great cantatrice is one of those wonderful natural gifts which Providence occasionally vouchsafes to a favorite mortal. Jenny Lind possesses what may be termed a double voice, the natural voice from grave to the acute, a range over three octaves ; and she has the power and faculty of producing a recurrent, or back- ward voice into the lungs, upon the upper and lower notes in sing- ing, which is purely ventriloquious, of which faculty her ' echo ' song is a perfect illustration. Thus she is able to control her voice on the most difficult vibrations of the vocal chords, to be perfect in her in- tervals, and which renders her so surprising in the perfection of her intonations, that they ring upon the ear with an effect and a charm so indescribable and puzzling to the hearer. The peculiarity is, this ventriloquious power ; and the wonderful part of her vocali- zation is, that her organization enables her to use those recurrent sounds the same as a person whistling executes sounds by the re- current action or drawing in the breath while inspiring. This faculty Jenny Lind controls and manages with an ease, a grace, and with such masterly and artistical skill as almost to defy detection by the most refined and critical ear. By this recurrent or ventriloquial action, she has the command of the epiglottis and its parts, (the valve closing the laryngeal chamber when in the act of swallowing,) 156 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. vibrating plates, similar to the plates forming the bronchial fissure of the larynx, which I have stated is the natural passage for the air forming the voice. " In addition to the command over her vocal faculties, she sings from the larynx, while she throws the vocal force from the lungs and diaphram, giving to it the strength, the fulness, the roundness, and the steadiness and endurance of the grave, or 'chest voice.' By this immensity of vocal power, by the contraction and diminution of the vocal chamber, she is enabled to trill and revel high into alto, without any detection from her hearers of any stop or of any change in her voice. Thus her intonations and modulations, by this pecu- liar organization, are rendered perfect, and her upper and lower notes are given with an inflexibility and softness of which her dy- ing-away ' echo ' tone is a practical illustration ' Linked sweetness long drawn out,' as are also each cadenza, ' run,' ' shake,' and ' trill,' made upon her tones with a decision, flexibility, purity, and correctness that are only surpassed by the delicate yet magnificent swell and chaste diminuendo of her middle and lower tones, which has established that ' indescribable peculiarity ' in her voice, and emphatically se- cured to her the euphonious title of * the Nightingale.' Nor are these all. In her thrilling notes, she has the faculty of using the accessory recurrent notes. It is our opinion, that the exercising of these notes, and this ventriloquious faculty, by overtasking her powers, lost to Jenny Lind her voice for a period. These accessory notes, although dissimilar, are rendered artistically correct, and at once strike the mind and awaken attention and wonderment, both as to the cause and their execution. It is all-sufficient, however, that a pleasing charm of an exquisite novelty excites the admiration, and calls forth the spontaneous bursts of enthusiasm from her audi- ences, who have placed the great cantatrice, for these peculiarities, upon the pinnacle of fame, where she stands herself alone Jenny Lind." Superficial observation pronounces a thousand things to be lijse, which a little discrimination finds to be so unlike that the wayfaring man, though a fool, might have discovered it. The face, the form, and general movements of man furnish TTNTFOKMITY OF THE HUMAN FACE. 157 other examples. Nothing is more distinctive than the human countenance, yet nothing which exhibits more uniformity. It is rare, and indeed horrifying, to meet with a countenance which is wanting in any of the parts which go to make up the human face. Though alike in this respect, yet nothing is more unlike. Of all the vast population of the globe no two faces are precisely the sajne : probably the remark may be ex- tended to all that have or shall live on the face of the earth. There is, even in cases of the nearest approximation, a diver- sity sufficiently marked for all the purposes of distinction. I have seen twin sisters, as nearly alike as two peas, yet in the family circle and among their intimate friends the distinction was abundantly obvious to prevent all mistakes. Nor do we stop here : the countenance may be unseen, the voice unheard, yet there is in the form those infallible marks of distinction or variety which enable us, almost without mistake, to recognize our friends. The same may be said of general deportment. The maxim is extensively true, that every one has a way of his own. This way of his own is a universal variety, charac- terizing the entire race. And I am by no means certain that the same principle will not hold respecting variety in the countenance, form and gen- eral carriage of brutes less striking, perhaps, though not the less real. A flock of sheep or a herd of cattle look alike, on the same principle that an assemblage of Chinese or Africans appear alike to a person unaccustomed to see men of their na- tional peculiarities. The attention is, at first, fixed only on the general likeness. The thick lips and the curly hair of the one, and the long straight hair and the high cheek bones of the other are, perhaps, the only features contemplated. These 158 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. every member of the same class has in common. But the mo- ment we look beyond these marks of uniformity we find as dis- tinct marks of variety as in men of our own color and clime. So, no doubt, we should find it in reference to all those ani- mals with whom we have not a familiar acquaintance. Bodily organization affords further varieties : such as the greater or less predominance of the solids or fluids ; the strength of the passions ; the vigor of the nerves ; and the greater or less acuteness of the senses. And so it is with our susceptibilities. Some are susceptible of high pleasure or pain from objects which give none to others not to mention all the intermediate degrees. Some have a high sense of honor or shame or propriety, where others are almost wholly destitute of it. We select individual organs or features ; the eyes, the nose, the ears ; the color of the skin and the hair ; the size, shape and expression of the mouth ; the form of the lips and the contour of the forehead ; the eye-brows, the eye-lashes ; or whatever feature you please, and as you compare those of any number of individuals composing an assemblage ever so im- mense, you will find no two alike. Compare noses, a thou- sand, or a thousand myriads if you will ; and though all are in general alike, yet every one is a distinct variety. Not only do you meet the Roman nose, the Grecian nose, the truly or- thodox Jewish nose, the broad, flat nose, the pug nose, the evil-omened sharp nose, but, noses of the most approved pat- terns. Noses neither fantastically queer or ominously pointed, but seemingly run in the same sensible mould, are nevertheless as diversified as the faces to which they are attached are nu- VARIETY IX NOSES. 159 merous. Every man has his own nose, and no other man of the universal family has a nose like him. A clever Quarterly discourses thus learnedly on the form and philosophy of noses : " A first division of noses includes all that are in proportion to the face, too small, i. e., all such as are decidedly less than one- third of the length of the face, or less long than the forehead is deep. The varieties of these are numerous in the snub, flat, retrousse, and up-turned, or celestial noses. The natural types to which they are generally referable are either the little noses of children, or the flat, broad noses of negroes ; and it is consistent with this that in men of civilized races all such noses indicate defective intellectual power ; and do so with a certainty of symbolism which nothing but excel- lence in the form of the head, as in the case of Socrates, can neu- tralize. They tell of an unfinished intellectual development ; and the lower and flatter, and more snub they are, the more certainly do they indicate feebleness and meanness of intellect, and of a mind in which bad temper more than good judgment will have sway. " It is not quite so with women. In them the whole organiza- tion, in its gradual development, diverges less than that of men does, from the almost similar form which they both have in early childhood. The retention, therefore, of the little child-like nose im- plies no such grave defect in the woman's mind. If her head be well formed, such a nose may express naivete, or perhaps smartness of wit and dexterous intelligence. But even in women such noses need to be associated with good features. If they are not, they add much to the expression of insignificance or even coarseness. The thicker and larger forms of snub nose in either sex commonly indi- cate the predominance of the material sensuous character ; and a turn-up nose with wide obvious nostrils is an open declaration (so far as nose can make one,) of an empty and inflated mind ; of a mind in which there is but the spurious imitation of that strength and loftier pride which the wide nostrils in a well-formed nose might in- dicate. ' ; Large noses, in men, are generally good signs ; especially, they add emphasis to the good indication of a well-formed head j but they must not be too fleshy or too lean. If they are long, (yet short of 160 THE PALACE OF THE GKEAT KING. being snout-like,) they mark, as prolongations of the forehead, the intelligent, observant and productive nature of the refined mind. If Roman, arched high and strong, they are generally associated with a less developed forehead and a larger hind-head ; and they disclose strength of will and energy, rather than intellectual pow- er ; they show also the want of that refinement which is indicated by the straighter nose. The Jewish or hawk-nose commonly sig- nifies shrewdness in worldly matters ; it adds force to the meaning of the narrow concentrative forehead, symbolical of singleness of object ; and its usually narrow nostrils wear the unfailing sign of cau- tion and timidity. The Greek straight nose, ' indicates refinement of character,' love for the fine arts and lelles lettres, astuteness, craft, and preference for indirect rather than direct action. ' Per- pendicular noses that is such as approach this form, suppose a mind capable of acting and suffering with calmness and energy.' "A nose slightly befied at its end, extends and corroborates the indication of the analytic forehead. Such noses, large and broad pointed, are frequent in men with acute practical knowledge of the world. The same befied end is often seen in the cogitative or wide- nostriled nose, wide at the end, thick and broad, indicating a mind that has strong powers of thought, and is given to close and serious meditation. "With these symbols, Lavater's dicta fall in : ' A nose whose ridge is broad, no matter whether straight or curved, always announces superior faculties. But this form is very rare.' And again. 'A small nostril is the certain sign of a timid spirit.' In a woman a large nose is of more uncertain augury ; for it is apt to extend into caricature. If it be well-formed and finely modeled, a rather large nose, and especially one which is nearly straight, or slightly arched, is, in a woman, often characteristic of excellent mental power. But any of the more peculiarly male forms of nose, if large and coarsely formed in woman, denote a too masculine character ; and those that are of ill omen in man, are much worse in woman ; since the evil of being inappropriate is added to that of malformation." And so it is of eyes, ears and every other feature named. The general form, size and structure of the eye in every hu- THE EYE THE INDEX OP THOUGHT. 161 man head arc strikingly alike ; yet when the eyes of any as- semblage of people, however large, is examined with a little attention, every eye of every individual is found to have its distinctive variety. In color, form, expression, in something, every eye differs from every other eye. In form, size and gen- eral structure, nothing would seem to present more uniformity than the human ear. Yet when you may be sitting behind an immense concourse of people, you would be amused to allow the eye to take a glance of the array of ears before you all alike yet no two of the whole alike. The eye affords as prolific as it does a beautiful illustration of our thought. Not only in form, size, color and general structure, does the eye present most interesting varieties, but still more in its expression. Some modern writer has furnish- ed us a beautiful illustration in his delineation of a woman's eye. What strange emotions, what thoughts do we discover in this little mirror of the soul. There is the " glance, the stare, the sneer, the invitation, the defiance, the denial, the look of love, the flash of rage, the sparkling of hope, the lan- guishment of softness, the squint of suspicion, the fire of jea- lousy, and the lustre of pleasure : " all but a mere specimen of the endlessly varied expressions of what the human eye is capable. There is probably not a thought, not an emotion of the soul which it may not mirror forth. And in similar phrase we might speak of the form of the face, the general expression of countenance, the shape, size and expression of the mouth, and indeed every feature of the hu- man lace ; and each class would present varieties perhaps not less numerous than we have seen in respect to the eye. Nor is such endless variety a mere freak of nature not 162 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. simply A display the consummate skill of the architect. It is a matter of great practical utility. It displays a rich exuber- ance of the Divine wisdom and benevolence. But for these dis- tinctions, trifling as they may, at first, appear, men would lose their individuality we should often be unable to distinguish our friends from strangers the innocent would be arraigned and condemned instead of the guilty instead of an absent child we might receive back a stranger who should happen to have a nose of the same form and size, or an eye of the same color or expression, the only marks of recognition which, after a long absence and the obliterating processes of time, might be suppos- ed to remain. But a kind Providence has left us to no such confusion and chagrin. No two individuals of all the human race are allowed to have the same distinctive marks. But what an idea does this give us again of the manifold wisdom of God ! of his exhaustless skill of his " thoughts " the wonderful contrivances the infinite designs in the Di- vine Mind ! It was when contemplating the wonderful work- manship of the Divine Hand something after this sort that David exclaimed, " Lord, how great are thy works, and thy thoughts " the contrivances and ideas of all existing things, made or to be made " are very deep." How precious thy thoughts unto me, God, how great is the sum of them. If I should count them, they are more in number than the sand ! Not a thing so minute is formed not the color of a hair, or the form of an eye-brow, or the most trifling expression of a single feature of the face ; no, not the shape, size and color of the tiniest flower, the conception of which is not an eternal idea or thought in the Divine Mind. CHAPTER X. Human Skill and Workmanship. BEFORE proceeding in our survey of the department marked "Man and his varieties," we may turn aside a few moments to contemplate some specimens of the skill and workmanship of man. The digression may be more seeming than real. 1 have had occasion frequently to allude to the exquisite skill and workmanship of the Divine Hand as surpassing all won- der and comprehension. We may not compare the human with the Divine. We may not speak of the one as more than the remotest imitation of the other, yet there is something in the aspirations of the human mind to excel in skilful work- manship which cannot fail to excite our profoundest admira- tion something which is divine. We trace these aspirations to a divine origin. " There is a spirit in man, and the inspira- tion of the Almighty giveth them understanding." I do not now refer so much to the thousand ingenious and useful inventions and discoveries, which are the proud realiza- tions of the human intellect, as to certain skilful executions of an extraordinary character. While some of these involve a high degree of mental acumen, they are more the objects of ad- miration as specimens of the extreme delicacy of workman- ship, and in this respect bear a more striking resemblance to 164 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. the works. of the Supreme Architect. The resemblance, how- ever striking, sadly diminishes as each is subjected to a near inspection. The extremest microscopic view does but enhance, in the same proportion, the beauty of the executions of nature ; while the same close inspection quite mars the beauty and con- verts to roughness the most perfect work of human skill. Viewed " through the microscope, the finest and most costly fa- bric of the loom which has tasked the utmost reach of human skill, becomes hideous ropes and rags, while the beauty, grace and exquisite finish of 'the lily is infinitely magnified." I shall quote but a few examples : most of which display more of the folly than of the wisdom of man, yet they exhibit a singular mechanical skill, and are worthy of notice as speci- mens of the diversified talent of man. u The Emperor Charles V. after his abdication of the throne, amused himself in his later years by automata of various kinds. " It was his custom after dinner, to introduce upon the ta- bles figures of armed men and horses. Some beat drums, some played upon fftites, while others attacked each other with spears. Sometimes he let fly wooden sparrows, which flew back again to their nest. He also exhibited corn mills, so small that they could be concealed in a glove. " The next piece of mechanism of the kind worthy of much notice, was constructed by M. Camus for the amusement of Louis XIV. when a child. It consisted of a small coach which was drawn by two horses, and which contained the figure of a lady within, with a footman and page behind. The machine was placed on a table at one extremity, when the coachman smacked his whip, and the horses set off, moving their legs in WONDERFUL MECHANISM. 165 a natural manner, drawing the coach after them. When the coach reached the opposite edge of the table it turned sharply round at a right angle and proceeded along the adjacent edge. As soon as it reached the place opposite where the king sat, it stopped, the page descended and opened the coach-door ; the lady alighted, and with a courtesy presented a petition, which she held in her hand, to the king. After waiting some time, she again courtesied and re-entered the carriage. The page closed the door, and resuming his seat behind, the coachman whipped his horses and drove on. The footman, who had pre- viously alighted, ran after the carriage and jumped up behind into his former place." " The automaton peacock of Gen. Degennes, a French officer of the 17th century, probably suggested to Fancauson the idea of constructing his celebrated duck, which excited so much in- terest throughout Europe, and which was perhaps the most wonderful piece of mechanism ever made. This duck exactly resembled the living one in size and appearance. It executed accurately all its movements and gestures it ate, and drank with avidity, performed all the quick motions of the head and throat peculiar to the living animal, and like it muddled the water it drank with its bill. It produced the sound of quack ing in the most natural manner. Every bone in the real duck had its representative in the automaton, and its wings were anatomically exact. When corn was thrown down before it, it reached out its neck to pick it up. It swallowed it, digested it, and discharged it. The digestion was accomplished by a chemical solution, after which it was conveyed away by tubes. Beekman, who saw it long after, informs us that its ribs were of wire, and that the motion was communicated through the 166 THE PALACE OP THE GREAT KING. feet by means of a cylinder and fine chains like that of a watch." " A miscroscopic photograph was recently exhibited at Man- chester, England, of the size of a pin's head, which when magni- fied several hundred times, was seen to contain a group of seven portraits, the likenesses being admirably distinct. Another of less size represented a tablet erected to the memory of a citi- zen of Manchester ; it covered one nine-hundredth part of a superficial inch, and contained 680 letters, every one of which could be distinctly seen by the aid of the microscope." " In the olden times, people's fancies ran into queer ex tremes, and set their ingenuity to work in odd veins, as use- less as curious. For instance, there is a cherry-stone at the Salem (Mass.) Museum which contains one dozen silver spoons. The stone, itself, is of the ordinary size, but the spoons are so small that their shape and finish can only be well distinguished by the microscope. Here is the result of immense labor, for no decidedly useful purpose ; and there are thousands of other ob- jects in the world, fashioned by ingenuity, the value of which, in a utilitarian sense, may be quite as indifferent. Dr. Oliver gives an account in his Philosophical Transactions, by the way, of a cherry-stone, on which were carved one hundred and twenty-four heads, so distinctly that the naked eye could dis- tinguish those belonging to popes, and kings, by their mitres and crowns. It was bought in Prussia for $1,500, and thence con- veyed to England, where it was considered an object of so much value, that its possession was disputed, and became the object of a suit in chancery. This stone Dr. 0. saw in 1687." " In more remote times still, an account is given of an ivory chariot, constructed by Mermecides, which was so small that a MINIATURE WRITINGS. 167 fly could cover it with its wing ; also a ship of the same ma- terial, which could be hidden with the wings of a bee ! Pliny, too, tells that Homer's Iliad, which is fifteen thousand verses, was written in so small a space as to be contained in a nut- shell ; while Elia mentions an artist who wrote a distich in letters of gold, and enclosed it in the rind of a kernel of corn. But the Harren MS. mentions a greater curiosity than any of the above ; it being nothing more or less than the Bible written by one Petre Bales a chancery clerk in so small a book that it could be enclosed within the shell of an English walnut. D'Israeli gives an account of many other similar exploits to that of Bales." " There is a drawing of the head of Charles II., in the library of St. John's College, Oxford, wholly composed of minute written characters, which, at a small distance, resemble the lines of an engraving. The head and the ruff are said to con- tain the book of Psalms, the Creed, and the Lord's Prayer. Again, in the British Museum, is a portrait of Queen Anne, not much bigger than the hand. On this drawing are a num- ber of lines and scratches, which, it is asserted, include the en- tire contents of a thin folio." Such illustrations of genius and industry are scarcely more than melancholy tokens of perverted skill and assiduity. In modern days human genius has sought out a more excellent way for its development. Once it scarcely aspired to a higher honor or office than to amuse the curious, or to cater to the gratification of the great. Now it becomes the minister of human profit and of human progress. It enters into the very business of life gives wings to commerce teaches how to ex- tract the metal and the useful mineral from the earth and to 1(58 THE PALACE OF THE GEEAT KING. fashion them into implements and agencies of profit to man it gives power and skill to the mechanic, and ministers essential and timely aid to the farmer. Human skill, no longer satis- fied to fill the office of a mere inventor and fabricator of toys, has become the handmaid of human improvement. It is indeed singular how many " men have literally devoted the energies of their minds to perfecting toys, which, although displaying wonderful inventive powers, yet have never confer- red any benefit on mankind, nor ever been even used for any other purpose than as a piece of amusement the childish ex- hibition of masculine mind, the fame of foolery, and foolery of fame. " Thus Jerome Faba, an Italian priest, and a native of Ca- labria, exercised himself in a species of industry, wonderful from its difficulty. He finished a work of box- wood, which re- presented all the mysteries of the Passion, and which might be put in the shell of a walnut. To him was attributed a coach, the size of a grain of wheat, within which there were to be seen a man and a woman, a coachman who drove it, and horses that drew it. These were presented to Francis I. and Charles the Fifth. " In China, the tomb of Confucius has been made in small miniature, no larger than a nut, but wonderfully composed of precious metals, and adorned with a profusion of gems ; but its value consists of the labor expended on its, execution. Its landscapes, dragons, angels, animals, and human figures, would require several pages of description, which would, after all, without a view of the model, prove tedious and unin- telligible. " Charles V., of Spain, had a watch which was confined in THE TOMB OF RAPHAEL. 169 the jewel of his ring ; and a watchmaker in London presented George III. with one set in the same manner. Its size was something less than a silver two-pence, and it contained one hundred and twenty-five different parts, and weighed alto- gether no more than five pennyweights and seven grains. " The tomb of Eaphael, executed by an Italian named Kac- cavalva, is indeed a wonder. It is only twelve inches in height, and from an inch to four inches in diameter. It is adorned with various architectural ornaments, in the richest style of Gothic, and also figures of the virgin and child. The work is said to be of unrivalled merit and beauty. The model is contained in a case of wrought gold, and -is itself of box- wood. The general design may be regarded as architectural, embellished with several compartments of sculpture, or of carv- ing, consisting of various groups of figures. These display different events in the life of Christ. Some of the figures are less than a quarter of an inch in height, but, though thus mi- nute, are all finished with the greatest precision and skill ; and what renders this execution still more curious and admirable, is the delicacy and beauty with which the back and distant figures are executed. "A Polish gentleman in New York has transcribed the Holy Bible on a surface of about the size of a mantel pier glass, presenting at first view the appearance of a beautiful temple, but on close examination every part of the elevation, each win- dow and doorway, and every thing about the picture, is found to be distinct and regular handwriting, not one word of the Bible being omitted, no sentence transposed, and the chap- ters following each other in proper order. The work required two years and seven months of constant labor. When he 8 170 THE PALACE OF THE GREAT KING. commenced, he was entirely ignorant of the English lan- guage." The Birmingham Journal says, " An extraordinary instance of industry in an humble way has recently come under our no- tice. A working tailor, named George "Watts, residing at West Bromwich, has just completed a piece of fancy needle- work, consisting of upwards of four thousand pieces of cloth, sewed together with different colored silk. There are three hundred figures formed by pieces of cloth upon this cover ; amongst which are scenes illustrative of Paradise, the Death of Abel, the Crucifixion,