the smaller works of nature, and that the telescope exalts our prospect to the wonders of the celestial bodies: but these are fixed and limited to certain distances, and particular points of view; one is adapted to measuring the magnitude of a planet, the other to examining the formation of an insect: but the eye wonderfully accommodates itself to every distance within its own extensive sphere. Without diminution of its force, or the energy or distinctness of its powers, it alike surveys the page of learning, embraces the wide prospects of sea and land, and takes in the countless constellations of the heavens. In what manner it can adapt itself to these very different objects and distances, seems not to be clearly understood by anatomists; we know however enough of its effects to see the most evident traces of design in its formation, and its most perfect fitness to the spheres in which different animals move. The study of optics, to which these remarks may lead, is one of the most pleasing branches of science.

The final cause for the production of animals was a subject of deep and serious speculation among ancient philosophers: Aristotle, Cicero, Seneca, and Pliny concluded, that all things were created for the service of man. In modern times, this prejudice, so indulgent to the pride of mankind, has been strengthened rather than weakened, by more enlarged inquiries, and more intimate acquaintance with nature.

The dominion of man is sufficiently extensive to relieve his wants, administer to his luxury, and indulge his pride, as the lord of the creation. Is there any thing peculiarly august in his countenance, or commanding in his erect figure, which impresses the most savage beasts of the forest with terror, and awes them

into submission? Or does he derive his superiority from his intellectual powers, and his contrivance of various expedients to subdue and tame them? The latter is certainly the more probable supposition. Those animals, which have not yet become acquainted with his prowess, meet his first attacks with the most hardy presumption. The albatross and the whale only fly from his presence, when they have felt the force of his weapons. The enormous bear of the polar regions boldly advances to meet his attack; and the ferocious lion of Zaara, confiding in his strength, ventures singly to engage a whole caravan, consisting of thousands; and when repulsed by numbers, and obliged to retire, he still continues to face his pursuers. On the contrary, in the most populous parts of Africa, when the lion has been frequently hunted by the hardy natives, such is his dread of the human race, that even the sight of a child puts him to flight. In all countries, in proportion as man is civilized, the lower ranks of animals are either reduced to servitude, or treated as rebels; all their associations are dissolved, except such as will answer his purposes; and all their united strength and natural powers are subdued, and nothing remains but their solitary instincts, or those foreign habitudes, which they acquire from human education. Those whose daring, or those whose timid natures admit not of being tamed, seek in the distant recesses of the forests, or the impenetrable fastnesses of the mountains, protection from an enemy, whose superiour sagacity detects their arts, and discovers their retreats; who entraps them with his snares, when not present himself; and who lurking behind the thick covert, discharges his unerring instrument of death,

and slays them at a distance so great, as not to awaken their apprehensions of danger.

It is thus he maintains his power over all living creatures, alike in the frozen regions of the north, and in the hot and burning plains of the torrid zone. Whenever they are discovered by his penetrating eye, the most savage and hostile tribes may for a time hold his empire in dispute: but their opposition and their force serve only to awaken his ingenuity, and call his powers into more daring action. The horse and the dog which enjoy his protection from the earliest period of their lives, are taught to know their master, and to adopt many of his habits of life. Upon the lion and the tyger, which the African leads captives from the forests, or upon the vulture and the eagle, which he secures when young, or brings down from their rapid and sublime flights, he at first imposes the severity of famine, watching, and fatigue, to conquer their savage nature, and reduce them to obedience. The dangers of the ocean stop not the pursuits of man; the sailor catches the ravenous shark, and transfixes the mighty whale. With a boldness still more desperate, the fowler of the north climbs the perpendicular rocks of Norway or St. Kilda, or lowered from their airy summits which overhang the tempestuous deep, explores the nests of the clamorous birds, and plunders them of their eggs and their young. From such arduous labours does man draw the means of his subsistence; from such exertions he acquires peculiar habits of courage and agility, becomes reconciled to his situation, and enjoys it without repining at the easier lot of others.

Thus is constantly executed that primeval law, which secured the empire of the creation to man by the ex

press voice of divine revelation, even after he had forfeited his innocence, and was debased by guilt. And the fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth, and upon every fowl of the air; upon all that moveth upon the earth, and upon all the fishes of the sea; into your hand are they delivered. Gen. ix, 2.

Much as we may discern in the animal economy to convince us of the benevolence of nature, there are many things, which excite our surprise, and for which we cannot readily account. That she should so far in appearance counteract her own designs, as to make one animal prey upon another, seems extraordinary ; but perhaps this law is not so severe as it appears to be, when we consider, that animals have no presentiment of their fate; that contracted as their existence is, all of them evidently enjoy that portion of happiness, which is consistent with their formation and powers. By the present constitution of the animal system the life and happiness of its superior orders are promoted the bodies of the inferior classes, which from their delicate structure, must more quickly perish, become the materials of sustaining life in others; and a much larger number is enabled to subsist in consequence of animals thus devouring each other, than could be maintained, if they all subsisted upon vegetables; because it is a received principle in physics, that animal food furnishes more nutriment than vegetable substances of equal weight.

It is sufficiently evident, that the various tribes of insects, by preying upon each other, preserve the fruits of the earth from those ravages they would necessarily suffer, should any one species of them multiply too fast; and even those which we drive from our habitations are formed for salutary purposes, and consume

such substances as would become pernicious to the health of man, if left to a gradual decay.

For what reason nature is so prodigal in the production of animals invisible, as well as visible, to the unassisted eye; for what cause such ingenious contrivance is bestowed upon their structure, and so much elegance displayed in their colours and forms; why the more noxious animals should exist, such as the tarantula, the rattle snake, the crocodile, and the izal salya*; are questions which naturalists will not be able to answer, until they are more perfectly acquainted with the general economy of her designs, and the particular relation and dependance of one animal upon another.

CHAPTER V.

THE SIMILARITY OF ANIMALS TO VEGETABLES.

II. THE powers of growth and of the propagation of their respective species are possessed in common by the animal and the vegetable; and the first step, which is made by nature towards endowing a creature with motion, constitutes the connecting link

* A species of bee, armed with a poisonous sting: when it appears in Abyssinia, and the coasts of the Red Sea, so terrified are the inhabitants, that they quit their abodes, and fly to the distant sands of Beja. See Sullivan, vol. iii, p. 287.