west. " From this area," he adds, " the south wind must formerly have absorbed moisture, and must have been still further cooled and saturated with aqueous vapour as it passed over the Mediterranean. When at length it reached the Alps, and, striking them, was driven into the higher and more rarefied regions of the atmosphere, burthenit would in partthe formwith of itssnowwatery; so ^'^- '"^(liv&g ST"*""'" that the same aerial current which, under the name of the Fohn, or Sirocco, now plays a leading part with its hot and dry breath, sometimes, even in the depth of winter, in melting the snow and checking the growth of glaciers, must, at the period alluded to, have been the principal feeder of Alpine snow and ice."t Nevertheless, we repeat, no exA planation presents itself which can be considered conclusive; and in ^

science we should never be afraid to say, / do not knouK x" * " Ossements fossiles. Discours sur les Revolutions du Globe." t Lyell's "Elements of Geology," p. 175.

464

CREATION OF MAN AND THE ASIATIC DELUGE.

It was only after the glacial period, when the earth had resumed its normal temperature, that man was created. Whence came he?

He came from whence originated the first blade of grass which grew upon the burning rocks of the Silurian seas; from whence proceeded the different races of animals which have successively replaced each other upon the globe, gradually, but unceasingly, rising in the scale of perfection. He emanated from the supreme will of the Author of the worlds which constitute the universe.

The earth has passed through many phases since the time when — in the words of the Sacred Record — " the earth was without form and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.'' We have considered all these phases; we have seen the globe floating in space in a state of gaseous nebulosity, condensing into liquidity, and beginning to solidify at the surface. We have pictured the internal agitations, the disturbances, the partial dislocations to which the earth has been subjected, almost without interruption, while it could not, as yet, resist the force of the waves of the fiery sea imprisoned within its fragile crust. We have seen this envelope acquiring solidity, and the geological cataclysms losing their intensity and frequency in proportion as this solid crust increased in thickness. We have looked on, so to speak, while the work of organic creation was proceeding. We have seen life making its appearance upon the globe; and the first plants and animals springing into existence. We have seen this organic creation multiplying, becoming more complex, and constantly made more perfect with each advance in the progressive phases of the history of the earth. We now arrive at the greatest event of this history, at the crowning of the edifice, si parva licet componere viagnis. At the close of the Tertiary epoch, the continents and seas assumed the respective limits w^iich they now present. The disturbances ofthe ground, the fractures of the earth's crust, and the volcanic eruptions which are the consequence of them, only occurred at rare

intervals, occasioning only local and restricted disasters. The rivers and their affluents flowed between tranquil banks. Animated Nature is that of our own days. An abundant- vegetation, diversified by the existence of a climate which has now been acquired, embellishes the earth. A multitude of animals inhabit the waters, the dry land, and the air. Nevertheless, creation has not yet achieved its greatest work — a being capable of comprehending these marvels and of admiring the sublime work — a soul is wanting to adore and give than*ks to the Creator. God created man.

What is man? We might say that man is an intelligent and moral being; but this would give a very imperfect idea of his nature. Franklin says that man is one that can make tools! This is to reproduce a portion of the first proposition, while depreciating it. Aristotle calls man the " wise being," ^wov TroKiriKbv. Linnaeus, in his " System of Nature," after having applied to man the epithet of wise {homo sapiefis) writes after this generic title these profound words: JVosce te ipsum. The French naturalist and philosopher, Isidore Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, says, " The plant lives, the animal lives and feels, m.an lives, feels, ajid thi?iks " — a sentiment which Voltaire had already expressed. " The Eternal Maker,'' says the philosopher of Ferney, "has given to man organisation, sentiment, and intelligence; to the animals sentiment, and what we call instinct; to vegetables organisation alone. His power then acts continually upon these three kingdoms." It is probably the animal which is here depreciated. The animal on many occasions undoubtedly thinks, reasons, deliberates with itself, and acts in virtue of a decision maturely weighed; it is not then reduced to mere sensation.

To define exactly the human being, we believe that it is necessary to characterise the nature and extent of his intelligence. In certain cases the intelligence of the animal approaches nearly to that of man, but the latter is endowed with a certain faculty which belongs to him exclusively; in creating him, God has added an entirely new step in the ascending scale of animated beings. This faculty, peculiar to the human race, is abstraction. We will say, then, that man is an intelligent being, gifted with the faculty of comprehending the abstract.

It is by this faculty that man is raised to a pre-eminent degree of material and moral power. By it he has subdued the earth to his empire, and by it also his mind rises to the most sublime contempla-tions. Thanks to this faculty, man has conceived the ideal, and realised poesy. He has conceived the infinite, and created mathe- E E

matics. Such is the distinction which separates the human race so widely from the animals— which makes him a creation apart and absolutely new upon the globe. A being capable of comprehending the ideal and the infinite, of creating poetry and algebra, such is man! To invent and understand this formula —

or the algebraic idea of negative quantities, this belongs to man. It ^ is the greatest privilege of the human being to express and compre- i hend thoughts like the following:

J'etais seul pres des flots, par une nuit d'etoiles, ^ Pas un nuage aux cieux, sur les mers pas de voiles, Mes yeux plongeaient plus loin que le monde reel, Et les vents et les mers, et toute la nature Semblaient interroger dans un confus murmure, Les flots des mers, les feux du del.

Et les etoiles d'or, legions infinies, A voix haute, a voix basse, avec mille harmonies Disaient, eninclinant leur couronne de feu; Et les flots bleus, que rien ne gouverne et n'arrete: Disaient, en recourbant I'ecume de leur crete: ** C'est le Seigneur, le Seigneur Dieu! " * Victor Hugo, les Orientales.

• Alone with the Avaves, on a starry night. My thoughts far away in the infinite; On the sea not a sail, not a cloud in the sky. And the wind and the waves with sweet lullaby Seem to question in murmurs of mystery. The fires of heaven, the waves of the sea.

And the golden stars of the heavens rose higher. Harmoniously blending their crowns of fire, And the waves which no ruling hand may know, 'Midst a thousand murmurs, now high, now low. Sing, while curving their foaming crests to the sea, *' It is the Lord God! It is He."

The " M^canique Celeste " ot Laplace, the " Principia " of Newton, Milton's ''Paradise Lost," the " Orientales " by Victor Hugo — are the fruits of the facuUy of abstraction.

In the year 1800, a being, half savage, who lived in the woods, clambered up the trees, slept upon dried leaves, and fled on the approach of men, was brought to a physician named Pinel. Some

XXXII.—Appearance of Man.

sportsmen had found him; he had no voice, and was devoid of inteUigence; he was kno\vn as the Uttle savage of Aveyron. The Parisian savants for a long time disputed over this strange individual. Was it an ape?— was it a wild man?

The learned Dr. Itard has published an interesting history of the

savage of Aveyron. " He would sometimes descend/' he ^vrites, '" into the garden of the deaf and dumb, and seat himself upon the edge of the fountain, preserving his balance by rocking himself to and fro; after a time his body became quite still, and his face assumed an expression of profound melancholy. He would remain thus for hours — regarding attentively the surface of the water — upon which he would, from time to time, throw blades of grass and dried leaves. At night, when the clear moonlight penetrated into the chamber he occupied, he rarely failed to rise and place himself at the window, where he would remain part of the night, erect, motionless, his neck stretched out, his eyes fixed upon the landscape lit up by the moon, lost in a sort of ecstacy of contemplation." This being was, undoubtedly, aman. No ape ever exhibited such signs of intelligence, such dreamy manifestations, vague conceptions of the ideal — in other words, that faculty of ahstradmi which belongs to humanity alone. In order worthily to introduce the new inhabitant who comes to fill the earth with his presence — who brings with him intelligence to comprehend, to admire, to subdue, and to rule the creation (Pl. XXXIL), we require nothing more than the grand and simple language of Moses, whom Bossuet calls "the most ancient of historians, the most sublime of philosophers, the wisest of legis-lators." Let us hsten to the words of the inspired writer: " And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in his 07un image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them." " And God saw everything that he had made, and, behold, // was very good." Volumes have been ^vritten upon the question of the unity of the human race; that is, whether there were many centres of the creation of man, or whether our race is derived solely from the Adam of Scripture. We think, with many naturalists, that the stock of humanity is unique, and that the different human races, the negroes, and the yellow race, are only the result of the influence of climate

upon organisation. We consider the human race as having appeared for the first time (the mode of his creation being veiled in Divine mystery, eternally impenetrable to us) in the rich plains of Asia, on the sniiling banks of the Euphrates, as the traditions of the most ancient races teach us. It is there, where Nature is so rich and vigorous, in the brilliant climate and under the radiant sky of Asia, in the shade of its luxuriant masses of verdure and its mild and perfumed atmosphere, that man loves to represent to himself the father of his race as issuing from the hand of his Creator.

We are, it will be seen, far from sharing the opinion ot those naturalists who represent man, at the beginning of the existence of his species, as a sort of ape, of hideous face, degraded mien, and covered with hair, inhabiting caves like the bears and lions, and par-ticipating in the brutal instincts of those savage animals.'^ There is no doubt that early man passed through a period in which he had to contend for his existence with ferocious beasts, and to live in a primitive state in the woods or savannahs, where Providence had placed him. But this period of probation came to an end, and m.an, an eminently social being, by combining in groups, animated by the same interests and the same desires, soon found means to intimidate the animals, to- triumph over the elements, to protect himself from the innumerable perils which surrounded him, and to subdue to his rule the other inhabitants of the earth. " The first men," says Buffon, "witnesses of the convulsive movements of the earth, still recent and frequent, having only the mountains for refuge from the inundations; and often driven from this asylum by volcanoes and earthquakes, which trembled under their feet; uneducated, naked^ and exposed to the elements, victims to the fury of ferocious animals, whose prey they were certain to become; impressed also with a common sentiment of gloomy terror, and urged by necessity, would they not unite, first, to defend themselves by numbers, and then ta assist each other by working in concert, to make habitations and arms? They began by shaping into the fonns of hatchets these hard flints, the Jade, and other stones, which were supposed to have been