The Religion of Geology and Its Connected Sciences

by Edward Hitchcock

We have other examples of catalytic influences in nature, exhibiting an agency still more subtile and energetic. I refer to contagious and epidemic diseases in animals and plants. An influence goes abroad, and seems to be propagated through the atmosphere, traversing whole continents, and crossing wide oceans, powerful and deadly in its effects, yet inappreciable by the most delicate mechanical or chemical tests. But the phenomena admit of explanation by supposing a movement, either in the particles of the atmosphere, or of the still more subtile and elastic medium that pervades all space; a movement started at a particular spot, as the cholera in India, and the small-pox or some epidemic from some focus, and communicating an unhealthy movement from atom to atom, till it has encircled the earth and mowed down its hecatombs.

Now, when we look at such facts, who can suppose it improbable that man, who can hardly lift a finger without producing some chemical change, should start some of these movements, that may reach far beyond his imagination? And here, as in the cases that have preceded, we must not estimate the actual change in the constitution of bodies by the apparent; for we know that multitudes of such changes are passing within us and around us, without our cognizance; and yet there may be chemical eyes in the universe quick enough to see them all, and to follow them onward to the final result; for there must be a final resultant of all such forces; nor can we doubt that, some time or other, and to some beings, if not to ourselves, it will be manifest. Here, then, is another mode in which a chemical influence may go forth from us, reaching the utmost limits of matter and of time; nay, perhaps extending into eternity, and revealing our actions to the finer sensibilities of exalted beings.

I derive my sixth argument in support of the general principle from organic reaction.

Few persons, save the zoölogist and comparative anatomist, have any idea of the great nicety and delicacy of the relations that exist between all the species of animals and plants, so that what affects one affects all the rest. Perhaps the subject may be illustrated by supposing all the species of organic beings to be distributed at different distances through a hollow sphere, while between them all there is a mutual repulsion, and the whole are retained in the form of a sphere by an attracting force directed to the centre. By such an arrangement, if one species be taken out of the sphere, or its repellency become stronger or weaker, the relative position of all the rest would be altered. No matter how many millions of species there are, the movements of one will cause a reaction among all the rest.

Now, this illustration, although an approximation, falls short of representing the actual state of things in nature. It is no exaggeration to say that a relation similar to the supposed one exists throughout the vast dominions of animate beings; so that you cannot obliterate or change one species without affecting all the rest. Often the change is effected so slowly and indirectly that the beings experiencing it are unconscious of it; or they may realize some slight disturbance of the balance in organic nature, and yet be unconscious of the cause. By the illustration above given, when one or more species is removed from the supposed sphere, or its repellent force weakened or strengthened, although an influence will reach all the other species, yet a new equilibrium will soon be established, and no permanently bad effects seem to follow. But not so in nature. There the balance originally fixed between different beings by infinite wisdom is the best possible; and every change, not intended by Providence, must be for the worse. It was intended, for instance, that man should subdue forests and extirpate noxious plants, as well as ferocious and noxious animals; and, therefore, such a change operates to his advantage, but to the injury of the inferior animals. Yet often he pushes this exterminating process so far as to injure himself also. Thus the farmer wages a relentless war against certain birds, because of some slight evils which they occasion. But when they are extirpated, opportunity is given for noxious insects to multiply, and to bring upon the farmer evils much greater than those he thus escapes.

To prevent an excessive multiplication of some species is one of the grand objects of the present balance established among the whole. Such an increase is an inevitable effect of the extinction of a species, and it often occasions great mischief. The carnivorous species, especially, were intended to act as nature’s police, to prevent a too great increase of the herbivorous races, which are rendered excessively fruitful to keep the world full. If, then, a carnivorous species become extinct, the species on which it has fed will so multiply as to prove great nuisances, and to produce wide disorder among many species, not only of animals, but of plants. And often has man, in this way, by the extermination of species, in particular districts, unwittingly brought a powerful reaction on himself.

On the Island of New Zealand, within one or two hundred years past, eight or ten species of gigantic birds—the dinornis and palapteryx—have become extinct, probably through the persecution of man. The natives, without doubt, hunted them down for food, until all disappeared: and as no quadruped of much size inhabits the island, we think there is no little plausibility in the suggestion of Professor Owen, that when the birds were all gone, or nearly gone, the natives were tempted to the practice of cannibalism, as the only means of gratifying their passion for meat. What a terrible retribution for disturbing the equilibrium of organic nature!

The records of zoölogy and botany afford endless illustration of this subject. But the great truth which they all teach is, that so intimately are we related to other beings, that almost every action of ours reacts upon them for good or evil; for good, upon the whole, when we conform to the laws which God has established; and for evil, when by their violation we disturb the equilibrium of organized nature, and produce irregular action. In this latter case, we cannot tell where the disturbance, thus introduced, will end; for it is not a periodical oscillation, like the perturbations of the heavenly bodies, nor a mere change of position and intensity by mechanical forces.

But does not this law of mutual influence between organic beings extend to other worlds? Why should it not be transmitted by means of the luminiferous ether to the limits of the universe? Who knows but a blow struck upon a single link of organic beings here may be felt through the whole circle of animate existence in all worlds? That is a narrow view of God’s work, which isolates the organic races on this globe from the rest of the universe. The more philosophical view throws the golden chain of influence around the whole animal creation, whether small or great, near or remote.

Reverting to the reasoning which we employed in tracing out the extent of mechanical reaction, we shall see that organic reaction may extend not only to other worlds, but also into eternity. For if the matter of the universe is to survive the conflagration of the last day, the future economy of life must have some connection with the present, whether this earth or some other part of the universe be the theatre of its development.