The zoologist would still use the fossil forms of non-existing animals, to illustrate the mutual analogies of species and groups. His recognition of their prochronism would in nowise interfere with his endeavours to assign to each its position in the scale of organic being. He would still legitimately treat it as an entity; an essential constituent of the great Plan of Nature; because he would recognise the Plan itself as an entity, though only an ideal entity, existing only in the Divine Conception. He would still use the stony skeletons for the inculcation of lessons on the skill and power of God in creation; and would find them a rich mine of instruction, affording some examples of the adaptation of structure to function, which are not yielded by any extant species. Such are the elongation of the little finger in Pterodactylus, for the extension of the alar membrane; and the deflexion of the inferior incisors in Dinotherium, for the purposes of digging or anchorage. And still would he find, in the fossil forms, evidences of that complacency in beauty, which has prompted the Adorable Workmaster to paint the rose in blushing hues, and to weave the fine lace of the dragonfly's wing. The whorls of the Gyroceras, the foliaceous or zigzag sutures of the Ammonites, and the radiating pattern of Smithia, are not less elegant than anything of the kind in existing creation, in which, however, they have no parallels. In short, the readings of the "stone book" will be found not less worthy of God who wrote them, not less worthy of man who deciphers them, if we consider them as prochronically, than if we judge them diachronically, produced.
GYROCERAS.
Here I close my labours. How far I have succeeded in accomplishing the task to which I bent myself, it is not for me to judge. Others will determine that; and I am quite sure it will be determined fairly, on the whole. To prevent misapprehension, however, it may be as well to enunciate what the task was, which I prescribed, especially because other (collateral, hypothetical) points have been mooted in these pages.
All, then, that I consider myself responsible for is summed up in these sentences:—
I. The conclusions hitherto received have been but inferences deduced from certain premises: the witness who reveals the premises does not testify to the inferences.
II. The process of deducing the inferences has been liable to a vast incoming of error, arising from the operation of a Law, proved to exist, but hitherto unrecognised.
III. The amount of the error thus produced we have no means of knowing; much less of eliminating it.
IV. The whole of the facts deposed to by this witness are irrelevant to the question; and the witness is, therefore, out of court.