Modern science, by the extent of its generalization, has learned to
indemnify the student of man for the defects of individuals, by tracing
growth and ascent in races; and, by the simple expedient of lighting
up the vast background, generates a feeling of complacency and hope.
The human being has the saurian and the plant in his rear. His arts
and sciences, the easy issue of his brain, look glorious when
prospectively beheld from the distant brain of ox, crocodile, and fish.
It seems as if nature, in regarding the geologic night behind her,
when, in five or six millenniums, she had turned out five or six men,
as Homer, Phidias, Menu, and Columbus, was nowise discontented with
the result. These samples attested the virtue of the tree. These were
a clear amelioration of trilobite and saurus, and a good basis for
further proceeding. With this artist time and space are cheap, and she
is insensible of what you say of tedious preparation. She waited
tranquilly the flowing periods of paleontology, for the hour to be
struck when man should arrive. Then periods must pass before the motion
of the earth can be suspected; then before the map of the instincts
and the cultivable powers can be drawn.
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