Outlines of Creation

Outlines of Creation

The foregoing descriptions refer to the great works of God as seen in those creations which possess not that most wonderful attributelife. There is no limit in extent, in quality, or in number, to these works; their extension appears to be infinite; their magnitudes are large or small, just as we compare them one with the other. This earth is an enormous mass, contemplated in comparison with ourselves, but an insignificant speck when compared with the sun, and there are certain laws, chemical and mechanical, which govern them allheat, light, and electricity permeate all the infinity of spaceattraction exists everywhere. There are no individual existences among them; all are made up of matter combined according to certain definite chemical laws, and always obedient to them under the same conditionsmoving according to certain mechanical laws, and always obedient to them. The Creator who made these lifeless masses made also the laws to regulate them; but, besides these, it has pleased Him to form certain other creatures not for an instant to be compared in size or quantity with the former, and made up also of certain chemical compounds obedient to the mechanical and chemical laws, with one more addition, that unknown, inexplicable attributelife. This wonderful quality exists in all organic beings; they obtain by it individual identity; they are whole creaturesimperfect with any part taken away, also imperfect with any addition. Clay is clay, in any quality or form; iron is iron, whether a grain or a ton; but a tree is only a tree when it is complete. We cannot say "some tree," as we would "some clay," it must be a tree, or several trees, each a separate and complete existence [Pg 111]perfect in itselfmade up of solids and fluids, and possessing certain attributes, namely, a constant circulation of its fluid parts, a constant appropriation of food and rejection of waste mattersgrowth thereby to a certain definite form, and in many a definite size, together with the production of germs, capable, under certain conditions, of producing beings exactly similar to themselves. This constitutes organic life, and is possessed by all vegetables. Animal life is exactly the same, with the super-addition of will or mind in its most perfect state, of instinct or some analogous function in its lower states, or in quite the lowesta chemical and mechanical difference only, such as shall determine the choice of food and mode of assimilating it. This difference consists in the vegetable feeding upon inorganic food, and the animal on food which has received the stamp of organisation. Creatures possessing life, whether vegetable or animal, are called organisms. It is found that these organisms are made up of certain atoms united in larger multiples than in inorganic substances, which are either simple or compounded of but few atoms; thus water is composed (every atom of it) of one atom oxygen, united to two of hydrogen. Common salt (every atom of it) is composed of one atom of the metal sodium with one atom of chlorine. Chalk is compounded of one atom of calcium in union with one of oxygen, and this united to one atom of carbonic acid, itself composed of one atom of carbon with two of oxygen. But organic compounds are often made up of four or six elements, united in multiples of their usual combining quantities. Thus, grape-sugar is made up (every atom of it) of 24 atoms of carbon, 28 of hydrogen and 28 of oxygen; these 78 atoms unite and form one compound atom, of which the sugar is wholly compounded, and thus, from such a complex nature, it happens that most organic compounds are decomposed by even a moderate degree of heatall by a heat equal to red-hot iron. From these facts, it may be therefore stated, that all organisms are complete in themselves, have definite lives or existences, appropriate certain matters to themselves, grow thereby, and are compounded of organic atoms. [Pg 112] In contemplating nature there are few things which give more delight than the beauty and variety of the vegetation which clothes the surface of the earth, whether it be that we contemplate the grassy covering of the plains of the Old World, or the immense "prairies" of the New, spreading out as it were into seas of grass, and giving food and shelter to thousands of wild animals; or gaze upon the rocky height of some vast mountain range, and see the gigantic oak or pine, forming by their wide-spread shades the solemn forest which extends for miles beneath us, and [Pg 113] which forms a shelter for the various tribes of birds, monkeys, and other animals, to whom it is a home of happiness and plentyunder every aspect the contemplation of nature's clothing fills the mind with awe and admiration. ......Buy Now (To Read More)

Product details

Ebook Number: 48876
Author: Noyce, Elisha
Release Date: May 4, 2015
Format: eBook
Language: English