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138 WHEN 1)11) ADAM MVKV Vol. VII lli ! II n ' I f 11' pestilence could have prevented the over peopling of the world ages ago. Man, from the assistance of liis suporior intelligence, is not subject to extensive diminution of his numbers by the lower animals. Again, man has a natural tendency to ward civilization. Of the meaning of this term, we all have an intuitive idea, though writers are not agreed as to its exact def inition. It is sulllcicnt for our purpose if wo define it as an active working prin ciplc, innate in man, and leading him to find and adopt that which promises to im prove his condition. This progressive principle sepcrates him radically from the brute creation, and prevents him from re maining entirely stationary, If tlie ex trcmoagoof the world be admitted, we should expect to find extensive remains of vary early civilization. Bill this, as we Sit nl 1 mention further on, does not appear. Philologists claim that language is at first monosyllabic, then by development to reach a highly iuHcctcd state, and finally through phonetic decay and loss of inflec tion, to retrograde to simpler forms. The Greek language was highly inllccted; the Sanscrit still more so; yet both these be long to historic times. All the phases therefore, which language assumes, do not require an extremely long poriod for their development. The considerations wo have thus far ad duced go to show that the race is com par atlvoly young compared with the vast length of geological time. They have little weight, however, if the arguments which are brought forward in opposition can be shown to contradict them. The other side of the question, therefore, now demands our attention. Archaeology, appealing to geology for a support, oilers arguments in support of the claim for a groat age to.tho race. But if this claim bo admitted, civilizations must have flourished in extremely remote times, and have loft many traces of their existence. But this is not so evident, a poriod of n few thousand years boing suf. flciont to account for the ago of all that if 1 H& i; 1 . sm S m i HilWBriiiiMl I i MUff h i 1IW arc known, and wc may well doubltho al. leged antiquity of a few relics that have been found here and there. Thus, remains of human industry are occassionally found at considerable depths in alluvial strata. One naturalist has found such a relic in rocks of the Miocene epoch and confidently asserts that its ago, and of course that of the race, is to be reck, oned by millions of years. Now the pres ence of these may often bo due to purely accidental causes. This is indeed known to be the case in some instances, and when true, proves little as to their antiq uity. Yet even when geological causes have been the agency, the lest is uncer tain and unicliablc. The operations of such causes, though, as a rule slow, are yet subject to many exceptions, and eigh ty feet, for instance, of superincumbent strata may as often indicate a moderate age for a relic as an immense one. Coins of the age of Edward IV of England have been tound in the valley of the Dee of that country at a depth of ten feet, proving an antiquity of but little more than two centuries at the farthest. In other cases twenty conturics have been claimed for the age of alike deposit, thus showing, in the absence of positive data, how little we know of geological lime. Sketches of extinct or extirpated ani mals do not necessarily possess a high an tiquity, but only show that animals once common in certain localities have, through t lie agency of man disappeared. Some European writers speak much of the Ages of " Stone" and " Bronze", and assign them to determinate periods of time in the distant past. The same is said of the lake dwellings of Switzerland and the British Islands- These, which are now generally under water, consist ed of scaffolds of wooden beams, support ed by piles driven into the beds of tho lakes. The lake dwellings of Ireland continued in some cases to bo occupied within the historic era. As wo know very little or northern Europe before the time of Ciysar, it is unnecessary to go much