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CONTENTS.
INTRODUCTORY.
Interest attached to the study of the PAST in natural as in human
history.-Fossils, or petrified remains of plants and animals,
the medals and records of Creation.-The unerring certainty of
the record.-Palæontology, or the Science of Extinct Life.—Its
scope and bearings, as founded on a knowledge of the present
life of the globe. Its importance, abstract and practical.—
The task it has yet to accomplish,
PAGE
17
THE PRESENT.
Characteristics and classification of living plants and animals as
established by the Botanist and Zoologist: 1. Plant-Life.-Its
governing conditions in space.-Its typical forms and charac-
ters.-Its primal plan and patterns.-Systematic arrangement
of its forms.-Their apparent functions.-Persistency of plan
in time past. 2. Animal Life.-Its distribution or governing
conditions in space. -Its typical forms and their functions.—
Its primal plan and patterns.-Higher and lower.-Systematic
arrangement of its forms.-Identity of plan and design in
time past. 3. Co-adaptation of plants and animals in one great
Life-Scheme,
THE RECORD.
Chronology of geology, or the arrangement of the world's past into
Rock-formations and Life-periods.-Principles and methods of
this arrangement. - Continuity of natural law. - Provisional
and negative state of geological knowledge as influencing our
comprehension of the successional order of organic being.—
Palæontology so based. The problems it has to solve.—Its
progress and prospects,
69
THE FAR PAST.
Characteristics and gradations of the PALEOZOIC or "Ancient Life"
period: 1. The Cambrian age-so-called "Dawn of Life." 2.
The Silurian age.-Erroneous notions respecting its physical
geography and life-relations. Its vegetation, graptolites, corals,
star-fishes, shell-fish, and crustaceans.-Their specialties and
place in the scale of being. 3. The Devonian or Old Red Sand-
stone age. Physical features of the epoch.-Its plants, crus-
taceans, shell-fish, and fishes. 4. The Carboniferous age.—The
physical geography and climatal conditions of the period.-Its
forest-growths, coral-reefs, shell- beds, crustaceans, insects,
fishes, and reptiles. 5. The Permian or Lower New Red Sand-
stone age-so-called "close" of the Paleozoic cycle.-Imper-
fect interpretation and provisional nature of the Life-phases
and Life-periods of the geologist,
79
THE MIDDLE PAST.
Characteristics and gradations of the MESOZOIC or "Middle Life"
period: 6. The Triassic or Upper New Red Sandstone age.—
Its foot-tracks, birds, and reptiles. 7. The Oolitic age.-Sea
and land of the epoch.-Its vegetation, lower marine life, shell-
fish, crustacea, insects, reptiles, and terrestrial mammals. 8.
The Cretaceous or Chalk age.-Physical geography of its seas
and shores.-Its lower marine life, foraminiferæ, sponges, star-
fishes, sea-urchins, shell-fish, fishes, reptiles, birds, and mam-
mals.-Generalisations resulting from a review of the Mesozoic
cycle,
119
THE RECENT.
Characteristics and gradations of the CAINOZOIC or "Recent Life"
period 9. The Tertiary age.-Geography of the epoch.-Its
huge terrestrial mammals and recent forms of life.-Interme-
diate forms, and their relation to the fauna of existing areas.
Extinctions during the so-called "Glacial" or "Drifts" period.
10. The Post-Tertiary or Current age.-General existing ar-
rangements of sea and land.-Existing forms and distribution
of life.-General and local extinctions.-Man, pre-historic and
historic.-Mutations of the human race,
151
THE LAW.
General deductions arising from the discoveries of Palæontology.-
Origin and advent of life unknown to science.-Universality of
life in time and space.-Uniformity of type and plan through
all the geological life-periods.-Similarity of functions and life-
relations. - Distribution in space.--External conditions never
uniform. Representatives of the great life-types in every
epoch. Gradation and progress.-The course and apparent
order of this progress.-Introduction of new forms.-Extinction
and creation of species.-Theories of variation and development.
-Geological epoch of man:- Time and progress. Apparent
course of creation.-Life-phases of the Current epoch.-Causes
of local and general extinction.-Man as a sub-creative centre
and modifying agent. Duration of species.-Time and term of
the human race.-Life aspects of the future.-Progression or
succession?-Onward and upward,
-
177
CONCLUSION.
What has been aimed at.-The known and the unknown.-The field
in which we may all become fellow-workers.-The spirit in which
we should inquire,
241
INTRODUCTORY
PALEONTOLOGY-ITS SCOPE AND BEARINGS