Page:Geology and Mineralogy considered with reference to Natural Theology, 1837, volume 1.djvu/94

 90 have, in former Periods, occupied our Planet, afford in their fossil remains, the same evidences of contrivance and design that have been shown by Ray, Derham, and Paley, to pervade the structure of existing Genera and species of organized Beings.

From the high preservation in which we find the remains of animals and vegetables of each geological formation, and the exquisite mechanism which appears in many fossil fragments of their organization, we may collect an infinity of arguments, to show that the creatures from which all these are derived were constructed with a view to the varying conditions of the surface of the Earth, and to its gradually increasing capabilities of sustaining more complex forms of organic life, advancing through successive stages of perfection.