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Show The Origin of Death Lecky, the historiau, says geology has conclusively disproved what was once the universal belief concerning" the origin of death. That this fearful calnmity appeared in the universe on account of the transgression of man; that every pang that convulses tho frame of any created being, every j passion or instinct or necessity that contributes to the infliction of suffering, suffer-ing, is but the fruit of the disobedience in paradise, was long believed with unfaltering un-faltering assurance, aud is even now held by many who can not be regarded regard-ed as altogether uneducated. And this general proposition became a great arohetypo, a ceuter around which countless congenital beliefs were formed, a first principle or measure of probability guiding the predispositions predispo-sitions of men iu all their inquiries. If all death and all pain resulted from the sin of Adam, it was natural to give every particular instance of death or pain a special signification; and if these the greatest of tcrrestial imperfectious were connected with tho history of roan, it was natural to believe be-lieve that all minor evils were no less so. But geology has now proved decisively de-cisively that a profound error lurks in these conclusions. It has proved that countless ages before man trod this earth death raged and reveled among its occupants; that it so entered into the original constitution of things that the ngony aud infirmity it implies were known as at present when tho mastodon masto-don and thediuotherium were the rulers of the world. To deny this is now impossible; im-possible; to admit it is to abandon one cf the root doctrines of the past. |
