The earliest stratified rocks contain no matters which are not to be found in the primitive granite. They are the same in material, but only changed … - Robert Chambers

While there is such a persistency to ordinary observation, it would also appear that nature has a power of producing new varieties, though this is only done rarely. Such novelties of type abound in the vegetable world, are seen more rarely in the animal circle, and perhaps are least frequent of occurrence in our own race.

In most instances, affectionate relatives and kind friends would wish to prolong the existence of the individual who has reached that age; but if we look at the happiness of mankind in general, we shall find reason to believe that, like all the other general principles of nature, this one carries the impress of an all-wise and beneficent Creator; and that if man had it in his power to alter the arrangement, it may be questioned if he could improve it. At this age the great desires of life are generally accomplished, and the tired laborer in the hardest fields of exertion, which are those of the intellect, has had some years of quiet meditation on the long battle of life to which his days of energy and hope were devoted. The world has, in general, little more use for him; and should he—however meritorious his services, however honored his gray hairs—too long remain an actual living man, seeming to fill a part of the arena in which younger and abler combatants are looking for places, the consciousness of being honored and beloved may give way before the suspicion that he has become an encumbrance to the circle he once adorned.

Zoophyta, polyparia, crinoidea, conchifera, and crustacea are the orders of the animal kingdom thus found in the earliest of earth's sepulchres.