My sincere desire in the composition of the book was to give the true view of the history of nature, with as little disturbance as possible to existi… - Robert Chambers

The style of living is ascertained to have a powerful effect in modifying the human figure in the course of generations, and this even in its osseous structure.

Of late years... it has been successfully shewn that the human race might have had one origin, for anything that can be inferred from external peculiarities.

May not the sacred text, on a liberal interpretation, or with the benefit of new light reflected from nature, or derived from learning, be shewn to be as much in harmony with the novelties of this volume as it has been with geology and natural philosophy? What is there in the laws of organic creation more startling to the candid theologian than in the Copernican system or the natural formation of strata?