If, therefore, science makes the "history of creation" its highest, most difficult, and most comprehensive problem, it must accept as its idea of creation the second explanation of the word, viz., _the coming into being of the form_ of natural bodies. In this way geology, which tries to investigate the origin of the inorganic surface of the earth as it now appears, and the manifold historical changes in the form of the solid crust of the earth, may be called the history of the creation of the earth. In like manner, the history of the development of animals and plants, which investigates the origin of living forms, and the manifold historical changes in animal and vegetable forms, may be termed the history of the creation of organisms. As, however, in the idea of creation, although used in this sense, the unscientific idea of a creator existing outside of matter, and changing it, may easily creep in, it will perhaps be better in future to substitute for it the more accurate term, _development_.
The great value which the _History of Development_ possesses for the scientific understanding of animal and vegetable forms, has now been generally acknowledged for many years, and without it it would be impossible to make any sure progress in organic morphology, or the theory of forms. But by the history of development, only one part of this science has generally been understood, namely, that of organic individuals, usually called Embryology, but more correctly and comprehensively, _Ontogeny_. But, besides this, there is another history of development of organic species, genera, and tribes (phyla), which has the most important relations to the former.
The subject of this is furnished to us by the science of petrifactions, or palæontology, which shows us that each tribe of animals and plants, during different periods of the earth's history, has been represented by a series of entirely different genera and species. Thus, for example, the tribe of vertebrated animals was represented by classes of fish, amphibious animals, reptiles, birds, and mammals, and each of these groups, at different periods, by quite different kinds. This palæontological history of the development of organisms, which we may term _Phylogeny_, stands in the most important and remarkable relation to the other branch of organic history of development, I mean that of individuals, or Ontogeny. On the whole, the one runs parallel to the other. In fact, the history of individual development, or Ontogeny, is a short and quick recapitulation of palæontological development, or Phylogeny, dependent on the laws of Inheritance and Adaptation.