Kingdom (biology)

“ Some naturalists, from being deeply impressed with the mental and spiritual powers of man, have divided the whole organic world into three kingdoms, the human, the animal, and the vegetable, thus giving to man a separate kingdom. ”

“ Thus, all creatures which agree only in presenting the few distinctive marks of animality form the 'Kingdom' ANIMALIA. The numerous animals which agree only in possessing the special characters of Vertebrates form one 'Sub-Kingdom' of this Kingdom. ”

“ The organic kingdoms of the earth—animals and plants—are as truly parts of the terrestrial globe as the inorganic kingdom is; and as such they share in, and are actuated by, the same great tendency or instinct as that which actuates the whole. ”

“ THE animal kingdom is, as we know, dependent on the vegetable kingdom, which must have existed on the earth before men and animals could live upon it. We may, therefore, rightly call plants children of the earth. ”

“ In the vegetable kingdom, for example, the life-force might commence its career by occupying grasses or mosses and end it by ensouling magnificent forest trees. In the animal kingdom it might commence with mosquitoes or with animalculæ, and might end with the finest specimens of the mammalia. ”

“ A continuous, unbroken line of life reaches downward from man. Its successive stages are seen in the animals, the reptiles, the insects and the microbes. Even the great kingdoms into which the biologist divides life fade into each other almost imperceptibly and it becomes difficult to say where the vegetable kingdom stops and the animal kingdom begins. ”

“ The first volume contains the animal kingdom. The introduction presents a brief view of the constitution of the world, in the usually laconic style of the author. In it the three kingdoms of nature are thus defined:—Minerals are concrete bodies, possessing neither life nor sensibility; vegetables are organized bodies, possessed of life, but without sensibility; animals are organized bodies, possessing life and sensibility, together with voluntary motion. ”

“ During these years I knew that man was not a mineral nor a plant—that, indeed, he belonged to the animal kingdom. But, like most men still, I continued to think of him as being altogether different from other animals. ”

“ We speak of all these forms as finer or grosser relatively to one another, but all of them are almost infinitely finer than any with which we are acquainted in the physical world. Each of these three is a kingdom of Nature, as varied in the manifestations of its different forms of life as is the animal or vegetable kingdom which we know. ”

“ Thus the animal kingdom is divided, first of all, into Sub-kingdoms, then each Sub-kingdom into so many Classes containing those which have further characteristics in common, the Classes into Orders, the Orders into Families, the Families into Genera, and these again into species or kinds. ”

“ Then, gradually, over perhaps many million more years, the germinal kingdom brought forth the different forms of matter, bacteria, et cetera. These in turn brought forth the various bodies, the animalistic kingdom, and other forms of life that would be needed to help build and prepare the way and become an assisting force in eventually bringing forth the human expression. ”

“ The animal kingdom has its sub-kingdoms, classes, orders, families, and species. Botanists speak of divisions, classes, orders, genera, and species, &c., species being the first assemblage of individuals. ”

“ This vast mass of animals is subdivided into a number of very large groups, each of which is a called a sub-kingdom. Thus, we have the sub-kingdom to which we ourselves belong—the vertebrate sub-kingdom ”

“ The inquiry into the faculties and functions of living beings is here continued, for the purpose of determining, through them, the source from which life is derived; and the distinction between the animal and vegetable kingdom is, incidentally, alluded to. ”

“ All divine philosophers and men of wisdom and understanding, when observing these endless beings, have considered that in this great and infinite universe all things end in the mineral kingdom, that the outcome of the mineral kingdom is the vegetable kingdom, the outcome of the vegetable kingdom is the animal kingdom and the outcome of the animal kingdom the world of man. ”

“ We cannot draw a sharp line of distinction between these two great divisions of nature, any more than we can recognize an absolute distinction between the animal and the vegetable kingdom, or between the lower animals and man. ”

“ It has already been made abundantly clear, in the course of our investigations, that entities attaining to the culminating point in one kingdom do not enter the lower levels of the next higher kingdom. The life which ensouls an oak-tree, a banyan, or a rose-bush will pass directly into the mammalian order when it enters the animal kingdom; whereas the life which leaves the vegetable kingdom at a much lower level may pass into the stage of insects and reptiles. ”

“ Whether Man should take his place in the animal kingdom? a question which evidently leads to another: Is man distinguished from animals by important and characteristic phenomena, absolutely unknown in the latter? ”

“ As Nature is "the representation of the individual activities of the spirit," so the animal kingdom is the representation of the activities or organs of man. The animal kingdom is therefore "a dismemberment of the highest animal, i.e., of Man" (p. 494) . Now "animals are gradually perfected, entirely like the single animal body, by adding organ unto organ"—the way of evolution is the way of development. Hence "animals are only the persistent fœtal stages or conditions of Man," who is the microcosm, and contains within himself all the animal kingdom. ”

“ In the animal kingdom are found myriads of forms so minute that their bulk is reckoned by less than the millionth part of a cubic inch, yet each one is endowed with organs of sense or assimilation sufficient to serve the purpose in their sphere of life. The vegetable kingdom, also, offers abundant specimens of microscopic forms, calculated to excite our admiration by the beauty and minuteness of their organisms. ”

“ And that supreme law which has guided the development from simple to complex in matter, in individual, in sub-Kingdom, and in Kingdom, until only two or three great Kingdoms remain, now begins at the beginning again, directing the evolution of these million-peopled worlds as if they were simple cells or organisms. ”

“ In the Secondary Age the Reptiles reach their climax, while the Bony Fishes, Mammals, and Birds are just appearing. The gradual unfolding of the vegetal kingdom during the Primary and Secondary Ages is as marked as that of the animal kingdom. ”

“ The general result is one of great interest, as illustrating a striking degree of interdependence between lower and higher organisms,—the vegetable and animal kingdom contributing to each other's subsistence and propagation. ”

“ How immense, for instance, is the number of individual objects necessary to represent, by a single specimen, each of its kind, the animal kingdom, with its six sub-kingdoms, their subdivisions, classes, orders, species, and varieties, already known, from the dawn of animal life down to our own day, besides species and varieties yet to be discovered! ”

“ The answer is not always easy. We know that, in what may be called the basis of each kingdom, there are ambiguous forms, whose nature has long been, and still is, the subject of contention among naturalists. ”

“ All this has long been known, and has been regarded as a wonderful evidence of the homology or unity of plan which pervades nature, and as constituting man the archetype of the [71] animal kingdom—the highest realization of a plan previously sketched by the Creator in many ruder and humbler forms. It also teaches that it is not so much in the mere bodily organism that we are to look for the distinguishing characters of humanity as in the higher rational and moral nature. ”

“ From the scientific point of view it is seen that there is but one universal Kingdom of Life, Nature. This kingdom may be divided into three, perhaps four, states constituting the United States of Life: the mineral, the vegetable, the animal and the human. ”

“ Yet sometimes vegetables and animals are, by certain epithets or circumstances, extended to other significations; as a Tree, when called the tree of life or of knowledge; and a Beast, when called the old serpent, or worshipped.
When a Beast or Man is put for a kingdom, his parts and qualities are put for the analogous parts and qualities of the kingdom; as the head of a Beast, for the great men who precede and govern; the tail for the inferior people, who follow and are governed; ”

“ The scientists say there are three kingdoms in nature—mineral, vegetable and animal. I say there are four—mineral, vegetable, animal and man, or the spiritual Kingdom of God. Man is a soul or spiritual body which is from God and a part of God. He can think, reason, aspire, analyze, and soar into the psychic realms of the spiritual world and commune with angels and Deity, and is a spirit monarch of the universe. ”

“ The animal kingdom is distinguished into beasts, birds, and fishes, corresponding to the three forms under which matter is known to exist, and respectively inhabiting the three elements, earth, air, and water. ”

“ The number of all the various kinds of living creatures is so enormous that it would be impossible to study them profitably, were they not classified in an orderly manner. Therefore the whole mass has been divided, in the first place, into two supreme groups, fancifully termed kingdoms—the "animal kingdom" and the "vegetal kingdom." ”

“ When we look upon the human kingdom, we readily observe that it is superior to all others. In the differentiation of life in the world of existence, there are four degrees or kingdoms: the mineral, vegetable, animal and human. ”

“ The principles, doctrine, germ, and, I may say, marrow of that Kingdom are actually planted on the earth, but does it grow to perfection at once? No. When wheat is planted and germinates, you first see the blade, and by and by the head forming in the boot, from which in due time it bursts forth and makes its appearance. When this Kingdom is set up on the earth, and spreads, its condition is happily set forth in the toast that was given here on the fourth, viz.—"May the wings of the American Eagle spread over the nations, and its DOWN fall on America." ”

“ And because the whole kingdom is the body politic of the King, therefore the Sun, or a Tree, or a Beast, or Bird, or a Man, whereby the King is represented, is put in a large signification for the whole kingdom ”

“ Any name, therefore, which is intended to embrace a large section of the animal kingdom, must ever be more or less arbitrary. It will extend too far in one direction, and embrace organisms which might be classed in a different section. ”

“ In this kingdom life reveals its nature in clearer characters, in higher and more varied forms. It shows that it is of its nature to feel, to know, to associate with others, to enjoy, and to bring many material substances into its own service. ”

“ The forms of vegetable life around us to-day—cereals, fruit-trees, plants, and flowers of infinitely varied tint—bear witness to the art and skill of man; and the animal kingdom, ruled by mysterious biological laws, has provided him with faithful servants obedient to his will, in a life which to dogs and horses is largely artificial. ”

“ Man, then, considered zoologically, and without regard to the distinct character assigned to him by theology, simply takes his place as the type of all types of the animal kingdom, the true and unmistakable head of animated nature upon this earth. It will readily occur that some more particular investigations into the ranks of types might throw additional light on man’s status, and perhaps his nature; and such light we may hope to obtain when the philosophy of zoology shall have been studied as it deserves. ”