Ascending the scale of life-forms, we next observe the great family of the Annulosa, or jointed creatures, which comprises the various families of the worm, the crab, the spider, the ant, etc.  In this great family are grouped nearly four-fifths of the known life-forms.  Their bodies are well formed and they have nervous systems running along the body and consisting of two thin threads, knotted at different points into ganglia or masses of nerve cells similar to those possessed by the higher animals.  They possess eyes and other sense organs, in some cases highly developed.  They possess organs, corresponding to the heart, and have a well-developed digestive apparatus.  Note this advance in the nutritive organism:  the moneron takes its food at any point of its body; the amoeba takes its food by means of its “false-feet,” and drives it through its body by a rhythmic movement of its substance; the polyp distributes its food to its various parts by means of the water which it absorbs with the food; the sea-urchin and star-fish distribute their food by canals in their bodies which open directly into the water; in the higher forms of the annulosa, the food is distributed by a fluid resembling blood, which carries the nourishment to every part and organ, and which carries away the waste matter, the blood being propelled through the body by a rudimentary heart.  The oxygen is distributed by each of these forms in a corresponding way, the higher forms having rudimentary lungs and respiratory organs.  Step by step the life-forms are perfected, and the organs necessary to perform certain definite functions are evolved from rudimentary to perfected forms.

The families of worms are the humblest members of the great family of the Annulosa.  Next come the creatures called Rotifers, which are very minute.  Then come the Crustacea, so called from their crustlike shell.  This group includes the crabs, lobsters, etc., and closely resembles the insects.  In fact, some of the best authorities believe that the insects and the crustacea spring from the same parent form, and some of the Yogi authorities hold to this belief, while others do not attempt to pass upon it, deeming it immaterial, inasmuch as all life-forms have a common origin.  The western scientists pay great attention to outward details, while the Oriental mind is apt to pass over these details as of slight importance, preferring to seek the cause back of the outward form.  On one point both the Yogi teachers and the scientists absolutely agree, and that is that the family of insect life had its origin in some aquatic creature.  Both hold that the wings of the insect have been evolved from organs primarily used for breathing purposes by the ancestor when it took short aerial flights, the need for means of flight afterwards acting to develop these rudimentary organs into perfected wings.  There need be no more wonder expressed at this change than in the case of the transformation of the insect from grub to chrysalis, and then to insect.  In fact this process is a reproduction of the stages through which the life-form passed during the long ages between sea-creature and land-insect.