On natural theology

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Chalmers, Thomas, 1780-1847 J
On natural theology

ON

NAT U U A L T H i-:0 LOG Y.

THOMAS CHALMERS, D.D. & LL.D.

l-ROFESSOR OK THEOLOGY IN TWii: UMVEllsiiy OF EDINBURGH,
AMD COKRXSPONOING MEMBER OF THE ROYAL INSTIfUTK OF FRAMCBi

IN TWO VOLUMES.

VOL. I.

NEW YORK:
ROBERT CARTER & BROTHERS

No. 285 B R O A D W A V .

1850.

PREFACR

The Science of Theology in its most general
meaning, as comprehensive both of the Natural
and the Revealed, might, in respect to the order
of its topics and propositions, be presented to the
disciple in two different ways — so as, if not to affect
the substance of its various arguments, at least to
affect the succession of them. According to the
first way, a commencement is made, as if at the
fountain-head of the whole theme, with the being
and the constitution and the character of God ;
and then from this point of departure, a demonstra-
tion is carried forward in the footsteps of the
history of the divine administration, from the first
purposes of the uncreated mind to the final issues
of His government in eternity.. This most fre-
quently is the course of those Christian writers,
who attempt the construction of an entire system
of Theology. They descend from the heights of
the eternity that is past ; and, often, it is not till
they have bestowed their treatment on such ante-
mundane topics as the mysteries of the divine
essence and the high pre-ordinations of God, that
1*

n PRBFACB.

they enter on the development of these in the
creation of a universe and its moral history onward
to the consummation of all things. One cannot
peruse the successive titles of the chapters in the
systematic works of our best and greatest authors,
without observing how much the arrangement
proceeds in the chronological order of the history,
of the divine government — so that, after the estab-
lishment of the initial lessons which we have now
specified, we are very generally conducted along
some such series of doctrines as the following-^
the formation of man; his original state of innocence;
the introduction of moral evil at the fall, and the
consequent guilt and depravation of our species;
the remedy for this universal disease in the ap-
pointment of a Mediator ; the atonement made by
Him, so as to release his followers from the penalty
of sin; the doctrine of a regenerating Spirit to
deliver them from its power ; the free overtures of
this reconciliation and recovery to the world ; the
great moral change experienced by all who accept
them; their duties in the present hfe, and their
blissful prospects of another: on the other hand
the fearful doom of all who reject the Christian
message ; the judgment to which both the obedient
and the rebellious will be summoned at the end of
the world ; and the destinies which respectively
await them, in that everlasting economy which is

PREFACE. Til

to succeed after the present economy of things
shall h«re passed away.

Now such an arrangement, proceeding as it
does in the chronological order of the divine
administration, and which quadrates too with the
great successions that take place in the collective
history of the species, has peculiar advantages of
its own. But there is another arrangement, having
a distinct principle, attended too with its own distinct
benefits, but of another sort. Instead of treating
Theology in the order of the procedure of the
divine government, and with general respect there-
fore to the whole Universe of created InteUigences
or at least to the whole of the human family, it
may be treated in the order of those inquiries
which are natural to the exercised spirit of an
individual man, from the outset of his religious
earnestness when the felt supremacy of conscience
within tells him of a Law and tells him of a
Lawgiver — when his own sense of innumerable
deficiencies from a higher and a holier standard of
rectitude than he has ever reached, first visits him
with the conviction of guilt and the dread anticipa^
tion of a coming vengeance. This would give
rise to an arrangement differing from the former,
having a different starting-post or point of de-
parture, and, though coinciding in some places,
yet reversing the order of certain of the topics;

vm FRBFACB.

and, more especially, transferring to a far ulterior
part of its course, some of those initial matters in
the first arrangement, which, when discussed at so
early a stage give an obscure and transcendental
character to the very commencement of the science.
By the first arrangement we are made to descend
synthetically, from principles which have their
residence in the constitution and character of the
Godhead, and which transport us back to past
eternity — as in those systems of Christian Theo-
logy, where the doctrines of the Trinity and
Predestination take the priority of all those themes
w'hich are within the reach of human conception,
or bear with immediate application on the desires
and the doings of man. By the second arrange-
ment, we are made to ascend in the order of
man's fears and of his efforts to be relieved from
them — ^beginning, therefore, with that sense o2 God
which is so promptly and powerfully suggested
to every man by his own moral nature ; and pro-
ceeding, under the impulse of apprehensive and
conscious guilt, to the consideration of what must
be done to escape from its consequences, and what
is the remedy if any for the sore disease under
which humanity labours. It is obvious that with
such a commencement as this for our System of
Theology, the depravity of man, along with the
moral character and government of God, and the

PREFACE.

requisitions and sanctions of His law, would find an
early place in it ; and, whereas in the atonement
made known by a professed Revelation there is a
remedy proposed, it were most natural to pass
onward to the claims and credentials of this pro-
fessed embassy from Heaven — thence, under the
promptings of a desiVe for relief, from the consi-
deration of our danger to the consideration of
the refuge opened up for us in the Gospel —
thence to the new life required of all its disciples
— thence to the promised aids of a strength
and grace from on high, for the fulfilment of our
due obedience — thence to the issues of our repen-
tance and faith in a deathless eternity — thence,
finally, and after the settlement of all that was
practical and pressing, to the solution of difficulties
which are grappled with at the outset of the former
scheme of Theology ; but which in the latter
scheme would be postponed for their more scien-
tific treatment to that stage, when, leaving the
first principles of their discipleship, the aspirants
after larger views and more recondite mysteries go
on unto perfection.

By the former method Theology is capable oi
being presented more in the form or aspect
of a regular science, with the orderly descent
and derivation of its propositions from the highest
principles to which we can ascend ; but when the
A 2

X PREFACK.

departure is made from the primeval designs of the
Godhead, or the profound mysteries of his nature

^this gives more of a transcendental, but more at

the same time of a presumptuous and a priori
character, to the whole contemplation. The
second method, by which departure is made from
the suggestions and the fears of human conscience,
has the recommendation of being more practical
and, if not in the order of exposition, is more at
least in the order of discovery. Even Natural
Theology, taken by itself, is susceptible of both
these treatments; and may be either studied as
the Theology of academic demonstration, or traced
to its outgoings as the Theology of Conscience — .
from the first stirrings of human feelings or human
fancy on the question of a God, to the fullest
discoveries that can be made by the light of Nature
whether of His existence or His character or KQs
ways. In the following treatise we do not rigo-
rously adhere to any of these methods — though we
hold it incumbent upon us, to clear away the inju-
rious metaphysics, in which certain disciples of the
first school have, even in their earhest, their initial
lessons on the subject, shrouded the science of
Theology ; and we have also endeavoured to show
what those incipient, those rudimental tendencies
of the human spirit are, under the guidance of
which the disciples of the second school are carried

PREFACE. XI

onward in the path of inquiry. In the execution
of these tasks we have occupied the first Book,
having the title of PreUminary Views ; and would
now bespeak the indulgence of our readers for
what some might deem the superfluous illustration
of its two first, and others might feel to be the
hopeless and impracticable obscurity of its two
succeeding chapters. The latter complaint should
be laid, we think, not on the Author, but on the
necessities of his subject. To the former however
he must plead guilty; for, even though at the
expense of nauseating those of quick and powerful
understanding; and whose taste is more for the
profound than the palpable, however important
the truth inculcated may be and however desirable
to have the luminous conception and mtense feehng
of it— he should rejoice to be the instrument, and
more particularly at the outset of their rehgious
earnestness, of giving the most plain and intelli-
gible notices of their way even unto babes.

We shall not be so liable to either of these
extremes in the subsequent Books of which this
treatise is composed — and the perusal of which
indeed might be immediately entered on, although
the first or preliminary Book were to receive the
treatment that is often given to a long and weari-
some preface, that is, passed over altogether. Wo
must confess however our desire for the judgment

XU PREFACE.

of th6 more profound class of readers on the fourth
chapter in this department of the work, and which
treats of a pecuhar argument by Hume on the
side of Atheism.' The truth is that we do not
conceive the infidelity of this philosopher to have
been adequately met, by any of hi^ opponents;
whether as it respects the question of a God or the
question of the truth of Christianity. In the
management of both controversies, it has been
thought necesbary to conjure up a new principle for
the purpose of refuting his especial sophistries ;
and thus to make two gratuitous, and we think
very questionable additions, to the mental philo-
sophy— ^in the shape of two distinct and original
laws of the human understanding, which, anterior
to. the date of his speculations, never had been
heard of ; and probably never would, but for the
service which they were imagined to render in the
battles of the faith. We hold ourselves independent
of both, these auxiliaries ; and it is our attempt to
show on the premises of the author himself, or at
least with the help of no other principles than the
universal and uniform faith of men in the lessons
of experience, now of his atheistical, and afterwards
of his deistical argument — the one grounded on the
alleged singularity of the world as an efiect, the
other grounded on the alleged incompetency of
human testimony to accredit the truth of a miracle

PREFACE. Xm

—we hope to show that there is a distinct fallacy in
each, and at the same time a contradiction between
the fallacies in itself destructive of both ; and which
must either have escaped the penetration, or been
concealed by the art of this most subtle metaphyst-
cian and reasoner.

After having disposed in the first Book of all that
is of a prefatory or general character, we in the
second Book enter on the consideration of proofs
for the being of a God in the dispositions of matter.
The third Book is occupied with proofs, not for the
being only, but for the being and character of God
as displayed in the constitution of the mind — ^from
which department it has been strangely affirmed of
late, that little or no evidence has yet been collected
for the defence or illustration of Natural Theology.
The object of the fourth Book, is to exhibit addi-
tional evidence for a God in the adaptation of Exter-
nal Nature to the Mental Constitution of Man.
And in the fifth, which is the last Book, we endeavour
to estimate the amount as well as the dimness and
deficiency of the hght of nature in respect to its power
of discovering either the character or still less the
counsels and the ways of God. In this concluding
part of the treatise, beside recording the efforts which
Philosophy has made, and to what degree she has
failed in resolving that most tremendous and appalling
of all mysteries, the Origin of Evil, we attempt to

MV PREFACE.

reconcile both the doctrine of a Special Providence
and the efficacy of prayer with the constancy of
visible nature. It is well to evince, not the suc-
cess only, but the shortcomings of Natural The-
ology ; and thus to make palpable at the same time
both her helplessness and her usefulness — helpless
if trusted to as a guide or an informer on the way
to heaven ; but most useful if, under a sense of her
felt deficiency, we seek for a place of enlargement
and are led onward to the higher manifestations of
Christianity.

Edikburgb, nth Dte,t 16S6.

CONTENTa

BOOK I

PRELIMINART VIEWS.

PAQB

Cba?. T. On the Dlstincii<m between the Ethics of Theo-
logy and the Objects of Theology 17

IL On th» Duty which is laid upon Men by the

Probability or even the Imagination of a God, 56

III. Of the Metap^ijrsics which have been resorted to

on theside ofThekm 99

DR. Clarke's a priori argument on the

BEING OF A GOD.

IV. Of the Metaphysics which have been resorted to

on the side of Theism, 121

MR. Hume's objection to the a posteriori

ARGUMENT, GROUNDED ON THE ASSERTION
THAT THE WORLD IS A SINGULAR EFFECT.

V. On the Hypothesis that the World is Eternal, .161
BOOK 11.^

PROOFS FOR THE BEING OF A GOD IN THE DISPOSITIONS OF
MATTER.

CUAF. I. On the Distinction 1)«tween the Laws of Matter

and the Dispositioo* of Matter, ..... 189

XVI CONTENTS.

PAOS

Chap. II. Natural and Geological Proofs for a Commence-
ment of our present Terrestrial Economy, . . 228

III. On the Strength of the Evidences for a God in the

Phenoraeaa of Visible and Bxtemal Nature, . 258

BOOK III.

PBOOfS FOE THE BEING AND CHARACTER OF GOD IN THB
CONSTITUTION OF THE HUMAN MIND.

Chap. I. General Considerations on the Evidence aflForded
by the Phenomena and Constitution of the
Human mind for the Being of a God, . . 280

n. On the Supremacy of Conscience, SOS

IIL On the inherent Pleasure of the Virtuous, and

Misery of the Vicious Affections, . • • 352

IV. The Power and Op«rai&ba of Kabit, • • . • 868

BOOK I.

PRELIMINARY VIEWS.

CHAPTER I.

On the Distinction between the Ethics of Theology and the
Objects of Theology/.

1, Our first remark on the science of Theology is,
that the objects of it, by their remoteness, and by
their elevation, seem to be inaccessible. The
objects of the other sciences are either placed, as
those of matter, within the ken of our senses ; or,
as in the science of mind, they come under a nearer
and more direct recognition still, by the faculty of
consciousness. But no man hath seen God at any
time. We " have neither heard His voice nor seen
His shape." And neither do the felt operations
of our own busy and ever-thinking spirits imme-
diately announce themselves to be the stirrings of
the divinity within us. So that the knowledge of
that Being, whose existence, and whose character,
and whose ways, it is the business of Theology to
investigate, and the high purpose of Theology to
ascertain, stands distinguished from all other know-
ledge by the peculiar avenues through which it is
conveyed to us. We feel Him not. We behold Him
not. And however palpably He may stand forth

18 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.

to our convictions, in the strength of those appro-
priate evidences which it is the province of this
science to unfold — certain it is, that we can take no
direct cognizance of Him Uy our faculties whether
of external or internal observation.

2. And while the spirituaUty of His nature places
Him beyond the reach of our direct cognizance,
there are certain other essential properties of His
nature which place Him beyond the reach of our
possible comprehension. Let me instance the past
eternity of the Godhead. One might figure a
futurity that never ceases to flow, and which has
no termination ; but who can climb his ascending
way among the obscurities of that infinite which is^
behmd him ? Who can travel in thought along the
track of generations gone by, till he has overtaken
the eternity which hes in that direction ? Who can
look across the milhons of ages which have elapsed,
and from an ulterior post of observation look again
to another and another succession of centuries ; and
at each further extremity in this series of retro-
spects, stretch backward his regards on an antiquity
as remote and indefinite as ever ? Could we by
any number of successive strides over these mighty
intervals, at length reach the fountain-head of dura-
tion, our spirits might be at rest. But to think of
duration as having no fountain-head; to think of
time with no beginning ; to uplift the imagination
along the heights of an antiquity which hath posi-
tively no summit ; to soar these upward steeps
till dizzied by the altitude we can keep no longer
on the wing ; for the mind to make these repeated
flights from one pinnacle to another, and instead

ETHICS Of THEOLOGY. l^

of scaling the mysterious elevation* to lie baffled
at its foot, or lose itself among the far, the long-
withdrawing recesses of that primeval distance,
which at length merges away into a fathomless
unknown ; this is an exercise utterly discomfiting
to the puny faculties of man. We are called on
to stir ourselves up that we may take hold of God,
but the "clouds and darkness which are round
about Him" seem to repel the enterprise as hope-
less ; and man, as if overborne by a sense of little-
ness, feels as if nothing can be done but to make
prostrate obeisance of all his faculties before Him.
3. Or, if instead of viewing the Deity in rela-
tion to time we view Him in relation to space, we
shall feel the mystery of his being to be alike
impracticable and impervious. But we shall not
again venture on aught so inconceivable, yet the
reality of which so irresistibly obtrudes itseK upon
the mind, as immensity without hmits ; nor shall
we presume one conjecture upon a question which
we have no means of resolving, whether the Uni-
verse have its terminating outskirts ; and so, how-
ever stupendous to our eye, shrink by its very
finitude, to an atom, in the midst of that unoccupied
and unpeopled vastness by which it is surrounded.
Let us satisfy ourselves with a humbler flight.
Let us carry the speculation no further than our
senses have carried it. Let us but take account
of the suns and systems which the telescope has
unfolded ; though for aught we know there might,
beyond the furthest range of this instrument, be
myriads of remoter suns and remoter systems.
Let us, however, keep witliin the curcle of our

20 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.

actual discoveries, within the limits of that scene
which we know to be peopled with realities ; and
instead of trying to dilate our imagination to the
infinity beyond it, let us but think of God as sitting
in state and in high sovereignty over millions of
other worlds beside our own. If this Earth
which we know and know so imperfectly form so
small a part of His works- — what an emphasis it
gives to the lesson that we indeed know a very
small part of his ways. " These are part of his
ways," said a holy man of old, " but how little a
portion is heard of Him." Here the revelations
of Astronomy, in our modern day, accord with the
du*ect spiritual revelations of a former age. In
this sentiment at least the Patriarch and the
Philosopher are at one ; and highest science meets
and is in harmony with deepest sacredness. So
that we construct the same lesson, whether we
employ the element of space or the element of
time. With the one the basis of the argument is
the ephemeral experience of our httle day. With
the other the basis of the argument is the con-
tracted observation of our little sphere. They
both alike serve to distance man from the infinite
the everlasting God.

4. But it wUl somewhat dissipate this felt
obscurity of the science, and give more of distinct-
ness and definiteness to the whole of this transcen-
dental contemplation — if we distinguish aright be-
tween the Ethics of Theology, and the Objects of
Theology.

5. To understand this distinction let us con-
ceive some certain relation between two individual

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 21

men — as that for example of a benefactor to a
dependant, or of one who has conferred a kindness
to another who has received it. There is a moral
or ethical propriety that springs out of this relation.
It is that of gratitude from the latter of these in-
dividuals to the former of them. Gratitude is the
incumbent virtue in such a case, and a benefactor
is the object of that virtue.

6. Now to make one feel the truth of the ethical
principle, it matters not whether he has seen many
or few benefactors in the course of his experience.
Nay, it matters not whether there are many or
few benefactors in the world. The moral pro-
priety of gratitude is that which attaches to the
relation between a benefactor and a dependant; and
it equally remains so whether the relation be seldom
or often exemplified. Nay, gratitude would be
the appropriate virtue of this relation, although
actually it were never exempHfied at all. The ethical
principle of the virtuousness of gratitude does not
depend on the existent reality of an object for this
virtue. Let a benefactor really exist ; and then
gratitude is due to him. Or let a benefactor only be
supposed to exist ; and then we affirm with as great
readiness that gratitude would be due to him. The
incumbent morality is alike recognised — whether
w^e behold a real object, or only figure to ourselves
a hypothetical one. The morality, in fact, does
not depend for its rightness on any such contm-
geucy, as the actual and substantive existence of
a proper object to which it may be rendered.
The virtuousness of gratitude would remain a
stable category in ethical science ; although, never

22 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.

once exemplified in the living world of realities, we
derived our only notion of it from the possibilities
which were contemplated in an ideal world of
relations.

7. It is thus that whether much or little conver-
sant with the objects of a virtue, there may of th«
virtue itself be a clear and vivid apprehension. A
peasant, all whose experience is limited to the home-
stead of his own Uttle walk, can recognise the
virtuousness of gratitude and justice and truth with
as great correctness, and feel them too with as great
intenseness, as the man of various and ample in-
tercourse, who has traversed a thousand times
wider sphere in human society. By enlarging the
field of observation we may extend our acquaintance
with the objects of moral science; but this does
not appear at all indispensable to our acquaintance
with the Ethics of the science. To appreciate
aright the moral propriety which belongs to any
given relation, we do not need to multiply the
exemplifications or the cases of it. The one is not
a thing of observation as the other is, and therefore
not a thing to which the Baconian or inductive
method of investigation is in the same manner ap-
phcable. Our knowledge of the objects belongs to
the Philosophy of Facts. Our knowledge of the.
Ethics belongs to another and a distinct Philosophy^

8. There has been too much arrogated for the
philosophy of Lord Bacon in our day. " Quid
est?" is the only question to the solution of which it
is apphcable. It is by observation that we ascer-
tain what are the objects in Nature ; and what are,
or have been, the events in the history of Nature.

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 23

But there is another question wholly distinct from
this, " Quid oportet?" to the solution of which we
are guided by another hght than that of experience.
This question lies without the domain of the Induc-
tive Philosophy, and the science to whose cogni-
zance it belongs shines upon us by the light of its
own immediate evidence. There may have been a
just and a luminous Ethics, even when the lessons
of the experimental philosophy were most disre-
garded ; and, on the other hand, it is the office of
this philosophy to rectify and extend physical, but
not to rectify and extend moral science.*

9. On this subject there is an instructive ana-
logy taken from another science, and which illus-
trates still more the distinction now stated between
the objects and the ethics of Moral Philosophy;!

• We mean not to deny the legitimate application of the Bacon-
ian Philosophy to mental science — a distinct thing from moral
science. The philosophy which directs and presides over the
investigation of facts has to do with the facts and phenomena of
mind, as well as those of matter ; and though the sanguine anti-
cipations of Reid and Stewart, of a vast coming enlargement in
the science of mind, from the call which they had sounded for the
treatment of it by the inductive method, have not been realized—
it is not the less true that the philosophy which has for its object
the determination of the Quid est throughout all the departments
of observational truth, has to do with the facts of the mental
world, as well as with those of the material world, and with the
classification of both. But the feelings and purposes of the mind
viewed as phenomena, present a different object of investigation
altogether, from those feelings and purposes viewed in relation to
their Tightness or wrongness. The lattei is the object of moral
science. And when we say that the office of Lord Bacon's philo-
sophy is to rectify and extend physical, but not to rectify moral
science, let it be understood that the physical includes phenomena
and facts wherever they are to be found — more especially the pheno-
mena of man's spirituiJ and intellectual nature, the physics of the
wind, the mental physiology of Dr. Thomas Brown, the pneuma-
tology of an older generation.

f Moral Philosophy is here understood in its most generic

24 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY

that is, the distinction between the mathematics and
the objects of Natural Philosophy.

10. The objects of Natural Philosophy are the
facts or data of the science. The knowledge of
these is only to be obtained by observation. Jupi-
ter placed at a certain distance from the sun, and
moving in a certain direction, and with a certaui
velocity, is an object. His satellites, with then:
positions and their motions, are also so many ob-
jects. Any piece of matter, including those attri-
butes which it is the part of Natural Philosophy to
take cognizance of, such as weight, and magnitude,
and movement, and situation, is an object of this
science. Altogether they form what may be called
the individual and existent realities of the science.
And Lord Bacon has done w eU in having demon-
strated that for the knowledge of these we must
give ourselves up exclusively to the informations of
experience ; that is, to obtain a knowledge of the
visible properties of material things we must look
at them, or of their tangible properties we must
handle them, or of their weights or motions or
distances we must measure them.

11. Thus far, then, do the applications of the
Baconian Philosophy go, and no farther. After
that the facts or objects of the science have in this
way been ascertained, we perceive certain mathe-
matical relations between the objects from which
we can derive truths and properties innumerable.
But it is not experience now which Hghts us on
from one truth or property to another. The objects

meaning-, as comprehensive of the duties owing to God in bearen,
M well as to our fellow-men upon earth.

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 25

or data of the science are ascertained by the evi-
dence of observation ; but the mathematics of the
science proceed on an evidence of their own, and
land us in sound and stable mathematical conclu-
sions, whether the data at the outset of the reason-
ing be real or hypothetical. The moral proprieties
founded on equity between man and man would
remain like so many fixtures in ethical science,
though the whole species were swept away, and no
man could be found to exemplify our conclusions.
The mathematical properties founded on an equa-
lity between line and line would in like manner
abide as eternal truths in geometry, although mat-
ter were swept away from the universe, and there
remained no bodies whose position or whose dis-
tances had to be reasoned on. It has been already
said that we do not need to extend the domain of
observation in order to have a clear and a right
notion of the moral proprieties ; and it may now be
said that we do not need to extend the domain of
observation in order to have a clear and a right
notion of the mathematical properties. If straight
lines be drawn between the centres of the earth and
the sun and Jupiter, they would constitute a triangle,
the investigation of whose properties might ehcit
much important truth on the relations of these three
bodies. But all that is purely mathematical in the
truth would remain, although it were not exempli-
fied, or although these three bodies had no existence.
Nay, the triangle might serve as the exemplar of an
infinity, of triangles, which required only a corre-
sponding infinity of objects, in order that the general
and abstract truth might become the symbol or
VOL. I. 3

26 ETH.CS OF THEOLOGY,

representative of an endless host of applicable and
actually existent truths. For the objects of both
sciences you must have inductive or observational
evidence ; but by a moral light in the one science, and
a mathematical light in the other, we arrive at the
ethics of the first science, at the mathematics of the
second, without the aid of the inductive philosophy.

12. It is interesting to note if aught may have
fallen from Lord Bacon himself upon this subject.
"In his English treatise on "the advancement of
learning," he says, " that in mathematics I can
report no deficience." So that this great author
of the experimental method by which to arrive at
a true philosophy of facts, had no improvement to
propose on the methods of mathematical investiga-
tion. And in his more extended Latin treatise on
the same subject, entitled, " De augmentis scien-
tiarum," where he takes so comprehensive a view
of all the possible objects of human knowledge, he
says, speaking of geometry and arithmetic, " Quae
duo artes, magno certe cum acumine, et industria,
inquisitoe et tractatse sunt : veruntamen et Euclidis
laboribus in geometricis nUiU additum est asequenti-
bus quod intervallo tot seculorum dignum sit ;" or
" which two arts have certainly been investigated
and handled with much acuteness and industry;
notwithstanding which, however, nothing has been
added to the labours of Euclid in geometry by
those who have followed him, that is worthy of so
long a series of ages."

13. The proper discrimination then to be made
in natural philosophy, is between the facts or data
oi the science, and the relations that by means of

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 27

mathe niLics might be educed from these data. The
former are ascertained by observation — after which
no further aid is required from observation, while
we prosecute that reasoning which often brings the
most weighty and important discoveries in its train.
It is well to consider how much can be achieved by
mathematics in this process, and how distinct its
part is from that of wide and distant observation ;
insomuch that by the light which it strikes out in
the little chamber of one's own thoughts, we are
enabled to proceed from one doctrine and discovery
to another. From three distant points in the
firmament, a triangle may be formed to which the
very mathematics are appUcable. that we employ
upon a triangle constructed upon paper by our
own fingers. Whether they be the positions and
the distances that lie within the compass of a dia-
gram, or the positions and distances that obtain in
wide immensity, it is one and the same geometry
which, from a few simple and ascertained data,
guides the inquirer to the various and important
relations of both. After that observation hath
done its office, and made over to mathematics the
materials which it hath gathered — this latter science
can guide the way to discoveries and applications
innumerable ; and without one look more upon the
heavens, with Sought but the student's concen-
trated regard on the lines and the symbols that lie
in little room upon his table, might the whole mys-
tery and mechanism of the heavens be unravelled.
14. Let those things, then, be rightly distin-
guished which are distinct from one another. They
were not the objects of the science which gave the

28 ETrtics or theology.

observer his mathematics. These objects were
only addressed to his previous and independent
mathematics ; and he, in virtue of his mathematics,
was enabled rightly to estimate many important
relations which subsisted between the objects. Nay,
it is conceivable that the objects might have re-
mained for ever obscure and unknown to him. He,
in this case, would have wanted an apphcation
j^hich he now has for his mathematics; but the
mathematics themselves would have been still as
much within his reach or his power of acquisition
as before. His mathematical nature, if we may
so speak, would have been entire notwithstanding ;
and he have had ^s clear a sense of the mathe-
matical relations, and as prompt and powerful a
faculty of prosecuting these to their results. Things
might have been so constituted, as that every star
in the firmament should have been beyond the
discernment of our naked eye ; or what is still more
conceivable, the lucky invention might never have
been made by which the wonders of a remoter
lieavens have been laid open to our view. But
still they were neither the informations of the
eye nor of the telescope which furnished man with
his geometry ; they only furnished him with data
for his geometry. And thus, while the objects of
astronomy are brought to him by a light from afar —
there enters, as a constituent part of the science,
'the mathematics of astronomy, immediately seen
by him in the light of his own spirit, and to master
the lessons of which he needs not so much as one
excursion of thought beyond the precincts of his
own little home.

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 29

15. Now, what is true of the mathematical may
be also true of the moral relations. We may have
the faculty of perceiving these relations whether
they be occupied by actually existent objects or
not ; or although we should be in ignorance of the
objects. On the imagination that one of the inha-
bitants of the planet Jupiter had the mysterious
knowledge of all my movements, and a mysterious
power of guidance and protection over me ; that
he eyed me with constant benevolence, and ever
acted the part of my fi-iend and my guardian — I could
immediately pronounce on the gratitude and the
kind regard that were due from me back again :
And should the imagination become a reality, and
be authentically made known to me as such, I
have a moral nature, a law within my heart, which
already tells me how I should respond to this com-
munication. The instance is extravagant ; but it
enables us at once to perceive what that is which
must be fetched to us from without, and what that
is which we have to meet it from within. The
objects -are either made known by observation ; or,
if they exist without the hmits of observation, they
are made known by the credible report or revela-
tion of others. But when thus made known, they
may meet with a prior and a ready made Ethics in
ourselves. The objects may be placed beyond the
limits of human experience ; but though the know-
ledge of their existence must therefore be brought
to us fi'om afar, a sense of the correspondent mora-
lities which are due to them may arise spontane-
ously in our bosoms. After the mind has gotten,
in whate^^er way, its information of their reality—
3*

30 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.

then within the httle cell of its own feehngs and
its own thoughts, there may be a light which mani-
fests the appropriate ethics for the most distant
beings in the universe.

16. We are thus enabled to bestow a certain
amount of elucidation on a question which falls
most properly to be d^cussed at the outset of
Natural Theology. On this distinction between
the ethics of the science and the objects of the
science, we can proceed at least a certain way in
assigning their 'respective provinces to the light of
nature and the light of revelation. But for this
purpose let us shortly recur again to the illustra^
tion that may be taken from the science of astro-
nomy.

17. Natural Philosophy has two great depart-
ments— one of them celestial, the other terrestrial ;
and it may be thought a very transcendental move-
ment on the part of an inquirer, a movement
altogether per saltum, when he passes from the one
to the other. Now this is true ; but only should
it be remarked in as far as it regards the objects
of the science. The objects of the celestial he in
a far more elevated region than the objects of
the terrestrial ; and it may certainly be called a
transcendental movement, when, instead of viewing
with the telescope some lofty peak that is sustained
however on the world's surface, we view therewith
the planet that floats in the firmament and at an
inconceivably greater distance away from it. There
is a movement per saltum when we pass from the
facts and data of the one department, to the facts
and data of the other. But there is no such move-

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. Si

ment when we pass from the mathematics of the
one department to the mathematics of the other.
There is, no doubt, in one respect, a very wide
transition ; when instead of a triangle, whose base-
line is taken by a pair of compasses from the
Gunter scale, or even measured by a chain on the
surface of the earth, v^ e are called to investigate
the relations of a triangle whose base-line is tiie
diameter of the earth, or perhaps the diameter of
the earth's orbit. There is doubtless a very wide
transition from the objects of the terrestrial to
those of the celestial physics; when, instead of
three indivisible points on the parchment that lies
before us, or three signposts of observation that
wave on mountain-tops within sight of each other,
we have three planetary bodies that, huge though
they be in themselves, shrink into atoms when
(•ompared with the mighty spaces that lie between
tiiem. The fields of observation are wholly differ-
ent ; but it is by the very same trigonometry that
we achieve theT computation of the resulting tri-
angles. And we again repeat that, sublhne as the
ascent may be from the facts or data of the one
computation to those of the other, there is no
gigantic or impracticable stride in their mathe-
matics— that if able to trace certain curves in the
page which lies before us, we are further able to
scan the cycles of astronomy — that, widely apart as
are the revelations of this wondrous science from
the conceptions of our first and ordinary experi-
ence, yet grant but the facts, and it is by the dint
of a familiar and ordinary mathematics, that the
mind can ascend to them. It is thus that lliough

32 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.

in person we never stepped beyond the humble
glen of our nativity, we may have that within the
depository of our thoughts, which guides us to the
certainties that be on the outskirts of creation.
Within the little home of our bosom, there lie such
principles and powers, as without one mile of loco-
motion are of as great avail, as if we could have
traversed the infinities of space with the plumb4ine
in our hand, or carried the torch of discovery round
the universe. It does look a marvel and a mystery,
how man is able to climb the steep and lofty ascent
from the terrestrial to the celestial in Natural
Philosophy. But it helps to resolve the mystery,
when we thus advert to the distinction between the
facts or objects of the science, and the mathematics
of the science. It at least tells us what that is,
wherein the transition from the one department to
the other lies; and gives us to understand that,
could we in any way ascertain by observation,
certain of the motions and magnitudes that belong
to the upper regions of astronomy, there is an
instrument within our reach, by which we may
come to the accurate determination of its laws.

18. And as with Natural, so with Moral,
Philosophy. The former hath its objects, whose
properties are found by observation; and these
objects have their mathematical relations, most of
which are found without observation, by an abstract
and solitary exercise of mind on the data which
have been previously ascertained. There is a great
difference between the terrestrial and the celestial
physics, in regard to the way by which we arrive
at the data. On the one field they ai'e near at

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 33

hand ; and at all events do not lie beyond the con-
fines of the globe which we inhabit. On the other
field they have place and occupancy at an exceeding
distance away from us. The eye in quest of them
must lift itself above all earthly objects ; and often
beyond the ken of our natural vision, they would
have been for ever unknown — had not the telescope,
that powerful instrument of revelation, fetched
them to the men of our world, from those far and
hidden obscurities in which they had lain for ages.
But whatever the difference may be between the
terrestrial and the celestial physics, in regard to
the way by which we arrive at their data — there is
no such difference in regard to the way through
•which, by a mathematical process of reasoning,
truths are educed from these data. It matters
not whether they be the elements of some terrestrial
survey, or the observed elements of some distant
planet that have been committed to a formula, and
made over to the investigations of the analyst. It
was indeed a far loftier flight, when in the capacity
of an observer, he passed from the stations anil
the objects of a landscape below^ to those of the
upper firmament. But there was no transition,
at all corresponding to this — when passmg from
tne mathematics of the one contemplation to the
mathematics of the other. Even at the time when
he labours to determine the form or the periods of
some heavenly orbit, his mind is only in contact
with the symbols of that formula, or with the Hucis
and spaces of that httle diagram, which is before
his eyes. It is enough that the triangle which
comprehends any portion however small of his
B 2

34 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.

paper, hath the same relations and properties with
the triangle which comprehends any portion how-
ever large of immensity. It is enough that what
is jM-edicated of the line which extends but a few
inches may also be predicated of the same line
when prolonged to the outskirts of creation. And
thus it is, that after observation hath done its work
and collected what may be styled the facts of
Astronomy, there is a capability in the human
spirit, and upon no other materials than what may
lie within the compass of a table, to unravel the
principles of its wondrous mechanism — and in the
little chamber of thought, to elaborate a doctrine
which shall truly represent the universe and is
realized in its most distant processes.

19. Now whence were the mathematics by which
he made an achievement so marvellous — whence
were these mathematics derived? For our pur-
pose it is a sulficient answer to this question that
he had not to go abroad for them. They may
have enabled him to scan the cycles of heaven —
but most certainly heaven's lofty concave is not the
page from which his geometry was drawn. To
obtain the necessary mathematics he has not to
travel beyond the hmits of his own humble apart-
ment— and though in person he may have never
wandered from the secluded valley that bounds his
habitation, yet, such is the power of this home
instrument, that it can carry him in thought through
the remotest provinces .of nature, and give him the
intellectual mastery over them. He needs not
have gone half-a-mile in quest of those conceptions
which lie in little room within the receptacle of his

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 35

bosom. There may have been some obscureJv
initial or rudimental business of observation at tne
outset of his mental history, ere his notions of a
line or a number or a quantity were settled ; but it
is an observation that might have all been carried
on within a cell or a hermitage : And the important
thing to be remarked is, that these notions, o{
homeward growth and origin though they be, are
available on the field of the celestial as well as on
that of the terrestrial Physics — and that when once
by observation the respective data of each are
ascertained, the same mathematics are applicable
to both,

20. And it is just so in Moral Philosophy. This
science hath its objects that are ascertained by-
observation — and, apart from these, it hath its
Ethics, in virtue of w^hich it can assign the moral
relations that subsist between these objects. The
facts of the science are just as distinct from the
ethics of the science, as the facts of Natural Philo-
sophy are from the mathematics of Natural Philo-
sophy. By observation we can know of certain
particulars in the state, or of certain passages in
the history of two human beings — and, not by
means of any further observation, but by certain
ethical principles and by these alone, we can pro-
nounce on the moral relationship that is between
them, and on the proprieties of that relationship.
Let us but know of any two men, that the one is
a friendly and disinterested benefactor, and that
the other is a dependant on his liberalities — or of
the one that he is the generous lender, and of the
othca: that he is the debtor who had promised and

36

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.

is now in circumstances to repay — or of the one
that he is an injured party, and of the other that
he IS now a prostrate offender honestly offering
every reparation, and pouring out fi-om the sincerity
of a contrite bosom the acknowledgments and the
vows of a deep-felt repentance : these are the facts
of so many distinct cases presented to view either
by our own observation or by the credible testi-
mony of others; and it is not by means of any
further observation, it is not by the aid of any addi-
tional facts that we learn what be the moralities
which belong to each of them. Observation, whether
in Natural or in Moral Philosophy, furnishes only
the data. It is by a mathematics in the one case,
and by an ethics in the other that we draw our
conclusions from these data. The gratitude that
we should render to a benefactor, the fidehty that
we should observe with a creditor, the forgiveness
that we should award to a penitent : these are not
the lessons of observation any more than the axioms
or the demonstrated truths of geometry. And as
in Natural Philosophy we should distinguish be-
tween the facts of every question and its mathe-
matics; so is there a similar distinction to be
observed between the facts and the ethics of every
question in Moral Philosophy.*

* While impressing the distinction between the ethics and the
ohjects of Theology, it may be asked whence did our knowledge
of the ethics originate— and how is it that thev diffet in respect
of origination from our knowledge of the objects? We have
already remarked that some rudimental, some obscurely initial
process of observation, may, for aught we know, have been con-
cerned in the first evolution whether of our ethical or our mathe-
matioal conceptions ; but that after these conceptions had be«j
formed, there was no further obsenration necessary od our part

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 57

2L This helps us to understand what the pre-
cise nature of the transition is, when we pass from
the terrestrial to the celestial of moral science.
We pass to other data; but we have the same

for the completion of the respective systems of these two sciences.
It is very likely that had we never been in converse either by
touch or sight with external substances, we might never have
attained our pi'esent notions of position or direction or quantity;
and so the principles of our mathematical nature might have lain
in dormancy and never been evolved. And it ir. just as likely
that, had we never been m converse with other jentient creatures
like ourselves, we might never have attained our present notions
of equity or of other moral relations; and so the principles of our
moral nature rnigh* have lain in dormancy too and nevor been
evolved. These principles are ultimate facts in the human con-
stitution, not communicated to us from external objects, but
called forth into actual and sensible exercise by the contact .is it
■were and excitement of these objects. It was not thtf observation
of things without us which deposited them in our min-Id: though,
apart from the observation of things without us, the principles,
n hether ethical or matherjatical, might never have been wakened
into action and have never been recognise ,\ But whether obser-
vation gave these principles at the first or only evolved iiiera, it
truly affects not either the reality or the importance of the dis-
tinction on which we have been insisting. Enough, that, some
how or other, there he a mathematics in Natural Philosophy,
which, without the aid of further observation, can, by a peculiar
light of its own, guide the investigating spirit from one truth and
discovery to another, and elicit doctrines that admit of application
to thousands of the known objects in nature, and to an infinity of
objects thh.t are yet unknown; and it is in like manner enough,
that, some how or other, there be an ethics in Moral Philosophy,
which, witliout the aid of further observation,^n, by a peculiar
light of its own, guide us from one moi-al d^^-ine to another,
applicable aiike to the existent beings that lie within the sphere
of our knowledge, and to those, who, though at present without
this sphere, may, on coming forth by revelation to our notice, call
out the verv regards and moral recognitions that already had long-
been familiar to u». The difference established by Dr. Whately
between the truths which we receive by information and those
which we receive by instruction, so far from being placed iu
opposition ic these views, just serves to illustrate and confirm
them. Tbe truths of mere information have no logical depen-
dmce, the one upon the other; and each is made known to us on
3 distinct and separate evidence of its own. It follov/s not because

VOL, T. 4

38 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.

elhica— just as when in physical science we elevate
our regards from the earth we tread upon to the
sublime movements of astronomy, we pass to other
data biit have the same mathematics. He who
can resolve a triangle whose angles are indivisible
points on the parchment that lies before him, can
resolve a triangle whose angles are planets in the
firmament— and all that he requires to know are
the facts or the objects of the celestial physics, to
make his mathematics as available in that Natural
Philosophy whose field is the heavens, as he may
have already made them in that Natural Philosophy
whose field is this lower world. In hke manner
he who can assign the proprieties of that relation
which subsists between a dependent family and
their earthly benefactor, can assign the proprieties
of that relation which subsists between our whole
species and their heavenly Benefactor. For this
purpose he ha? no new ethics to learn; and all that
he requires to know are the facts or the objects of

there is a Jupiter that there must be a Georgium Sidus; and it
requires an additional and independent act of observation to ascer-
tain the existence of the latter. These informational truths, as
they may be termed, form the proper olyects of the Inductive
Philosophy; whereas the tniths of mstruclion are come at, not-
by separate obseUktions, but by development and deduction from
certain primary and comprehjiisive propo^-itions wiiich virtually
contain them; 'but in which they lie wrapped ana uneduced, till,
by the processes whether of rixcral or matliematical reasoning-,
they are brought out in their own distinct individuality to view.
And thus it is, that though it needs a new observation to tell us
of that before unknown and existent object the Georgium Sidus

it needs not a new mathematics, to tell either the period of its

revolution or the form of its orbit. Thus too though it be by an
altogether new information that we come to know of the i'xiste nv
Being Jesus Christ; it is not by a new ethics that we ctnit; to
acknowledge the services which we ou«', or the rcvcj-cuco ai.d giv.u-
tude which of right belong lo Hihi.

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 39

this higher relationship— to make the ethics which
he already has as available in that Moral Philo-
sophy whose field is the heaven above, as he has
already made them in that Moral Philosophy
whose field is the earth below.

22. The celestial physics form a more transcen-
dental theme than the terrestrial. But this cha-
racter of the more transcendental lies only in the
facts, and not at all in the mathematics. And so
the celestial in Moral Philosophy is a more trans-
cendental theme than the terrestrial — but this too
lies only in the facts, and not at all in the ethics.
To obtain the facts and data of the former science,
a new and peculiar mode of discovery was struck
out. The telescope was invented. JMany of the
objects were beyond the reach of our natural vision;
and nature was provided with an assistance — else
there had been much of the celestial physics that
would have remained for ever unknown. The
same may, perhaps, hold of the celestial ethics also.
Perhaps, there are many of its data that never
could have been ascertained but by a peculiar mode
of discovery. Perhaps the unaided faculties of
man were incompetent to the task — and what the
telescope hath done for us in respect of the material
heavens, a living messenger may have done for us
in respect of their moral and spiritual economy.
It is a very wide transition when wc pass from
those distances in a terrestrial survey which can
be measured by the chain, or at the farther extre-
mities of which we can descry some floating signal
that has been erected by human hands — v*'hen we
pass from these through the mighty voids of hii

40 ITHICS OF THEOLOGY.

mensity; and across that interval which sepaiates
the rolUng worlds from each other, can now by the
aid of the telescope look on moons and planets that
eye had not seen, nor ear heard of, neither had it
entered into the heart of man to conceive. And
it is also a v^ ide transition when we pass from
the terrestrial to the celestial objects of Moral
Philosophy — from the Hving society around us, to
the Great Unseen who is above us ; and of whom
perhaps we could not have known save by the voice
of a messenger from the pavihon of his special
residence, who in reference to the celestial ethics,
hath done what the telescope hath done in re-
ference to the celestial mechanics, hath brought
out from the obscurity in which for ages they had
lain, objects of which the world was before un-
conscious; but to which when made known she
is already furnished with a morahty by which she
can respond to them — even as when the new facts
of astronomy were presented to her view, she
already had the mathematics by which she could
draw from them the just and important apphca-
tions. The telescope gave her no geometry,
though it gave her the data of many a geometrical
exercise. And thus it is that a teacher from
heaven, even though he should confine himself to
the revelation of such facts and objects as had been
before wrapt from human eye in the depths of their
own mysteriousness — though he should simply lift
the veil from that which was before unseen; or by
tlie notices that he brought with him from the
I'pper Sanctuary, should bring forward into view
a spiritual landscape, v.hich by its remoteness, was

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 41

dim at least, if not altogether invisible— though he
should not be the expounder of any new morahty
at all, might be the expounder of facts that would
meet and call forth a doctrine, or a previous dis-
cernment of morality, which had been already in
the world.

23. And thus as the movement from the terres-
trial to the celestial, is in Natural, so is it also in
Moral Philosophy. By this movement w^e look at
other things, and perhaps do so by other instru-
ments of vision. In the latter, more particularly,
instead of our fellow men, with whom we can hold
immediate converse by the organs of sense, the
great object is a Being whom no man hath seen at
any time ; but whom w^e either see by reflection
from the mirror of His own workmanship, or see
by revelation brought down to our earthly dwelling-
places through a direct embassy from heaven.

24. And if on earth gratitude to a human bene-
factor is not unknown, and it be the universal sense
of the species that there is virtue in the emotion —
if truth, and goodness, and purity, when seen in
a fellow mortal, draw an homage from the heart of
every observer — if within the bounds of our world,
the obligations of honour and humanity, and justice,
are felt among those who live upon it; then let a
new object be set forth to us from heaven, or per-
haps an object seen but darkly before and now set
forth in brighter manifestation — ^let Him be made
known as the God whose hands did frame and
fashion us, end whose right hand upholds us con-
tiiiu^ly — let some new light be thrown upon His
chara:ler aiul ways; some new and before unheard

42 ETHICS OF THCOLOGY. *

demonstration given of a holiness that can descend
to no compromise with sin, and yet of a love that
by all the sin of His creatures is unquenchable —
let Him now stand out in the lustre of His high
attributes, with each shedding a glory upon the
other, yet mercy rejoicing over them all — let
this Being, at once so lovely and so venerable, be
expounded to our view, as the Father of the human
family, and as sending abroad upon that world
which He hath so plenteously adorned, a voice of
general invitation, that his wandering children
might again return to his forgiveness, and He again
be securely seated in the confidence and affection
of them all — it needs not that there be superadded
to our existing Ethics, some new principle, in order
that we may be qualified to meet this new revela-
tion which is addressed to us. From the nature
of man as he is already constituted, there might
go back a moral echo to Him who thus speaketh to
them from heaven : and they might only need to look
upon the now manifested Deity, that their hearts
may feel the love, or their consciences may attest
the obedience which are due to Him.

25. And there is nought to baffle our ethics in
the infinity of God, or in the distance at which He
stands from us. Only grant Him to be our bene-
factor and our owner ; and on this relation alone
do we confidently found our obligations, both of
gratitude and of service. Just as there is nothing,
either in the mighty distance or overbearing mag-
nitude of the sun, that baffles our mathematics.
The magnitude of quantity does not affect the re-
lations of quantity. It only gives a larger result

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 43

to the calculation. And the same is true of the
moral relations. Though the oe'mg who is the
object of them, be exalted to the uttermost— though
the beneficence whicli he has rendered outweigh
indefinitely all that ever was conferred upon us by
our fellow-men, there is nothing in this to disturb
the conclusion that we owe him a return. It
only enhances the conclusion. It only swells pro-
portionally the amount of the return — and, instead
of some partial offering, it points to the dedication
of all our powers, and the consecration of all our
habits, as the alone adequate expressions of our
loyalty. In ascending from the terrestrial to the
celestial ethics, we come in view of more elevated
gifts, and a more elevated giver — ^but the relation
between the two elements, of goodwill on the one
hand, and of gratitude on the other, subsists as
before— and the only effect of this ascent upon the
morality of the question, is, that we are led thef eby
to infer the obligation of a still more sacred regard,
of a still more duteous and devoted obedience.

26. Observation may have been the original
source of all our mathematics. My acquiescence
in the axioms of Euclid may have been the fruit of
that intercourse which I have had with the external
world by means of my senses ; and but for the
exercise of the eye or of the feehngs on visible or
tangible objects, I might never have obtained the
conception of lines, or of figures bounded by lines.
This may be true ; and yet it is not less true that
every essential or elementary idea of the mathema-
tics may be acquired in early life, and with a very
limited range of observation ; and that we do not

44 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.

need to widen or extend this range — nay, that with-
out the aid of one additional fact or experience, it
is possible for the spirit of man to pass onward from
the first principles of the science, and traverse all
the fields both of geometry and analysis that have
yet been explored. More particularly — with that
little of observation, which for aught we know
might have been necessary ere we could conceive
aright of one triangle — with that, and no more,
might we master the many thousand properties of
each individual in that infinity of triangles that
could be furnished by the points innumerable of
space — and so, while passing from one truth to
another in the little diagram that is before me, I
may in fact, and without one particle of more light
being borrowed from observation, be storing up in
my mind the truths of a high and distant astronomy.
And, in like manner, observation it may be con-
tended is the original source of all our ethics,
though I should rather say that it supplied the
occasional cause for the development of our ethical
faculties. But in either way, I must perhaps have
seen an exemplification of kindness from one being
to another, ere I could understand that gratitude
was the emotion which ought to be rendered back
again. But after having once gotten my concep-
tion and my belief of the virtue of this pecuHar
relationship — this will serve me for all the cases of
Beneficence that shall ever afterwards come within
my knowledge. The moral will admit of as wide
and as confident an application as the mathematical
■ — and only grant me to have ethics enough for
perceivmg that when between two fellow-men

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 45

there is good-will on the one side, there ought to be
gratitude on the other— and then simply with ths
information that God exists, and that He is a God
of kindness, the very ethics which told me what I
owe to a beneficent neighbour also tells me what I
owe to a beneficent Deity.

27. We may thus learn what is the precise ascent
which we make, in passing from the terrestrial to
the celestial in Moral Philosophy. Let us dis-
tinguish between the objects of the science and the
ethics of the science — and take notice that these
two things stand related to each other, as do the
objects of Natural Philosophy to the mathematics
of Natural Philosophy. It is well to understand
that a revelation of new facts might of itself suffice
for this transition from the lower to the higher
department of the subject — and that we do not need
to go in quest of new principles. We may perhaps
feel relieved from the apprehension of some great
and impracticable mystery in this progress — and, at
all events, it is most desirable that we conceive
aright what be the actual stepping-stones by which
it is accomplished. In Natural Philosophy the
revelations of the telescope have been super-added
to the perceptions of the naked eye — and by this
instrument what was before seen has been made
more distinct, and there has been brought forth to
notice what before was wholly invisible. Perhaps
too in Moral Philosophy, a science which in its
most comprehensive sense embraces all the disco-
verable relations of the moral world, some new and
peculiar revelation hath been super-added to the
powers and the perceptions of Nature — and by

4C ETHICS OF THEOLOGY,

which, we both see brighter what before was seen
but dimly, and there may have further been made
known to us what to the unaided mind of man is
wholly undiscoverable. But still they might mainly
be the peculiar facts or peculiar data which consti-
tute the peculiarities of the celestial and distinguish
it from the terrestrial of Moral Philosophy. It is
in the facts and not in the ethics that the pecu-
liarity lies.

28. The question then is — " What are the facts,
and how are they accredited ?" We already have
an ethics suited to all the objects that we actually
know — and that could be adapted to more objects
on the moment of their being proposed to us. By
the mathematics now in our possession, we could
assign orbits corresponding to every possible law of
attraction in astronomy. There is only one such
law ascertained by observation ; and the mathema-
tical result of it is — the elliptic course of every
planet that is within the reach of our instruments.
Could we be made to know of the fact, that there
is a gravitation of another rate in distant places of
the universe, we are already furnished with the
mathematics that would assign the path and perio-
dical velocity of all the projectiles which are under
it. Should a new satelhte of Jupiter be discovered,
the mathematics are at hand by which to assign
the path that he ought to follow — and, to extend this
remark from the physical to the moral world, should
I be authentically made sure of the fact that there
is a mystic influence between some certain inhabi-
tant of that planet and myself, that in his breast
there is a sympathy towards me, and in his hands

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 47

a power over me — that he hath an eye upon aU
my movements, and by the charm of some taUsman
in his possession, can read all the feelings and fluc-
tuations of my bosom — that, withal, he is my watch-
ful and unwearied friend, and that every opportune
suggestion, whether of comfort in distress or of
counsel in the midst of my perplexities, is but the
secret whisper of his voice — this were a fact utterly
beyond the range of all our present experience, yet
if only ascertained to be a fact not beyond the range
of our present and existing ethics — and the grati-
tude I should owe to this beneficent though unseen
guardian of my walk is as sure a dictate of our
known and established morality, as is the gratitude
that I owe to the nurse who tended my infancy, or
to the patron who led me step by step along the
bright prosperity of my manhood.

29. ^1^0 ascertain then whether there be indeed a
celestial ethics we hav« to go in quest of facts, and
not of principles. We have no new system of
morality to devise. There are present capacities
of moral judgment and emotion within our heart;
and for the development of which the world that is
immediately around us is crowded with the objects
to which they respond. The question is, whether
there are not such objects also out of our world — .
and which when so addrest to our understanding
that we perceive their reality, do not furthermore
so address our sense of duty, as to convince us of a
something which we ought to feel, or of a something
which we ousrht to do.

o

30. We are aware, that along with the total
degeneracy of man, there has been a totaJ darkness

48 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY,

ascribed to him ; but we feel quite assured that in
the vagueness and vehemence wherewith this charge
has been preferred, the distinction between the
objects and the ethics of Theology has not been
enough adverted to. There is no such bhndness
in respect to moral distinctions that there is in
respect to objects placed beyond the domain of
observation, and holding substantive existence in a
spiritual and unseen world. It is true that there Ls
diversity of moral sentiment among men^— and that,
along with the general recognition of one and the
same morals in the various ages and countries of
the world, there have been certain special and im-
portant modifications. These have so far been
well accounted for by Dr. Thomas Brown in one of
his Lectures upon this subject — and what he has
said on the effect of passion in so blinding ibv a time
the mind that is under its influence as to* obscure
i:s perceptions of moral truth, may apply to whole
generations of men unbridled in revenge or im-
mersed in the depths of sensuality. Even the
ivorst of these, however, will pronounce aright on
•,he great majority of ethical questions — and should
i-he power of profligacy or passion be from any
cause suspended, if solemnized or arrested by the
revelation of new objects from heaven, or (even
vithout the intervention of aught so striking as this)
if but withdrawn for a season from those influences
which darken the understanding only because they
ileprave the affections, it is wonderful with how
much truth of sentiment virtue is appreciated and
the homage to virtue is felt. A thousand evidences
of this could be extracted, not from the light and

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 49

licentious, but certainly from the grave and didactic
authorship both of Greece and Rome. And while
beyond the limits of Christendom, all those peculiar
revelations of the Gospel which relate either to past
events or to existent objects are almost wholly un-
known— we are persuaded that bosoms may be
found which would do the homage of acknowledg-
ment at least, if not of obedience, to its truth and
its purity and its kindness and its generous self-devo-
tion all the world over *

31. On this distinction between the objects and
the ethics of Theology we should not have ex-
patiated so long had we not been persuaded of the
important uses to v/hich it may be turned in
estimating the legitimacy and the weight of various
sorts of evidence for the truth of religion; and,
more especially, in helping us to mark the respec-
tive provinces which belong to the light of nature
and the light of revelation. We sometimes hear
of the apphcation of the Baconian Philosophy to
the Christian argument ; and it is our belief that
this Philosophy so revered in modern times, and
to which the experimental science of our day
stands indebted for its present stability and
gigantic elevation, does admit of most wholesome
and beneficial application to the question between

* It is thus, Uiat tliere is a pervading error in Leland's book oa
the Necessity of Revelation. There is not one. trace, from be-
ginning to end of it, of that discrimination which we have now been
urging — nor do we remark in it any difference at all between the
ignorance which springs from moral perversity and that which
spriogs from mere intellectual deficiency. It is a book, however,
that is worthy of perusal, though more for the exceeding fukes3
of its learned information, than for its just or enlightened princi«
pies.

VOL. I. 5

50 ETHICS Ol- Tii£GLOGY.

infidels and believers. But then we must so dis*
criminate as to assign those places in the contro-
versy where the Philosophy of Bacon is, and
those where it is not applicable. It is of para-
mount authority on the question of facts or objects.
On the question of ethics again, it is not more
admissible than on the question of mathematics.
And by thus confining it within its appropriate
limits, we not only make a sounder application of
it — but an apphcation of it that we shall find to
be greatly more serviceable to the cause.

32. Our first inference fi'om this argument is,
that even though the objects of Theology lay
under total obscuration from our species — though
a screen utterly impervious were placed between
the mental eye of us creatures here below, and
those invisible beings by whom lieaven is occupied
— still we might have an ethics in reserve, which
on the screen being in any way withdrawn, will
justly and vividly respond to the objects that are
on the other side of it. There might be a mathe-
matics without Astronomy, but of which instant
application can be made, on the existent objects of
Astronomy being unveiled. And there may be a
morals without Theology, that, on the simple pre-
sentation of its objects, would at once recognise the
duteous regards and proprieties which belong to
them. We often hear, in the general, of the dark-
ness of nature. But a darkness in regard to the
ethics might not be at all in the same proportion or
degree as a darkness in regard to the objects of
Theology. We can imagine the latter to be a
total darkness, while the former is only a twilight

ETHlCa OF THEOLOGY. 51

obscurity; or may even but need a rev elation of
the appropriate facts to be excited into full illumi-
nation. There may be moral light along with the
ignorance of all supernal objects, in which case
there can be no supernal application. But yet, in
reference to the near and palpable and besetting
objects of a sublunary scene, this same light might
be of most useful avail in the business of human
society. It is thus that we understand the Apostle
when speaking of the work of the law being written
in the hearts of the Gentiles, and of their being a
law unto themselves. It at least furnished as much
light to the conscience as that they could accuse or
else excuse each other. In this passage he con-
cedes to nature the knowledge, if not of the objects
of Theology at least of the ethics. There might
need perhaps to be a revelation ere any moral
aspiration can be felt towards God — ^but without
such a revelation, and without any regard being
had to a God, there might be a reciprocal play of
the moral feeUngs among men, a standard of equity
and moral judgment, a common principle of refer-
ence alike indicated in their expressions of mutual
esteem and mutual recrimination.

33. This, we think, should be quite obvious to
those who are at all acquainted with the literature
and history of ancient times. It is true that ere
all the phenomena even of pagan conscience and
sensibility can be explained, we must admit the
knowledge, or at least the imagination of certain
objects in Theology. But it is also true that apart
from Theology altogether, with no other objects in
the view of the mind than those which are supplied

52 ETHICS OF THEOLOGV.

within the limits of our visible world and by the
fellows of our species, there was a general sense
of the right and the wrong — an occasional exempli-
fication of high and heroic virtue with the plaudits
of its accompanying admiration on the one hand —
or, along with execrable villany, the prompt indig-
nancy of human hearts, and execration of human
tongues upon the other. We are not pleading for
the practical strength of morahty in those days, —
though we might quote the self-devotion of Regulus,
the continence of Scipio, and other noble sacrifices
at the shrine of principle or patriotism. It is enough
for our object which is to prove, not the power of
moraUty, but merely the sense and recognition of
it — that the nobihty of these instances was felt,
that the homage of public acclamation was rendered
to them, that historians eulogized and poets sung
the honours of illustrious virtue. We are not con-
tending for such a moral nature as could achieve
the practice, but for such a moral nature as could
discern the principles of righteousness. In short
there was a natural ethics among men, a capacity
both of feeling and of perceiving the moral distinc-
tion between good and evil. The works of Horace
and Juvenal and above aU of Cicero abundantly
attest this — nor are we aware of aught more splen-
did and even importantly true in the whole author-
ship of Moral Science than the following passage
from the last of these writers. " Est quidem vera
.ex, recta ratio, naturre congruens, diffusa in omnes,
constans, sempiterna ; quae vocet ad officium
jubendo, vetando a fraude deterreat; quae tamen
neque probes frustra jubet aut vetat, nee improbos

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 53

jubendo aut vetando movet. Huic legi, nee abro-
gari fas est, neque derogari ex hac aliquid licet
neque tota abrogari potest. Nee vero per senatum,
aut per populum, solvi hae lege possumus, neque
est quaerendus explanator aut interpres ejus alius.
Nee erit alia lex Romae, alia Athenis — alia nunc,
alia posthac ; sed et omnes gentes, et omni tempore,
una lex et sempiterna, et immortalis continebit;
unusque erit communis quasi magister, et Impe-
rator omnium Deus. lUe legis hujus inventor,
discepator, lator; cui qui non parebit, ipse se
fugiet, ac naturam hominis aspernabitur ; atque
hoc ipso, luet maximas pcenas, etiam si csetera
supplicia quae eiFugerit." Such is the testimony
of a heathen to the* law within the breast — and
armed too with such power of enforcement, that,
apart from the retributions of a reigning and a
living judge, man cannot offer violation to its
authority without at the same time suffering the
greatest of all penalties in the violence which he
thereby offers to his own nature. •

34. But though we have thus separated between
the Ontology and the Deontology of the question,
between man's knowledge of existences and his
knowledge of duties, between the light by which he
views the being of a God and the light by which he
views the services and affections that we owe to
him — ^let it not be imagined that in conceding to
nature the faculty of perceiving virtue, we concede
to her such a possession of virtue, as at all to miti-
gate that charge of total and unexcepted depravity
wliich the Scriptures have preferred against her.
And neither let it be imagined that we even accredit

54 ETHICS OF THEOLOGY.

her with such an unclouded perception of Ethics,
as to leave nothing for revelation to do, but to
superadd the knowledge of objects — so that on the
simple information of what is truth, we could in-
stantly and decisively follow it up with the conclu-
sion of what is duty. We believe that Christianity
not only addresses to the mind of her disciples
objects which were before unknown, but quickens
and enlightens them in the sense of what is right
and wrong — making their moral discernment more
clear, and their moral sensibility more tender.*
But remember that Christianity herself presupposes
tliis moral sense in nature — ^not however so as to
alleviate the imputation of nature's worthlessness,
but really and in effect to enhance it. Had nature
been endowed with no such sense, all responsibihty
would have been taken away from her. Where
there is no law there is no transgression ; and it is
just because men in aU ages and in all countries are
a law unto themselves, that the sweeping condem-
nation of Scripture can be carried universally round
among the sons and daughters of our species.

35. This distinction in fact between the ethics
and the objects of Theology will help us to defend
aright the great Bible position of the depravity of
our nature. It will lead us to perceive that there
may be a morality without godliness, even as there
may be a mathematics without astronomy. If we
make proper discrimination we shall acknowledge
how possible it is that there may be integrity and
humanity in our doings with each other — while the

* This subject will fall to be more thoroughly dbcussod in
Chapter on the Interna Existence of Christianity.

ETHICS OF THEOLOGY. 55

great unseen Being with whom we have most em-
phatically to do, is forgotten and disowned by us.
We shall at length understand how along with the
play and reciprocation of many terrestrial moralities
in our lower world — we may he dead, and just
from our heedlessness of the objects, to all tliose
celestial moralities by v> hich we are fitted for a
higher and a better world. We shall cease from a
treacherous complacency in the generosity or up-
rightness of nature ; and no longer be deceived, by
the existence of social virtue upon earth, into the
imagination of our most distant claim to that heaven,
from the elevation and the sacredness of which all
the children of humanity have so immeasurably
fallen.

36. So far from the degree of naturallight which
we have contended for being any extenuation of
human depravity, it forms the very argument on
which the Apostle concluded that all, both Jews
and Gentiles, were under sin. His inference from
the universal possession of a conscience among men
is, *' so that they are without excuse." It is not
because they are blind that they are chargeable —
but it is because they to a certain extent see that
therefore their sin remaineth with them. We in-
deed think that the viev^^ which we have given may
be turned to the defence of Orthodoxy, when the
light of a man's conscience and the natural virtues
of his life are pled in mitigation of that deep and
desperate wickedness which is ascribed to him in
the Bible. For it suggests this reply — There may
be a mathematics without astronomy — there may
be an Ethics without Theology. Even though the

56 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

phenomena of the visible heavens are within the
reach of human observation — yet, if we will not
study them, we may ^iil have a terrestrial geome-
try ; but a celestial we altogether want, nay have
wilfully put away from us. And so also, we may
be capable of certain guesses and discoveries re-
specting God— yet, if we will not prosecute them,
we may still have a terrestrial morals, and yet be
in a state of practical atheism. The face of humai
society may occasionally brighten with the patriot-
ism and the generosity and the honour which reci-
procate from one to another amongst the members
of the human family — and yet all may be unmersed
in deepest unconcern about their common Father
who is in heaven — all may be living without God
in the world.

CHAPTER II.

On the Duty which is laid upon Men hy the Probability or
even the Imagination of a God.

1. We have already seen that even though the
objects of Theology lay under total obscurity, there
might be a distinct and vigorous play of the Ethics
notwithstanding — ^kept in actual exercise among
those objects which are seen and terrestrial, and in
readiness for eventual exercise on the revelation of
unseen and celestial objects. This, however, does

not accurately represent the real state of nature

for in no age or country of the world, we beheve.

ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 57

did the objects of Theology lie hidden under an
entire and unqualified darkness. There is, in
reference to them, a sort of twilight glimmering,
more or less, among all nations — and the question
is, what sort of regimen or responsibility may that
man be said to lie under, whose sole guidance in
Theology is that which a very indistinct view of its
objects, though with certainly a more distinct sense
of its ethics, may suggest ?

2. This brings us to the consideration of the
duty laid upon men by the probability or even the
imasfination of a God.

3. It must now be abundantly obvious, that
along with nature's discernment of the ethics, she
may labour at the same time under a comparative
blindness as to the objects of Theological Science.
On the hypothesis of an actually existent God,
there may be an urgent sense in human consciences
of the gratitude and the obedience which belong
to him. But still while this ethicaV apprehension
may be clear and \ivid, there may be either a
bright or a dull conviction in regard to the truth of
the hypothesis itself. We should here distinguish
the things which be distinct from each other ; and
carefully note that, along with a just discernment
of the proprieties which belong to certain moral
relations, the question may still be unresolved,
whether these relations be in truth exemplified by
any real and hving beings in the universe. WTiat
is right under certain moral relations, supposing
them to be occupied, is one consideration. What
exists in nature or in the univ^erse to occupy these
relations is another. It does not follow that though

c2

58 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

nature should be able to pronounce clearly and
confidently on the first of these topics — she can
therefore pronounce alike confidently on the second
of them. The two investigations are conducted
on different principles; and the two respective
sorts of evidence upon which they proceed are just
as different, as is the light of a mathematical
demonstration from that light of observation by
which we apprehend a fact or an object in Natural
Philosophy. We have already conceded to nature
the possession of that moral light by which she can
to a certain, and we think to a very considerable
extent, take accurate cognizance of the ethics of
our science. And we have now to inquire in how
far she is competent to her own guidance in seeking
after the objects of the science.

4. The main object of Theology is God.

5. Going back then to the very earhest of our
mental conceptions on this subject, we advert first
to the distinction in point of real and logical import,
between unbelief and disbelief. There being no
ground for affirming that there is a God is a dif-
ferent proposition, from, there being ground for
affirming that there is no God. The former we
apprehend, to be the furthest amount of the atheis-
tical verdict on the question of a God. The atheist
does not labour to demonstrate that there is no
God. But he labours to demonstrate that there
is no adequate proof of there being one. He does
not positively affirm the position, that God is not ;
but he affirms the lack of evidence for the position,
that God is. Judging from the tendency and effect
of his arguments, an atheist does not appear posi-

ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 59

tively to refuse that a God may be — but he insists
that He has not discovered Himself, whether by
the utterance of His voice in audible revelation or
by the impress of His hand upon visible nature.
His verdict on the doctrine of a God is only that
it is not proven. It is not that it is disproven.
He is but an Atheist. He is not an Antitheist.

6. Now there is one consideration, which affords
the inquirer a singularly clear and commanding
position, at the outset of this great question. It
is this. We cannot, without a glaring contraven-
tion to all the principles of the experimental philo-
sophy, recede to a further distance from the
doctrine of a God, than to the position of simple
atheism. We do not need to take our departure
from any point further back than this, in the region
of antitheism ; for that region cannot possibly be
entered by us but by an act of tremendous pre-
sumption, which it were premature to denounce as
impious, but which we have the authority of all
modern science for denouncing as unphilosophical.
We can figure a rigidly Baconian mind, of a cast
so slow and cautious and hesitating, as to demand
more of proof ere it gave its conviction to the
doctrine that there was absolutely and certainly
a God. But, in virtue of these very attributes,
would it, if a sincere and consistent mind, be at
least equally slow in giving its conviction to the
doctrine that there was absolutely and certainly
not a God. Such a mind would be in a state
neither for assertion nor for denial upon this sub-
ject. It would settle in ignorance or unbelief
which is quite 'another thing from disbelief. The

60 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

place it occupied would be some mid-way region
of scepticism — and if it felt unwarranted from any
evidence before it that God is, it would at the very
least feel equally unwarranted to affirm that God
is not. To make this palpable, we have only to
contrast the two intellectual states, not of theism
and atheism, but of theism and antitheism — along
with the two processes, by which alone, we can
be logically and legitimately led to them.

7. To be able to say then that there is a God,
we may have only to look abroad on some definite
territory, and point to the vestiges that are given
of His power and His presence somewhere. To
be able to say that there is no God, we must walk
the whole expanse of infinity, and ascertain by
observation, that such vestiges are to be found
nowhere. Grant that no trace of Him can be
discerned in that quarter of contemplation, which
our puny optics have explored — does it follow,
that, throughout all immensity, a Being with the
essence and sovereignty of a God is nowhere to
be found? Because through our loopholes of
communication with that small portion of external
nature which is before us, we have not seen or
ascertained a God — must we therefore conclude
of every unknown and untrodden vastness in this
illimitable universe, that no Divinity is there ? —
Or because, through the brief successions of our
little day, these heavens have not once broken
silence, is it therefore for us to speak to all the
periods of that eternity which is behind us ; and to
say, that never hath a God come forth with the
uiiequivocal tokens of His existence? Ere we can

ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 6

say that there is a God — we must have seen, on
that portion of Nature to which we have access,
the print of His footsteps ; or have had direct in-
timation from Himself; or been satisfied by the
authentic memorials of His converse with our species
in other days. But ere Ave can say that there is
no God — we must have roamed over all nature,
and seen that no mark of a Divine footstep was
there; and we must have gotten intimacy with
every existent spirit in the universe, and learned
from each, that never did a revelation of the Deity
visit him ; and we must have searched, not into the
records of one solitary planet, but into the archives
of all worlds, and thence gathered, that, tlrrough-
out the wide realms of immensity, not one exhibi-
tion of a reigning and living God ever has been
made. Atheism might plead a lack of evidence
within its own field of observation. But antitheism
pronounces both upon the things which are, and
the things which are not within that field. It
breaks forth and beyond all those limits, that have
been prescribed to man's excursive spirit, by the
sound philosophy of experience ; and by a presump-
tion the most tremendous, even the usurpation of
all space and of all time, it affirms that there is no
God. To make this out, we should need to travel
abroad over the surrounding universe till we had
exhausted it, and to search backward through all
the hidden recesses of eternity; to traverse in every
direction the plains of infinitude, and sweep the
outskirts of that space which is itself interminable
and then bring back to this little world of ours, the
report of a universal blank, wherein we had not

VOL. T. 6

62 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

met with one manifestation Ox* one movement of a
presiding God. For man not to know of a God,
he has only to sink beneath the level of our com-
mon nature. But to deny him, he must be a God
himself. He must arrogate the ubiquity and omni-
science of the Godhead.*

8. It affords a firm outset to this investigation,
that we cannot recede a greater way from the doc-
trine to be investigated, than to the simple point
of ignorance or unbelief. We cannot, without
making inroad on the soundest principles of evi-
dence, move one step back from this, to the region
of disbelief. We can figure an inquirer taking up
his position in midway atheism. But he cannot,
without defiance to the whole principle and philo-
sophy of evidence, make aggression thence on the
side of antitheism. There is a clear intellectual

* This idea has been powerfully rendered by Foster in the fol-
lowing' passage extracted from one of his essays : —

•' The wonder turns on the gi-eat process, by which a man
could grow to the immense intelligence that can know there is no
God. What ages and what lights are i-equisite for this attain-
ment? This intelligence involves the very attributes of Divinity,
while a God is denied. For unless this man is omnipresent, unless
he is at this moment in every place in the Universe, he cannot
know but there may be in some place manifestations of a Deity
by wliich even he would be overpowered. If he does not absolutely
know every agent in the Universe, the one that he does not know
may be God. If he is not himself the chief agent in the universe,
and does not know what is so, that which is so may be God. If
he is not in absolute possession of all the propositions that con-
stitute universal truth, the one which he wants may be that theie
is a God. If he cannot with certainty assign the cause of all
that he perceives to exist, that cause may be a God. If he does
not know every thing that has been done in the immeasuralila
ages that are past, some things may have been done bv u Gud.
Thus unless he knows all things, that is, precludes anoth'er Deity
by being one himself, he cannot know that the Being whose
existence he reiects, does not exist."

ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 63

principle, which forbids his proceeding in that direc-
tion ; and there is another principle equally clear,
though not an intellectual but a moral one, which
urges him, if not to move, at least to look in the
opposite direction. Vv'e arc not asking him, situated
where he is, to believe in God. For the time
being, we as little expect a friendly as we desire a
hostile decision upon the question. Our only de-
mand for the present is, that he shall entertain the
question. And to enforce the demand, we think
that an effective appeal might be made to his own
moral nature. We suppose him still to be an
atheist, but no more than an atheist — for, in all
right Baconian logic, the very farthest remove fi'om
theism, at which he or any man can be placed by
the lack of evidence for a God, is at the point of
simple neutrality. We might well assume this
point, as the utmost possible extreme of alienation
fi'om the doctrine of a Creator, to which the mind
of a creature can in any circumstances be legiti-
mately carried. We cannot move from it, in the
direction towards antitheism, without violence to all
that is just in philosophy ; and we might therefore
commence with inquiring, whether, in this lowest
state of information and proof upon the question,
there can be any thing assigned, which should lead
us to move, or at least to look in the opposite
direction.

9. In the utter destitution, for the present, of
any argument, or even semblance of argument, that
a God is — there is, perhaps, a certain duteous
movement which the mind ought to take, on the
bare suggestion that a God may be. An object

64 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

in moral science may be wholly unseen, while the
Ethics connected with that object may not be wholly
unfelt. The certainty of an actual God binds over
to certain distinct and most undoubted proprieties.
But so also may the imagination of a possible God
—in which case, the very idea of a God, even in
its most hypothetical form, might lay a responsi-
bility, even upon atheists.

10. Here then is one palpable use for the dis-
tinction between the ethics and the objects of
Theology, or between the Deontology and Ontology
of it. We may have a moral nature for the one,
even when in circumstances of utter blindness to
the other. The mere conception of the objects is
enough to set the ethics agoing. Though in the
dark as to the question whether a God exists, yet
on the bare imagination of a God, we are not at aU
in the dark as to the question of the gratitude and
the obedience which are due to Him. There is a
moral light in the midst of intellectual darkness —
an ethics that waits only for the presentation of the
objects. The very idea of a God, even in its most
hypothetical form, will bring-along with it an instant
sense and recognition of the moralities and duties
that would be owing to Him. Should an actual G od
be revealed, we clearly feel that there is a some-
thing which we ought to be and to do in regard to
Him. But more than this ; should a possible God
be imagined, there is a something not only which
we feel that we ought, but a something which we
actually ought to do or to be, in consequence of our
being visited by such an imagination. The thought
of a God not only suggests what would be our in-

ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 65

cumbent obligations, did such a Being become
obvious to our convictions — ^but the thought of a
God suggests what are the incumbent obhgations
which commence with the thought itself, and are
anterior even to the earliest dawn of evidence for a
Deity. We hold that there are such obligations ,
and our purpose now is, if possible, to ascertain
them.

11. To make this palpable, we might imagine a
family suffering under extreme destitution, and
translated all at once into sufficiency or affluence
by an anonymous donation. Had the benefactor
been known, the gratitude that were due to him
becomes abundantly obvious ; and in the estimation
of every conscience, nothing could exceed the tur-
pitude of him, who should regale himself on the
bounties wherewith he had been enriched, and yet
pass unheedingly by the giver of them all. Yet
does not a proportion of this very guilt rest upon
him, who knows not the hand that relieved him, yet
cares not to inquire ? It does not exonerate him
from the burden of all obligation that he knows not
the hand w^hich sustains him. He incurs a guilt,
if he do not want to know. It is enough to convict
him of a great moral delinquency, if he have gladly
seized upon the liberalities which were brought in
secret to his door, yet seeks not after the quarter
whence they have come — willing that the hand of
the dispenser should remain for ever unknown, and
not wanting any such disclosures as v/ould lay a
distinct claim or obligation upon himself. He alto-
gether lives by the bounty of another ; yet would
rather continue to live without the burden of those

60 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

services or acknowledgments that are due to him»
His ignorance of the benefactor might alleviate the
charge of ingratitude ; but it plainly awakens the
charge again, if he choose to remain in ignorance,
and would shun the information that might dispel
it. In reference then to this still undiscovered
patron of his family, it is possible for him to evince
ingratitude; to make full exhibition of a nature
that is unmoved by kindness and withholds the
moral responses which are due to it, that can riot
with utmost selfishness and satisfaction upon the
gifts while in total indifference about the giver — an
indiiFerence which might be quite as clearly and
characteristically shown, by the man who seeks not
after his unknown friend, as by the man who sUghts
him after that he has found him.

12. And further this ingratitude admits of de-
grees. It may exist even in a state of total uncer-
tainty as to the object of it; and without the
smallest clue to the discovery of him. But should
some such clue be put into his hand, and he forbear
the prosecution of it — this would enhance the
ingratitude. ' It were an aggravation of his base-
ness if there cast up some opening to a discovery,
and he declined to follow it — if the probability fell
in his way that might have guided him to the unseen
hand which had been stretched forth in his behalf,
and he shut his eyes against it — if he, satisfied with
the bounty, were not merely content to live without
the slightest notice of the benefactor, but lived in
utter disregard of every notice that transpired upon
the subject — loving the darkness rather than the
light upon this question; and better pleased to

ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 61

grovel in the enjoyment of the gifts without the
burden of any gratitude to that giver whom he
rather wills to abide in secrecy. There is most
palpable dehnquency of spirit in all this; and it
would become still more evident, should he dis-
tinctly refuse the calls that were brought within
his hearing to prosecute an inquiry. The grateful
man would not do this. He would be restless
under the ignorance of him to whom he owed the
preservation of his family. He would feel the
uneasiness of a heart whose most urgent desire was
left without its object. It is thus that anterior to
the knowledge of the giver, and far anterior to the
full certainty of him — the moralities which spring
from the obligation of his gifts might come into
play. Even in this early stage, there is, in refer-
ence to him who is yet unknown, a right and a
wrong — and there might be evinced either the
worth of a grateful disposition, or there be incurred
the guilt of its opposite. Under a discipline of
penalties and rewards for the encouragement of
virtue, one man might be honoured for the becom-
ing sensibilities of his heart to one whom he never
saw; and another be held responsible for his con-
duct to him of v/hom he utterly was ignorant.

13. It may thus be made to appear, that there
is an ethics connected with theology, which may
come into play, anterior to the clear view of any
of its objects. More especially, we do not need
to be sure of God, ere we ought to have certain
feehngs, or at least certain aspirations towards
him. For this purp^^se we do not need, fully and
absolutely to believ that God is. It is enough

68 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

that our minds cannot fully and absolutely acquiesce
in the position that God is not. To be fit subjects
for our present argument, we do not need to have
explored that territory of nature which is within
oiir reach ; and thence gathered, in the traces of a
designer's hand the positive conclusion that there
is a God. It is enough if we have not tra^^ersed,
throughout all its directions and in all its extent,
the sphere of immensity ; and if we have not scaled
the mysterious altitudes of the eternity that is past ;
nor, after having there searched for a divinity in
vain, have come at length to the positive and the
peremptory conclusion, that there is not a God.
In a w^ord, it is quite enough that man is barely
a finite creature, who has not yet put forth his
faculties on the question whether God is ; neither
has yet so ranged over all space and all tim.e, as
definitely to have ascertained that God is not — but
with whom though in ignorance of all proof, it
still remains a possibihty that God may be.

14. Now to this condition there attaches a most
clear and incumbent morality. It is to go in quest
of that unseen benefactor, who for aught I know,
has ushered me into existence, and spread so glo-
rious a panorama around me. It is to probe the
secret of my being and my birth ; and, if possible,
to make discovery whether it was indeed the hand
of a benefactor, that brought me forth from the
chambers of nonentity, and gave me place and
entertainment in that glowing territory, which is
lighted up with the hopes and the happiness ot
living men. It is thus that the very conception ot
a God throws a responsibility after it ; and that

ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 69

»

duty, solemn and imperative duty, stands associated
with the thought of a possible deity, as well as with
the sight of a present deity, standing in full mani-
festation before us. Even anterior to all knowledge
of God, or when that knowledge is in embryo,
there is both a path of irreligion and a path of
piety ; and that law which denounces the one and
gives to the other an approving testimony, may
find in him who is still in utter darkness about his
origin and his end, a fit subject for the retributions
which she deals in. He cannot be said to have
borne disregard to the will of that God, whom he
has found. But his is the guilt of impiety, in that
he has borne disregard to the knowledge of that
God, whom he was bound by every tie of gratitude
to seek after — a duty not founded on the proofs
that may be exhibited for the being of a God, but
a duty to which even the most slight and slender of
presumptions should give rise. And wha can deny
that, antecedent to all close and careful examination
of the proofs, there are at least many presumptions
in behalf of a God, to meet the eye of every obser-
ver ? Is there any so hardy as to deny, that the
curious workmanship of his frame jnay have had a
designer and an architect ; that the ten thousand
independent circumstances which must be united
ere he can have a moment's ease, and the failure of
any one of which would be agony, may not have met
at random, but that there may be a skilful and
unseen hand to have put them together into one
wondrous concurrence, and that never ceases to
uphold it ; that there may be a real and a living
artist, whose fingers did frame the economy of actual

70 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

things, and who hath so marvellously suited all that
is around us to our senses and our powers of grati-
fication ? Without affirming aught which is positive,
surely the air that we breathe, and the beautiful
light in which we expatiate, these elements of sight
and sound so exquisitely fitted to the organs of the
human frame-work, may have been provided by one
who did benevolently consult in them our special
accommodation. The graces innumerable that lie
widely spread over the face of our worlds the glo-
rious concave of heaven that is- placed over us, the
grateful variety of seasons that like Nature's shifting
panorama ever brings new entertainment and deUght
to the eye t)f spectators — these may, for aught we
know, be the emanations of a creative mind, that
originated our family and devised such a universe
for their habitation. Regarding these, not as
proofs, but in the humble light of presumptions for
a God, i\\Qj are truly enough to convict us of foulest
ingratitude — if we go not forth in quest of a yet
unknown, but at least possible or likely benefactor..
They may not resolve the question of a God. But
they bring the heaviest reproach on our listlessness
to the question; and show that, anterior to our
assured belief in his existence, there lies upon us a
most imperious obUgation to '' stir ourselves up that
we may lay hold of Him."

15. Such presumptions as these, if not so many
demands on the belief of man, are at least so many
demands upon his attention ; and then, for aught
he knows, the presumptions on which he ought to
inquire, may be more- and more enhanced, till they
brighten into proofs which ought to convince him.

ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 71

ThQ prima facie evidence for a God may not be
enough to decide the question; but it should at
least decide man to entertain the question. 1 o
think upon how slight a variation either in man or
in external nature, the whole diiierence between
physical enjoyment and the most acute and most
appalling of physical agony may turn ; to think how
delicate the balance is, and yet how surely and
steadfastly it is maintained, so as that the vast
majority of creatures are not only upheld in com-
fort but often may be seen disporting themselves in
the redundance of gaiety ; to think of the pleasur-
able sensations wherewith every hour is enlivened,
and how much the most frequent and familiar occa-
sions of life are mixed up with happiness ; to think
of the food, and the recreation, and the study, and
the society, and the business, each having an appro-
priate rehsh of its own, so as in fact to season with
enjoyment the great bulk of our existence in the
world ; to thmk that, instead of living in the midst
of grievous and incessant annoyance to all our
faculties, we should have awoke upon a world that
so harmonized with the various senses of man, and
both gave forth such music to his ear, and to his
eye such manifold lovelir ^« : to think of all these
palpable and most precious auaptations, and yet to
care not, whether in this wide universe there exists
a being who has had any hand in them ; to riot and
regale oneself to the uttermost in the midst of all
this profusion, and yet to send not one wishful in-
quiry after that Benevolence which for aught wo
know may have laid it at our feet— this, however
shaded from our view the object of the question

72 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

may be, is, from its very commencement, a clear
outrage against its ethical proprieties. If that veil
of dim transparency, which hides the Deity from
our immediate perceptions, were lifted up ; and we
should then spurn from us the manifested God — •
this were direct and glaring impiety. But anterior
to the hfting of that veil, there may be impiety. It
is impiety to be so immersed as we are, in the busy
objects and gratifications of life ; and yet to care
not whether there be a great and a good spirit by
whose kindness it is that life is upholden. It needs
not that this great spirit should reveal Himself in
characters that force our attention to Him, ere the
guilt of our impiety has begun. But ours is the
guilt of impiety, in not hfting our attention towards
God, in not seeking after Him if haply we may find
Him.

16. Man is not to blame, if an atheist, because
of the want of proof. But he is to blame, if an
atheist, because he has shut his eyes. He is not
to blame, that the evidence for a God has not been
seen by him, if no such evidence there were within
the field of his observation. But he is to blame, if
the evidence have not been seen, because he turned
away his attention from it. That the question of a
God may lie unresolved in his mind, all he has to
do, is to refuse a hearing to the question. He may
abide without the conviction of a God, if he so
choose. But this his choice is matter of condem-
nation. To resist God after that He is known, is
criminaHty towards Him ; but to be satisfied that
He should remain unknown, is like criminality
towards Him. There is a moral perversity of

ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 73

Spirit with him who is wilUng, in the midst of many
objects of gratification, that there should not be
one object of gratitude. It is thus that, even in
the ignorance of God, there may be a responsibility
towards God. The Discerner of the heart sees,
whether, for the blessings innumerable wherewith
He has strewed the path of every man, He be
treated, like the unknown benefactor who was dili-
gently sought, or like the unknown benefactor who
was never cared for. In respect, at least of desire
after God, the same distinction of character may be
observed between one man and another — whether
God be wrapt in mystery, or stand forth in fuU.
development to our world. E\ en though a mantle
of deepest obscurity lay over the question of His
existence ; this would not efface the distinction,
between the piety on the one hand w^hich laboured
and aspired after Him ; and the impiety upon the
other which never missed the evidence that it did
not care for, and so grovelled in the midst of its
own sensuality and selfishness. The eye of a
heavenly witness is upon all these varieties ; and
thus, w^hether it be darkness or whether it be dis-
like which hath caused a people to be ignorant of
God, there is vrith him a clear principle of judgment,
that He can extend even to the outfields of atheism.
17. It would appear then, that, however shaded
from the view of man are the objects of Theology,
as in virtue of his moral nature he can feel and
recognise in some degree the ethics of Theology —
even in this initial state of his mind on the question
of a God, there is an impellent force upon the
conscience, which he ought to obey, and which he

VOL. I. 7

7-1 OISi THE BEISG OF A GOD.

incurs guilt by resisting. We do not speak of tliat
jght which irradiates the termination of the in-
quirer's path, but of that embryo or rudiraental
light which ghmmers over the outset of- it ; whicli
serves at least to indicate the commencement of liis
way ; and which, for aught he knows, may brighten,
as he advances onwards, to the blaze of a full and
finished revelation. At no point of this progress,
does *' the trumpet give an uncertain sound," ex-
tending, if not to those who stand on the ground of
antitheism, (which we have already pronounced
upon and we trust proved to be madly irrational)
— at least to those vvho stand on the ground of
atheism, who, though strangers to the conviction,
are certainly not strangers to the conception of a
Deity. It is of the utmost practical importance,
that even these are not beyond the jurisdiction of
an ob\^ous principle ; and that a right obligatory
call can be addressed to men so far back on the
domain of irreligion and ignorance. It is deeply
interesting to know, by what sort of moral force,
even an atheist ought to be evoked fi-om the fast-
ness which he occupies — vvhat are the notices, by
responding to which, he should come forth with
open eyes and a willing mind to this high investi-
gation ; and by resisting which, he will incur a
demerit, whereof a clear moral cognizance might
be taken, and whereon a righteous moral condem-
nation might be passed. The "fishers of men'*
should know the uttermost reach of their argument;
and it is well to understand of religion, that, if she
have truth and authority at all, there is a voice
proceeding fi'om her which might be universally

0^' THE i3ElNG OF A GOD. 75

heard — so that even the remotest families of earth,
if not reclaimed by her, are thereby laid under
sentence of righteous reprobation.

18. On this doctrine of the moral dynamics,
which operate and are in force, even in our state of
profoundest ignorance respecting God, there may
he grounded three important applications.

19. The first is that all men, under all the
possible varieties of illumination, may nevertheless
be the fit subjects for a judicial cognizance — inso-
much that when admitted to the universal account,
the Discerner of the heart will be at no loss for a
principle on which they all might be reckoned with
— as, corresponding to a very dim perception of
the objects of religion, there might still be as much
in operation of the ethics of religion as might lay a
distinct responsibility even on the most wild and
untutored of nature's children. Within the whole
compass of the human family there exists not one
outcast tribe that might not be made the subjects
of a moral reckoning at the bar of heaven's juris-
prudence— even though no light from the upper
sanctuary hath ever shone upon them; and neither
hath any light of science or of civihzation sprung up
among themselves. In each untutored bosom there
do exist the elements of a moral nature ; and the
peculiar character of each could be seen from the
way in which it responded to the manifestation of a
Deity. And though only visited by the thought
or the suspicion of a Deity, the same thing still
could be seen from the way in which these children
of nature were affected by it. Each would give
his own entertainment to the thought ; and, in the

76 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

longings of a vague and undefined earnestness that
arose to heaven from the soHtary wild, might there
be evinced as strong an affinity for God and for
godliness, as in those praises of an enlightened
gratitude that ascend from the temples of Christen-
dom. It is thus that the Searcher of the inner
man will find out data for a reckoning among all the
tribes of this world's population — and that nowhere
on the face of our globe doth spiritual light glim.mer
so feebly as not to supply the materials of a coming
judgment on one and all of the human family.

20. It is thus that even to the most remote and
unlettered tribes, men are everywhere the fit sub-
jects for a judgment-day. Their belief, scanty
though it be, hath a correspondent moraUty which
they may either observe or be deficient in, and so
be reckoned with accordingly. They have few of
the facts in Theology ; and these may be seen too
through the hazy medium of a dull and imperfect
evidence, or perhaps have only been shadowed out
to them by the power of imagination. Theu*
theology may have arisen no higher than to the
passing suggestion of a God — a mere surmise or
rumination about an unseen spirit, v/ho, tending
all their footsteps, was then* guardian and their
guide through the dangers of the pathless wilder-
ness, who provides all the sustenance which tliis
earth can supply, and hath lighted up these heavens
in all then- glory. Now in this thought, fugitive
though it be, in these uncertain glimpses whether
of a truth or of a possibility, there is that, to
which the elements of their moral nature might
respond — so that to them, there is not the same

ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 77

exemption from all responsibility, which will be
granted to the man who is sunk in hopeless idiotism,
or to the infant of a day old. Even with the scanty
materials of a heathen creed, a pure or a perverse
morality might be grounded thereupon — whether,
hi those longings of a vague and undefined earnest-
ness that arise from him who feels in his bosom an
affinity for God and godliness ; or, in the heedless-
ness of him, who, careless of an unknown benefac-
tor, would have been alike careless, although He
had stood revealed to his gaze, with as much light
and evidence as is to be had in Christendom.
These differences attest what man is, under the
dark economy of Paganism ; and so give token to
Avhat he would be, under the bright economy of a
full and finished revelation. It is thus that the
Searcher of the heart will find out data for a
reckoning, even among the rudest of nature's
children, or among those whose spiritual light
ghmmers most feebly — ^for faint and feeble though
it be, it afibrds a test to the character of him whom
it visits — whether he dismiss its suggestions with
facility from his mind, or is arrested thereby
into a grateful sense of reverence. Even the
simple theology of the desert can supply the materials
of a coming judgment — so that the Discerner of
the inner man, able to tell who it is that morally
acts and morally feels up to the light he has, or up
to the objects that lie within his contemplation, will
be at no less for a principle, on which He might
clearly and righteously try all the men of all the
generations that be upon the face of the earth.
2 1 . We read in the Epistle to the Romans of a

78 ■ ON THE ?F/NC OF A CrOD.

day when God shall judge the secrets of men — both
of the Jews who shall be judged by the written
law, and of the Gentiles who have the work of the
law written in their hearts, and are a law to them-
selves. We may now perhaps comprehend more
distinctly how this may be. Though it be true
that the more clearly we know God, the more
closely does the obligation of godliness lie upon us
— yet there might be none so removed from the
knowledge of God as to stand released from all
obligation. There is the sense of a Divinity in
every mind; and correspondent to that sense, there
is a morality that is either complied with by the
will or rebelled against — so that under all the possi-
ble varieties of illumination and doctrine which
obtain in various countries of the world, there
might be exemplified either a religiousness or an
impiety of character. The heavenly witness who
is on high can discern in every instance — whether
to the conception of a great invisible power that
floats indistinctly in many a bosom, but is nowhere
wholly obliterated, there be such duteous regards
of the heart or such duteous conformities of the
life as morahty would dictate, and out of this ques-
tion can be gathered materials for a cognizance and
a reckoning with all. The Searcher of hearts
knows how to found a clear and righteous judg-
ment even on those moral phenomena that are
given forth by men in the regions of grossest
heathenism — and though the condemnation will
fall lightest where the ignorance has been most pro-
found, and at the same time involuntary; yet none
we think of our species are so deeply imm >rsed in

ON THE BEING OF A OOD. ' 7.9

blindness or fatuity about Ciod, as that he might
not be sisted at the bar of heaven's jurisprudence,
and there meet with a clear principle of condemna-
tion to rest upon him.

22. The second important bearing of this prin-
ciple is on the subject of religious education. For
what is true of a savage is true of a child. It
may rightly feel the ethics of the relation between
itself and God, before it rationally apprehends the
object of this relation. Its moral may outrun its
argumentative light. Long anterior to the possi-
bility of any sound conviction as to the character
or existence of a God, it may respond with sound
and correct feeling to the mere conception of Him..
We hold, that, on this principle, the practice of
early, nay even of infantine rehgious education,
may, in opposition to the invectives of Rousseau
and others, be fully and philosophically vindicated.
Even though the object should be iUusory, still on
this low supposition there is no moral deterioration
incurred but the contrary by an education which
calls forth a right exercise of the heart, even to an
imaginary being. But should the object be real,
then the advantage of that anticipative process by
which it is addressed to the conception of the
3.oung, before it can be intelligently recognised by
them, is, that though it do not at once enlighten
them on the question of a God, it at least awakens
them to the question. Though they are not yet
capable of appreciating the proofs which decide the
question, it is a great matter, that, long before
they have come to this they can feel the moral pro-
priety of giving it solemn and respectfid entertain-

80 ON THE BEING OF A GOD,

ment. Anterior to a well-grounded belief in the
objects of religion, there is a preparatory season of
religious scholarship, commencing with childhood
and reaching onward through successive stages in
the growth of intellect — a very early and useful
season of aspirations and inquiries prompted by a
sense of duty even to the yet unknown God. Here
it is, that the ethics of our science and the objects
of our science stand most noticeably out from each
other — for, at the very time that the objects are
unknown, there is an impellent force upon the
spirit, of a clear ethical dictate, enjoining us to
acquire the knowledge of them.

23. And this early education can be vindicated
not only on the score of principle, but also on the
score of effect. Whether it properly illuminates or
not, it at least prepares for those brighter means of
illumination which are competent to a higher state
of the understanding. If it do not rationally con-
vince, it at least provides a responsibility, though
not a security for that attention which goes before
such a conviction. It does not consummate the
process ; but, in as far as the moral precedes the
intellectual, it makes good the preliminary steps ot
the process — ^insomuch that, in every Christian
land, the youth and the manhood are accountable
for their belief, because accountable for their use or
their neglect of that inquiry, by which the beliei
ought to have been determined. There is no indi-
vidual so utterly a stranger to the name and the
conception of a Divinity as to be without the scope
of this obligation. They have all from their in-
fancy heard of God. Many have been trained Ic

ON THE BEING OF a GOD 81

tliink of Him, amidst a thousand associations of
reverence. Some, under a roof of piety, have
often hsped the prayers of early childhood to this
unseen Being; and, in the oft repeated sound of
morning and evening orisons, they have become
familiar to His name. Even they who have grown
up at random through the years of a neglected
boyhood, are greatly within the limits of that respon-
sibility for which we plead. They have at least
the impression of a God. When utterance of Him
is made in their hearing, they are not startled as if
by the utterance of a thing unnoticed and unknown.
They are fully possessed, if not with the certainty,
at least with the idea, of a great eternal Sovereign
whose kingdom is the universe, and on whose will
all its processes are suspended. Whosoever may
have escaped from the full and practical belief of
such a Being, he most assuredly hath not escaped
from the conception of Him. The very impreca-
tions of profaneness may have taught it to him.
The very Sabbaths he spends in riot and blasphemy
at least remind him of a God. The worship-bell
of the church he never enters, conveys to him, if
not the truth at least an imagination of the truth.
In all these ways and in many more beside, there
js the sense of a God upon his spirit — and if such
a power of evidence hath not been forced upon
nis understanding as to compel the assurance that
God is — at least such intimations have been given,
that he cannot possibly make his escape from the
thought that a God may be. In spite of himself
this thought will overtake him, and if it do not
arrest him by a sense of obligation, it will leave
D 2

fe2 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

guilt upon his soul. It might not make him a he-
hever, hut it ought to make him an inquirer — and
in this indifference of his there is the very essence
of sin — though it he against a God who is unknown.
24. And, thirdly, we may thus learn to appre-
ciate the plea on which the irreligious of all classes
in society would fain extenuate their heedlessness
—from the homely peasant who alleges his want of
scholarship, to the gay and dissipated voluptuary
who, trenched in voluntary darkness, holds himself
to be without the pale of a reckoning, because he
demands a higher evidence for religion than has
ever yet shone upon his understanding. This
antecedency of the ethics, not to the conception,
but at least to the belief of the objects, places
them all within the jurisdiction of a principle — the
violation of which brings guilt and dangel* in its
train. Instead of waiting till the light of an over-
powering manifestation shall descend upon their
spirits, it is their part to lift up their attention to
the light which is offered. It will not exempt
them from blame that they have never found the
truth which would have saved them — if their own
consciences can tell that in good earnest they have
never sought it. Their heedlessness about an
unknow^n though possible God, is just the moral
perversity that w ould make them heedless of a God
who had been fully ascertained — and, rudely un-
settled though they may deem their Theology to
be, it may be enough to make them responsible for
deepest seriousness about God ; and if they want
this seriousness, enough to convict them of most
glaring impiety. This principle tells even at the

THE BEING OF A GOD. 83

outset of a minster's dealings with the most rustic
(congregations ; and, all ignorant as they may be of
the proofs by which religion is substantiated, there
is still even in their untutored minds such an im-
pression of probabiUty, as if not sufficient to decide
the question, should at least summon all their
faculties to the respectful entertainment of it.

25. We may thus perceive what that is, on
which a teacher of religion finds an introduction
for his topic, even into the minds of people in the
lowest state both of moral and intellectual debase-
ment. They m^ay have not that in them, at the
outset of his ministrations, v/hich can enable them
to decide the question of a God ; but they have at
least that in them, whic-h should summon their
attention to it. They have at least such a sense
of the divinity, as their own consciences vvill tell,
should put them on the regards and the inquiries
of moral earnestness. This is a clear principle
which operates at the. very commencement of a
religious course; and causes the first transition,
from the darkness, and insensibility of ahenated
nature, to the feelings and attentions of seriousness.
The truth is, that there is a certain rudimental
theology every where, on which the lessons of a
higher theology may be grafted — as much as to
condemn, if not to " aw aken the apathy of nature.
AVliat we have alreadt^ said of the relation in which
the father of a starving household stands to the
giver of an anonymous donation, holds true of the
relation in which all men stand to the unseen or
anonymous God. Though in a state of absolute
darkness, and without one token or clue to a

84 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

discovery, there is room for the exhibition of moral
differences among men — ^ibr even then, all the ele-
ments of morality might be at v/ork, and all the
tests of moral propriety might be abmidantly veri-
fied ; and still more, after that certain likehhoods
had arisen, or some hopeful opening had occurred
for investigating the secret of a God, There is
the utmost moral difference that can be imagined
between the man who Avould gaze with intense
scrutiny upon these likelihoods, and the man who
either in heedlessness or aversion would turn hivS
eyes from them; between the man who would
seize upon such an opening and prosecute such an
investigation to the uttermost, and the man who
either retires or shrinks from the opportunity of
a disclosure, that might burden him both with
the sense and with the services of some mighty
obligation.

26. And the same moral force which begins this
inquiry, also continues and sustains it. If there
be power in the very conception of a God to create
and constitute the duty of seeking after Him, this
power grows and gathers with every footstep of
advancement in the high investigation. If the
thought of a merely possible deity have rightfully
awakened a sense of obligation within us to enter-
tain the question; the view of a probable deity
must enhance this feehng, and*make the claim upon
our attention still more urgent and imperative than
at the first. Every new likelihood makes the call
louder, and the challenge more incumbently bind-
ing than before. In proportion to the light we
had attained, would be the criminality of resisting

ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 85

any further notices or manifestations of that mighty-
Being with whom we had so nearly and so em-
phatically to do. Under the impulse of a right
principle, we should follow on to know God — till,
after having done full justice both to our oppor-
tunities and our powers, we had made the most of
all the available evidence that was within our reach,
and possessed ourselves of all the knowledge that
was accessible.

27. But we shall expatiate no longer on the
popular and practical applications of this principle
--all important though they be ; and will only now
advert to the distinction between the ethics and
the objects of Theology, for the purpose of eluci-
dating by a very obvious analogy the relation in
which the Natural and the Christian Theology
stand to each other.

28. And first, it is obvious that in virtue of our
moral nature, such as it is, the^e might be a feehng
of certain moral proprieties as appendant to certain
relations between man and m.an without any recog-
nition by the mind of God. Though the world
were to be transported beyond the limits of the
divine economy — though the Supreme v/ere now to
stamp a perpetuity upon its present laws both of
physical and mental nature, and then to abandon it
for ever — though He were to consign it to some
distant and solitary place in a reign of atheism,
only leaving untouched the outward accommodations
by which man is now surrounded, and the internal
mechanism which he carries in his bosom — ^let there
be no difference but one, namely, that all sense of
a ruling Divinity were expunged, but that with this

8G ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

exception all the processes of thought and hnagma
tion and feelmg went on upon their old principles — ■
still would there be a morality among men, a recog-
nition of the difference between right and wrong,
just as distinct and decided as a recognition of the
difference between beauty and deformity. There
would be nought in such a translation of the
human family to this new state that could break up
the alliance between a view of loveliness in scenery,
and the tasteful admiration of it ; or bet\ipen a view
of integrity in character and the approval of its
worth or its rectitude. By the supposition that we
now make, the taste is left entire — and it has only
to be presented with the same objects that it may
be similarly afiected as before. And by the same
supposition the moral nature is left entire — and it
has only to be presented with the appropriate ob-
jects, that it may respond to them as it did before,
and come forth wiUli its wonted evolutions. The
single difference is, that one object is withdrawn,
that God henceforth is unheeded and unknown,
that he is never present to the eye of the mind so
as to call forth from the heart a sense of corre-
sponding duteousness. But still in the utter absence
of all thought and of all knowledge about God,
there are other objects whereon with the human
constitution unchanged the moral feeling and the
moral faculty would find their appropriate exercise.
There would still be the reciprocations of morahty
among men — the same relationship as before be-
tween injury and a sense of displeasure — between
beneficence and a sense of gratitude — between a
consciousness of guilt, towards a neighbour, if not

ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 87

towards God, between this consciousness and the
pain of self-dissatisfaction — ^between the exposure
of human villany or baseness upon the one hand
and the outcries of pubUc execration on the other.
The voice of the inward monitor would still be
heard. The voice of society whether in applause
or condemnation would still be heard. Men would
still continue to accuse or else to excuse each other.
The whole system of our jurisprudence might re-
main as at present — and superadded to it, there
w^ould be a court of conscience and a court of public
opinion, by which, even after the world had been
desolated of all sense of God, a natural regimen of
morality might still be upholden.

29. Let a mathematician retain his geometrical
powers and perceptions entire ; and though he
should become an atheist, he will still apprehend a
question of equality between one line and another.
And let any one retain his moral powers and per-
ceptions entire ; and though he should become an
athe.ist, he will still apprehend a question of equity
between one man and another. Atheism does not
hinder the resentment which he feels upon a provo-
cation ; neither does it hinder the instinctive sensi-
bility which he feels at the sight of distress ; neither
does it hinder the quick and lively approval where-
with he regards an exhibition of virtue ; nor yet the
recoil of his adverse moral judgment with all its emo-
tions of antipathy from some scene of perfidy or of
violence. Though utterly broken loose from heaven,
there would still be the same play of action and re-
action upon earth. Both the obligation of a legal
right, and the approbation of a moral rightness

88 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

would continue to be felt — and as in the chamber
of a man's own heart there would be a remorse
upon the back of iniquity as before, and from the
tribunal of society there would descend upon it a
voice of rebuke as before — the obligations of
morality would still have a meaning; and apart
from the thought of God, there would be a sense
as well as an understanding of moral obligation.

30. With the access which the geometrician hajs
at present to the orbs and the movements which be
on high — ^liis mathematics do avail him for the com
putations of a sublime astronomy. Let this access
be barred ; and still his mathematics would avail
him as before for all terrestrial positions and dis-
tances. And so wdth the access which either
peasant or philosopher has to the knowledge of
God, his morals do avail for pointing out the incum-
bent latitude and the incumbent obedience. Let
this access be somehow intercepted, let the face of
the Divinity be mantled in thickest darkness, inso-
much that the very conception of Him were banished
from our world; and still would there remain a
sublunary morals that would take cognizance of the
sublunary relationships as before. The astronomer
in the one case might sink down into a landed sur-
veyor. The aspiring candidate for heaven, in the
other case, might sink down into a mere citizen of
earth — yet there would be a surviving mathematics
and also a surviving morals. The distinction be-
tween the right and the wrong would no more be
obliterated by such an interception of our view
towards the upper sanctuary, than the distinction
between the east and the west would be cancelled

ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 89

by the destruction of the telescope, and the disap-
pearance of all its wondrous revelations from the
memory of our species. The earth that we tread
upon would still continue to be a platform for the
display and exercise of the moral proprieties — and
as it was in the age of Greece and Rome, the
period of a distorted theology, so would it be now
in the period of an utterly extinct theology — ^virtue
w^ould be felt in its rightness, and also be felt in the
obligation of it.

31. When Sir Isaac Newton was first made to
know of the Satellites of Jupiter, he had not an
essentially new mathematics to learn that he might
evolve the law of their movements. The only
novelty lay in the facts, and not in the principles
that he brought to bear upon them. The geome-
try which guided him along these celestial orbs
was the very same by which he traced the path of
a projectile on the surface of our own planet ; and
to obtain a just estimate of those mazy heavens
that now were opened to his view, he had only to
transfer the. mathematics which he before had to
another set of data. And it is the very same with
the revelations of a higher moral, as with those of
a higher physical economy. It is a revelation not
of new principles, but of new objects addressed to
our old principles. The very ethics that had been
long in frequent and familiar exercise about the
things within onr knowledge, are available for
such things as are now offered for the first time to
our contemplation — even though our eye had not
before seen, nor our ear heard, nor yet it had ever
entered into our hearts to conceive of them. Th3
8*

90 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

very ethics that dictate our gratitude to an earthly
benefactor, dictate also the transcending gratitude,
the subiimer devotion that we owe to the benefac-
tor who sitteth on high— just as the arithmetic
which assigns the units of an earthly, is the same
with that which assigns the millions of a distance
that is heavenly. It is thus that the revelations
of heaven meet with a law already written in the
hearts of men upon earth — and so in the whole
morality of that relationship which subsists be-
tween men and their Maker, do we meet with
analogies to the morality of men who live without
God in the world.

32. Thus there is a natural philosophy which,
when conversant with earthly objects alone, may
be denominated the Science of Terrestrial Physics.
And in like manner there is a moral philosophy
which, when conversant with earthly objects alone,
as with the various beings who occupy this globe,
may be denominated the Science of Terrestrial
Ethics.

33. But even within the cognizance of man's
natural eye, there are heavenly objects whose
paths and movements can be traced by him ; and
so be made the subject of mathematical descrip-
tion and mathematical reasoning. When he lifts
himself to the contemplation of them, he enters on
the confines of a science distinct from the former,
thouah comprehended with it under the ofeneral
title of Natural Philosoph}- — even what may be
called the science of the Celestial Physics. In as
far as he prosecutes this science without the a'd of
instruments fcr tlie eiilarfremont of bis vision, lie

ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 91

may be said to study the lessons of natural astro-
nomy. There was such an astronomy prior to
the invention of the telescope ; and even still, the
limits could be assigned between those truths or
doctrines of the whole science of astronomy which
lie within the ken of the natural eye, and those
that He without the ken of the natural eye, but
wdthin the ken of the telescope.

34. And so truly of moral philosophy. Within
the natural eyesight of the mind, there may be
clearly perceived — not alone those objects of the
science which are placed immediately around us
upon earth ; but there may also be perceived,
though dimly and hazily we allow, one heavenly
object of the science. The light of nature reaches
more or less a certain w^ay into the region of celes-
tial ethics; and so there is a natural theology
which, however dull or imperfect the medium
through which it is viewed, presents us with some-
thing different from a total obscuration. There is
a book of observation open to all men, in whose
characters, indistinct though they be, we may read
if not the signals at least the symptoms of a Di-
vinity— and which, if not enough for the purpose of
our seeing, are at least enough to make us respon-
sible for the direction in which v/e are looking.
The doctrines of this natural theology may not
bear the decided impress of verities upon them —
so that as the conclusions of a full and settled
belief they may not be valuable. But they at
least stand forth in the aspect of verisimilitudes
— so that as calls to attention and further hi-
quiry they are highly valuable. There was such

92 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

a theology prior to the Christian revelation —
and even still there is a real, though not perhaps
very definable limit betv.een those truths of the
whole science of theology which lie within the ken
of nature, and those which lie without the ken of
nature, but within the ken of revelation.

35. And lastly, the telescope hath immeasura-
bly extended the dominion of astronomical science.
Objects, though before within the limits of vision
yet descried but faintly, have had vivid illumination
shed upon them ; and an innnensity teeming with
secrets before undiscoverable hath been evolved on
the contemplation of men. A world hath been
expanded into a universe ; and natural astronomy
shrinks into a very little thing, when compared
with that mighty system which the great instru-
ment of modern revelation hath unfolded. ^Miat
an injustice to this noble science, on the part of
one of its expounders — did he limit himself to the
information of the eye ; and forbear every allusion
to the powers or informations of the telescope.
What a creeping and inadequate representation
could he bring forth of it, if with no other materials
than the phenomena of vision, he was barred
either by ignorance of the telescope, or by a wilful
contempt for its performances, from the glories of
the higher astronomy.

36. This consummates the analogy. By what
may be termed an instrument of discovery too, a
spiritual telescope, the science of Theology has
been extended beyond its natural dimensions. By
the word of God, the things of Heaven have been
brought nigh to us ; and the mysteries of an

ON THE BEING OE A GOD. 93

ulterior region, impalpable to the eye of man, be-
cause utterly beyond its reach, have been opened
to his view. It is that boundary where the light
of nature ends and the light of revelation begins,
which marks the separation between the respective*
provinces of Moral Philosophy and the Christian
Theology. In demonstrating the credentials of
Scripture we authenticate as it were the informations
of the telescope. In expounding the contents of
Scripture we lay before you the substance of these
informations. We affirm the vast enlargement
which has thence accrued to Theology; from both
the richness and the number of those places in the
science to which man has been thereby introduced,
and that otherwise would have been wholly inaces-
sible. There are men who can glory in the dis-
coveries of modern science, and feel contemptuously
of the gospel of Jesus Christ. Yet so meagre
truly is their academic theism, notwithstanding the
pomp of its demonstrations — that to suppress the
doctrines of the Gospel were to inflict the same
mutilation on the high theme of the celestial ethics,
as astronomy would undergo by suppressing the
informations of the telescope.

37. We should not have expatiated at such
length on this distinction between the Ethics and
the Objects of Theology — had we not felt urged
by the paramount importance of a principle which
should be made as plain as may be to every under-
standing. And it is this — that from the very em-
bryo of thought or feeling on the subject of religion,
and in the rudest possible state of humanity, there
is what may be caiJed a moving moral force on the

94 ON THE BElIsG OP A GOD.

spirit of man which, if he obey, m ill conduct him
onward through successive manifestations, to what
in his circumstances is a right state of belief in
religion — and which if he resist, will supply the
subject matter of his righteous condemnatiouc It
should be made obvious that, in no circumstances
whatever, he is beyond the pale of Heaven's juris-
prudence ; and that whether or not he have light
for the full assurance of his understanding, he has
light enough to try his disposition towards God — .
both to prompt his desire towards Him, and give
direction to his inquiries after him. Even on the
lowly platform of the Terrestrial Ethics this prin-
ciple comes into operation ; and in virtue of it,
every mind which feels as it ought, and aspires as
it ought, will be at least set in motion and come to
all the light which is within its reach. " He that
doeth truth," says the Saviour, "cometh to the
light." He that is rightly affected by the Ethics
of the question, cometh to the Objects : and thus
an entrance is made on the field of the Celestial
Ethics, and possession taken by the mind of at
least one section of it — Natural Theology. But
after this is traversed ; and the ulterior or revealed
Theology has come into prospect, we hold that
the same impulse which carried him onwards to
the first will carry him on^\■urds to the second.
We shall therefore resume the consideration of this
principle after that we have ended our exposition
of the natural or the academic theism. And next
in importance to the question " What are those
conclusive proofs on the side of Religion which
make it our duty to believe ?" is the question

ON THE BEING OF A GOD. 95

" What are those hiitial presumptions which make
it our duty to inquire ?"

38. It is impossible to say how much or how
little of evidence for a God may he in these first
surmisings, these vague and shadowy imaginations
of the mind respecting Him. They serve a great
moral purpose notwithstanding — whether when en-
tertained and followed out by man they act as an
impellent to further inquiry, or when resisted they
fasten upon him the condemnation of impiety. An
argument for the existence of a Divinity has been
grounded on the fact of such being the universal
impression. We may not be able precisely to
estimate the argument; but this affects not the
import^r.-^e of the fact itself, as being a thing of
mighty subservience to the objects of a Divine ad-
ministration— ^bringing a moral force on the spirits
of all men, and so bringing all within the scope of
a judicial reckoning. This applies indeed to the
whole system of Natural Theology. It may be of
invaluable service, even though it fall short of con-
vincing us. We may never thoroughly entertain
the precise weight or amount of its proofs. But
this does not hinder their actually being of a certain
and substantive amount, whereupon follows a corre-
sponding amount or aggravation of moral unfairness
in our resistance of them — known to God though
unknown to ourselves. Enough if it be such as
to challenge our serious attention, though it may
not challenge our full and definite belief — and
whether Natural Theology has to offer such a proof
on the side of religion as enables us absolutely to
decide the question, yet high is the function which

U'O ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

it discharges if it offer such a precognition as lays
upon us the duty of farther entertaining it. *

39. For, after having traversed the field of Na-
tural Theology and come to the ulterior margin of
it, it will be found that though ignorant of all
which is before us in Christianity, there will still be
the same moving force carrying us forward to its
investigations, as that which now makes it morally
imperative upon us to prosecute the inquiry after
God. If it be morally incumbent on us now to
follow out the faintest incipient notices of a Deity,
it will be equally incumbent on us then to follow out
the same notices of a profest, if at all a likely mes-
senger from the sanctuary of His special dwelling-
place. Now this is precisely what we shall come
within sight of, after having finished the lessons of
natural theism. There will then be offered to our
observation a certain historical personage — bearing
at least such a creditable aspect and such verisimili-
tude of a divine commission, that we cannot without
violence to the ethical principles of the subject bid
it away from our mind by an act of summary rejec-
tion. In the revealed, as well as in the natural re-
ligion, there is 2i prima facie evidence which, if not
amounting to a claim on our belief, at least amounts
to a claim on our attention. There may not in-
stanter be put into our hands the materials of a
valid proof, so as to challenge all at once from
us a favourable verdict. But there will at least
be put into our hands the materials of a valid
precognition so as to challenge from us a fair trial.
It may not announce itself; and what question
whether in science or in history ever does so ?

ON THE liElNG OF A GOD. 97

—it may not announce itself as worthy of our im-
mediate conviction ; but it will announce itself as
worthy of an immediate hearing. If there be not
so much at the very first, of the certainty of truth
as shall compel us to receive ; there will at least be
as much of the semblance of truth as should compel
us to Usten and to look after. And whether one
looks to that expression of moral honesty which sits
on the character and sayings of Jesus Christ, or cast
a regard, however rapid and general, on the testi-
mony and the sufferings and the apparent worth of
those who followed in His train; and arter this
forbears a closer inquiry — ^he incurs the same de-
linquency of spirit which we have already charged
upon him who can step abroad with open eye among
the glories of the creation, yet remain unmoved by
any desire of gratitude or even of curiosity to the
question of a Creator.

40. But there is one special advantage which we
should not omit noticing in our study of the Natural
prior to our study of the Christian argument. It
may not prepare us for justly estimating the out-
ward credentitils of the embassy — but it will enable
us to recognise other credentials in the very sub-
stance and contents of the embassy. After, in
fact, that the theology of the schools has done its
uttermost, it but lands .us in certain desiderata
which, if not met and not satisfied, leave nothing
to humanity but the utmost destitution and de-
spair. But if, on the other hand, these desiderata
are met by the counterpart doctrines of Chris-
tianity— if the unresolved problems of the one
theology do find then solution and their adjust-

VOL. I. B

08 ON THE BEING OF A GOD.

iiient in the revelations of the other theology, one
cannot imagine a more inviting presumption in
favour of Christianity — a presumption which may
at length brighten into an overwhelming proof;
and thus furnish conviction to a man who, though
a perfect stranger to all erudition and history,
may find enough of evidence struck out between
his bible and his conscience to light him on his
path. This is an internal evidence — the rudi-
mental lessons of which we are in fact learning
w^hile we study the lessons of natural theology — a
system which, with all its defects, performs a very
high prehminary function, — seeing, that, by its
dim and dawning probabilities, if not the obliga-
tion to believe, at least the obHgation to inquire,
is most rightfully laid upon us ; and, that out of its
very imperfections, an effective argument may be
drawn in favour of that higher theology, in w^hose
promises and truths every imperfection of nature
meets with its appropriate and all-sufficient remedy.
41. Whether, then, at the commencement of
the one inquiry or of the other, let us enter upon it
in the spirit so admirably delineated by Seneca in
the following sentence : — " Si introimus templa
compositi, si ad saerificia accessuri vultum submit-
timus", si in omne argumentum modesties fingi-
mur ; quanto hoc magis facere debemus, cum de
sideribus, de stelUs, de natura deorum disputamus,
nequid temere, nequid impudenter, aut ignorantes
affirmemus, aut scientes mentiamur.'*

DR. CLAUKe's a priori ARGUMENT. 99

CHAPTER III.

Of the Metaphysics which have been resorted to on the side

of Theism.

DR. Clarke's a priori argument on the being op a god.

1. All have h#ard of the famous a priori argu-
ment of Dr. Clarke — an argument which Dr. Reid
does homage to as the speculation of superior
minds ; but whether it be as solid as it is sublime,
he professes himsel#wholly unable to determine.*

2. On this subject Dr. Thomas Brown is greatly-
more confident. " I conceive," he tells us, " the
abstract arguments which have been adduced to
show that it is impossible for matter to have existed
from eternity — ^by reasoning on what has been
termed necessary existence, and the incompatibility
of this necessary existence with the qualities of
matter — to be relics of the mere verbal logic of the
schools, as little capable- of producing conviction
as any of the wildest and most absurd of the tech-
nical scholastic reasonings, on the properties, or
supposed properties, of entity and non-entity."

3. But let us not dismiss an argument, which so
deeply infused what may be called the Theistical
Literature of England for the first half of the last
century, without some examination.

* " These," says Dr. Reid, "are the speculations of men of
superior genius — but whether they be solid as they are sublime, or
whether they be the wanderings of imagination into a region be-
yond the limits of. the human understanding, I am unable to de-
termine."

100 DR. Clarke's a priori argument.

4. What then we hold to be the first question-
able assumption in the reasonings of Dr. Clarke,
is that by which he appears to confound a physical
with either a logical or mathematical necessity.
We feel no difficulty in conceding to him the ne-
cessary existence of that which has existed from
eternity — and that the necessity for its existence
resides in itself and not in any thing apart from
itself. That which has been created by some-
thing else both came into being, and continues we
may also admit to be, in virtue of a power that
is without it ; and it is to this power exoteric to
itself that we have to look for#he ground both of
its first and its abiding existence. But the thing
which has existed for ever must also have some
ground on which it continues to be, rather than that
it should not be, or go to annihilation; and this
ground on which at present it continues to be,
must be the same with the ground on which "it
continued to be at any past moment. But if it
never had a beginning this ground or principle of
existence must have been from everlasting — the
present ground in fact, on which it continues to
exist, having abidden with it through the \v4iole of
its past eternity as the ground on which it exists at
all. But as we are not to look for this ground in
the 'fiat of another — it must be looked for in the
necessity of its own nature — it contains within itself
the necessity for its own existence.

5. Now what is the inference which Dr. Clarke
has drawn from this necessity ? The word is ap-
plied to speculative truths as well as to substantive
thin^ The truth of a proposition is often neces-

DR. Clarke's a priori argument. 101

sarily involved in the terms of it, or in the defini-
tion of these terms— just as the properties of a
circle lie surely enveloped in the description of a
circle. Nay a proposition may be so constructed
that the opposite thereof shall involve at first sight
a logical absurdity — so that this opposite cannot
possibly be apprehended, or even imagined Dy the
mind. Its truth is necessarily bound up in tiie
very terms of it. It may be said to contain its
own evidence within itself, or rather to contain
within itself the necessity of its being admitted
among the existent truths of Philosophy. The
mind cannot, though it would, put it forth of its
own belief ; or, in other words, put it forth of the
place which it occupies within the limits of neces-
sary and universal truth. Now this test of a logical
or mathematical necessity in the existent truths of
speculation, he would make also the test of a phy-
sical necessity in the existent things of substantive
and actual Nature. He confounds we think a
logical with an actual impossibility. Insomuch
that if the conception of the non-existence of any
actual thing involve in it no logical impossibility,
then that thing is not necessarily existent. He
applies the same test to the things of which it is
alleged that they necessarily exist, as to the pro-
positions of v.'hich it is alleged that they are
necessarily true. He holds that if things do
necessarily exist, we cannot conceive this thing not
to be — just as when propositions have in them an
axiomatic certainty, we cannot conceive these things
not to be true. And so on the other hand if we
can conceive any existent thing not to be, then that

102 DR. Clarke's a priori argument.

thing exists but does not exist necessarily. It has
not the ground of its existence in itself — even as a
necessary truth has its evidence or the ground of
its trueness in itself. And therefore the ground
of its existence must be in another beside itself.
It must have had a beginning — It must not have
existed from eternity.

^. It will be at once seen how when furnished
with such an instrument of demonstration as this —
he could on the strength of a mere logical category,
go forth on the whole of this peopled universe and
pronounce of all its matter and of all mind but the
one and universal mind that they have been cre-
ated. We can conceive them not to exist — and
this without any of that violence which is felt by
the mind, when one is asked to receive as true that
w^hich carries some logical or mathematical contra-
diction on the face of it. " The only true idea,"
he says, " of a self-existent or necessarily existing
Being, is the idea of a Being the supposition of
whose not existing is an express contradiction."
" But the material world," he afterwards says,
" cannot possibly be such a being" — for " unless the
material world exists necessarily, by an absolute
necessity in its own nature, so as that it must be
an express contradiction to suppose it not to exist ;
it cannot be independent and of itself eternal."*
This argument is reiterated in the following terms —
" 'Tis manifest the material world cannot exist
necessarily, if without a contradiction we can con-

• This and the other extracts from Clarke dven within inverted
commas are quotations from his Demonstration of the Being- and
Jjjjb Attributes of God.

DR. CLAUKE^S A PRIORI ARGUMENT. 103

ceive it either not to be or to be in any respect other-
wise than it now is." He proceeds all along on
the assumption that there is no necessity in the
substantive existence of things, unless the denial
of that existence involves a logical contradiction in
terms. Nay, if without such contradiction we
can imagine any variation in the modes or forms of
matter from those which obtain actually, this is
enough with him to expel from matter the pro-
perty of self-existence. Ere we can award to
matter this property, " it must," he says, " be a
contradiction in terms to suppose more or fewer
stars, more or fewer planets, or to suppose their
size, figure, or motion, different from what it now
is, or to suppose more or fewer plants and animals
upon the earth, or the present ones of different
shape and bigness from what they now are." At
this rate, it will be observed, if we can imagine
only five planets and without any such contradic-
tion as that three and four make five — this of itself
is proof that the actual state of the planetary system,
or the a.ctual state of matter whereof this system,
is a part, is not a necessary state, and so matter
is not necessarily self-existent. In lilce manner
the motion* of matter is held not to be necessary
because it is no contradiction in terms to suppose
any matter to be at rest. Thus throughout, our
powers or possibilities of conception vvithin, are
with him the measures or grounds of inference as
to the reahties of Being without. He denies the
necessary existence of matter, merely because we
can conceive it not to exist ; and the necessity of
motion, because we can conceive of other direc-

104 DR. Clarke's a priori argument.

tions to it than those which obtain actually; and
a necessity for the actual order or number or
figure of material things, because without logical
absurdity we can conceive of them variously. The
necessary trueness of eternal truths may be dis-
covered thus, that in the terms of that proposition
which affirmed their non-trueness there would be
contradiction. And so he would have it that the
necessary existence of eternal things may be dis-
covered thus, that in the terms of that proposition
which affirmed their non-existence there would be
the like contradiction. And therefore when the
opposite of any existent thing can be imagined
without such contradiction, it exists not necessarily

^nor is it of itself eternal. The logical is made

to be identical with, or made to be the test and the
measure of, the actual or the physical necessity*
The one is confounded with the other ; and this we
hold to be the first fallacy of the a priori argument.
7. On the strength of this fallacy, the puny
mind of man hath usurped for itself an intellectual
empire over the high things of immensity and eter-
nity— subjugating the laws of nature throughout
all her wide amplitudes to the laws of human
thought — and finding, as it were, within the little
cell of its own cogitations the means of an achieve-
ment so marvellous, as that of pronouncing alike
on all the objects of infinite space, and on all the
events of infinite duration. Because I can imagine
Jupiter to be a sphere instead of a spheroid ; and
no logical absurdity stands in tlie way of such im-
agination-therefore Jupiter must have been created.
Because he has only four sateUites, whilst I can

DR. CLARKE S A PRIORI ARGUMENT. 105

figure hisa to have ten ; and there is not the same
arithmetical falsity in this supposition, as in that
three and one make up ten — therefore all the satel-
lites must have had a beginning. Because I can
picture of matter that it might have been variously
disposed, that its motions and its magnitudes and its
forms may have been different from what they are,
and that space might have been more or less filled
by it — because there is not in short a universal
plenum all whose parts are immoveably at rest —
in this Dr. Clarke beholds a sufficient ground for
the historical fact that a time was when matter was
not, or at least that to the power of another beside
itself, it owes its place and its substantive Being
in our universe. We must acknowledge ourselves
to be not impressed by such reasoning. For aught
I know or can be made by the light of nature to
believe — matter may, in spite of those its disposi-
tions which he calls arbitrary, have the necessity
within itself of its own existence — ^and yet that be
neither a logical nor a mathematical necessity. It
may be a physical necessity — the ground of which
I understand not, because placed transcendentally
above my perceptions and my powers — or lying
immeasureably beyond the range of my contracted
and ephemeral observation.

8. But we have only touched on what may be
called the negative part of the a priori argument — .
that by which matter is divested of self-existence.
Thence, on the stepping-stone of actual matter,
existent though not self-existent, might we pass
by inference to a superior and antecedent Being
from whom it hath sprung. But this were de-
E 2

106 DR. Clarke's a priori argument.

scending to the a posten'on argument — whereas
the high pretension is, that in the light of that same
principle which enables the mind to discard from
all matter the property of self-existence, may it
without the intervention of any derived or created
thin"- lay immediate hold on the truth of a self-
existent God. This forms what we might call the
positive part of the a priori argument. . The truth
is, if matter be not^ self-existent, because the sup-
position of its non-existence involves in it no felt
and resistlessly felt contradiction; then the sup-
position of the non-existence of that which really
is a self-existent Behig must involve in it such a
contradiction. " This necessity must," to use the
language of Dr. Clarke, " force itself upon us '
whether we will or no, even when we are endea-
vouring to suppose that no such Being exists."
This is the same principle on which we have
' animadverted already; but there appears, we think,
to be a second and a distinct fallacy involved in
the application of it. \\Tiat is that in the whole
compass of thought, whose existence must force
itself upon the mind — and whose non-existence
involves that contradiction which the mind with all
its efforts cannot possibly admit into its belief.
The answer is space and time. We can imagine
matter to be swept away and the space which it
occupies to be left behind. But we cannot imagine
this space to be swept away. We cannot suppose
either immensity or eternity to be removed out of
the universe, any more than we can remove the
relation of equahty between twice two and four.
<^ To suppose," he adds, " immensity removed out

DR, Clarke's a priori ahgument. 107

of the universe or not necessarily eternal is an
express contradiction." " To suppose any part
of space removed, is to suppose it removed from
and out of itself; and to suppose the whole to be
taken away, is Apposing it to be taken away from
itself — that is to be taken away while it still
remains which is a contradiction in terms." The
language of Sir Isaac Newton to the same effect
is — " Moveantur partes Spatii de locis suis, et
movebuntur (ut ita dicam) de seipsis." Here
then is a something, if you choose thus to designate
either of the elements of space or time — ^here is a
something which fulfils what is affirmed to be the
essential condition of necessary existence. Its
non-existence involves a contradiction which the
mind cannot possibly receive ; and its existence is
forced upon the mind by a necessity as strong as
either any logical or any mathematical.

9. Now it is at the transition which the argu-
ment makes from the necessary existence of space
and time to the necessary existence of God that
we apprehend the secdnd fallacy to lie. Eternity
and immensity, it is allowed, are not substances —
they are only attributes, and, incapable as they are
of existing by themselves, they necessarily suppose
a substantive Being in which they are inherent.
'' For modes and attributes," says Dr. Clarke,
^' exist only by the existence of the substance to
which they belong." The denial then of such a
Being is held to be tantamount to the denial both
of infinite space and of everlasting successive dura-
tion— and so such denial involves contradiction
hi it. It is with him a contradiction in terms to

108 DR. Clarke's a priori argument.

assert no immensity and no eternity; and to sii|>-
pose that there is no Being in the universe to
which these attributes or modes of existence are
necessarily inherent is also a contradiction in terms.
Now, it is here we think that the^f^i-sequitur lies.
We do not perceive how boundless space and
boundless duration imply either a material or an
immaterial substratum in which these may reside
as but the modes or qualities. We can conceive
unlimited space, empty and empty for ever, of all
substances whether material or immaterial — and we
see neither logical nor mathematical impossibility
in the way of such a conception. We do not feel
with Dr. Clarke that the notion of immense space
as if it were absolutely nothing is an express con-
tradiction. Nor do we feel aught to convince in
the scholastic plausibility of such sentences as the
following : " For nothing is that which has no pro-
perties or modes whatever. That is to say, it is that
of which nothing can truly be affirmed, and of which
every thing, can truly be denied, which is not the
case of immensity or space.*' In spite of this we
can imagine no eternal and infinite Being in the
universe — Ave can imagine an infinite nothing;
nor do feel that in so doing, we imagine eter-
nity and immensity removed out of the universe
while they at the same time still continue there.
There is nothing it appears to us in this scho-
lastic jingle about modes and substances that leads
by any firm or solid pathway to the stupendous
conclusion of a God. Both Space and Time can
be conceived without a substance of which rhey
are but the attributes — nor is it at all clear that

DR. Clarke's a priori argument. 109

these modes imply a substantive Being to which
they belong.* — Now the main stay of the a priori
argument is that Eternity and Immensity are
modes — and as we cannot rid ourselves of the con-
ception of a stable existence in the modes, so
neither therefore can we rid ourselves'of the con-
ception of an existent substance to which these
modes belong. We repeat that we have no faith
in the product of such excogitation as this — and
should as little think of building upon it a system
of Theism, as we should of subordinating the
realities of History or Nature to the mere tech-
nology of Schoolmen.

10. However interesting, then, the modesty of
Dr. Reid on the subject of the a priori argument,
yet we cannot but regard the deUverance of the
younger Metaphysician Thomas Brown as greatly
the sounder of the two — although in it, perhaps,
there is a certain air of confident temerity, espe-
cially as he only pronounces on the defects of the
argument without expounding them. And if any
futile or inconclusive argument have been devised
for the support of religion, it is a real service to
discard it from the controversy altogether. It is
detaching an element of weakness from the cause.-
A doctrine stands all the more firm when placed
on a compact and homogeneous basis — instead of
resting on a pedestal which like the feet of Nebu-

♦ Sir Isaac Newton seems to have penned the following sen-
tences of a Scholium Generale under some such conception as
thi:<: — " Deus non eternitas et infinitas, sed eternus et infinitus;
Hon duratio vel spatium, sed durat-et adest, et existendo semper
et izbique durationem et spatium, eteruitatero et infiaitatem
<consiituit.

110 DR. Clarke's a priori argument.

chadnezzar's image is partly of clay and partly
of iron. Let us be assured that a weak or a
wrong reason is not only not an accession but is
a positive mischief to the interests of truth — a mis-
chief indeed which Dr. Brown has well adverted
to in the foMo\ving sentences : — " Still more super-
fluous must be all those reasonings with respect
to the existence of the Deity, from the nature of
certain conceptions of our mind, independent of
the phenomena of design, which are commonly
termed reasonings a priori, reasonings, that if
strictly analyzed, are found to proceed on some
assumption of the very truth for which they con-
tend, and that, instead of throwing additional Ught
on the argument for a Creator of the universe,
have served only to throw on it a sort of darkness,
by leading us to conceive that there must be some
obscurity in truths, which could give an occasion
to reasonings so obscure. God and the world
which he has formed — these are our great objects.
Every thing which we strive to place between these
is nothing. We see the universe, and, seeing it, we
beheve in its Maker. It is the universe, there-
fore, which is our argument, and our only argu-
ment ; and as it is powerful to convince us, God
is, or is not, an object of our belief." And again
— " The arguments commonly termed metaphy^
sical, on this subject, I have always regarded, as
absolutely void of force, unless in so far as they
proceed on a tacit assumption of the physical
argument, and, indeed, it seems to me no small
corroborative proof of -the force of this physical
argument, that its remaining imDres^on on our

DR. Clarke's a priori argument. 1 11

mind has been sufficient to save us from any doubt,
as to that existence, which the obscure and labori*
ous reasonings, a priori, in support of it, would
have led us to douht, rather than to believe J'*

II. We shall not go over the whole unsatisfac-
tory, metaphysics of that period — and whereof Dr.
Clarke is far the ablest advocate and expounder.*
For the sake of our intellectual discipline, it is
well, however, to familiarize ourselves with his
celebrated demonstration, which though in effect
vitiated by the one or two assumptions that we
have specified, is nevertheless an admirable speci-
men of close and consecutive reasoning. It is not
to be marvelled at, that possessed of such dialectic
powers, he should have tinged with his own spirit
almost all the authorship of natural theology at
that period — till at length, in the impotent hands
of his followers and imitators, it wrought itself out
of all credit when unaccompanied by those redeem-
ing qualities which buoyed, up the performance of
this great master, and has perpetuated its charac-
ter as a standard and classical work, even to the
present day. The whole of the Boyle lecture-
ship, for example, was for many years deeply in-
fused by it. Bentley, so able in other depart-
ments, presents us in his sermons on the subject,
with what we should call, a perfect caricature of
this a priori extravagance. It even deforms, at
times, the pages of Foster, who is the most
eloquent, and perhaps the best writer of that age
on natural religion. As 'to Abernethy, we hold
his book, in spite of the high character which was
• Brown's Lectures, XCII. and XCIII.

112 DR. Clarke's a priori argument.

affixed to it some half century ago, as so utterly
meagre and insipid, that one cannot without the
slackening of all his mental energies, accomphsh
the continuous perusal of it — and therefore it really
matters not what quarter he gives, in his pages of
cold and feeble rationality, to the a priori argu-
tnent. It is of more consequence to be told that
it is an argument patronised by Wollaston, who,
in his " Religion of Nature Delineated," imitates
Clarke in making our ignorance of the Quomodo
the foundation of a positive argument. " If mat-
ter," he says, " be self-existent, I do not see how
it comes to be restrained to a place of certain
capacity — ^how it comes to be Umited in other
respects — or why it should not exist in a manner
that is in all respects perfect." And just because
he sees not how — therefore matter must derive its
existence from some other being who causes it to be
just what it is. Because we do not see the reason
why matter should have been placed here and not
there in immensity — ^because we cannot tell the
specific cause of its various forms, and modifica-
tions, and movements — because of our inability to
explore the hidden recesses of the past — and so to
find out the necessary ground, if ought there is,
for the being and the properties of every planet
and of every particle — are we therefore to infer,
that there is no such ground, and for no better
reason than that just by us it is undiscoverable ?
The reasoning of Wollaston comes to this — Be-
cause we do not see how matter came to be
restrained to a particular place — therefore, it must
not have been so restrain 3d by an eternal necessity.

DR. CLARKE*S A PRIORI ARGUMENT. 113

Our own inference would have been diametrically
the opposite of this. Because we see not how,
we should say not how. It is a strange argument
to found, as Clarke and Wollaston have done, on
the impotence and incapacity of the human mind,
that its very ignorance should authorize it to sport
such positive and peremptory dogmata as have
been advanced by them on the high mysteries of
primeval being and primeval causation.

12. Dr. Clarke's style of reasoning upon this
subject, has now fallen into utter disesteem and
desuetude. He himself disclaims the old scholastic
methods of argumentation, while there is much of
his own that now ranks with the impracticable
subtleties of the middle ages. He deals in the
categories of a higher region than that which is at
all familiar to human experience — and we fear that
when he attempts to demonstrate the non-eternity
of matter, and that to spirit alone belong the attri-
butes of primeval necessity and self-existence, he
leaves behind him that world of sense and obser-
vation within which alone the human mind is yet
able to expatiate. After the modest declaration of
Dr. Reid, it may be presumptuous in us to pass
upon this argument a summary and confident rejec-
tion. But we may at least confess the total want
of any impression which it has made upon our
understanding — and that with all our partialities
for the argumentum a posteriori, we hold it with
Paley greatly more judicious, instead of groping
for the evidence of a Divinity among the transcen-
aental generalities of time, and space, and matter,
and spirit, and the grounds of a necessary and

114 DR. Clarke's a priori argua^ent.

eternal existence for the one, while nought but
modifications and contingency can be observed of
the other — we hold it more judicious simply to
open our eyes on the actual and peopled world
around us — or to explore the wondrous economy
of our own spirits, and try if we can read, as in a
book of palpable and illuminated characters, the
traces or the forth-goings of' a creative mind ante-
rior to, or at least distinct from matter, and which
both arranged it in its present order and continues
to overrule its processes.

13, Nevertheless, let us again recommend the
perusal of Clarke's Demonstration. One feels
himself as if placed by it on the border of certain
transcendental conceptions, the species of an ideal
world, w^hich men of another conformation may
fancy, and perhaps even see to be realities. And
certain it is, that the very existence of such high
thoughts in the mind of man may be regarded as
the presentiment or promise of a high destination.
So that however unable to follow out the reason-
ings of Clarke or Newton, when they convert our
ideas of infinity and eternity into the elements of
such a demonstration as they have bequeathed to
the world — nothing, we apprehend, can be more
just or beautiful than the following sentences of
Dugald Stewart, when he views these ideas as the
earnests of our coming immortality : — ^" Important •
use may also be made of these conceptions of im-
mensity and eternity, in stating the argument for
the future existence of the soul. For why was the
mind of man rendered capable of extending his
views in point of time, beyond the limit of human

DR. Clarke's a priori argument. 115

transactions ; and, in point of space, beyond the
limits of the visible universe — if all our prospects
are to terminate here ; or why was the glimpse of
so magnificent a scene disclosed to a being, the
period of whose animal existence bears so small a
proportion to the vastness of his desires ? Surely
this conception of the necessary existence of space
and time, of immensity and eternity, was not forced
continually upon the thoughts of man for no purpose
whatever ? And to what purpose can we suppose
it to be subservient, but to remind those who make
a proper use of their reason of the trifling value of
some of those objects we at present pursue, when
compared with the scenes on which we may after-
wards enter ; and to animate us in the pursuit of
wisdom and virtue, by affording us the prospect of
an indefinite progression ?"*

14. Before leaving this subject, we would re-
mark on what may be called a certain subordinate
application of the a priori argument — ^not for the
demonstration of tlie being, but for the demonstra-
tion of the attributes of God. Dr. Clarke himself
admits the impossibility of proving the divine intel-
ligence in this way — though, with this exception,
he attempts an a priori proof for the other natural
attributes of the Godhead — and the argument
certainly becomes more lucid and convincing as he
carries it forward from these to the other attri-
butes. The goodness, the truth, the justice of the
Divinity, for example, may not only be inferred by
an ascending process of discovery from the works

• Stewart's Philosophy of the Moral and Active Powers. Vol,
I. p. 336.

116 DR. Clarke's A priori argument.

and the ways of God — ^but they are also inferred
by a process of derivation from the power, and the
unity, and the wisdom. From the ampUtude of
His natural, they infer the equal amplitude of His
moral characteristics, — judging Him superior to
falsehood, because He is exempted from the temp-
tations to weakness ; and to malignity because
exempted from the temptations to rivalship ; and to
caprice because in the perfection of his wisdom
there is the full guarantee for his doing always
what is best. We give these merely as specimens
of a style of reasoning which we shall not stop to
appreciate — and instead of attempting any further
to excogitate a Deity in this way; let us now
search if there be any reflection of Him from the
mirror of that universe which he has formed. It
may be a lovrlier — but we deem it a safer enter-
prise— instead of groping our way among the in-
comprehensibles of the a priori region, to keep by
the certainties which are spread out before us on
the region of sense and observation— to look at the
actual economy of things, and thence gather as we
may, such traces of a handiwork as might announce
a designer's hand — to travel up and domi on that
living- scene which can be traversed by human
footsteps, and gazed at with human eyes — and
search for the impress, if any there be, of the in-
telligent power that either called it into being, or
that arranged the materials which com.pose it.

15. But our examination of the a priori rea-
soning will not be thrown away — ^if it guide our
attempts to separate the weak from the stron«
parts of the Theistical argument. More especiaDy

DR. Clarke's A PRIORI ARGUMENT. 117

it should help us to discriminate between the in-
ference that is grounded on the true existence of
matter, the inference that is grounded on the orderly-
arrangements of matter. The argument for the
being of a God drawn from the former considera-
tion, tinged as it is throughout with the a priori
spirit we hold to be altogether mystical and
meaningless — insomuch that for the doctrine of an
original creation of matter we hold it essential that
the light of revelation should be superadded to the
dull and glimmering light, or rather perhaps to the
impenetrable darkness of nature. We agree with
Dr. Brown in thinking " that matter as an un-
formed mass, existing without relation of parts,
would not of itself have suggested the notion of a
Creator — since in every hypothesis something ma-
terial or mental must have existed uncaused, and
since existence, therefore, is not necessarily a mark
of previous causation, unless we take for granted
an infinite series of causes." In the mere existence
of an unshapen or unorganized mass, we see nothing
that indicates its non-eternity or its derivation from
an antecedent mind — while on the other hand, even
though nature should incline us to the thought that
the matter of this earth and these heavens was from
everlasting, there might be enough in the goodly-
distribution of its paglB to warrant the conclusion
that Mind has been at work with this primeval
matter, and at least fetched from it materials for
the structure of many a wise and beneficent me-
chanism. It is well that Revelation has resolved
for us the else impracticable mystery, and given us
distinctly to understand, that to the fiat of '^ great

lis DR. Clarke's a priori argu.men

Eternal spirit, matter stands indebted as well for
its existence and its laws, as for its numerous collo-
cations of use and of convenience. We hold that
without a Revealed Theology we should not have
known of the creation of matter out of nothing,
but that by dint of a Natural Theology alone we
might have inferred a God from the useful disposi-
tion of its parts. It is good to know what be the
strong positions of an argument and to keep by
them — taking up our intrenchments there — and
wiUing to relinquish all that is untenable. It is
not the way to advance but really to discredit the
cause of Natural Theology, when set forward by
its injudicious defenders to an enterprise above its
strength. Nothing satisfactory can be made of
those obscure and scholastic generalities by which
matter is argued to be incongruous with Eternity ;
and that therefore, itseK originated from nothing,
it must have a creative mind for the antecedent
not of its harmonies and adaptations alone but of
its substantive Being. We should like a firmer
stepping-stone than this by which to arrive at the
conclusion of a God. For this purpose we would
dissever the argument founded on the phenomenon
of the mere existence of matter, from the argument
founded on the phenomenon of the relations be-
tween its parts. The one i^ptipresses the under-
standing just as differently fi'om the other, as a
stone of random form lying upon the ground im-
presses the observer differently from a watch.
The mere existence of matter, in itself, indicates
nothing. They are its forms and its combinations
and its organic structures which alone speak to us

DR. Clarke's a priori argumi^t. 119

of a Divinity— just as it is not the clay but the
shape into which it has been moulded that an-
nounces the impress of a Designer's hand. The
metaphysical argument Avhich we should like to
discard from this controversy wants altogether to
our mind the character of obviousness. We can
afford to give it up. It is truly a dead weight
u^^it the cause. It is like seeking for the indi-
cations of an artist's hand in the rude and raw
material upon which he operates — when we might
behold them at once in the finished work of those
exquisite fabrications which hold forth irresistibly
the marks of contrivance and so of a (!ontriver.*

16. In combating an argument for a doctrine,
we are not therefore combating the doctrine itself.
Dr. Clarke has failed, we think in his attempt to
demonstrate the non-eternity of matter — ^but it fol-
lows not that because we have attempted to expose
this failure, we advocate the eternity of matter.
It is well that our behef in the truths of religion
does not stand or fall with the success or the failure
of any human expounder. We happen to think
th^^. on the abstract question of the creation of
matter out of nothing, there is a want of clear and
decisive manifestation by the light of nature ; and
that for the establishment of what we hold to be
the right and orthodox position upon this question,

* Let us here present the following short and judicious extract
from Dr. Fiddes' work entitled " Theologia Speculativa or a
Body of Divinity." " But to discover the weakness of any ar-
f<vira'-jnt in particular which may be brought to prove a funda-
mental article of religion is not, as some pious men have supposed,
to do religion disservice — but only shows it does not stand in Tieed
of any artifices and has nothing to fear from a fair ingeuiioifs at.J
free examination."

120 DI^CLARKE*S A PRIORI ARGUiVIENT,

there is an incompetency not in the a 'priori argu-
ment alone, but in every argument which the un-
aided reason of man can devise. We wonder not
for example, that Aristotle, unblest and unvisited
as he was by any communication from Heaven,
admitted both an eternal matter and an eternal
mind into his creed — ^for in truth the brightest and
most convincing evidences for the one might for
aught we know, consist with the alJoriginal and
everlasting occupancy of the other in our universe.
These evidences as we shall afterwards see, are
grounded not on the existence of matter, but on
the order and disposition of its parts — and point to
the conclusion, not that there must have been an
intelligent spirit that willed the matter into being,
but that there must have been an intelligent spirit
who willed it into all those beauteous and beneficial
arrangements which we every where behold. It
is revelation alone we apprehend which has com-
pletely fixed and ascertained the proposition, that
God not only fashioned our universe into its pre-
sent mechanism and form ; but that he also cre-
ated the materials from which it is composed. He
not only moulded the clay ; but he made it, and
made it out of nothing. Nature perhaps cannot
pronounce decisively on the making ; but of the
exquisite moulding, of the goodly dispositions and
structures that bespeak contrivance and a contriver,
it taketh ample cognizance — so that it cannot look
with inteUigence to any department of observation
or of science without a powerful impression that the
hand of a divinity has been there.

MR. HUME^S OBJECTION 121

CHAPTER IV.

Of the Metaphysics which have been resorted to on the tide
of Theism.

(me. hume's objection to the a posteriobi argument,
grounded on the assertion that the world is a
singular effect.)

I. The doctrine of innate ideas in the mind, is
wholly different from the doctrine of innate ten-
dencies in the mind — which tendencies may lie
undeveloped till the excitement of some occasion
have manifested or brought them forth. In a
newly formed mind, there is no idea of nature or
of a single object in nature — ^yet no sooner is an
object presented, or is an event observed to
happen, than there is elicited the tendency of the
mind to presume on the constancy of nature. At
least as far back as our observation extends, this
law of the mind is in full operation. Let an infant
for the first time in its life, strike on the table with
a spoon ; and, pleased with the noise, it will repeat
that stroke with every appearance of a confident
anticipation that the noise will be repeated also.
It counts on the invariableness wherewith the
same consequent will follow the same antecedent.
In the language of Dr. Thomas Brown, these two
terms make up a sequence — and there seems to
exist in the spirit of man, not an underived, but
an aboriginal faith, in the uniformity of nature's
sequences.

122 MR. Hume's objection

2. This instinctive expectation of a constancy
in the succession of events is not the fruit of ex-
perience ; but is anterior to it. The truth is that
experience, so far from strengthening this instinct
of the understanding as it has been called, seems
rather to modify and restrain it. The child who
elicited a noise which it likes from the collision of
its spoon with the table would, in the first instance,
expect the same result from a like collision with
any material surface spread out before it — as if
placed for example, on the smooth and level sand
of a sea-shore. Here the effect of experience
would be to correct its first strong and unbridled
anticipations — so that in time it would not look for
the wished for noise in the infliction of a stroke
upon sand or clay or the surface of a fluid, but
upon wood or stone or metal. The office of ex-
perience here is not to strengthen our faith in the
uniformity of nature's sequences, but to ascertain
what the sequences actually are. The effect of
the experience is not to give the faith, but to the
faith to add knowledge. At the outset of its
experience a child's confidence in the uniformity of
nature is unbounded — and it is in the progress of
its experience, that it meets with that which serves
to limit the confidence and to qualify it. It goes
forth upon external nature furnished beforehand
with the expectation of the invariableness which
obtains between nature's antecedents and her con-
sequents-^but it often falls into mistakes in esti-
mating what the proper antecedents and consequents
are. To ascertain this is the great use of experi-
ence. The great object of repetition in experiments

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUMENT. 123

is not to strengthen our confidence in the constancy
of nature's sequences — ^but to ascertain what be
the real and precise terms of each sequence. It
is for this purpose that experiments are so varied
— ^for in that assemblage of contemporaneous things
amid which a given result takes place, it is often
not known at the first which of the things is the
strict and proper antecedent — and it is to deter-
mine this, that sometimes certain of the old
circumstances are detached from the groupe and
certain new ones added, till the discrimination has
been precisely made between what is essential and
what is merely accessary in the process.

3, This predisposition to count on the unifor-
mity of nature is an original law of the mind, and
is not the fruit of our observation of that uniformity.
It has been well stated by Dr. Brown that there
is no more of logical dependence between the pro-
positions, that a stone has a thousand times fallen
to the earth and a stone will always fall to the
earth, than there is between the propositions that
a stone has once fallen to the earth and a stone
will always fall to the earth. " At whatever link
of the chain we begin," he says, "we must always
meet with the same difficulty, the conversion of
the past into the future. If it be absurd to
make this conversion at one stage of inquiry, it is
just as absurd to make it at any other stage ; and,
as far as our memory extends, there never was a
time at which we did not make the instant conver-
sion." The truth is, that experience teaches the
past only — ^not the future. It tells us what has
happened before the present moment — and to mfer

124 MR. Hume's objection

from this what will happen afterwards, requires
the aid of a distinct principle — ^the instinctive prin-
ciple of behef, in short, whose reaUty we are now
contending for.

4. The constancy of nature and man's faith in
that constancy do not stand related to each other
like the terms of a logical proposition, or in the
way of cause and consequence. There is a most
beneficent harmony between the material and the
mental law — ^but it is altogether a contingent har-
mony; and the adaptation of the one to the other
is perhaps the most precious evidence within the
compass of our own unborrowed hght, for a pre-
siding intelligence in the formation or arrangements
of the universe. The argument unfolded by Dr.
Paley with such marvellous felicity and power, is
founded chieily on the fitnesses that meet together
in man's coporeal economy, and on the adjustments
of its parts to external nature. It is true that our
mental economy offers nothing so complex or so
palpable on which to raise a similar argument ;
and yet can we instance a more wonderful adjust-
ment, or one more prolific of good to our species,
than that which obtains between the unexcepted
uniformity of nature's processes, and the prior
independent disposition which resides in the heart
of man to count upon that uniformity, and to pro-
ceed on the unfaltering faith of it ? Were it not
for this, man should fox ever remain a lost and
bewildered creature among the appearances around
him — and no experience of his could in the least
help to unravel the confusion. The regularity &l
nature up to the pres'ent moment would be of no

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUMENT. 125

avail, without his faith in the continuance of that
regularity — and it is only by the force of this in-
stinctive anticipation, that the memorials of the
past serve him as indices by which to guide his
way through the futurity that lies before him.
The striking accordancy is, that there should be
such an expectation deposited in every bosom; and
that from every department of the accessible crea-
tion there should be to this expectation the response
or the echo of one wide and unexcepted fulfilment.
It is hke a whisper to the heart of man of a
universal promise, which can only be executed by
a hand of universal agency — and as if the same
Being who infused the hope by an energy within,
did, by a diffusive energy abroad, cause the response
of an unfailing accompHshment to arise from all
the amplitudes of creation and providence. This
intuitive faith is not the acquisition of experience ;
but is given as if by the touch of inspiration for the
purpose of stamping on experience all its value —
not gathered by man from his observation of out-
ward nature; but forming an original part of his
own nature, and yet in such glorious harmony with
all that is around him throughout the innumerable
host of nature's sequences, that he never once
by trusting in her constancy is disappointed or
deceived. Such is the steadfastness of her manifold
processes that nature never misgives from her
constancy. Such is the strength of his mental
instinct that man never misgives from His . con-
fidence. Had it not been for the union of these
two -man had been incapable of wisdom. The

126 MR. Hume's objection

establishment of both bespeaks at once the wisdom
and the faithfulness of a God.

5. But this harmony between the intellectual
constitution of man and the general constitution of
nature, is not only of use in a theological argu-
ment— it might also be applied to strengthen the
foundations of our Philosophy. It forms a demon-
stration of the perfect safety wherewith we might
confide in our ultimate or original principles of
behef. We have experimental evidence of this in
our anticipation of nature's constancy being so
fully reahzed. This anticipation is not the fruit
of experience, but is verified by experience. It is
an instinct of the understanding ; and that it should
have been so met and responded to over the whole
domain of creation is like the testimony of a concur-
rent voice from all things inanimate to the Creator's
faithfulness. Seeing that one of the instinctive
tendencies of the mind has been so palpably accre-
dited from without — ^we may commit ourselves,
as if to an infallible guidance, in following its other
instinctive tendencies. There is a scepticism that
is suspicious, as if they were so many false lights,
of our original and universal principles whether in
judgment or taste or morals — and which looks upon
them at best as but the results of an arbitrary
organization. From the instance now before us
it is plain that the arbiter of our constitution, the
artificer of the mechanism of our spirits, has at
least most strikingly adapted it to the constitution
and the mechanism of external things — the hope or
behef of constancy in the one meeting in the other

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUMENT. 127

with the most rigid and invariable fulfilment. This
is the strongest practical vindication which can be
imagined, of the unshaken faith that we might place
in the instinctive and primary suggestions of nature.
It restores that feeling of security to our intellectual
processes which the Philosophy of Hume so laboured
to unsettle: And we again feel a comfort and a
confidence in the exercises of reason — when thus
reassured in the solidity of those axioms which are
reason's stepping-stones, in the substantive truth
and certainty of those first principles whence all
argumentation takes its rise.

6. But the mention of David Hume leads to
the consideration of that atheistical argument which
has been associated with his name — an argument
not founded however on any denial of the regularity
of nature's sequences — ^but proceeding on the ad-
mission of that regularity ; and only assuming the
necessity of experience to ascertain what the
sequences actually are. Mr. Hume's argument is
tills : After having once observed the conjunction
between any two terms of an invariable sequence —
it is granted that from the observed existence of
either of the terms, w^ecan conclude without observa^
tion the existence of the other — that from a perceived
antecedent we can foretell its consequent, although
v/e should not see it; or on the other hand from the
perceived consequent we can infer the antecedent,
although it should not have been seen by us. Hav-
ing had the observation once of the two terms A
and B, and of the causal relation between them,
the appearance of A singly would warrant the anti-
cipation of B, or of B singly the inference of A,

125 MR. HUME^S OBJECTION

But then it is required for any such inference that
we should have had the observation or experience,
at least once, of both these terms ; and of the con-
junction between them. If we have seen but once
in our life a watch made, and coming forth of the
hands of a watch-maker; we, in all time coming,
can, on seeing the watch only, infer the watch-maker.
But this full experience comprehensive of both
terms is wanting, it is alleged, in the question of a
God. We may have had an experience reaching to
both terms of the sequence in watch-making — ^but
we have had no such experience in world-making.
Had we but seen a world once made, and coming
forth from the observed fiat of an inteUigent Deity,
then the sight of every other world might have
justified the inference that for it too there behoved
to have been a world-maker. It is the want of
that completed observation which we so often have
in the cases of human mechanism, that constitutes
it is apprehended the flaw or failure in the customary
argument for a God — as founded on the mechanism
of nature. It is because the world is to us a
singular eff'ect — ^it is because we have only per-
ceived the consequent a world, and never perceived
the alleged antecedent the mandate of a Creator
at whose forth-putting some other world had sprung
into existence — ^it is because in this instance we
have but witnessed one term of a succession and
never witnessed its conjunction with a prior term,
that we are hopelessly debarred it is thought, from
ever coming soundly or legitimately to the conclu-
sion of a God.
. 7. The following are so many of the passages

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUMENT. 129

from Hume containing the argument in his own
words : " But it is only when two species of objects
are found to be constantly conjoined that we can
infer the one from the other ; and were an effect
presented which was entirely singular and could
not be comprehended under arri^known species, I
do not see that we could forn^uiy conjecture or
inference at all concerning its cause. If experience
and observation and analogy be indeed the only
guides which we can reasonably follow in inferences
of this nature — ^both the effect and cause must bear
a similarity and resemblance to other effects and
causes which we know, and which we have found
in many instances to be conjoined with each other."*
A^in — " If we see a house, we conclude with the
greatest certainty that it had an architect or
builder; because this is precisely that species of
effect, which we have experienced to proceed from
that species of cause. But surely you will not
affirm that the universe bears such a resemblance
to a house, that we can with the same certainty
infer a similar cause, or that the analogy is here
entire and perfect. The dissimilitude is so striking,
that the utmost you can here pretend to is a guess,
a conjecture, a presumption concernmg a similar
cause ; and how that pretension w^ill be received in
the world I leave you to consider.".-.-—-" When two
species of objects have always been observed to be
conjoined together, I can infer by custom the exists
ence of one, wherever I see the existence of the
other; and this I call an argument from experience.

• Hume's Essays, Vol. II. p. 167, being an extract from hi»
Essay on Providence and a Future State. ,

F 2

130 MR. HUME*S OBJECTION

But how this argument can have place, where the
objects as in the present case, are single, individual,
without parallels or specific resemblance, may be
difficult to explain. And will any man tell me
with a serious countenance, that an orderly universe
must arise froiagtome thought and act, like the
human ; becaus^^e have experience of it ? To
ascertain this reasoning, it" were requisite, that we
had experience of the origin of worlds; and it is not
sufficient surely, that we have seen ships and cities

arise from human art and contrivance." " Can

you pretend to show any such similarity between
the fabric of a house, and the generation of a
universe? Have you ever seen nature in any
such situation as resembles the first arrangemenf of
the elements? Have worlds ever been formed
under your eye? and have you had leisure to
observe the whole progress of the phenomena,
from the first appearance of order to its final con-
summation ? If you have, then cite your experi-
ence and deliver your theory."*

8. Now it appears to us that this argument of
Hume has not been rightly met by any of his
antagonists. Instead of resisting it they have
retired from it — and, in fact, done him the homage
of conceding the principle on which it rests. They
have sufi*ered him to bear away one of the prime
supports of Natural Theism; and, to make up for
this loss, they have attempted to replace it with
another support which I hold to be altogether
precarious. Hume denies that we hl^ve any ex-

• The above extracts are taken from Hume's Dialogne* con-
cerning Natural Religion.

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUMENT. 131

perimental evidence for the being of a God — and
that simply because we have not any experience in
the making of worlds. Had we observed once or
oftener the sequence of two terms A and B — then
afterwards on our observing B though alone we
might have inferred A. Had we observed though
only once, a God employed in making a world—.
then when another world was presented to our
notice we might have inferred a God. But we
have never had the benefit of such observation ; and
hence the conclusion of Mr. Hume is, that the
reasoning for a God is not founded on the basis of
experience. Now how is this met both by Reid
and Stuart ? — ^by conceding that the argument for
a God is not an experimental one at all — the
inference of design from its effects being a result
neither of reasoning nor of experience. When the
question is put, on what then is the inference
grounded ?— the never-failing reply in a difficulty of
this sort, and in which more than once these philo-
sophers have taken convenient refuge is, that it is
grounded on an intuitive judgment of the mind.

9. Our own opinion of this evasion is that to
say the least it was unnecessary — and we think
that without recurring to any separate principle
on the subject, Mr. Hume's argument might be
satisfactorily disposed of, though we had no other
ground for the inference of a designing cause,
than that upon which we reason from hke conse-
quents to the hke antecedents that went before
them.

10. It. appears to us that these philosophers
have most unnecessarily mystified the argument

132

for a God, besides giving an untrue representation
of the right argument. The considerations on which
Reid and Stewart would resolve the inference of
design from its effects into an original principle,
distinct from that by which we infer any other
cause from its effects — even our prior observation
of the conjunction between them, appear to us
most singularly weak and inconclusive. They
say that we can only infer design on the part of a
fellow-creature from its effects in this instinctive or
intuitive way, because we never had any direct
perception of his mind at all, and therefore never
had a view of the antecedent but only of the conse-
quent. But we have the evidence of consciousness,
the strongest of all evidence, for the existence of
our own mind ; we have both the antecedent and
the consequent in this one instance, both the
design and its effects when ourselves are the de-
signers ; and, from the similarity of those effects
which proceed from ourselves to those which pro-
ceed fi*om our neighbours, we infer on a sufficient
experimental ground that there are design and
a designing mind on their part also. It comes
peculiarly ill from Mr. Stewart to say that we
know nothing of mind but by its operations and
effects, who himself has so oft affirmed that all our
knowledge of matter comes to us in the same way ;
and that the properties of tvhich sense informs us
as belonging to the one form no better evidence for
the substantive existence of matter, than that for
the substantive existence of mind afforded by the
properties of which consciousness informs us as
belonging to the other. And even though we

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUMENT. 133

should allow that, apart from all that experimental
reasoning by which from the observation of what
passes with ourselves we make inference as to
what passes with others of our kind, we arrive by
means of a direct and instinctive perception to the
knowledge of the existence of other human minds
beside our own — there is no analogy between this
case and that of the divine mind as inferred from
the eifects or the evidences of design in the
workmanship of nature. God does not by this
workmanship hold himseK forth to observers in
visible personality as our fellow-creatures do. He
has left for our inspection a thousand specimens of
skilful and beauteous mechanism ; but he has left
us to view them as separate from himself. These
philosophers would have us to infer a designing
God from the works of nature, just as we infer a
designing mind in man not from the works of man
but fr'om man in the act of working — even as if the
divine spirit animated nature in the same manner
as the human spirit animates the framev/ork by
which it is encompassed. Now the proper analogy
is to view a piece of human workmanship, after it
is completed and may be seen separately from the
man himself ; and to compare this with the work-
manship of nature viewed separately from God.
We take cognizance of the former as the work of
man, just because in previous instances we have
seen such work achieved by man. This con-
sideration proceeds altogether upon experience ;
and what we have now to ascertain is, in how far
experience warrants us to conclude a designing
eauae for the workmanship of nature. We hold

134 MR, humf/s objection

that this conclusion too has a strict experience for
its basis ; and that, notwithstanding that the prin-
ciple has been given up by Stewart as is evident
from his following reply to Hume's argument.
" The argument as is manifest proceeds entirely
on the supposition that our inferences of design are
in every case the result of experience, the con-
trary of which has been already sufficiently shown
—and which indeed (as Dr. Reid has remarked)
ii it be admitted as a general truth, leads to this
conclusion — that no man can have any evidence
of the existence of any intelligent being but him-
self."*

* Stewart's Philosopliy of the Moral and Active Powers, Vol.
11. p. 25.

In this treatise Mr. Stewart has rather presented the opinions
of others, than come forth in p>opria persona with any sustained
pleading of liis own ; and, as in most of his other performances,
instead of grappling with the question, he presents us with the
literature of the question — made up of history therefore rather
than of argument, and altogether composing but the outline
of what had been said or reasoned by other men, though ac-
companied with a very few slight yet elegant touches from his
own hand. We by no means agree with those who think of
this interesting personage, that, considering the few substantive
additions which he made to philosophy, he therefore as a philo-
sopher had gained an unfair reputation. It is true, he has not
added much to the treasures of science ; yet, in virtue of a
certain halo which by the glow of his eloquence and the purity
and nobleness of liis sentiments he threw around the cause, he
abundantly sustained the honours of it. It reminds us of what
is often realized in the higher walks of society, when certain
men vastly inferior to others both in family and in fortune, do, in
virtue of a certain lofty beai'ing in which they are upheld by
the consciousness of a grace and a dignity that natively belong
to them, not usurp the highest place in fashion, but have that
place most readily awarded to them by the spontaneous consent
and testimony of all. It was thus with Stewart in the world of
letters. His rank and reputation there were not owing either to
the number or importance of the discoveries achieved by him.
liut he had what many discoverers have not. Ho had the sua-

TO THE A POSTEIlIOm ARGUMENT. 135

11. Let us therefore resume our observations
on the strong mstinctive confidence of the human
mmd in the uniformity of nature — and thence apply
ourselves to the consideration of this seemingly
formidable argument.

1 2. We have already remarked on the perfect
agreement which there is between the constancy of
nature, and the instinctive belief which men have
in that constancy. There seems no necessary
connexion between these two things. It might
for aught we know have been otherwise. There
might have been a tendency in the human mind
always to look for the like event in the like cir-
cumstances— and this anticipation on our part may
have been thwarted at every turn by the most
capricious and unlooked for evolutions, on the part
of the actual world that is around us. Or there
might have been the same uniformity that there is
in nature now — ^but no such constitutional pro-
pensity with us to count upon that uniformity.
In either case we should not have profited by the
lessons of experience. The remembrance of the
past could have furnished no materials on which to
ground or to guide our expectations of the future.

tained and the lofty spirit of a high-toned academic ; and never
did any child, whether of science or poetry, breathe in an atmo-
sphere moi'e purely ethereal. The je ne scais quoi of manner
does not wield a more fascinating power in the circles of fashion,
than did the indescribable; charm of his rare and elevated genius
over our literary circles ; and, when we consider the homage of
reverence and regard which he drew from general society, we
cannot but wish that many successors may arise in his own like-
ness— who might build up an aristocracy of learning, that shall
infuse a finer element into the system of life, than any which has
ever been distilled upon it from the vulgar aristocracies of wealtli
or of power.

136

It is not because of one thing, that nature is con-
stant; but it is because of two things, that nature
is constant and that we have been endowed with
an irresistible faith in that constancy — it is because
of a concurrence in fact between two elements that
might have been separated the one from the other,
it is because of an adaptation between the mental
economy in man and that general economy of
things in the midst of which he is placed, that any
wisdom at all can be reared on the basis of ob-
servation ; or that, on the appearances which are
before our eyes, we can either reason back to those
which have preceded, or forv. ard to those which are
hereafter to ensue from them.

13. Our expectation of the constancy of nature
in all time coming, because of our experience of
that constancy in all past time, is not a deduction
of reason — ^but an immediate and resistless prin-
ciple of belief in the human constitution. It is no
more the fruit of an argumentative process than
any sensation or emotion is. That, on the obser-
vation of a certain event in given circumstances,
there should be a confident anticipation of the same
event in the same circumstances — this is the assumed
principle of many a reasoning ; but it is not reason-
ing which has conducted us thereto. It is an
underived and intuitive belief, and not a belief that
we reach by a succession of steps — and is, as far
as we can discern, as strong in infancy as it is in
matiive and established manhood. It is vain to
say that the constancy of nature throughout every
former generation of the world, is a reason for the
constancy of nature throughout every future gene*

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUMENT. 137

ration of it. The two statements are distinct, the
one from the other — and there is sm-ely no logical
necessity why because the first statement is true,
the second should be true also. Nevertheless,
and without reasoning, we are led from believing
by observation in the first, irresistibly to believe by
anticipation in the second. There is a harmony,
but it is a contingent harmony, between our strong
instinctive conviction that it shall be so, and the
unfaiUng universal accomplishment of it. The
very strongest among the principles of the human
understanding is faithfully responded to by the
very surest among the processes of external
nature ; and this adaptation, due to no will and to
no reasoning of ours, yet without which reasoning
would be left without a basis — ^is perhaps the most
striking proof which can be given, that man, even
when stalking in the pride of his intellectual great-
ness along the high walk of philosophy, is but the
creature of an instinct that should ever be leading
him astray — ^liad not God made the laws and the
arrangements of his universe to correspond with it.
14. But while we thus advocate the indepen-
dence of the two laws on each other, that is, of
the mental or subjective law of man's instinctive
faith in the constancy of nature, on the external
or objective law of nature's actual constancy — it
siiould well be understood, that the view we are
now to give of Hume's atheistical argument does
not rest on any metaphysical theory whatever, as
to the origin of this universal belief. WTiether
it be distinct fi'om experience or the fruit of expe-
rience, it is not upon this that we join issue with

138 MR. Hume's objection

our antagomst. Inquirers may diifer as to the
origin of our belief in the uniformity of nature's
successions. On this topic we exact no particular
opinion from them. It is enough if we agree in
the soundness of that belief, whatever the descent
or the derivation of it may have been. It is man's
universal judgment, that the same consequents are
ever preceded by the same antecedents, and the
two questions are altogether distinct from each
other — whence does that judgment take its rise,
and whether that judgment is a true one. We
may differ or agree upon the first. It matters not,
if we agree upon the second, which forms the basis
of Hume's reasoning. We concede to him his own
premises — even that we are not entitled to infer an
antecedent from its consequent, unless we have
before had the completed observation of both these
terms and of the succession between them. We
disclaim the aid of all new or questionable prin-
ciples in meeting his objection, and would rest the
argument a posteriori for the being of a God, on a
strictly experimental basis.

15. The uniformity of nature lies in this, that
the same antecedents are always followed by the
same consequents. Grant that the former agree
in every respect — then the latter will also agree in
every respect. This invariable following of two
events, the one by the other, is termed a sequence;
and there is not a more unfailing or universal
characteristic of nature than the constancy of these
sequences.

16. For the argument of this chapter it is
enough tiiat v.e p,m\ our antajronists have a com-

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUMENT. 139

mon belief in the constancy of these sequences — .
though they who think, as we do, that the behef is
of instinctive origin, cannot but feel how wondrous
the coincidence is between the constancy itself and
the fact, that from the very first dawnings of
mental perception this constancy is counted upon,
xt does not at all appear that the experience of
nature's constancy is first waited for ere it is
anticipated by the mind. And even although it
iiad to be waited for; and the observation had
been made for years of nature's constancy —
it is still to be explained why we should infer
from this the same constancy in the years which
are to come. It does not follow that because
nature hath proceeded in a certain invariable
course throughout the whole retrospect of our
experit^nce, it must therefore do the same through-
out the whole range of our future anticipations.
The one fact does not necessarily involve the
other. There has been an unfailing constancy in
nature through the years that are past — and there
appears no necessity which can be assigned, why
on this account there should be as unfailing a
constancy of nature through the years that are to
come. It may be, or it may not be,— but yet the
firm impregnable conviction of all, is that most
certainly it shall be — and this anticipation, which
all without exception have, is followed up by the
most unexcepted fulfilment.

17. The heat that is of a certain temperature
will always melt ice. The impulse that hath once
given direction and velocity, will always in the
same circumstances be followed up with motion.

240 MR. hume's objection

The body that is raised from the earth's surface,
and then left without support, will always descend.
The position of the moon in a certain quarter of
the heavens, will always be responded to by the
rising or falling tides upon our shores. I'hese
antecedents may be variously blended; and this
will give rise to different results ; but the very
same assemblage of antecedents will always be
followed by the same consequents. Our own
personal experience may have been limited to a
few square miles of the earth that we tread upon —
yet this would not hinder such a faith in the im-
mutability of nature, that we could bear it in con-
fident application all over the globe. In other
words, we count upon this constancy far beyond
what we ever have observed of it — and still the
topic of our wonder and gratitude is, that a belief
in every way so instinctive should be followed up
by an accomplishment so sure.

18. But we shall dilate no further on the general
position, that our faith in the future constancy of
nature is intuitive, and not deduced by any process
of reasoning however short, from our observation
of its past constancy. Let us here recommend
the masterly treatise of Dr. Thomas Brown on
Cause and Effect — a philosopher who, with occa-
sional inadvertencies in the ethical department of
his course, hath thrown a flood of copious and
original light over the mysteries of the human
understanding; and who seems, in particular, to
have grappled successfully with a question at one
time dark and hopeless as the metaphysics of the
schoolmen.

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUMENT. 141

19. Without, therefore, expatiating any farther
on the origin of this behef, and certainly without
laying the least argumentative stress upon it in the
reasonings which we have now to offer — ^let it
suffice for the present that there exists such a
belief in our mind, and that it meets with its corre-
spondent reality in nature.

20. There are two processes of inference, which,
however identical in their principle, may be distin-
guished the one from the other. When there is
an invariable connexion between certain antece-
dents and certain consequents — then, upon our
seeing the antecedents, we look confidently forward
to the appearance of the- consequents — or, when
we see the consequents, we conclude that theu:
proper antecedents have gone before them. But
it may so happen, that various antecedents shall
be mingled together at the same time — some of
which have an influence upon the result, and some
of which have none ; but still so as to make it a
necessary exercise of mind to disentangle the
trains from each other, and to discriminate Avhat
be the terms which stand to each other in the
strict relation of a sequence that is invariable.

21. But to descend from the obscure language
of generaUties upon this subject. Let us take the
case of a watchmaker, and a watch, the former
being the antecedent and the latter the consequent

^both of which, and the actual conjunction of

which, we have already observed, if we have ever
seen a watch made. Now, on looking first to the
antecedent, there is room for distinguishing between
the proper and the accidental It were wrong to

142 MR. Hume's objection

say of this antecedent, that it comprises all the
particulars which meet and are assembled together
in the person of the watchmaker. It has nothing
to do, for example, with the colour of his hair, or
with the quality of his vestments, or with the
height of his stature, or with the features of his
countenance, or with the age and period of his
life. The strict and proper antecedent is distinct
from one and all of these particulars ; and may be
said to lie enveloped, as it were, in a mass or
assemblage of contemporaneous things which have
nothing to do with the fabrication of the watch.
The watch, in fact, is the consequent of a purpos-
ing mind — putting itself forth in the execution of a
mechanism for the indication of time, and possessed
of competent skill and power for such an execu-
tion. The mind of the observer separates here
the essential from the accessary. Should he ever
again meet with the forth-putting of the same
essential antecedent as before, he will expect the
same consequent as before — even though he should
never meet with an antecedent compassed about
Mth the same accessaries. The next watchmaker
may differ from any he had ever before seen, in a
multitude of particulars — in age, in stature, in
dress, and general appearance, and a thousand
other modifications which it were endless to
specify. Yet how manifestly absurd to look for
another consequent than a watch because of these
accidental variations. It is not to any of these
that the watch is a consequent at all. It is solely
to a purposing mind, possessed of competent skill
and power — and this was common both to the first

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUMENT. 143

and the second watchmaker. The next time that
we shall see a watchmaker addressing himself to his
specific and professional object, there is little proba-
bility that we shall see in him the very same assem-
blage of circumstantials that we ever witnessed
before in any other individual of his order. And
yet how absurd to say that we are now looking to a
different antecedent from any that we ever before
had the observation of — that, just as Hume calls
the world a singular eiFect, we are now beholding
in this new watchmaker the operation of a singular
cause — and that therefore it is impossible to pre-
dict what sort of consequent it may be, that will
come out of his hands. It is true that there are
many circumstantial things in and about the man
which, if we admit as parts of the antecedent,
will make up altogether a singular antecedent.
But in the strict essential antecedent there is no
singularity. There is a purposing mind resolved
on the manufacture of a watch, and endowed with
a sufficient capacity for the achievement of its
object. This is what we behold now, and what
we have beheld formerly — and so, in spite of the
alleged, and indeed the actual singularity of the
whole compound assemblage, we look for the very
same consequent as before.

22. What is true of the antecedent is true also
of the consequent. There may be an indefinite
number of accessary and accidental things, asso-
ciated with that which is strictly and properly the
posterior term of the sequence. In a watch it is
the adaptation of rightly shapen parts to a dis-
tinctly noticeable end, the indication of time —

144 MR. Hume's objection

•
which forms the true consequent to the thought
and agency of a purposing mind in the watch-
maker. But in this said watch there are a thou-
sand collateral things which, rightly speaking, form
no part of the essential consequent — though alto-
gether they go to a composition different perhaps,
in some respects, from any that was ever exem-
plified before ; and therefore go to the construction
of a singular m atch. There is the colour of the
materials, there is their precise weight and magni-
tude, there is* the species of metal — each of these
and of many other things apart from that one
thing of form and arrangement, which indicates the
work and contrivance of an artist. Were the
things with their existing properties presented
before me in a confused mass, the inference of a
designing cause would instantly vanish. It is
the arrangement of things, obviously fashioned and
arranged for the measurement of time, that forms
the sole consequent — a consequent which does not
comprise all the other circumstantial peculiarities
that we have now specified, but which rather hes
enveloped in the midst of them. These circum-
stantial things, it is very possible, were never
precisely so blended, as they are in the specimen
before me. There never, it is most likely, was just
such a colour, united with just such a weight, and
with just such a magnitude, and with just such an
exact order of parts in the machinery, as altogether
obtain in the individual watch upon which I am
now reasoning. When looked to, therefore, in
this general and aggregate view, it may be deno-
minated a singular effect. Yet who does not see

TO THE A POSTEillORI AKGU3IENT. 145

that the inference of a designing cause is in no way
spoiled by this ? As a whole it may be singular
— but there is that in it which is not singular.
There is the collocation of parts which has been
exemplified in all other watches; and on which
alone the inference is founded, of an artist with
skill to devise and power to execute, having been
the producer of it. It is this which the observer
separately looks to, and singles out, as it were,
from all the collateral things which enter into the
assemblage that is before his eyes. In the effect,
the strict and proper consequent is the adjustment
and adaptation of parts for an obvious end. In
the cause, the strict and proper antecedent is a
designing intelligence, wherewith there may at the
same time be associated a thousand peculiarities of
person, and voice, and manner, to him unknown
— ^but to him of no' importance to be known, for
the purpose of establishing the sequence between
a purposing mind which is not seen, and the piece
of mechanism which is seen.

23. But ere we can bring this reasoning to bear
on the Atheism of Hume — there is still a farther
abstraction to be made. Hitherto we separated
the essential consequent from the accessaries in a
watch— .so that though each watch may be singular
in respect of all its accessaries taken together — ■
yet all the watches have in common that essential
consequent from which we infer the agency of
design in the construction of them. That conse-
quent is adaptation of parts for the specific end
which the mechanism serves — that is, the measure-
ment of time. But it should be further understood

146 MR. Hume's objection

that, for the purpose of mferring design, it is not
necessary that the end of the arrangement in
question should be some certain and specific end.
It is enough to substantiate the inference that the
arrangement should be obviously conducive to
some end — to any end. From what the end par-
ticularly is, we learn what the particular object
v.'as which the artist had in view — ^but for the pur-
pose of warranting the general inference that there
was an artist who had a sometliing in view, it mat-
ters not what the end particularly is. It is enough
that it be some end or other — and that, an end which
the structure or working of the machine itself ob-
viously announces. In the case of a watch the
following are the counterpart terms of the sequence.
The consequent is a mechanism adapted for the
measurement of time. And its counterpart ante-
cedent is an intehigent adaptation, putting forth
his ability and skill on the production of a me-
chanism for the measurement of time. But thoqgh
we should lop olf, as it were, the m^easurement of
time or this specific end from each of these terms;
and substitute in its stead an end generally, or a
whatever end, the inference of an intelligent adapta-
tion would still hold good. The consequent then
would be a mechanism adapted for a whatever end
(and that an end to be learned from the examina-
tion of the mechanism itself) ; and its counterpart
antecedent would be an intelligent adaptation for
that whatever end. For either the more special
or the more general inference, we equally arrive at
an intelligent adaptation. When we in the con-
sequent restrict our attention to what the end

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUMENT. 147

particularly is, then we proportionally restrict the
antecedent to an intelligent niind bent on the
accomplishment of that speciiic end. But when in
the argument we make but a general recognition
in the consequent of some end or other, the con-
clusion is equally general of an intelligent mind
bent on the accomplishment of that some end or
other. All this might be provided for in the rea-
soning, by laying proper stress on the distinction
between the adaptation of parts for the end, and
the adaptation of parts for an end. The latter,
in fact, is the only essential consequent to the
antecedent of a purposing mind — and from the
appearance of the latter we are entitled to infer
this antecedent. By taking this distinction along
with us, we come to perceive how far the argu-
ment of final causes may be legitimately extended.
24. We already understand then how on having
seen one watch made, we are entitled to infer a
maker for the second watch — though in many of
its accessaries it may differ most widely, and there-
fore differ most widely on the whole or as a compound
assemblage from the first. With all these con-
tingent variations in the two machines, there is
one thing which they have in common — adaptation
of parts for the end of measuring and indicating
time ; and this justifies the inference of a common
antecedent — even a purposing mind that had this
specific object in view. But we contend that, in
all sound logic, we are warranted to extend the
inference farther — not merely to a second watch
but to a second machine of any sort, though its use
or the end of its construction was wholly different

148 MR. hu.me's objection

from that of a watch. If, for example, mstead of
a mechanism which served to mark a succession of
hours, there were presented a mechanism which
served to evolve a succession of musical harmonies,
we should just as confidently infer an intelligent
artist in the one case as in the other, although we
had only seen the making of a watch, and never
seen the making of an harmonicon. The truth is
that it is not the particular end either of the one
machine or the other, which leads to the inference
of an intelligent maker — ^but the inference rests
nakedly and essentially on this, that there is
adaptation of parts for any end at all. Between
one watch and another there is tiiis common conse-
quent— adaptation of parts for the end; and on this
we ground the conclusion of there' having been
design and a designer in the fabrication of each of
them. But between the watch and the musical
apparatus there is also a common consequent —
not adaptation of parts for the end, but still
adaptation for an end ; and on this we are equally
warranted to ground the conclusion of design
having been employed in the formation of each of
them. The definite article is always compre-
hensive of the indefinite, so that whenever there
is the end, there is always an end. But the
indefinite is not also m the same way comprehensive
of the definite, so that in the case of an adaptation
having an end, it may not be the end which we
have ever witnessed in the putting together of any
former adaptation. Still it matters not. The infer-
ence, not of a mind purposing the specific thmg for
which we have formerly observed both a contrivance

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARCIMEKT. 149

and a contriver, but still of a mind purposing
something or a purposing mind, is as legitimate as
ever. And so there lies enveloped in the watch
this consequent — the adaptation of parts for the

end but there also lies enveloped there, the

adaptation of parts for an end — and the latter we
distinctly perceive to be in the music-box as well
as in the time-piece. When we look to the latter
machine we feel sensible that we never before
witnessed the putting forth of intelligence in the
adaptation of parts for the end. In this respect
there is novelty, because we never before saw
a machine made for the performance of tunes.
But we at the same time are abundantly sensible,
that whether in the example of a watch or of some-
thing else, we have a thousand times witnessed the
putting forth of intelligence in the adaptation of
parts for an end. In this respect there is no
novelty ; so that whether it be the watch that we
have seen made or the music-box that we have not
seen made, there is the same firm basis of a sure
and multiplied experience on which to rest the
conclusion of an Intelligent Maker for both.

25. And thus it is that we do not even require
a special experience in watch-making to warrant
the application of this argument from final causes
either to this or to any other machines whatever.
There may be a thousand distinct products of art
and wisdom in which our observation has been re-
stricted to the posterior, and has never reached to
the prior term of the sequence — that is, where we
have seen the product, and never either witnessed
the production nor seen the producer — and yet we

150

have a firm experimental basis on which to rest the
inference, that a producer there was, and one too
possessed of skill to devise and power to exe-
cute. The truth is that we every day of our lives,
and perhaps every hour of each day, witness the
adaptation of means to an end, in connexion with
design and a designer — though never perhaps to
the end in any instance of hundreds of distinct
machines which could be specified — and which
therefore, are in this respect to us singular effects.'
But still each of these machines has in it adapta-
tion to an end, as well as adaptation to the end ;
has in it therefore that posterior term, of whose
connexion with the prior term of an intelligent
cause we have had daily observation. It is not,
we should remark, on the adaptation to any object .
quoad the end — ^but on the adaptation to it quoad
an end that the inference is grounded. It is thus
that though introduced for the first time to the
sight of a watch or a gun-lock or a cotton-mill
or a steam-engine, we are as sure^ of intelUgence
having been engaged in the execution of each of
them as if we had been present a thousand times at
their fabrication. The truth is that we have been
present many thousand times, though not at the
process of formation in either of these individual
pieces of mechanism, yet at other processes which
have enough in common Avith the former ones to
make an experimental argument in every way as
good. We have had lessons every day of our life,
by which to read what the chararteristics be of
those arrangements that indicate a mind acting for
a purpose ; though not a mind acting for the purpose.

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUMENT. \51

This matters not. The conclusion is as good the
one way as tiie other — the valid conclusion, if we
will but reflect upon it, not of a subtle but of a
sound and substantial process of reasoning.

26. And if we can thus infer the agency of
design in a watch-maker, though we never saw a
v/atch made — we can on the very same ground
infer the agency of design on the part of a world-
maker, though we never saw a world made. We
concede it to our adversaries, that, when reasoning
from the posterior term or consequent to the prior
term or antecedent of a sequence, both terms
must have been seen by us m conjunction on
former occasions — else we are not warranted to
infer the one from the other of them. We are
aware of the use which they make of this principle.
They tell us that we cannot argue from a world
to a God — ^because the world, if an effect, is a
singular effect — that we have no experience in the
making of worlds, as we may have in the making
of watches — that had we seen a world made and a
God employed about it, then on being presented
with another world, we might have inferred the
agency of a God in the creation of it — and this
they contend to be the whole length to which our
experience can carry us. But they overlook the
distinction between what is essential in the conse-
quent, and what is merely circumstantial therein ;
and it is here that the whole mistake lies. The
essential consequent we have seen produced or we
have seen in conjunction with its proper antecedent
a thousand times — and thus it is, that we should
confidently infer a designing artificer from the view

152 MR. Hume's objection

of a watch, though we had just as little experience
in the making of watches as we have in the making
of worlds. We may never have seen a watch
made — but in the watcli before our eyes, we see
the manifest adaptation of means to an end ; and
this v/e have frequently before vritnessed, as the
posterior term of a sequence, in connexion v/ith
the forth-putting of sagacity and skill on the part
of a purposing mind, as its prior term. We have
not seen the whole consequent named a v/atch
produced by the whole antecedent named a v^atch-
maker — ^but we have seen daily and familiarly that
Avhich is in the watch, adaptation of means to an
end, produced by that which is in the watch-maker,
a designing intellect. These two terms we have
seen in constant conjunction in thousands of other
instances; and we have therefore the warrant of
a manifold experience for inferring that they were
conjoined in this instance also. W^e carry the
inference no farther than to the skill and power of
the artificer. It is this part and this only, that we
make the antecedent to the observed consequent
before us. We may have never seen a watch-
maker in contact with a watch — ^but we have often
seen the effort and skill of a designing mind in
contact with the adaptation of useful and subser-
vient means. This has been a frequently observed
sequence, from either term of which we may infer
the other. Now the consequent of this sequence,
the adaptation of useful and subservient means,
lies enveloped in the watch ; and we infer that the
antecedent in this sequence, the effect and skill of
a designing mind, lies enveloped in a watch-maker

TO THE A POSTERIORI All(ir.MENT. 153

SO that though we should never have seen a

watch made, and never seen a watch-maker em-
ployed in the formation of one, though we should
never have had this particular experience, yet we
liave had experience enough to infer from the
mechanism thereof the wisdom that presided over
the fabrication.

27. In the case of God and the world we have
only one term of the sequence before us. We
see the world — but we have never seen God ; and
far less have we ever seen Him employed in the
formation of a world. We never saw the whole
consequent, a world actually emanated and brought
forth by the whole antecedent a God. But both
in the mechanism of the world, and in the innu-
merable products wherev.ith it teems, do we sec the
adaptation of means to desirable ends — and this we
have seen emanated and brought forth in many
hundreds of instances by a purposing uiind as its
strict and proper antecedent. It is thus that we
hold ourselves to be abundantly schooled, and that
too on the basis not of a partial l>ut of a full ex-
perience, for the inference of a God. We carry
the argument ilpvv'ard fi'om the adaptations in
nature to a contriving intellect ; just because we
have often witnessed similar adaptations, and
witnessed them too in conjunction with an ante-
cedent wisdom that planned and that performed
them. It is because we have had manifold obser-
vation, and observation inclusive of both terms of
the sequence, that from the one term in the present
instance even the adaptations which nature oifers
to our view, we infer the other term even a design-
G 2

154 MR. Hume's objectiok

ing mind, at whose will and by whose power and
wdsdom they have been effectuated. We have
never seen a whole nature ordered into being — and
w^iich therefore in its entireness and totality may
be denominated to us a singular eiFeet — just as on
the first sight of a watch, the watch regarded as
a whole is to us a singular efiect. But neither
with the one nor the other is there any singularity
in the 'essential consequent. The singularity lies
only in cejtain circumstantials which have properly
no part in the reasoning, and which for the proof
of an antecedent wisdom in either case may be
dismissed from the sequences altogether. In that
which the mind strictly bears regard to in this
argument there is no singularity. We have seen
a multitude of times over that which is in the
watch, accommodation of parts to a desirable end
— and whenever we had the opportunity of per-
ceiving also the antecedent term, there was uni-
formly the mind of one who devised and purposed
the end — and so, on the pruiciple which gives
truth to all our reasoning from experience, we
infer the agency of such a mind in the formation
of a watch, though it be a formation that we never
witnessed. And the same of this world, though
we never saw the formation of a world. Our
present state gives us to see the posterior term —
even all of creation that is visibly before us. Our
past history hath not given us the opportunity of
seeing the creation itseK or of seeing the anterior
term, even that agency by which it was effected.
But in the course of our experience we have seen
adaptations innumerable conjoined with a prior

• TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUMENT. 155

agency that in every instance was the agency of a
scheming and a skilful intellect — and just as not
from the watch but from the adaptations in it, so
not from the world but from the adaptations in it,
do we on the basis of an accumulated experience,
reaching to both terms of many an actually observed
sequence, infer the existence of a world-maker,
who contemplated and devised the various ends
for which we behold so manifest a subserviency of
parts in the universe around us.

28. After all then the economy of atheism
would be a very strange one. We are led by the
constitution of our minds to count at all times on
the uniformity of nature — and it is an expectation
that never deceives us. We are led to anticipate
the same consequents from the same antecedents,
or to infer the same antecedents from the same
consequents — and we find an invariable harmony
between the external truth of things and this in-
ward trust of our own bosoms. Within the limits
of sensible observation we experience no disappoint-
ment---and from such an adaptation of the mental
to the material, we should not only argue for the
existence of an intelligent Designer, but should
hold it to be at once an indication of His bene-
volence, and His truth that He so ordered the
succession of ail objects and events, as to make of it
an universal fulfilment to the universal conviction
which Himself had implanted in every human
bosom. It were strange indeed if this lesson of
nature's invar iableness which is so oft repeated,
and which within the compass of visible nature has
never been found to deceive us, should only seiTO

1 J?> ^rn. humf/s OBjEcrroN

to land us in one great deception when we come to
reason from nature to nature's God — -or that in
making that upv/ard step which connects the
universe with its originating cause, there should for
once and at this great transition be the disruption
of that principle whereof the whole universe, as far
as we can witness or observe, affords so glorious a
verification. Throughout all the phenomena in
creation we find no exception to the constancy or
the uniformity of sequences — and it were truly
marvellous if the great phenomenon of creation itself,
offered the only exception to a law, which, through-
out all her diversities and details, she so widely
exemplifies — or if, while in every instance along
the world's history of a produced adaptation we
find that there have been contrivance and a con-
triver, the world itself with all the vast and varied
adaptations which abound in it, instead of one
great contrivance, is either the product of blind
necessity, or some random evolution of unconscious
elements that had no sovereign mind either to
create or to control tliem.

29. And here we may observe that the very
abstraction which we find to be necessary for the
vindication of our cause from the sceptical argu-
ment of Mr. Hume, is that, too, on which w^e might
found one of the proper refinements of a rational
Theism. To preserve our argument, we had to
detach all the accessaries from that which is com-
mon to the w^orks of nature and of art, and so to
generalize the consequent into adaptation for an
end. In like manner should we detach all that is
but accessary from the authors of nature and art — .

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUMENT. loT

and so generalize the antecedent into that which is
common to hoth, even an intelUgent and a purpos-
insr mind. When we thus Kmit our view to the
strict and proper consequent, we are led to limit
it in like manner to the strict and proper antece-
dent. All we are warranted to conclude of the
antecedent in a deduction thus generalized and
purified is that it is purely a mental one. This is
the alone likeness between God and man to which
the argument carries us. The gross imaginations
of anthropomorphitism are done away by it — and
the argument by which w^e thus establish the reality
of a God, serves also to refine and rationalize our
conceptions of Him.

30. .It is thus then that we would meet the
argument by Hume, of this w^orld being a singular
effect. We have already said that though unable
to demonstrate a primitive creation of matter, we
midit have still abundant evidence of a God in the

o

primitive collocation of its parts. And we now
say that though unable to allege our own observa-
tion or presence at the original construction of
any natural mechanism — though w^e never saw the
hand of an artist employed in the placing and adap-
tation of parts for the end of any such mechanism
— yet, beholding as we do every day from our in-
fancy adaptations for an end, and that too in con-
junction with an antecedent mind which devised
them — we have really had experience enough on
which to ground the inference of a living and in-
telligent God. On comparing a work of nature
with a work of human art, we find a posterior
term common to both — ^not adaptation for the end,

158 MiS. llU.MU's OBJECTION

because each has its own specific use, and the one
use is distinct from the other — but adaptation for
an end. It is on the strength of this similarity
that we can carr}^ the inference of a designing
cause from the seen to the unseen in specimens of
human handiwork ; and, by a stepping-stone in
every way as sure, from the seen handiwork of man
to the unseen handiwork of God. In each we
behold not subserviency to the same end, but
subserviency to an end — and on this generality in
the consequent of each, we infer for each an antece-
dent of like generality — a mind of com.mensurate
wisdom to devise, and of commensurate power to
execute, either of the structures that are placed
before our eyes. It is not brute matter in lumpish
and misshapen masses that indicates a deity. It
is matter in a state of orderly arrangement as in
the great apparatus of the heavens ; or matter more
finely and completely organized, as in the exquisite
structures of the animal and vegetable kingdom.
It is true we never saw such pieces of w-orkman-
ship made — but we have seen other pieces made
dissimilar to these only in the end of their fabrica-
tion, yet lilie unto these in subserviency to an end
— dissimilar therefore in that which is not essential
to our argument, but similar in that which is fully
sufficient for our argument. It is precisely in the
oversight of this distinction that the fallacy of the
atheistical reasoning lies. The singularity that
has been charged upon the W'orld belongs to
certain circumstantial things which have really
no place in the premises of our argument, and are
therefore not hidisnensable to the conclusion, Ir

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUxMENT. 15^

Ihe essential premises there is no singularity. The
formation of the whole world is like to nothincr
that we have ever witnessed — but in the forma-
tion of all that in the world holds out to us the
lesson of a Divinity, there is likeness to that which
we have often witnessed. We have, times and
ways without number, had experience of both
terms in the adaptation of parts to a?i end. It is
on this experience — the experience of a completed
sequence, that reason founds her concdusions. We
never with the eye of sense have perceived the
actual emanation of a creature from the fiat of its
Creator. But we have often seen the succession
between the working of a mind, and its workman-
ship, in a piece of fashioned and adjusted material-
ism. And tlierefore it is that the thousand goodly

complications which be on the face of our world

the trees, and the flov*ers, and the insects, and the
feathered birds, and the quadrupeds that browse
upon the earth, and the fishes of the sea w^hose
peculiar habitudes fit them for peopling that else
desolate waste of mighty waters ; and lastly, amidst
this general fulness both of animal and vegetable
life, erect and intelligent man, curiously furnished
in body and in mind, with aptitudes to all the
objects of external nature, and which turn into a
theatre of busy interest and enjoyment the crowded
and the glowing scene over v.hich he expatiates —
therefore it is, we say, that all bears so legibly the
impress of a governing spirit, that all speaks in
reason's ear so loudly of a God.

31. By this reasoning we avoid the necessity of
recurring to a new principle in order to repel or

160 MR, Hume's objection

ward off an assault of infidelity — an expedient,
which, unless the principle be very obvious in
itself, gives an exceeding frailty to the argument,
and causes it to be received with distrust. Per-
haps the tendency both of Reid and Stuart, was
to an excessive multiplication of the original laws
in our mental constitution, which they all the more
readily indulged, as it savoured so much of that
unshrinking Baconian philosophy, from the appli-
cation of which to the science of mind, they augured
so sanguinely — and in virtue of which, unseduced
by the love of simplicity, they would take their
lesson as to the number of ultimate facts whether
in the world of mind or matter from observation
alone. Now it is weJl to acquiesce in every
phenomenon, like that of magnetism, as if it v, ere
a distinct and ultimate principle of which no
further account can meanwhile be given — so long
as it withstands all the attempts of analysis to
resolve it into another phenomenon of a more
general and comprehensive quality. But this is
very different from a gratuitous multiplication of
first principles, and more especially from the con-
fident affirmation of one before unheard of till
framed for the accomplishment of a special service.
It appears to be a resting of the theistical argument
on a very precarious foundation, when the inference
of design from its effects, is made a principle sui
generis — instead of making it vvhat it really is one
case out of the many, \\ here by a principle more
comprehensive, we, on the recurrence of the same
consequent as before, infer the same antecedent
as before. We deprecate the introduction of such

TO THE A POSTERIORI ARGUMENT. 161

an auxiliary as calculated to give a mystical and
arbitrary character to the Philosophy of Religion;
afid hold it a far better offering to the cause, when
it is palpably made to rest on no other principles
than those which are recognised and read of all
men.

CHAPTER V.

On the Hypothesis that the World is Eternal.

1. But after all it may be asked, Is the world an
effect ? May it not have lasted for ever — and
might not the whole train of its present sequences
have gone on in perpetual and unvaried order from
all eternity ? In our reasoning upon antecedents
and consequents, we have presumed that the world
is a consequent. Could we be sure of this, it may
be thought — then on the principle of our last
chapter, let the adaptation of its parts to so many
thousand desirable objects be referred, and on the
basis of a multiplied experience too, to a designing
cause as its strict and proper antecedent. But
how do we know the world to be a consequent at
all ? Is there any greater absurdity in supposing
it to have existed as it now is, at any specified
point of time throughout the millions of ages that
are past, than that it shoidd so exist at this mo-
ment ? Does what we suppose might have been
then, imply any greater absurdity, than what we
actually see to be at present? Now might not

162 ox THE NON-ETERNITY OF

the same question he carried back to any point or
period of duration however remote — or, in other
words, might not we dispense with a beginning for
the world altogether ? .Such a consequent as our
world, if consequent it really be, would require, it
might be admitted, a designing cause or its ante-
cedent. But why recur to the imagination of its
being a consequent at all? Why not take for
granted the eternity of its being, instead of sup-
posing it the product of another, and then taking
for granted the eternity of his being ? And, after
all, it may be thought, that the eternity of our
world is but one gratuitous imagination instead of

two and, as to the difficulty of conceiving, this is

a difficulty which we are not freed from by the
theory of a God. Can w^e any more comprehend
His past eternity, than we can the past eternity of
matter — the everlasting processes of thought any
more than the everlasting processes of a material
economy — a circulation of feeling and sentiment
and purpose and effect that never had commence-
ment in an aboriginal mind ; than a circulation of
planets, or that orb of revolution which is described
by water through the elements of air and earth
and ocean, or thially the series of animal and
vegetable generations, , never having had com-
mencement in an aboriginal mundane system. At
this rate, the supposition of an intelligent Creator
may only be a shifting of the difficulty, from an
eternal Nature to an eternal Author of Nature.
If Nature is clearly made out to be a consequent,
then it might be admitted, that the adaptations
which abound' in it r)oint to an intelligent and

THE PRESENT ORDER OF THINGS. 103

designing cause. But this remains to be proved ;
and till this is done, it is contended, that it is just
as well to repose in the imagination of Eternal
Harmonies in a Universe, as of Eternal Harmonies
in the mind of One who framed it.

2. On this subject we have nothing to quote
from Mirabaud, whose work on the System of
Nature — though characterized more by its magni-
loquence than its magnificence, its plausibility than
its power — is fitted by its gorgeous generalizations
on nature and truth and the universe, to make
tremendous impression on the unpractised reader.
There is a certain phraseology which has on some
minds the effect of a sublime and seducing elo-
quence, while it excites in others a sensation of
utter distaste as if absolutely oversatiated with
vapidity and verbiage. This work is one of the
products of Germany ; and for upwards of fifty
years has been well known in the Continent of
Europe. Its circulation has been much extended
of late by the infidel press of our own country —
where it is, we understand, working mischief among
the half-enlightened classes of British society. We
know nothing of the history of its author. In real
strength and staple of thought he is a mere senti-
mental weakling when compared with Hume, from
whose Dialogues on Natural Religion we shall
give one or two extracts on the argument now in
question.

3. " Eor aught we can know a priori^ matter
may contain the source or spring of order originally
within itself as well as mind does ;. a«d there is no
more difficulty in conceiving that the several ele-

164 ON THE NON-ETERNITY OF

ments from an internal unknown cause may fall
into the most exquisite arrangement, than to con-
ceive that their ideas in the great universal mind
from a like internal unknown cause fall into that
arrangement. The equal possibility of both these
suppositions is allowed." Again — ^' If the ma-
terial world rests upon a similar ideal world, this
ideal world must rest upon some other ; and so on
without end. It were better therefore never to
look beyond the present material w^orld. By
supposing it to contain the principle of its order
within itself, we really assert it to be God; and
the sooner we arrive at that divine Being so much
the better. When you go one step beyond the
mundane system, you only excite an inquisitive
humour, which it is impossible ever to satisfy.
To say that the different ideas v.hich compose the
reason of the Supreme fall into order of themselves
and by their own nature, is really to talk without
any precise meaning. If it has a mearing, I would
fain know, why it is not as good sense to say, that
the parts of the material world fall into order of
themselves and by their own nature. Can the
one opinion be intelligible while the other is not
so ?" Lastly — " An ideal system arranged of
itself without a precedent design is not a vrhit
more explicable than a material which attains its
order in like manner ; nor is there any more diffi-
culty in the latter supposition than in the former."
" A mental world or universe of ideas requires a
cause as much, as does a material w^orld or uni-
verse of objects ; and if similar in its arr^ngerop-nt
mus^. require a similar cause,"

THE PRESENT OKDUR OF THINGS. 165

4. This is very distinctly put ; and we think
admits of as distinct and decisive a reply. The
Atheist does not perceive vrhy a material economy
as exemplified in the world might not fall into
order of itself, as well as a mental economy as
exemplified in God. The precise difference
between the two is, that we have had proof, as we
shall attempt to show, of a commencement to our
present material economy — we have had no such
proof of a commencement to the mental economy
which may have preceded it. There is room for
the question, how came the material system of
things into its present order? — because we have
reason to beheve that it has not subsisted in that
order from eternity. There is no such room for
the question, why might not the material have
fallen into its present order of itself, as well as the
mental that is conceived to have gone before it ?
We have no reason to l)eheve that this mental
economy ever was otherwise than it now is. The
latter question presumes that the mental did .fall
into order of itself, or which is the same thing,
that the Divinity had a commencement. In the
material economy we have the vestiges before our
eyes of its having had an origin, or in other words
of its being a consequent — and we have further-
more the experience that in every instance which
comes under full observation of a similar conse-
quent, that is of a consequent which involved as
the mundane order of things does so amply, the
adaptation of parts to an end, the antecedent was
a purposing mind which desired the end, and
devised the means for its accomplishment. We

1()6 ON THE NON-ETERNITY OF

might not have been called upon to ma.ke even a
single ascent in the path of causation, had the
world stood forth to view in the character or aspect
of iinmutabilit}'. But instead of this, both history
and observation tell of a definite commencement
to the present order — or, in other words, they
oblige us to regard this order as the posterior
term of a sequence ; and we, in reasoning on the
prior term, just follow the lights of experience
when we move upward from the world to an in-
telligent mmd that ordained it. It is this which
carries us backward one step from the world to
God — and the reason why we do not continue the
retrogression beyond God is, that we have not met
with an indication of his having had a commence-
ment. In the one case there is a beginning of the
present material system forced upon our convic-
tions ; and we proceed on the solid ground of
experience, when v.e infer that it begun in the
devisings of an antecedent mind. In the other case,
the case of the antecedent mind, there is no such
beginning forced upon our convictions ; and none
therefore that we are called upon to account for.
It is our part as far as in us lies to explain an
ascertained difficulty ; but not surely to explain an
imagined one. We must have some reason for
believing in the existence of a difficulty ere we are
called upon to solve it. We have ample reason for
regarding this world as a posterior term, and seeking
after its antecedent. But we have no such reason
for treating this antecedent as a posterior term,
and seeking for its prior term in a higher ante-
cedent. The one we see to be a changeable and

THE PRESENT ORDER OF THINGS. 167

a necent world. The other for aught we know
may be an unchangeable and everlasting God.
So that when the question is put — .Why may not
the material economy fall into order of itself, as
well as the mental which we affirm to have caused
it? — our reply is, that so far from this mental
economy falling into order of itself, we have yet to
learn that it ever had to fall into order at all.
The one order, the material, we know, not to have
■ been from everlasting. The other, the mental,
which by all experience and analogy must have
preceded the material, bears no symptom which
we can discover, of its ever having required any
remoter economy to call it into being.

5. At the same time we must admit that on this
question between the eternity of matter and the
eternity of mind, there has been advanced, on the
Theistical side of the controversy, a deal of specu-
lation and argument with which our understandings
do not at all coalesce. We have already stated
the reasons of our having no confidence in the a
priori argument — although both Sir Isaac Newton
and Dr. Samuel Clarke were employed, we believe,
in the construction of it. But besides this, there
is a world of not very certain metaphysique we do
think, about the necessity of mind to originate
motion in the universe — and that v/ere there nought
but matter all space would be alike filled with it,
and all would be inert and immoveable. We have
already given one specimen of this gratuitous style
of arguing from AYollaston — and without offering
any more from other v/riters of that period, we
may state that in the general ^^♦feel no sympathy

168 ON THE NON-ETERNITY OF

of understanding with much which has been written
on the side of Natural Rehgion. There appears
for example to be nothing substantial or eiFective in
that reasoning which is founded on the comparison'
between mind in the abstract and matter in the
abstract — or which, on the bare existence of matter
apart from its collocations, would conclude the
necessity of an antecedent Intelligence to originate
it into being. The palpable argument for a God
as grounded on the phenomena of visible nature •
lies, not in the existence of matter, but in the
arrangement of its parts — a firmer stepping-stone to
the conclusion — than the mere entity of that which
is corporeal is to the previous entity of that which
is spiritual. To us it marks far more intelligibly
the voice of a God, to have called forth the beau-
teous and beneficent order of our world from the
womb of chaos, than to have called forth the
substance of our world from the chambers of
nonentity. We knovv that the voice of God
called forth both. But it is one of those voices
which sounds so audibly and distinctly in Reason'^
ear. Of the other w(> have been told, and we
think needed to be told by Revelation.

6. The question to be resolved then is — ^not
whether the matter of tlie v.orld, but whether the
present order of the Avorid had a commencement ?

7. Of the various reasons which might be
alleged in favour of such a commencement, there
are some that we would advance with much greater
confidence than others. There is one by Dr.
Paley which does not appear to us satisfactory —
and in his staten^t of which, we think that for

THE PRESENT OKDER OF THINGS. 169

ouce he is metaphysically obscure. He, in k'S
Natural Theology, brings it forward as a general
position, that wherever wo meet with an organic
structure where there is the adaptation of compli-
cated means to an end, the cause for its being must
be found out of itself and apart from itself. This,
at least, does not carry the instant assent of
a proposition that announces at once its own
evidence. Neither, although we think it a very
impressive consideration, would we insist on the
argument by which it is attempted to be proved,
that although the existence of each organic being
can be accounted for by derivation from a parent
of its own likeness — yet we are not on that account
to acquiesce in the imagination of an infinitude
for the whole race, as if the line of successive
generations reached backward to eternity. It
does seem as irrational so to conclude, as to say
of an iron chain which ascends perpendicularly
from the surface of our earth, and at its higher
extremity was too distant for vision, that each link
was sustained by the one immediately above it,
and that simply if the whole had no termination
each would have a support of this kind and so the
whole be supported. It seems as impossible that
there should be an eternal race of men or animals,
as that a chain rising infinitely upwards from our
earth should hang upon nothing. If there be
good reason for the belief, that there must be a
suspending power for the whole chain at whatever
height it may be conceived to go — there is at least
the semblance of as good reason for the behef, that
there must be a prime originating power for the
VOL. I. H

170 ON THE NON-ETERNITY OF

whole race, however remote the antiquity of
its origin. But even this consideration we at
present shall forego — thinkmg as we do that the
non-eternity of our animal and vegetable races
rests upon a basis of proof certainly as firm as
this, and greatly more palpable.

8. This proof is of two kinds. The recency of
the present order of things — the recency of the
world, meaning by this term not the matter in
respect to being, which forms its substratum; but
the dispositions of matter, more especially as exem-
plified in the structures of the animal and vegetable
kingdoms, which form its existing economy* — the
commencement of the world in this sense of it may
be learned, either from the evidence of history or
the evidence of observation. If there have been
a creation, it belongs to the order of historical
events, and like any other such event might be-
come the subject of an historical testimony — the
authority of which might be tried by the rules and
decided by the judgment of ordinary criticism. In
this respect there is no difference between these
two facts — the origin of a world and the origin of
a kingdom. They are ahke susceptible of being
made known by competent and contemporaneous
witnesses, and of being transmitted downward on
a pathway of oral or written tradition — the con-
tinuity of which and the credibihty of which are
ahke cognizable, by the versant in that species,
of erudition. This evidence is distinct from that
of direct and scientific observation, just as the

• "The proper and original meaning in fact botli of the Greek
m*9fMs and tho Latin mnndtu.

THE PRESENT ORDER OF THINGS. 171

evidence of a record for some bygone event is
distinct from that of our senses. We might have
documentary information as to the precise year of
the building of a house, or we might be satisfied
by mai'ks and appearances of which we have the
immediate eyesight, that it was built wkhin the
last century. In like manner we might have
evidence, if not for the precise year or century at
which the present system of visible things was put
together, at least for all that we are in quest of as
connected with our present argument that it was
put together at some time. The historical evidence
for a commencement to the present order of the
material world is all that we shall notice in this
preliminary chapter — postponing our view of its
observational evidence to the next book, when we
treat of the proofs for the being of a God in the
dispositions of matter.

9. There is one principle which should never be
lost sight of, when investigating the Evidence of
Religion, or indeed any evidence which relates to
questions of fact. We mean the sound and sterling
quality of that evidence which is either historical
or experimental. The truth is, that the historical,
when good and genuine, resolves itself into the
experimental. The only difference is, that instead
of our own observation, it substitutes the observa-
tion of others. We receive by our ears what we
are assured by the diagnostics of credible testimony,
that they have seen by their eyes. Historical
evidence has thus the character ; and, in proportion
as it is substantiated, should have the effect of the
observational. Origmally, it is the evidence of

172 ON THE NON-ETERNITY OF

sense — and no one can question the paramount
authority of this evidence over all the plausibilities
of speculation. It is a very obvious principle,
although often forgotten in the pride and prejudice
of controversy, that what has been seen by one
pair of human eyes is of force to countervail all
that has been reasoned or guessed at by a thousand
human understandings. This is just the Baconian
principle in science — and all we want is the scru-
pulous and faithful application of it to religion.
In this we would have religion to make common
cause with philosophy — and, in the formation of
our creed, we should feel as little inclined as any of
philosophy's most enhghtened disciples to build an
airy hypothesis on an unsubstantial foundation
We no more want to devise or excogitate a system
by any creative exercise of our own, than the most
patient of those physical inquirers who question
nature in their laboratories; and, upon a single
adverse response, would dispost the theory of a
whole millennium from its ascendancy over the
schools. They seek for truth on the field of ex-
periment alone ; and, if.not able to stand this ordeal,
neither the beauty of an opinion nor the inveteracy
of its long possession will save it from its over-
throw. Such is the deference which they; and
such also is the deference which we would render
to the authority of observation. In every question
of fact, it is all in all. It is so in the things of
science — it is so in things of sacredness. We
would look at both, not through the medium of
imagination but of evidence — ^nd that, whether we
sit in judgment on a question of our own science.

THE PRESENT ORDER OF THINGS. 173

or on a question of geology — whether we invest!
gate the past history and present state of the
divine administration, or investigate the past physi-
cal history and actual state of our globe. In either,
we should deem the real findings of one man to
be of more value than the splendid fancies of a
thousand men.

10. For example — ^in the latter science, we may
have one doctrine on the degradation of the hills,
and another on the encroachment or regress of the
sea, and another on the relation between the
position of the strata and the character of the fossil
remains to be found in them. Of the last of these
it is evident, that the results of theory must give
way to the results of observation, should they stand
opposed to each other; and in reference to the
two first it is obvious, that there might be an
evidence of history which should overbear the
speculation. For instance had we the authentic
memorials of a trigonometrical survey taken two
thousand years back, and with the same securities
for its correctness that we have in the surveys of
the present day, who would not prefer the infor-
mations of such a document to all the plausibilities
of all the speculatists ? It were in the very spirit
of our modern science to learn of the height of our
mountains and the line and locality of our shores,
from the men who had then measured rather than
from the men who v/ere now arguing them — and it
is just a recognition of the great principle that all
the philosophy of actual being in the universe, to
be solidly established, must rest on the basis of
facts — when we affirm that the doctrines of science

174 ON THE NON-ETERNITY OF

want an indispensable prop, if they are not found
to quadrate with the sure depositions of history.

11. It is thus, we think, that in the strict
philosophy of the question, the geological specula-
tions of our day should come under the tribunal,
or be brought to the touchstone of authentic
history. At a time when those physical characters
are so confidently spoken of, which have been
sculptured on rock, as it were, by the finger of
nature, and wherewith she hath recorded the anti-
quity and revolutions of the globe ; we are not to
overlook those characters which have been trans-
mitted to us from past ages on the vehicle of human
testimony, deponing perhaps to the recency of our
present world. We mean to affirm that if some
credible and authentic memorial of history stands
in the way of any theory, there is violence done to
the philosophy of observation — when such an ele-
ment is not disposed of, and perhaps not so much
as adverted to. It is not a comprehensive \iew
which is taken of the question, by those who run
waywardly and unbridled on some track of specu-
lation, and who bhnk any of the evidence that
legitimately bears upon it. In questions of fact,
history, when marked with the usual signatures of
truth, is not only a competent, but in most instances
is the best voucher that can be appealed to. If
the Baconian logic require that one's own observa-
tion should give the law to his o\^'n fancy, it equally
requires that the observation or the findings of one
man should give law to the fancy of another. Now
history is the vehicle on which are brought to us
the observations of other men, whether the path

THE PRESENT ORDER OF THINGS. 175

over which it has travelled be a distance in space
or a distance in time — that is, whether they whose
observations it bears to us ai'tj the men of other
countries, or of by-gone ages. History if not direct
is at least derivative observation; and if rightly
derived is only observation at a distance instead of
observation on the spot. There is an end of all
solid philosophy, if such evidence is set aside — and
that, to make room for the mere wantonness of the
human spirit, that would fain substitute its own
creations in the place of ail which observation
distinctly points out, or which history audibly tells
of the creation by God. At this rate the fair
domain of science is again laid open, as in the days
of the schoolmen, to the misrule, the wild vagaries
of unchastened imagination.

12. Hence it is that in the exceeding dimness of
reason or of nature's light, we do feel the utmost
value for all those historical notices, which serve
to indicate that the world had a beginning. Among
the ambiguities of natural theism, and between the
plausibilities which can be alleged on either side of
this question — between an eternal universe whose
laws and processes are now as they have ever been,
and an eternal God who hath ordained these laws
and still overrules these processes — there is no
evidence that we should more desiderate than what
may be called the observational. We shoidd like
the question to be rescued from the obscurity of
metaphysique — and that the clear experimental light
of authentic and credible history were shed over it.
If from the documents and vestiges of other times,
there could be collected even so much as the bare

176 ON THE NON-ETERNITY OF

fact, that, somehow or other the world had a
beginning, this would make room for the argu-
ment of its having begun in the devices of a mind
that had an aim and a purpose in the formation of
it. Let it in this Vv ay be made out that the world
really is a consequent — and then from what we
observe of this consequent we might reason to an
antecedent — ^from the adaptations which abound
in it to objects that are palpable, might we reason
to a mind which designed such adaptations because
it desired such objects — from the beauties and
the benefits of its most orderly arrangement, might
we reason to an Intelligent Being who had the
Taste to conceive what is lovely, and the Bene-
volence to institute what is useful, and both the
Power and the Wisdom to frame a mechanism
which moved in such exquisite harmony, and
wrought off so abundant a happiness to that host
of sentient creatures who are on the surface of our
Earth. Let there only be evidence, whether in
nature or in history, by which to get quit of the
hypothesis that this world with all its present laws
and harmonies must be eternal — and then, on the
stepping-stone of a world so beauteously ordered
and so bountifully filled, might we rise to the
sound hypothesis of an Eternal Mind from whom
this universe is an emanation. This would give
full introduction to the reasonings a posteriori —
carrying us at once from the indications of
design to a primary designer. All that is needed
is satisfactory evidence that these indications are
not from Eternity — that the curious mechanism,
for example, of our bodies hath not alw ays existed,

THE PRESENT ORDEK OF THINGS. 177

and been transmitted down v.ards from one generation
to another by a law which hath been everlastingly
in operation — in a word that things have not con-
tinued to be as they are at present, we shall not
say from the beginning of the Creation, for the
fact of a Creation is that which we are now in
quest of — ^l)ut that they have not so been from
Eternity.

13. But ere proceeding farther, there is still
another principle which we would here interpose,
in the shape of a lemma, on the general doctrine
of the Evidences. Whatever strength there may
be in the argument for the theology of revelation,
it makes a clear addition to the argument for
certain propositions in the theology of nature —
such as the being of a God, and the immortality
of the soul. Now, there is a certain habit or
order of conception among the advocates of
religion, which serves to throw a disguise over the
real strength of the cause. We often, in the first
place, read of Christianity as being based upon
natural religion, as if it was on the preliminary
establishment of the one that the other was founded.
But, in the second place, it is held preposterous
and illogical, to discuss the theism of nature on any
other reasons than those which are furnished by
the light of nature. Now, this habit of viewing
the one as the foundation and the other as the
superstructure — and at the same time of treating
their evidences as wholly distinct and independent
of each other, has had the effect, we should say, of
unnecessarily weakening the defences of religion.
What we contend f r is, that it is logically a cora-
h2

178 ON THE NON-ETERNITY OF

petent thing, to take, if we may so term it, of the
cement which goes to consolidate the structure,
and that for the purpose of giving firmness and
sohdity to the foundation. For example, what-
ever of evidence there might be for the authority
of the Jewish Scriptures, we have a right to
appropriate for the support of natural theology, in
as far as its doctrines enter into the contents or
informations of that volume. If, instead of a
succession of Jewish, it had been an equally
numerous and creditable succession of authors in
any other nation, we should have made this use of
them. Had there been a continuous chain of
credible and well-supported testimony, passing
upward through a series of approved and classical
writers in Rome, and Greece, and Egypt — each
reiterating from their predecessors a consistent
testimony regarding a succession of patriarchs,
and a flood in the early ages of the world, and a
creation at the outset — their history would have
been admitted to the proof, and been held as a
most important witness in the question of a Deity.
Now, what we contend is, thac however insensible
to the force and the value of it — this is a proof
which we actually possess — and, by all sound
criticism not the less valid or impressive, that
it answers a double purpose — or that it makes
at once for the leading truths of natural the-
ology, and for the peculiarities both of the Jewish
and the Christian faith. It is at all times com-
petent for us to discuss the existence of God as
a separate proposition — and to fetch from every
quarter, where evidence can be found, all the

THE PRESENT ORDER OF THINGS. 179

arguments, whether of reason or of testimony,
which can be brought to bear upon it. Though
natural religion should be indeed the basis, and
Christianity but the erection which springs from it
— still it may so happen, that from one and the
same source there might be extracted a material
for the consolidation of both — and so the whole
fabric of religion may suffer by our restricting our-
selves to a partial instead of a full use of that
material. If the testimonies we have for the
recency of our world as now constituted, would
have been so eagerly seized upon, in behalf of
natural theism, had they come to us through the
channel of secular or profane history — then, we
are not to lose the service of them even as present
auxiliaries to our cause, unless it can be shown to
us in what way they have become impotent or
worthless, by their having descended to us through
the channel of sacred history. We thus hold, that
in virtue of the artificial process by which the
whole argument has been conducted, there has
been created what we should call an artificial
scarcity of argument for the doctrines of natural
religion. For there is no real scarcity. On the
firm and frequent stepping-stones of a sustained
history, we may rise to the observational evidence
of a creation and a Creator — but, by the generai
practice of our guides and conductors, we are kept
at the present stage of our inquiries, from entering
upon this path. The fact of creation is strictl}
an historical one, and is therefore susceptible of
being proven by historical evidence, if such is to be

180 ON THE NON-ETERNITY OF

found. And by all the signatures of valid or in-
corrupt testimony, v/e are directed to a place and
a people, among whom the registers both of crea-
tion and providence were deposited. Yet on the
existence of God, as a preliminary question, these
leading credentials are kept out of sight — and we
are presented instead, with but the secondary or
shadowy reflections of them in the oral traditions
of other places and other people, or the dying and
distant echoes of nations that had been scattered
abroad over the face of the world. It is thus that
the fundamental demonstrations and doctrines in a
course of theology are made to lack of that strength
which rightfully belongs to them. We go in pur-
suit of dim or mythological allusions, to be found
in heathen writers ; and should we catch at some
•remote semblance of the Mosaic story, whether in
the literature of Greeks or Hindoos, we rejoice
over it as if a treasure more precious than all that
we possess. Now, whatever semblance may be
found there, the substance of this argument is to
be found in the succession of Jewish and Christian
writers. We ask no special indulgence for them.
We should like them to be tested in the same way
as all other authors ; and, ere they are admitted as
the chroniclers of past ages, to pass through the
ordeal of the same criticism that they do. It is
thus that we would trace by its successive land-
marks, what may be called the great central stream
of that history which stretches from the commence-
ment of our existing world to the present day —
and it is only thus that our minds can be adequately

THE PRESENT ORDER OF THINGS. 181

possessed with the richness and power of the his-
torical evidences for a God.*

* Of the coincidences between profane authors and the Mosaic
history, we have a very good precis in the 16th Section of tho
1st Book of " Grotius on the Truth of the Christian Religion"—
with a copious exemplification in the footnotes which are appended
to it — tending to show that the most ancient tradition among all
nations is exactly agreeable to the religion of Moses. In support
of this he quotes from the remains of the Phoenician histories, from
the accounts transmitted to us of the Indians and Egyptians, from
tho traditions preserved both in Greek and L itiu and Jewish and
Christian writers, of whom, from the stores of his vast and varied
erudition, he presents us with many interesting specimens. The
notices which he collects from these multifarious sources 'respect
chiefiy tlie chaos out of which our present system was formed,
the framing of animals, the creation of man after the divine image
and the dominion given to him over the creatures, the energy of
the divine word in the production of all things, the priority of
darkness to light, the infusion of life into all that is vital by the
Spirit of God, the formation of man from the matter of the earth,
the division of time into weeks, with the special honour rendered
by various distinct nations to the seventh day. In further cor-
roboration of the harmony between profane and sacred history,
we are presented with allusions to the primitive nakedness of our
race, to the innocence and simplicity and happiness of a golden
age, to the history respecting Adam's fall and the great longevity
of the patriarchs. To these must be added the almost universal
tradition of a deluge — with many gleanings of ancient authorship
about its minuter particulars, as the ark in which a few of our
race were preserved and other species of animals, tho place on
which it rested, the sending forth from it of a dove and a raven.
Besides these, resemblances can be traced between the current
legends of various writers on the one hand, and on the other the
scriptural narratives of the tower of Babel and the rite of circum-
cision, the histories of Aluaham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph and Moses,
the later scriptural nanMtives which respect Elijah, Elisha and
Moses. It is well that in these shadowy reflections, there is none
of that incongruity with sacred history which can affect the truth
and authority of its informations. But when we consider the
weight and number of the immediate testimonies that we possess
in support of these informations, the continuity and strength of
their evidence, the marks both internal and external which
demonstrate the authenticity of the Bible, we cannot but regard
it as a mai'vellous phenomenon, that inquirers should feel tho
satisfaction as of a stronger evidence in these hazy reflections ol
the truth, than when they view it in its own direct and primary
radiance.

182 ON THE NON-KTERNITV OF

14. We are far from meaning to insinuate that,
beside the direct testimony of the sacred volumes,
there are not other memorials of the world's
recency v/liich are worthy of our regard — such
probabilities, even within the range of Nature's
discernments of a recent Creation, or at least of
a first (however remote) origin of Things as might
serve to demonstrate that we live in the midst
of a derived and not of an everlasting system ;
that many of tlie most exquisite structures which
arrest the eye and the admiration of beholders are
in the only important sense of the term consequents,
and that no other antecedent can be found for them
than the Hat of an intelligent Creator. There
have many such vestiges been collected and ap-
pealed to, such as the recency of science — the
Hmited range of our historical traditions, mounting
upwards to only a few thousand years — the vast
capacity of the species for general or collective
improvement contrasted with the little progress
which they have yet made, and which marks it is
supposed but a comparatively modern origin to the
human family — the expansive force of population,
and yet its shortness still from the territory and
resources of a globe, that could accommodate so

many hundreds more of millions upon its surface

These and several more taken chiefly from the
history of nations, and the migration of tribes as
indicated by the spread and the similarity of
cognate languages, have been much insisted on for
the purpose of building up an argument, and
strengthening the barrier against the tide of a
desolating Atheism. They are of some value,

THE PRESENT OHDER OF THINGS. \H3

we admit. It is well that, if not very great or
sensible confirmations of, they are at least in
coincidence with the main narrative. They shed
a fainter light on the question, but they show-
nothing opposite to what is shown by the light of
the direct testimonies.

15. After all, they are the direct testimonies,
handed down from one to another in the stream of
Jewish and Christian Authors, which constitute
the main strength and solidity of the historical
argument for the historical fact of a Creation.
There might be fitter occasions for entering into
the detail of this Evidence — but we hold it not out
of place to notice even at present the strong points
of it. In tracing the course upwards from the
present day, we arrive by a firm and continuous
series of authors at that period, when not only the
truth of the Christian story is guaranteed by
thousands of dying martyrs — but when the Old
Testament Scriptures, these repositories of the
Jewish story, obtamed a remarkable accession to
then* evidence vhich abundantly compensates for
their remoteness from our present age. We allude
to the split that took place between two distinct
and independent or, stronger still, two bitterly
adverse bodies of v, itnesses at the outset of the
Christian economy. The publicity of the New
Testament miracles — the manifest sincerity of
those who attested them as evinced by their cruel
sufferings in the cause, not of opinions which they
held to be true, but of facts which they perceived
by their senses — the silence of inveterate and im-
passioned enemies most willing, if they could, to

184 ON THE NOX-ETERNITY OF

have transmitted the decisive refutation of thorn to
modern times — these compose the main strei t^ih.
of the argument, for our later Scriptures. And
then, beside the references in which they abound
to the former Scriptures — and by which, in fact,
they give the whole weight of their authority to
the Old Testament — we have the superadded testi-
mony of an entire nation, now ranged in zealous
hostility against the Christian Faith, and bent
upon its overthrow. They who are conversant in
the practice, or who have reflected most on the
Philosophy of E\idence, know well how to estimate
the strength which hes in a concurrence of testi-
monies where collusion is impossible ; and still more
where one of the parties, inflamed with hatred and
rivalship against the other, could almost choose to
disgrace themselves for the sake of involving their
adversaries in disgrace and discredit along with
them. It is this which stamps a character and a
credit on the archives of the Jewish history, whereof
it were vain to seek another exemplification over
again in the whole compass of q^-udition. These
memorials of our race, which they had no interest
in preserving — for, mainly, they were but the
records of their own perversity and dishonour, had
been handed down to them by uncontrolled tradi-
tion from former ages ; and were now embodied in
the universal faith of the people. And when the
two great parties diverged, however widely asunder
in every other article of belief — they held a firm
agreement in this, the perfect integrity of at least
the historical Scriptures. Had there been a juggle
here why did not an enraged priesthood stand forth

THE PRESENT ORDER OF THINGS. 185

to expose it — that along with it they might expose
the weakness of that alleged prophecy which formed
one great pillar of the Christian argument ? How,
in the fierce conflicts of this heated partizanship, did
not the secret break out of an imposition on the cre-
dulity of mankind, if imposition there was ? — and
out of this fell warfare among the impostors who
were for palming upon the world the miracles of
the present or the memorials of the past, ought not
that very effervescence to have arisen which would
have swept the imposture of both religions from the
face of the earth? It says every thing for the
truth both of the Christian story and of the He-
brew records, that they survived this hurricane ;
and more especially that, ere the observances of the
Mosaic ritual were done away, so strong a demon-
stration should have been given of the national
faith in those documents by which the solemnities
of the Jewish religion w^ere incorporated with the
facts of the Jewish history. The virtue of an
institution like the Passover to authenticate the
narrative in which it took its profest origin, and of
which it is the standing memorial, has been ably
expounded by LesHe and others. It is thus that
we are carried upwards through a medium of

historic light to the times of the Patriarchs or

even though we ascend not the ladder, but abide
as it were at the bottom of it, we shall find in the
Jev/s of the present day, the characteristics of a
singular race which bespeak them to be a monu-
ment of old revelations. They have maintained
their separate identity, as no other nation ever did,
among the tempests and the fluctuations in which

186 ON THE NON-ETERNITY OF

they have been cradled for two thousand years — •
and now stand before us as a living evidence of their
past story — and an evidence along with it, that
throughout the long succession of those fitful tur-
moils which have taken place in the wars and
politics of our world for so many centuries — there
lias been indeed the controlling agency of a God
mixed up with the history of human affairs.

16. Kow the truth of the continuous narrative
which forms the annals of this wondrous people
would demonstrate a great deal more than what we
at present are in quest of — that the world had a
beginning — or rather that many of the world's
present organizations had a beginning, and have
not been perpetuated everlastingly from one gene-
ration to another by those laws of transmission
which now prevail over the wide extent of the
animal and vegetable kingdoms. We hold the
Jewish Scriptures to be authentic memorials of
this fact — and although we might afterwards find a
better place for the contents both of the Jewish
and Christian revelations — yet v,e cannot forbear,
amid all that is imagined about the sufficiency of
the natural argument, to offer our passing homage
to these greater and lesser lights of our Moral
Hemisphere, which have both of them together
poured a flood of radiance over the field of Natural
Religion, and so as to have manifested many objects
there which would have been but dimly seen by
the eye of Nature. Believing as we do that the
surest of all philosophy is that which rests on the
basis of well-accredited facts, in justice to our
views on the strict science of the question, we

THE PRESENT ORDER OF THINGS. 187

must state the informations even of the Old Testa-
ment to be far more satisfying to ourselves than all
the vaunted theorems of academic demonstration.
There is a great reigning spirit by which the varied
authorship of this book is so marked and har-
monized— there is such a unity of design and
contemplation in writings that lie scattered over
the tract of many centuries — there is such a stately
and consistent march from the first dawnings of this
singular history, towards that great evolution in
which the whole prophecy and priesthood of the
consecrated land converged and terminated — there
is withal such an air of simple and venerable great-
ness over this earlier record — such loftiness in
its poetry — such obvious characters of truth and
sanctity and moral earnestness throughout all its
compositions, as superadd the strongest weight of
internal testimony to the outw^ard and historical
evidence by which it is supported. This may
afterwards be more distinctly unfolded — ^but we
cannot even at this stage of our incjuiries withhold
all reference to a Book on whose aspect there sits
the expression of most unfeigned honesty, and in
whose disclosures we have lessons of the sublimost
Theism.

BOOK II.

PROOFS FOR THE BEING OF A GOD IN THE
DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

CHAPTER I.

On the Distinction between the Laws of Matter and the
Dispositions of Matter.

1 . We have already adverted to the style of that
argumentation which has been employed, for the
purpose of demonstrating the creation of matter
from the mere existence of it ; and charged it with
the same obscurity and want of obviousness which
characterize the a priori reasoning. We do not
perceive how on the observation of an unshapen
mass, there can from its being alone, be drawn any
clear or strong inference in favour of its non-
eternity ; or that simply because it now is, a time
must have been when it was not. We cannot thus
read in the entity of matter, a prior non-entity
or an original commencement for it; and some-
thing more must be affirmed of matter than barely
that it is, ere we can discern that either an artist's
mhid or an artist's hand has at all been concerned
with it.

2. But more than this. This matter, whether
an organized solid or a soft and yielding fluid

190 ox THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTEB

congregated apparently at random in the receptacie
which holds it, might exhibit a number of properties
and manifest itself to be the subject of various
laws, without announcing that either a creative
power or an intelligent purpose had to do with
the formation of it. For of what signincancy is it
towards any conclusion of this sort — that an isolated
lump is possessed of hardness, or solidity, or
weight ; or that we can discern in it the law of
cohesion, and the law of impulse, and the law of
gravitation. These laws might all be detected in
any one body, or they might be shared in common
throughout an aggregate of bodies — scattered about
in rude disorder ; yet exhibiting no trace whatever
of a first production at the mandate of any living
potentate, or any subsequent distribution which
bespoke a skilful and scheming intellect ^^hich
presided over it. Matter must have had some
properties to certify its existence to us, it being by
its properties alone and not by any direct view of
its naked substratum that we come to recognise it
— so that, to learn of matter at all, it must have
had some properties or other belonging to it.
Now these properties might be conceived of vari-
ously, and all the actual laws of the material
system might be discovered in a confused medley
of things strewn around without any principle of
arrangement — its chemical, and optical, and mag-
netic, and mechanical laws ; and yet from the study
of these, no argument might be drawn in favour of
a God, who either called the matter into being, or
endowed it with the attributes which we find it to
possess.

ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER. 191

3. The main evidence, then, for a God, as faj
as this can be collected from visible nature, lies not
in the existence of matter, neither in its laws, but
in its dispositions. This distinction between thQ
laws and the dispositions of matter has been over-
looked by theists; or at least riot been brought
forward with sufficient prominency. Nevertheless
it is essential, not only for the purpose of exhibit-
ing the argument in its strength, but of protecting
it from the sophistry of infidels.

4. It may be difficult to discriminate, or at least
to characterize by a single word, what that is in
matter apart from laws, which we w^ould single out
as affording the chief argument for a God. It is
not enough to say that, in contradistinction to the
properties of matter', we would appeal to the collo-
cation of its parts. No doubt a very great pro-
portion of the evidence that we are now seeking to
demonstrate lies in the right placing of things, but
not the whole of it ; and this, therefore, is only d
specimen of our meaning, without being the full
and general exemplar of it. It is not from some
matter being harder than others that we infer a
God ; but when we behold the harder placed where
it is obviously the most effective for a beneficial
end, as in the nails, and claws, and teeth of
animals, in this we see evidence for a God. It is
not the law of refraction in optics that manifests to
us a designer ; but there is a very striking manifes-
tation of Him in the position of the lenses of the
eye, and of the retina behind it — being such as to
make the rays of light converge into that picture

192 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

which is indispensable for the purposes of vision.
It is not from the law alone of muscular contrac-
tion in animal substances that we argue for a God ;
b.ut from the circumstance, that wherever a collec-
tion of fibres having this property is to be found in
the comphcated ff amework of a living creature, the
moving force thereby established is always in con-
junction with a something that is moveable, and
with motions that subserve a useful end — insomuch
that along with an apparatus of moving forces, we
have a corresponding apparatus of parts to be
moved ; and furnished too, with the requisite joints
or hinges — in other words, not the right powers
only, but the right mechanics for giving operation
and eifect to the powers. Now, though these
adaptations may all be quoted as adaptations of
place, and therefore as instances of wise and bene-
ficial collocation, it is not right placing alone which
gives rise to all our beneficial adaptations. Things
must be rightly shaped and rightly proportioned ;
and besides, looking to laws and forces alone, one
can imagine that were all the other dispositions of
our present actual economy to remain as they are,
a mere change in the intensity of these forces
would be the occasion of many grievous maladjust-
ments— as a gravitation of ten times greater force
towards the centre of the earth, with only the
present powers of locomotion in those who inhabit
the surface of it; or more intense affinities of
cohesion in the various material substances within
the use or reach of man ; or an atmosphere and
ether for the propagation of light, of different

ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER. 193

elasticity than what is now so exquisitely suited to
our present susceptibilities of sound and vision.*
These instances are enough to prove that the term
collocation does not of itself suffice for expressing
the distinction at w4iich we now aim. A different
centrifugal influence on each planet of our system
might have given to each an elongated instead of a
nearly cncular orbit, and the benefits of such an
orbit cannot therefore be referred to collocation
alone. The term collocation, no doubt, might
express by a single w^ord that which in this argu-
ment is contrasted to " Law." But a better per-
haps might be found. It certainly does not com-
prehend all which we wish to include in it as
marking design at its first setting up. It is not
the mere placing of the parts of matter which
affords decisive indication of this, but of parts
shaped and sized in the most beneficial way —
beside being endowed with the very forces or
motions that were the most suitable in the given
circumstances. Beside the original placing of
Jupiter and his satelhtes, we must advert in the
argument for intelligence to the original direotion
and intensity of the motions which were communi-
cated to them. Beside the situation of the parts
in an anatomical mechanism, reference must be
had both to the form and magnitude of the parts.
Perhaps then, instead of the collocations, it were
better, as more expressive of v/hatever in matter
might be comprehended under the head of its

* Whewell, in the second chapter of the Introduction to his
truly admirable Bridgewater Treatise, distinguishes both between
the force of a law and its intensity or rate, which latter is an
arbitrary magiaitude.

VOL. I. I ■

194 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

arbitrary arrangements, that we contrasted the dis-
positions of matter with its laws.

5. For the purpose, then, of viewing aright
what that is, in which, nakedly and singly, the
chief strength of the natural argument for a God
lies — we should not only distinguish between the
existence of matter and its dispositions, but also
between the laws of matter and its dispositions.
We have already said, that we detach an ingredient
of weakness from the cause, when we give up that
part of the argument which is founded on the bare
existence of matter; and we at least bring out
more prominently, because more separately, the
main strength of the argument — when we discri-
minate between the evidence for a divine wisdom
in the laws of matter, and the evidence for a divine
wisdom in the disposition of its parts. If matter
have existed from eternity, it must have had pro-
perties of some kind ; and why not, it is asked, as
well the actual properties which characterize it as
any others ? La Place, indeed, goes so far as to
found an atheistical insinuation on the doctrines
whioh he professes to demonstrate — that every
virtue which radiates from a central point diminishes
in intensity with the squares of the distances ; and
hence, if gravitation be a property at all, the actual
law of gravitation is an essential property of matter.
Now, it is not sufficiently adverted to, that we can
even afford to give up the evidence as indicated
singly by the laws, because of the overpassing
evidence which is indicated by the collocations of
matter. Laws of themselves would announce
nought whatever of the hand or mind of an

ox THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER. 195

artificer. The truth is, that with laws and with-
out collocations or dispositions, we should still
have but a heaving, turbid, disorderly chaos —
whereas it is by the collocations as adapted to the
laws that the only decisive indications of counsel
or contrivance are given. We can imagine all the
present and existmg laws of matter to be in full
operation; and yet, just for the want of a right
local disposition of parts, the universe might be
that wild undigested medley of things, in which no
one trace or character of a designing architect was
at all discernible. Bodies may have gravitated
from all eternity through the wide expanse of
nature, as they do now. Light may have diffused
itself by emanation from various sources with its
present velocity. Fluids may have commixed
with solids ; ' and each class of substances have had
the very properties which they possess at this
moment. All the forces whether of mechanics or
of chemistry, or even of physiology, might have
been inherent in the various substances of nature ;
and yet in the random play of all these physical
energies, nothing still but a chaos might have
emerged, that gave no indication whatever of a
presiding Mind, which dhected the principles and
the processes of this immense universe, to any one
end or object that mind can be conceived as set
upon. A headlong gravitation might have amal-
gamated all the matter of the universe into one
mass. And what of this matter was in a liquid
or aerial form, might have buoyed all the lighter
substances to the exterior of this rude mundane
system. And motion might have been excited by

196 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

those inequalities of temperature which the cease-
less operations of chemistry give rise to. And this
motion, whether communicated by impulse or with-
stood by resistance, might have ever and anon
been renewed by the partial action of the evolved
heat on the susceptible fluids of that turbid and
ever heaving mass which constituted the whole
Universe — and thus a perpetual vortex of move-
ments might have been kept up, all under the
guidance of those very laws which it is the object
of our existing Philosophy to ascertain. There
might have been the rotation of a vast unweildy
sphere; and the coherence of its parts by attraction;
and the play of various activities among the particles
of the mass ; and even such vegetative or animate
tendencies as, with a right assortment of the sub-
stances in which they reside, might have given
birth to the two great families of the great Physio-
logical kingdom, but, without such -assortment, ever
and anon fell short and were frustrated in the
formation of a complete organic being. All this is
conceivable with the present laws, just if without
the present collocations. In truth, there is not
one law of matter which now falls under the obser-
vation of ihquirers that, if unaccompanied with
such a collocation as shall suit the parts of matter
to each other, might not have had place in the
random and undirected turbulence of a chaos.
The laws of matter uphold its movements — ^but
they are its dispositions which guide the move-
ments. They acre the laws which carry forward
the processes or evolutions of a framework. But
it is collocation which made the framework.- In

ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER. 197

other words design is not indicated by the mere
properties of matter — -but by a right placing of the
parts of matter. One can imagine all the properties
of matter to have existed before that the Spirit of
God moved on the face of the waters, and sum-
moned the parts of matter into that order and
harmony which are now before our eyes. Even
then, in the void and formless abyss, it is conceiv-
able that there might have been a harmoniousness
in one set of bodies, and transparency in another,
and opaque sohdity in a third, and the tendency to
crystallize or to run even into organic harmonies
in a fourth — and light might have radiated from
any quarter where it resided, and been reflected
and refracted according to the very laws which
characterize the optics of our present world; and
yet, altogether instead of a world with the regu-
larities which are exhibited by ours, there might
have been nought but a wild and indescribable
medley of things, with all the activities which
abound in our present system, but without one
indication of pui-pose or aim in any of its arrange-
ments. And, confining ourselves to one example,
the refraction of light in its passage from a rarer
to a denser medium might have obtained in a chaos
as well as in a world. The wisdom therefore that
appears in the formation of an eye is not properly
indicated by the law but by the adaptation of the
parts of this organ to the law — not by the law or
property of refraction, but by the situation of the
refracting fluids, which so bend the rays that
emanate from the points which be without, as that
they should meet in points which arp. within.

198 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

Neither does the law which connects vision with
the formation of a picture composed of these points,
of itself, indicate a purpose — but this purpose is
instantly recognised in the situation of a retina
spread out in the very place where aU this refracted
light is collected, and so furnishing the canvass as
it were on which the indispensable picture might
be received. The law of varying refraction by
which the distance of the picture behind the pupil
varies either with the convexity of the pupil or
with the distance of the objects — ^it is not this
which, of itself indicates the hand of Intelligence.
But the decisive indication lies in the placing of
those various muscles wherewith the organ is so
curiously set — ^by some of which the pupil might
be rounded or flattened, and by others of which
the retina might be either placed nearer to the
front of the eye or drawn back to a greater distance
from it. The term convenience is equivalent to
utUity, and had its origin doubtless in this that
utility results from the coming together of parts.
And it is just the coming together of those parts
which compose the mechanism of the eye that
gives the impression of a fabricator's hand — ^and
tells us how the eye was fashioned as it is and
placed where it is for the purpose which it so
distinctly serves.

6. In every work of human fabrication, they
are the dispositions more especially the collocations,
and the dispositions alone, which announce the
design which appears to have been in the making
of it. They form the sufficient, for they form hi
truth the sole indication, of the artist's mind that

ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER. 199

devised and the artist's hand that executed. We
do not accredit him with the original formation of
the materials — neither do we accredit him with the
laws and properties of matter. He did not establish
the properties of matter — he only took advantage
of these properties by a right disposition of the
parts of matter. He did not institute tiie laws —
but he turns these laws to his purpose ; and this
purpose is indicated not by the laws, but by such
a disposition of substantive and tangible things as
places them in the way of the law's operation.
The watch-maker did not give to the main-spring
its elasticity — but he coiled it up, and so placed it
in the barrel as to impress a rotatory direction
thereupon. He did not give to matter its power
of cohesion ; but he availed himself of this power
—when he connected the barrel by a chain with
the fusee, and so communicated a circular move-
ment to the latter. He did not give its property
to the lever — but there must have been a maker
who had this property in his eye, when by means
of a train of wheel-work, he placed a succession of
revolving levers between the movingporce and the
balance-wheel which communicates a certain regu-
lated pace to the handles of the dial-plate. He did
not give to glass its transparency — but he made
use of this its property, when he employed it as a
covering, which might protect the dial-plate with-
out concealing it. The design is not indicated by
any one of the laws — ^but by such a collocation of
pieces as made these laws conspire to the accom-
plishment of some palpable end. AH the parts of
this beautiful machinery, if misshapen and disjointed

200 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

from each other, might be huddled together into a
little chaos — and on the examination of each there
might be detected all the principles which give
movement and efficacy to the mechanism of the
time-piece — but the design is gathered purely from
the arrangement of the materials. It is because
of an elastic spring being there ; and a fusee con-
nected with it by a chain being here ; and because
the varying diameters of this cone are so accom-
modated to the variations in the elastic* force of the
spring, as to make it equalize the movement of the
whole ; and because, placed in the very order that
favours the operation of so many different laws,
there are the wheels with their teeth lapping into
each other, and the regulator, and the vibrating
balance, and the indices on the outer face, and the
gxEss that protects and yet keeps it visible — in a
word, it is not because of things being endowed
with given properties, but because of things being
so put together as that these properties are made
to be useful, that we infer contrivance in the watch.
The properties might all have been detected in
the medley o4[p:s rude and unfashioned materials.
But it is because of a shape and distribution that
evolved the properties towards some useful accom-
plishment— ^it is because of this, that we recognise
a designer's hand in the whole fabrication. In
short, it is adaptation and that alone which gives
the impression of a designing cause — and to make
this a complete and warrantable impression, we do
not need to conceive of the designer that he either
originated a substance or endowed it with pro-
perties. It is enough that he turned the substance

ON TPIE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER. 201

and its properties to account by collocation. And
what is true of a watch is true of a world. We do
not need to demonstrate the non-eternity of matter.
We do not need to involve ourselves in any ques-
tion about the essential and the arbitrary properties
of matter. We make our single appeal to its
dispositions. It is in these tbat we behold the
finger of a God — and in these that there is most
unequivocal impress of the mind which presided
over the formation of all things,

7. In the performances of human art, the
argument for design that is grounded on the
useful dispositions of matter, stands completely
disentangled fi'om the argument that is grounded
on the useful laws of matter — for in every implement
or piece of mechanism constructed by the hands of
man, it is in the latter apart from the former, that
the indications of contrivance wholly and exclusively
lie. We do not accredit man with the establish-
ment of any laws for matter — yet he leaves enough
by which to trace the operations of his intelligence
in the collocations of matter. He does not give
to matter any of its properties ; but he arranges it
into parts — and by such arrangement alone, does
he impress upon his workmanship the incontestable
marks of design ; not in that he has communicated
any powers to matter, but in that he has intelligently
availed himself of these powers, and directed them
to an obviously beneficial result. The watchmaker
did not give its elasticity to the main-spring, nor
its regularity to the bitlance-wheel, nor its trans-
parency to the glass, nor the momentum of its
varying forces to the levers of his mechanism, — ^}'et
I 2

202 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

is the whole replete with the marks of intelligence
notwithstanding, announcing throughout the hand
of a maker who had an eye on all these properties,
and assigned the right place and adjustment to
each of them, in fashioning and bringing together
the parts of an instrument for the measurement
and indication of time. Now, the same distinc-
tion can be observed in all the specimens of natural
mechanism. It is true that we accredit the author
of these with the creation and laws of matter, as
well as its dispositions ; but this does not hinder its
being in the latter and not in the former, where the
manifestations of skill are most apparent, or where
the chief argument for a divinity lies. The truth
is, that mere laws, without collocations, would
have afforded no security against a turbid and dis-
orderly chaos. One can imagine of all the sub-
stantive things which enter into the composition of
a watch, that they may have been huddled together,
without shape, and without collocation, into a little
chaos, or confused medley ; — ^where, in full posses-
sion of all the properties which belong to the mat-
ter of the instrument, but without its dispositions,
every evidence of skill would have been wholly
obhterated. And it is even so with all the sub-
stantive things which enter into the composition of
a world. Take but their forms and collocations
away from them, and this goodly universe would
instantly lapse into a heaving and disorderly chaos
— ^yet without stripping matter of any of its pro-
perties or powers. Ther^ might still, though
operating with random and undirected activity, be
the laws of impulse, and gravitation, and magnet-

ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER. 203

ism, and temperature, aud light, and the forces of
chemistry, and even those physiological tendencies,
which, however abortive in a state of primitive
rudeness, or before the spirit of God moved on the
face of the waters, waited but a right distribution
of the parts of matter, to develope into the full
effect and establishment of animal and vegetable
kingdoms. The thing wanted for the evolution of
this chaos into an orderly and beneficial system is
not the endowing of matter with right properties ;
but the forming of it into things of right shape and
magnitude, and the marshalling of these into right
places. This last alone would suffice for bringing
harmony out of confusion ; and, apart altogether
from the first, or, without involving ourselves in
the metaphysical obscurity of those questions which
relate to the origination of matter and to the dis-
tinction between its arbitrary and essential proper-
ties, might we discern, in the mere arrangements
of matter, the most obvious and decisive signatures
of the artist hand w^hich has been employed on it.
8. It is thus I imagine that we might clear aw^ay
the obscurer from the distincter parts of the the-
istical argument. Laws without collocations
would not exempt the universe from the anarchy
of a chaos. All the existent law^s of the actual
universe would not do it — and, w^ere the present
collocations destroyed, we see nothing in the pre-
sent laws which have even so much as a tendency
to restore them. For example, let the human
species be extinguished; and for aught we see,
there is no force and no combination of forces in
Nature which could replace the organic creature

204 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

man, made up as he is of such curious and mani-
fold collocations. Apart from the estabUshed
line of derivation, we do not even see an abortive
tendency towards the formation of any such dis-
tinct organic bemg whatever, whether animal or
vegetable. So that if by any chance our race
should be extinguished, then, unless by the fiat of
a Creator, the surface of our globe would remain
for ever desolated of all its rational generations.
If we can demonstrate, then, whether from Nature
or History, that there was a time when our human
species was not — we should hold this to be a sure
stepping-stone to the demonstration of a God.

9. The evidence for design in a workmanship
of art is grounded exclusively on the shapes and
collocations of thmgs ; and in no way presupposes
either a creation of matter, or an infusion of its
properties, on the part of the artificer. And the
very same evidence we might have entire, in the
workmanship of Nature — whatever the obscurities
may be which rest on the eternity of matter, or on
the essential and inseparable qualities which may
be conceived to belong to it. We do not escape
from this evidence by ascribing self-existence to
body, and asking why its present properties might
hot have obtained from everlasting ? There is still
enough of evidence for an over-ruling mind, if the
present arrangements be not from everlasting.
"Wlien these arrangements commenced, there was a
turning of the properties of matter by the new adap-
tation of its parts to the fulfilment of certain
ends — and in this alone we have the same entire
evidence for design, that we have in the fabrications

ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER. 205

of human intelligence. Grant that there may have
been light from all eternity, and that there might also
have been fluids which had the power of bending
the direction of its rays. Still if ever a time was
when man was not — we ask, how came the fluids
to be so disposed in the pupil of the eye, and the
retina to be placed at such a dista^jce behind — as
to make the pencils meet on that visual tablet, and
there spread out a picture of nature for the infor-
mation of the living occupier within ? What brought
the manifold muscles around this delicate and com-
plex organ, and set each in that very position, and
gave to each tfiat very limit and path by which it
could best add to the perfection of this instrument
for the purposes of sight ? It is not enough to
say that the law by which the successions of the
animal kingdom are upholden, is that in virtue of
which each parent transmits its own likeness
throughout all generations. We speak on the
supposition of a first parent, a supposition that we
shall endeavour to substantiate afterwards-— and, in
reference to him we would ask, not who established
the laws of life and of nourishment and of sensa-
tion and of thouglit which make man what he is —
but who brought such an innumerable assemblage
of circumstances together, and by the adaptation
of each to all the rest, upholds the living creature
in the exercise of all his functions and all his facul-
ties? Who so curiously organized him— and set
him all over with so many fitnesses both of one part
to another, and of all to the constitution of external
things? Who gave him the lungs that could
breathe in no other atmosphere — and the eyes that

20G ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

an intenser day-light than ours might have over-
borne into utter bhndness — and the ears that either
might have been insensible to the actual sounds of
external nature, or on which these sounds would
have inflicted the agony of a loudness that was
intolerable — and the sensibility of touch that might
under a random^conomy have been far too delicate
for the rude exposures of this world's elements, or
too obtuse for any intimation even from the rudest
of their collisions ? And how came such a com-
plex anatomy into being, made up of more than
ten thousand parts, the want of any one of which
would bring discomfort or utter deduction on the
creature who has been provided with it ? The laws
of nature can explain the succession of its events ;
but these laws do not inform us of the way, in which
such an arrangement or such a collocation of many
things has been brought about, as to make the
working of these laws subserve an accomplishment,
which, but for the adaptation of one part to
another would have utterly been frustrated.

10. This diff'erence between the Laws of Matter
and the Dispositions of Matter, is one of great
argumentative importance. In astronomy, for
example, when attending to the mechanism of the
planetary system, we should instance at most but
two laws — the law of gravitation ; and perhaps the
law of perseverance, on the part of all bodies,
whether in a state of rest or of motion, till inter-
rupted by some external cause. But had we to
state the dispositions of matter in the planetary
system, we should instance a greater number of
particulars. We should describe the an-angeraent

ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER. 207

of its various parts, whether in respect to situation,
or magnitude, or figure — as the position of a largo
and luminous mass in the centre ; and of the vastly
smaller hut opaque masses which circulated around
it, but at such distances as not to interfere with
each other ; and of the still smaller secondary
bodies which revolved about the planets : And we
should include in this description the impulses in
one direction, and nearly in one plane, given to the
different moving bodies; and so regulated, as to
secure the movement of each, in an orbit of small
eccentricity. The dispositions of matter in the
planetary system were fixed at the original setting
up of the machine. The laws of matter were
ordained for the w^orking of the machine. The
former, that is the dispositions, make up the frame-
w^ork, or what may be termed the apparatus of the
system. The latter, that is the laws, uphold the
performance of it.

1 1 . Now the tendency of atheistical writers is
to reason exclusively on the laws of matter, and to
overlook its dispositions. Could all the beauties
and benefits of the astronomical system be referred
to the single law of gravitation, it would greatly
reduce the strength of the argument for a designing
cause. La Place, as if to fortify still more the
atheism of such a speculation, endeavoured to
demonstrate of this law — that, in respect of its
being inversely proportional to the square of the
distance from the centre, it is an essential property
of matter. La Grange had previously established
— that but for such a proportion, or by the devia-
tion of a thousandth part from it, the planetary

208 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

system would go into derangement — or, in other
words, that the law, such as it is, was essential to
the stability of the present mundane constitution.
La Place would have accredited the law, the un-
conscious and unintelligent law, that thing accord-
ing to him of blind necessity, with the whole of
this noble and beautiful result — overlooking what
La Grange held to be indispensable as concurring
elements in his demonstration of it — certain dispo-
sitions along with the law — such as the movement
of all the planets, first in one direction, second nearly
in one plane, and then in nearly circular orbits.
We are aware, that according to the discoveries,
or rather perhaps to the guesses of some later
analysts, the three last circumstances might be
dispensed with; and yet notwithstanding, the
planetary system, its errors still remaining peri-
odical, would in virtue of the single law oscillate
around a mean estate that should be indestructible
and everlasting. Should this come to be a con-
clusively settled doctrine in the science, it will
extenuate, we admit, the argument for a designing
cause in the formation of a planetarium. But it will
not annihilate that argument — ^for there do remain
certain palpable utilities in the dispositions as well
as laws of the planetary system, acknowledged by aU
the astronomers ; such as the vastly superior weight
and quantity of matter accumulated in its centre,
and the local establishment there of that great
fountain of light and heat from which the surround-
ing worlds receive throughout the whole of their
course an equable dispensation. What a mal-
adjustment would it have been, had the luminous

ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER. 209

and the opaque matter changed places in the firma-
ment ; or the planets, by the eccentricity of their
orbits, been subject to such vicissitudes of tempera-
ture as would certainly, in our own at least, have
entailed destruction both on the animal and vege-
table kingdoms.

12. We hold that there is strong evidence for
the commencement of our planetary system — .
though we shall not attempt to expound it at
present — and the more, as there is a greatly over-
passing evidence for the commencement of the
organic systems in our animal and vegetable king-
doms, which are far more replete with the indica-
tions of design than is the mechanism of the heavens,
as unfolded to us by astronomy. Let us therefore
meanwhile assume a beginning for our solar system
— and then, though we should not be able to dis-
prove the eternity of matter, or that it had all the
laws and properties which we now observe from
everlasting — still these laws and properties though
perfectly sufficient to account for the working of
the planetary mechanism, are not sufficient to
account for the original collocation of its parts.
They may account for the operation of the machine,
but not for the fabrication of it. If we have evi-
dence for its being at one time set up, we are in
the profoundest ignorance of any law by which it
behoved to be set up according to its present
arrangement. Why, for example, should all the
luminous matter have been accumulated in the
centre ? \Vliy should the fountain-head of light
and of heat have been throned, as it were, in that
place, whence it could emanate its gracious influ-

210 ON 'lllE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

ences with best advantage on those worlds, which
by the weight of its superior attraction it could
compel to a close attendance upon itself? Why,
instead of this great central fire around which the
planets move, and whence they receive through
every part of their course an almost equable dis-
pensation— might there not have been an opaque
mass in the midst of that planetarium which now
is lighted up so gorgeously ; and wandering suns
that, moving as comets do, might have scorched
and left to freeze alternately the fixed and immove-
able opaque in the midst of the firmament ? And
there are other adaptations — a rotation around
every axis that affords a grateful succession of day
and night — a progressive movement in space which
along with the inclination of the axis to the plane
of revolution leads on the seasons through the
round of their beneficent journey — the satellites
that reflect though they do not radiate, and cast
their pale but useful lustre over the wintry and
benighted regions of the worlds which they encom-
pass— the distance at which the planets are kept
from each other, and the free uncumbered amplitude
which is thus left for moving without interruption,
and without even any hurtful disturbance from
their mutual gravitations. These are the few but
still the contingent simplicities which might or
might not have taken place — and on the actual
concurrence of which, those worlds resemble our
own in certain great characteristics, which we know
are indispensable to the sustenance and the being
of all its animated generations. We are aw^are of
no force now in operation that could have carried

ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER. 211

out these planets to their respective distances from
the sun — that could then, instead of simply leaving
them to fall back into the mass of that great
luminary, have projected them at about right
angles to the line which lay between them — that
could have directed the impulses so, as that in
most instances, there should have been an axis
with an angle of inclination to the plane of the
orbit — that should have^o tempered the velocity
of the centrifugal motion as to have given to each
a nearly circular path — that, in like manner, should
have launched the satellites around their primaries,
and thus have given rise to that beauteous and
beneficent mechanism which the laws of nature
might keep in action, but which no laws of nature
that we have any access to could have framed or put
together. To constitute a machine is one thing — to
continue it in operation is another. The latter might
be done in virtue of the properties of matter, and
the former not be referrible to any one material
agent within the compass of our knowledge.
Although we should concede to Atheists, that the
laws of matter had been long antecedent to the
formation of the planetary system — yet formed as
the system may have been in accommodation to
these laws, there might, by the mere adjustment of
its parts, (and an adjustment whfch no blind and
unconscious forces that we at least know of could
have given rise to,) to subserve some striking and
palpable ends — there might be evidence in this
goodly fabrication, of a purpose by an Artist's
mind, and of an Artist's hand put forth on the
execution of it.

212 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

13. But whatever defect or doubtfulness of
evidence there may be m the mechanism of the
heavens— this is amply made up for in a more
accessible mechanism near at hand. If either the
dispositions of matter in the former mechanism be
so few, or the demonstrable results of its single
law be so independent of them, that the agency of
design rather than of necessity or chance be less
manifest than it otherwis#v,'ould be in the astro-
nomical system; nothing on the other hand can
exceed the force and concentration of that proof,
which is crowded to so marvellous a degree of
enhancement within the limits of the anatomical
system. It is this which enables us to draw so
much weightier an argument for a God, from the
construction of an eye than from the construction
of a planetarium. And here it is quite palpable,
that it is in the dispositions of matter more than in
the laws of matter, where the main strength of the
argument lies, though we hear much more of the
wisdom of Nature's laws than of the wisdom of
her collocations.* Now it is true that the law of
refraction is indispensable to the faculty of vision ;

* This distinction between tlie laws and the collocations of
matter is overlooked bv atheistical writers, as 'in the following
specimen from the "'Systeme de la Nature" of Mirabaiul.
"These prejudiced drctiniers," speaking of believers in a God,
*' are in an ecstasy at the sight of the periodical motion of the
planets ; at the order of the" stars ; at the various productions
of the earth ; at the astonishing harmony in the component
parts of animals. In that moment, however, they forget the laws
of motion; the power of gravitation; the forces of attraction
and repulsion ; they assign all these striking phenomena to
•unknown causes, of which they have no one substantive idea."

When Professor Robison felt alarmed by the attempted demon-
stration of La Place, that the law of gravitation was an essential

ON THE DISPOSITIONS ©F MATTER. 213

but the laws indispensable to this result are greatly
outnumbered by the dispositions which are indis-
pensable to it — such as the rightly sized and
shaped lenses of the eye ; and the rightly placed
retina spread out behind them, and at the precise
distance where the indispensable picture of external
nature might be formed, and presented as it w^ere
for the information of the occupier within; and
then, the variety and proper situation of the
numerous muscles, each entrusted with an impor-
tant function, and all of them contributing to the
power and perfection of this curious and manifoldly
complicated organ. It is not so much the endow-
ment of matter with certain properties, as the
arrangement of it into Certain parts, that bespeaks
here the hand of an artist ; and this will be found
true of the anatomical structure in all its depart-
ments. It is not the mere chemical property of
the gastric juice that impresses the belief of con-
trivance ; but the presence of the gastric juice, in
the very situation whence it comes forth to act
w4th advantage on the food, when received mto the
stomach, and there submitted to a digestive process
for the nourishment of the animal economy. It is
well to distinguish these two things. If we but
say of matter that it is furnished w4th such powers
as make it subservient to many useful results, we

property of matter, lest tlie cause of natural theology should be
endangered by it — he might have recollected that the main
evidence for a Divinity lies not in the laws of matter, but in their
collocations — because of the utter inadequacy in the existing
laws to have originated the existing collocations of the material
world. So that if ever a time was, when these collocations were
not — there is no virtue in the laws that can account for their
commencement, or that supersedes the fiat of a God.

214 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

keep back the strongest and most unassailable
part of the argument for a God. It is greatly
more pertinent and convincing to say of matter,
that it is distributed into such parts as to ensure a
right direction and a beneficial application for its
powers. It is not so much in the establishment
of certain laws of matter that we can discern the
aims or the purposes of intelligence, as in certain
dispositions of matter, that put it in the way of
being usefully operated upon by the laws. Inso-
much, that though we conceded to the atheist the
eternity of matter, and the essentially inherent
character of all its laws — we could still point out
to him, in the manifold adjustments of matter, its
adjustments of place, and .figure, and magnitude,
the most impressive signatures of a Deity. And
what a countless variety of such adjustments
within the compass of an animal, or even a vege-
table framework ! In particular, v/hat an amount
and condensation of evidence for a God in the
workmanship of the human body ! What bright
and convincing lessons of theology might man
(would he but open his eyes) read on his own
person — that microcosm of divine art, where as in
the sentences of a perfect epitome, he might trace
in every hneament or member the finger and
authorship of the Godhead !

14. It is thus that the evidence yielded by one
department of nature for a God, diiFers so much
in strength from that yielded by another. It
varies with the number of independent circum-
stances which must meet together for the produc-
tion of some given end. Shoidd it require, for

OS THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER. 215

example, the concurrence of ten such ciiSimstances
to brmg about a useful result, the argument for
design founded on this concurrence has inconceiv-
ably greater force than when it requires only three
or four. According to the doctrine of chances, the
evidence should grow in a rapid multiple ratio
with the increase in the number of those contin-
gent things which enter into an arrangement, and
are indispensable to the effect of it. It is precisely
for this reason that anatomy is so much more
prolific of argument for a God than astronomy.
There is a vastly greater number of independent
parts and relations in the anatomical system, than
when viewed largely and generally, the only way in
which it can be viewed by us, there is in the system
of the heavens. There is a prodigiously more
concentrated proof of contrivance within the little
compass of an eye, than jn the wide survey of an
astronomer there is within the compass of the
planetarium. Hence the more slender evidence
for a God in the great movements of astronomy.
The number of independent circumstances which
meet together upon the arena of this wondrous
science is comparatively small — A great body in
the centre kept there by the one law of gravi-
tation, which binds upon it the attendance of its
revolving worlds — a single impulse upon each of
these worlds to impress upon them both the •
projectile and the rotatory movements, though so
regulated we admit as to secure a nearly circular
orbit to them all — the inclination of the axis in
most of them to the orbit of revolution, which could
still have been impressed in dependence on the

216 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

random ^ot where the first impulse was given — a
similar treatment for each of the satellites, with
this peculiarity in the comets, their being struck
either with more unequal force in proportion to
their distance from the sun, or in a more acute
direction to the radius vector of their ' orbits.
These make up as it were the few simple contin-
gencies on the union of which the mechanism of
our celestial economy was framed at the first, and
is upholden afterwards. It is because so few, that
there is more room for the supposition that their
combination might have been fortuitous — and hence
astronomy is not the best medium through which
to prove the agency of an intelligent Creator — .
although in the language of Dr. Paley if this can
be proved by other means, it shows beyond all
other sciences the magnificence of His operations.
15. In the proportion* that w^e lessen the number
of contingent things which enter into any useful
combination — we weaken the argument for its
having originated in design, or in a designing
cause. Had both the rotatory and the projectile
motions of a planet required three impulses — that
is, two equal and opposite forces to spin it round
its axis, and then a progressive force to set it
forward— this would have afforded all the stronger
evidence for the hand of a God. But these two
• motions, as well as the incUnation of the axis to
the plane of the orbit, can aU be ensured by one
impulse in a direction obhque to the planet's surface.
This in so far attenuates the argument for a
divine agency having been concerned in the put-
ting together of this marvellous framework. But

OlM THE DISPOSITIONS OF JMATTER 217

it is worthy of remark that this same consideration
which tends to reduce the strength of the evidence
for a God, tends also to the demonstration of His
greatness on the supposition of His existence being
estabUshed on other grounds. This reduction of
the progressive and rotatory movements to one
impulse ushers the mind of the inquirer into larger
views of the constitution of our universe. The
sun is known to have a revolution round its own
axis — and this, if not communicated by two equal
and opposing forces that leave it stationary in
space, would bespeak the application only of one
force which must give it a progressive motion also.
If, then, he be moving forward through immensity,
he must carry the whole planetary system along
with him, even as Jupiter does his secondary sys-
tem of sateUites around the sun. This points to
the common centre of a higher system than ours,
around which suns with their attendant planets
are revolving. And whereas, we have been in the
habit of looking to the revolution of our Georgium
Sidus as the most magnificent sweep of which we
had direct observation — this may be but a humble
epicycle to that great circuit, in which all the suns
of our universe with their attendant systems, are
so many fellow-travellers on the scale of a highei
astronomy.

16. The chief then, or at least the usual subject-
matter of the argument, is the obvious adaptation
wherewith creation teems, throughout all its bor-
ders, of means to a beneficial end. And it is
manifest that the argument grows in strength with
the number and complexity of these means. The

VOL. I. K*

218 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

greater the number of independent circumstances
which must meet together for the production of
a Tiseful result — then, in the actual fact of their
concurrence, is there less of probability for its
being the effect of chance, and more of evidence
for its being the effect of design, A beneficent
combination of three independent elements is not
so impressive or so strong an argument for a
divuiity, as a similar combination of six or ten
such elements. And every mathematician, con-
versant in the doctrine of probabilities, knows how
with everv addition to the number of these elements,
tHe argument grows in force and intensity, with
a rapid and multiple augmentation — till at length,
in some of the more intricate and manifold
conjunctions, those more particularly having an
organic character and structure, could we but
trace them to an historical commencement, we
should find, on the principles of computation alone,
that the argument against their being fortuitous
products, and for their being the products of a
scheming and skilful artificer, was altogether over-
powering.

17. We might apply this consideration to various
departments in nature. In astronomy, the inde-
pendent elements seem but few arid simple, which
must meet together for the composition of a
planetarium. One uniform law of gravitation,
with a force of projection impressed by one impulse
on each of the bodies, could suffice to account for
the revolutions of the planets round the sun, and
of the satellites around their primaries, along with
the diurnal revolution of each, and the varying

ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER 219

inclinations of the axes to the planes of their
respective orbits. Out of such few contingencies,
the actual orrery of the heavens has been framed.
But in anatomy, to fetch the opposite illustration
from another science, what a complex and crowded
combination of individual elements must first be
eifected, ere we obtain the composition of an eye,
— for the completion of which mechanism, there
must not only be a greater number of separate
laws, as of refraction and muscular action and
secretion ; but a vastly greater number of separate
and distinct parts, as the lenses, and ttie retina,
and the optic nerve, and the eyelid and eyelashes,
and the various muscles wherewith this dehcate
organ is so curiously beset, and each of which is
indispensable to its perfection, or to the right
performance of its functions. It is passing mar-
vellous that we should have more intense evidence
for a God in the construction of an eye, than in
the construction of the mighty planetarium — or
that, within less than the compass of a handbreadth,
we should find in this lower world a more pregnant
and legible inscription of the Divinity, than can be
gathered from a broad and magnificent survey of
the skies, lighted up though they be, with the
glories and the wonders of astronomy.

18. But while nothing- can be more obvious
than that the proof for design in any of the natural
formations, is the stronger, in proportion to the
number of separate and independent elements
which have been brought together, and each of
which contributes essentially to its usefulness — .
we have long held it of prime importance to the

220 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER*

theistical argument, that clear exhibition should be
made of the distinction not generally adverted to,
and which we have now attempted to expound,
between Dispositions and Laws in the material
world.

19. Our argument hitherto has been, that even
though matter with all its properties had existed
from eternity, there might still be room for the
indication of a great master spirit being concerned
in those existing arrangements of matter, by which
its properties have been made subservient to
certain ends which were desirable. We have no
doubt that this overruling spirit hath both created
the matter and established the properties — although
the cause of theism can afford to give this up, and
can find enough m the order and adaptation of
things to prove that the hand of a Divinity has
been there. There is less, we admit, of this evi-
dence in the movements of astronomy — because of
the very few distinct and independent elements which
are concerned in them. Yet we cannot, in spite
of the atheistical evasion which has been made
from it, refrain from adverting to the actual law
of gravitation as being inversely proportional to
the squares of the distances. Laplace and others
affirm it to be an essential property of matter, that
every virtue which is propagated from a centre
should diminish in intensity in this very propor-
tion— and so would rob us of the argument for a
God that may be' founded on the contingency of
this law. Nevertheless, seeing that we have such
abundant evidence for a Divinity from other
quarters, we will appropriate the honours of this

ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER. 221

law to the presiding intelligence who ordained it.
It is the beautiful discovery of La Grange that
this is the only law which is consistent with the
permanency of the planetary system — that if the
law of mutual attraction between its bodies had
deviated by a thousandth part from that which
actually obtains, the mutual disturbances which
take place among the planets themselves would at
length have deranged the whole economy of their
movements — that the errors would have accumu-
lated in one direction so as at length either to have
brought the planets to the sun, or sent them to
irreclaimable distances away from it — but that now
the errors alternate between one direction and
another — ^reaching to a maximum upon one side,
which it never can exceed, and then oscillating
back again so as to keep a httle way to the right
or the left of a certain mean state, which forms
the invariable and indestructible average of a
system that, under other laws of gravitation, would
have contained within itself the principles of its
own dissolution.

20. In virtue of the distinction between the laws
of matter and its dispositions, we might perhaps
release ourselves from a certain atheistical imagi-
nation which, without assuming the shape of a
distinct principle, or coming forth in aught like a
formal avowal, is apt to maintain its hold over
the spirits and conceptions chiefly of physical
inquirers. There is a mystery inscrutable in the
creation of matter out of nothing — and, on the
other hand, if it have existed from everlasting, why
may it not, unchangeable in character as in being,

222 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

have had the very properties from everlasting
which are now exhibited before our eyes ? And
all the phenomena of this our material universe
are held to be the evolution of these properties.
Now, the distinction is here overlooked between the
phenomena of successive nature, and the phenomena
of contemporaneous nature, on which distinction
Professor Robison of Edinburgh founded his
definitions of natural philosophy and natural history

. making it the office of the one to classify the

resemblances which take place among the events
of the material Universe; and of the other to
classify the resemblances which take place among
the objects of the material Universe. Conceive
the eye to be open for an indivisible moment of
time, and that at that moment all the senses of a
living and perfectly intelligent observer were alive,
to all the properties of all the things in external
nature which were fitted to impress them — then
the registration and orderly arrangement of all the
properties, thus taken cognizance of on the instant
form the business of the one science — which there-
fore, if completed, would make known to us the
colour and the form, and the weight and the taste,
and the sonorous and tangible qualities, and lastly,
the structure or collocation among the parts of
every thing that exists. But if, instead of one
moment, we introduce the element of time into
our observations of Nature, then we shall not fail
to perceive incessant changes going on in all that
is around us — and it is the business of these other
sciences to record and to classify these changes.
Now what we affirm is, that the powers of our

ON THE DISPOSITIONS OP MATTEi 223^

existing natural philosophy have not given rise to
the arrangements of our existing natural history
— and that if these arrangements were destroyed,
these powers are not able to replace them. They
may account for the evolution of things or sub-
stances collocated in a certain way; but they did
not originate the collocations — and if it can be
demonstrated that ever a time was v.hen certain
mechanisms were not, that are novv in full operation,
or certain organic forces and combinations that

now sustain the life and enjoyment of millions

then it is at the commencement of these that we
require the fiat of a God; the interposition of a
living and purposing agent who moulded the forms,
and brought together the parts of the various goodly
constructions which are now before our eyes.

21. This fine generalization o^Robison, ranges
all philosophy into two sciences — one the science
of contemporaneous nature; the other, the science
of successive nature. When the material world
is viewed according to this distinction, the whole
science of its contemporaneous phenomena is com^
prehended by him under the general name of
Natural History, v»-hich takes cognizance of all
those characters in external nature that exist to-
gether at the instant, and which may be described
without reference to time — as smell, and colour,
and size, and weight, and form, and relation of
parts, w^hether of the simple inorganic or more
complex organic structures. It is when the elements
of time and motion are introduced, that we are
presented with the phenomena of successive nature ;
and the science that embraces these is, in contradis-

€24 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATl'ER.

tinction to the former, termed Natural Philosophy,
This latter science may he separated or subdivided
further into natural philosophy, strictly and indeed
usually so called, whose province it is to investi-
gate those changes which take effect in bodies by
motions that are sensible and measurable; and
chemistry, or the science of those changes which
take effect in bodies by motions whicli are not
sensible or, at least, not measurable, and which
cannot therefore be made the subjects of mathe-
matical computation or reasoning. This last,
again, is capable of being still further partitioned
into the science which investigates the changes
effected by means of insensible motion in all in-
organic matter, or chemistry strictly and usually
so called; and the science of physiology, whose
province it is to «investigate the like changes that
take place in organic bodies, whether of the animal
or vegetable kingdoms.

22. Or, the distinction between these two
sciences of contemporaneous and successive nature
may otherwise be stated thus. The one, or natural
history, is conversant with objects — the other, or
natural philosophy in its most comprehensive
meaning, is conversant with events. It is obvious
that the dispositions of matter come within the
province of the former science — ^^vhile the laws of
matter, or the various moving forces by which it is
actuated, fall more properly under the inquiries of
the latter science. Now, adopting this nomen-
clature, we repeat it as a most important assertion
for the cause of natural theology, that should all
the present arrangements of our existing natural

ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER. 225

history be destroyed, there is no "power in the laws
of our existing natural philosophy to replace them.
Or, in other words, if ever a time was, when the
structure and dispositions of matter, under the
pi-esent economy of things were -not — there is no
force known in nature, and no combination of forces
that can account for their commencement. The
laws of nature may keep up the working of the-
machinery — ^but they did not and could not set up
the machine. The human species, for example,
may be upholden, through an indefinite series of
ages, by the established law of transmission — but
were the species destroyed, there are no observed
powers of nature by which it could again be
originated. For the continuance of the system and
of all its operations, we might imagine a sufficiency
in the laws ^f nature ; but it is the first construc-
tion of the system which so palpably calls for the
intervention of an artificer, or demonstrates so
powerfully the fiat and finger of a God.

23. This distinction between nature's laws and
nature's collocations is mainly lost sight of in those
speculations of geology, the object of which is to
explain the formation of new systems emerging
from the wreck of old ones. They proceed on
the sufficiency of nature's laws for building up the
present economy of things out of the ruins of a
former economy, which the last great physical
catastrophe on the face of our earth had over-
thrown. NoM^, in these ruins, viewed as materials
for the architecture of a renovated w^orld, there did
reside all those forces, by which the processes of
the existing economy are upholden ; but the geolo-

226 ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER.

gists assign to them a function wholly distinct from
this, when they labour to demonstrate that by laws,
and laws alone, the framework of our existing
economy was put together. -It is thus that they
would exclude the agency of a God from the tran-
sition between one system, or one formation, and
another; although it be precisely at such transition
when this agency seems most palpably and pecu-
liarly called for. We feel assured that the neces-
sity for a divine intervention, and, of course, the
evidence of it would have been more manifest, had
the distinction between the laws of matter and its
collocations been more formally announced, or
more fully proceeded on by the writers on natural
theism. And yet it is a distinction that must have
been present to the mind of our great Newton, who
expressly affirms that a mechanism of wonderful
structure could not arise by the mere laws of
nature. In his third printed letter to Bentley,
he says, that "the growth of new systems out oi
old ones, without the mediation of a divine power,
seems to me apparently absurd ;" and that *•' the
system of nature was set in order in the beginning,
with respect to size, figure, proportions, and
properties, by the counsels of God's own intelli-

* Towards the end of the third book of Newton's Optics, we
have the following very distinct testimony upon this subject:
«* For it became Him who created them to set them in order.
And if he did so, it is unphilosophical to seek for any other
orio-in of the world ; or to pretend that it might arise out of a
chaos by the mere laws of nature ; though being once formed, it
may continue by those laws for many ages."

This disposition to resolve the collocations into the laws of
nature proves, in the expressive language of Granville Pena,

ON THE DISPOSITIONS OF MATTER. 227

24. One precious fruit of the recent geological
discoveries may be gathered from the testimony
which they afford to the destruction of so many
terrestrial economies now gone by, and the substi-
tution of the existing 6ne in their place. If there
be truth at all in the speculations of this science,
there is nothing which appears to have "been more
conclusively established by them, than a definite
origin or commencement for the present animal
and vegetable races. Now we know what it is
which upholds the whole of the physiological
system that is now before our eyes, — even the
successive derivation of each individual member
from a parent of its own likeness ; but we see no
force in nature, and no complication of forces
which can tell us what it was that originated the
system. It is at this passage in the history of
nature, where we meet with such pregnant evidence
for the interposition of a designing cause, — an
evidence, it will be seen, of prodigious density and
force, when we compute the immense number and
variety of those aptitudes, whether of form or
magnitude or relative position, which enter into
the completion of an organic structure. It is in
the numerical superiority of the distinct colloca-
tions to the distinct laws of mat ter, that the superior
evidence of the former lies. We do not deny that
there is argument for a God in the number of
beneficial, whUe, at the same time, distinct and
independent lav,s wherewith matter is endowed.

how strenuously, not •' physical science," but only some of its
disciples have " laboured to exclude the Criator from the details
of his own creation ; straining everv nerve of ingenuity to ascribe
them all to seco?idanf c«Mirs."

228 ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD.

We only affirm a million-fold intensity of argument
in the indefinitely greater number of beneficial,
and at the same time distinct and independent
number of collocations whereinto matter has been
arranged. In this respect 'the human body may
be said to present a more close and crowded and
multifarious inscription of the divinity, than any
single object within the compass of visible nature.
It is instinct throughout with the evidence of a
builder's hand ; and thus the appropriate men of
science who can expound those dispositions of
matter which constitute the anatomy of its frame-
work, and which embrace the physiology of its
various processes, are on secure and firm vantage-
ground for an impressive demonstration. This we
shall attempt to show more fully in our next chapter.

CHAPTER II.

Natural and Geological Proofs for a Commencement of our
present Terrestrial Economy.

1 . The historical argument which we have already
attempted to unfold for the non-eternity of our
present world, has been exposed to a certain
collision with the speculations of those naturalists,
who have founded their theories on the vestiges of
certain revolutions which may have taken place
in the state of our globe. It is not for the vindi-
cation of the Mosaic account that we now advert
to this, but for the exposition of what we should

ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD. 229

term the Geological argument in behalf of a Deity.
On this subject there are many, and these perhaps
an increasing number, who think that there might
be conceded to the geologists an indefinite anti-
quity for the matter of our globe — -and that, without
violation even to the strict literalities of the book
of Genesis — ^not one of which, save when allow-
ance is evidently to be made for the use of popular
language, they would *feel disposed to give up for
any imaginations or reasonings which philosophy
has yet set forth upon the subject. All, according
to them, which can positively be gathered from the
first chapter of that book is a great primary act of
creation, at how remote a period is uncertain — .
after which our world may have been the theatre
of many changes and successive economies, the
traces or memorials of which might be observable
at the present day. It leaves on the one hand
abundant scope to those who are employed in the
investigation of these memorials, if it be granted
that the Mosaic narrative fixes, only the antiquity
of our present races, and not the antiquity of the
earth that is peopled by them. But on the other
hand we should not tamper with the record by
allegorizing any of its passages or phrases. We
should not for example protract the six days into
so many geological periods — as if by means of a
lengthened natural process to veil over the fiat of a
God, that phenomenon, if we may so term it,
which of all others seems the most offensive to the
taste of some philosophers, and which they are
most anxious to get rid of. We hold the week of
the first chapter of Genesis to have been literally

230 ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD.

a week of miracles — the period of a grfeat creative
interposition, during which by so many successive
evohitions, the present economy was raised out of
the wreck and materials of the one which had gone
before it. But on this we need not speak decisively
— ^for in whatever way the controversy is adjusted,
there remains argument for a God. Should, in
the first , place, the Mosaic account be held to
supersede all those speculations in Geology which
would stretch the antiquity even of our earth
beyond the period at which man was created —
this were deferring to the historical evidence of the
Old Testament — that book which of all others
speaks most directly for a God, and which in fact
may be regarded as the formal and express docu-
ment in which the authoritative register of Creation
is found. Or should it be allowed, in the second
place, that the sacred penman does not fix the
antiquity of our globe but only of our species — this
leaves the historical argument entu'e, and enables
us to superadd any geological argument which may
be founded on certain characters of vicissitude in
the history of our globe, that are alike recognised
by all the systems of geology. Or, thirdly, should,
instead of scripture superseding or harmoniz-
ing with geology, geology be held as superseding
scripture, an imagination which of course we dis-
own— still the argument for a creative interposition
would not in consequence be banished from our
w orld. It is the establishment of this last position
to which at present we address ourselves. There
are certain alleged processes in geology which if
true show unequivocally, we have long thought, the

ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD. 231

marks and footsteps of a Divinity. There are
some we are aware who have founded thereupon a
melancholy Deism — our business now is to demon-
strate, that even in this walk of inquiry, abused as it
has been thus far to the purposes of licentious
speculation, there are to be met the strongest
of Nature's evidences against the system of a still
dismal and wretched Atheism.

2. But let us here premise that our argument
does not rest on the truth of any one of the geolo-
gical theories. . It is enough, if causes of decay
and destruction are at work which are now under-
mining the present harmony of things ; and which
must therefore have brought to an end any economy
that may have gone before it. All those who
conceive of our globe that it liad an existence, and
was the theatre of physical changes anterior to the
commencement of the script aral era, agree in this.
We are not called upon t-j intermeddle w^ith the
controversies of geological science, when it is by
means of a universal artcle of belief that we
attempt to establish the necessity of a Creative
Interposition. We do not make ourselves respon-
sible for any of the theories, although we select
one for the purpose of illustration — seeing, in fact,
that our argument rests not on the specialty of
any of the Ante-Mosaical creeds, but on an
assumption which is nearly common to them all.
For generally speaking they proceed on the rise
and disappearance of certain distinct and successive
economies of nature on the face of our globe — the
decay or destruction of each implying the extinction

232 ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD.

of at least so many of the animal and vegetable
races proper to its era. It is on this and this
alone that our argument is based ; and we do not
need therefore, for the purpose of upholding it, to
advocate any one geological system in preference to
others — seeing that it rests, not on the pecuharities
of one creed, but on one article very generally if
not universally to be found in them.

3. Our object in adverting to the speculations of
geology is to direct the eye to a point in the
physical history which it assigns to our globe, when,
on every principle of our commonly received philo-
sophy, there would be required a special inter-
position on the part of a God. It is to exhibit
what we have long regarded as the nearest to a
direct and experimental manifestation of a Creative
Process. It is to make demonstration of a time
when the goodliest specimens of organization that
now abound in our world did not exist — and are
therefore a consequent, from which we are fully
warranted to reason of the antecedent that went
before it. We know not from what quarter to
borrow a more effectual weapon, for putting to
flight the atheistical imagination of the -animaJ and
vegetable kingdoms, being upheld by a chain that
is lost in a posterior direction among the obscurities
of the distant future, and lost in an anterior direc-
tion among the still more formidable recesses of the
eternity that is past. It is enough, if, amid the
loose and unsettled speculations of geology, they
generally point to this, that the chain is not end-
less but has had a definite commencement — and that

ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD. 233

therefore our present races were originated in a way
different from that in which they are now perpetu-
ated by successive generations.

4. Let us now offer then a short exposition of
this argument with Cuvier's theory of the earth,
on which, not to ground, but only to illustrate the
argument.

5. The water of our present ocean holds certain
substances in solution — and is thereby adapted to
the. support of certain marine animals. Now it is
conceivable that the nature of this solution may be
changed, either by coming into contact with new
substances and dissolving them, or by a mere
change in the proportion of its present ingredients.
But it is probable, that, after the changes had been
accomphshed to a certain degree in the waters of
the ocean, the present generation of marine animals
could not exist in them. Those of them which
were formed in nice dependence on the constitution
of their element, would be the first to fall a sacri-
fice to its progressive alterations — the hardier would
then follow — and, after the lapse of ages, it is con-
ceivable that the change of element might be so
great as to bring along v/ith it the entire destruc-
tion of the existing genera.

6. The remains of marine animals must be
accumulated every year in the bottom of the ocean.
But this is not the only deposition that is going on
there. There is an incessant deposition of sedi-
ment carried down by innumerable rivers, and
obtained from the wearing of those various materials
which compose the land. In addition to this, there
may be the chemical precipitation of matter in a

234 ON TJiE commence:vIl:st of the world.

solid form from the water of the ocean itself. All
these depositions may be spread over the bottom
of the sea in successive layers or strata. They
may be hardened by long-continued pressure into
the consistency of stone. There may have been
thousands of shells imbedded in them — and what is
more, the form even of the softer fishes may be
retained in petrifaction ; and handed down to the
observation of very distant ages.

7. All this may be going on in the vast and
inaccessible solitudes of the deep — but how can the
vestiges of such a process ever be submitted to
actual observation ? The ocean may change its
place. There are known causes perfectly com-
petent to the production of such an effect. What
is now dry land may be submerged — and the
deserted bed of the ocean may come to be inhabited
by land animals. By an exercise of creative power
the sea may be stocked with new generations,
adapted to the last changes which its waters have
undergone — and by another exercise of creative
power, the new land which has been formed may
also be peopled with living beings. If there be a
rational being among the last like man, he might
observe the traces of that process which took place
hi the last era of the history of the globe. He
might learn from the vestiges of marine animals
firmly imbedded in the stratified rock, that the
ground he is now treading upon was at one
time covered with the waters of the sea — and by
comparing specimens extracted from the fossil
productions around him with the fishes of the
present ocean, he might come to the wonderful

ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WOULD. 235

conclusion that the former species have been
extinguished, and given place to a new and totally-
dissimilar generation.

8. But this is not all. The various tribes of land
animals now rAiltiply and die, and deposit their
remains in that very, region which abounds with
the marine productions of a former era. The
sediment of rivers is not all carried forward im-
mediately to the sea. A great part of it is arrested
in its progress, and goes either to accumulate a
soil upon their banks, or to form alluvial land at
their mouths. The skeletons of land animals are
enveloped in this mass of mineral substances. The
ocean which has changed its place once may do it
again. It may make a second irruption upon the
land, and sweep away whole genera of living
creatures from the globe. The surface that ls
left dry may be repeopled by a few out of the
many who may have escaped this catastrophe — ^or
an ever watchful Deity may again interfere ; and,
by another exercise of creative power, may occupy
the new formed land by other generations.

9. In this way the remains of land and of sea
animals may be assembled together in the same
neighbourhood. The successive retreats and irrup-
tions of the Ocean may produce, not one, but a
series of alternations. And the strata which are
around us, each evincing its own relative antiquity
by its position, and exhibiting the remains of its
own peculiar animals, may serve the double pur-
pose of recording the great revolutions which have
taken place, both in the animal and vegetable
kingdoms, and upon the surface of our Globe,

236 ON THE COxMxMENCEMENT OF THE WOULD.

iO. And, apart from any violent changes in the
place of the Ocean, it must be obvious that the
surface of the Globe is not in a state of permanency.
There is a constant wearing of the land. Even its
hardest materials could not resisfl^for ever the
incessant operation of the air and the moisture and
the frost to which they are subjected. The mighty
continent would at length wax old and disappear;
and the world that we now live in become a howling
solitude of waters.

11. To this it now tends, and thus to all
appearance must it remain through eternity, but
for a change in the place of the Ocean; and a
change that may happen long before the degrada-
tion of the land to its own level. A slight change
in the axis of the Earth would be altogether
adequate for such an effect. It is to the diurnal
revolution of the Earth round its axis, that we owe
the deviation of its figure from a perfect sphere.
The Earth is so much flattened at the poles and
so much elevated at the equator, that the former
are nearer to the centre of the Earth than the
latter by so many English miles. What would be
the effect then if the axis of the Earth were sud-
denly shifted ? If the polar and equinoctial regions
were to change places there would be a tendency
towards an elevation of these miles in the one
region, and as great a depression in the other —
and the more transferable parts of the Earth's
surface would be the first to obey this tendency.
The Ocean would rush towards the new equator.
The cohesion of the solid parts, would, it is likely,
offer a feeble resistance, and give way to this

ON THE COMMENCExMENT OF THE WORLD. 237

mighty conaUis — nor would the Earth become
quiescent till a new and elevated equator was
formed at right angles to the former one, and
passing through the present poles.

12. But it is not necessary to assume so entire
a change in the position of the Earth's axis as to
produce so great a difference in any of the existing
levels — nor would any single impetus indeed suffice
to accomplish such a change. The transference
of the poles from their present situatioa by a few
degrees, would give rise to a revolution sudden
enough and mighty enough for a great physical
era in the history of the Globe — and a change of
level indeed for a single- quarter of a mile, Avould
overwhelm its fairest regions, and destroy the vast
majority of its living animals.

13. To show that we fear nothing from infidel
science, let us present the following extract from
La Place, the ablest and most exalted of its
votaries, who in his book entitled " the System of
the World," after having reasoned on the likelihood
that in the course of ages a comet might interfere
with our Earth, thus pictures the effects of the
collision :-— " It is easy to represent the effect of
such a shock upon the Earth — the axis and motion
of rotation changed — the waters abandoning their
ancient position to precipitate themselves towards
the ncAV equator — the greater part of men and
animals drowned in a universal deluge, or destroyed
by the violence of the shock given to the terrestrial
globe — whole species destroyed — all the monuments
of human industry reversed — such are the effects
which the shock of a comet w^ould produce." — —

238 ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD.

" We see then why the Ocean has abandoned th»3
Mghest mountains on which it has left incomestable
marks of its former abode. We see why the
animals and plants of the south may be transported
into the climates of the north, where their rehcs
and impressions are still to be found — ^lastly, it
explains the short period of the existence of the
moral world — whose earliest monuments do not go
much farther back than three thousand years.
The human race reduced to a small number of
individuals in the most deplorable state, occupied
only with the immediate care of their subsistence,
must necessarily have lost the remembrance of all
sciences and of every art ; and when the progress
of civilization has again created new wants, every
thing v/as to be done again as if man had been just
placed upon the Earth. But whatever may be
the cause assigned by philosophers to these pheno-
mena— we may be perfectly at ease with respect
to such a catastrophe during the short period of
human life."

14. We may now understand what is meant by
a formation. There is a formation going on just
now at the bottom of our present ocean by those
muddy depositions which are brought to it from all
the rivers ; and which, laid the one over the other,
will form, it is supposed, the strata of a new con-
tinent. Mixed up with this there must be a
constant accumulation going on both of shells and
skeletons — and from the bony parts of the nume-
rous and rapid generations by which the sea is
peopled, there must accrue a perpetual addition
to the solid materials of that deposit, which, by

ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD. '239

the operation of a coming catastrophe, may be the
dry land of the next geological era. There is at
present both a forming and a hardening process
going forward under the waters of the deep — so
that, when these waters shall have shifted their
position, there will emerge a continent of the same
firm and concrete texture with that which is now
inhabited by ourselves — and like it too, lifted here
and there into Alpine elevations, by the mighty
violence that will then be abroad over the whole
surface of the world. It is obvious that this new
land will have been mainly built up from the waste
and demolition of the present one — insomuch as
now it is principally fed by the supply of new
matter swept off from the earth by the flow of
rivers, and transported into the cavities of the
deep. It is thus that in geological language our
present continent becomes the father of a new one ;
and that itself hath had a father and a grandfather,
which venerable personage can further lay claim
to an ancestry ; and thus it is that on the face of
our world there are characters by which to trace
what may be called the pedigree of successive
formations — the most recent of these formations
being that which preceded the very last catastrophe ;
and the intervals between the catastrophes mark-
ing the distinct eras of a globe, which, for aught
we know, might have been the theatre of many
revolutions.

15. Now to come nearer to our argument.
Correspondent to the marks by which one set of
professional men, even the geologists, have arranged
these various formations in the order of their

240 ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WOELD.

antiquity — ^there is another set of professional men,
even the anatomists or comparative anatomists,
who in the course of their independent researches
have by the study of fossil remains ascertained,
they think, many of the species and genera of Hving
creatures by which the world has been peopled
during the respective eras of its physical history.
It is certainly conceivable that a few stragglers
may have survived the operation of one catastrophe
— and transmitted their own proper genera and
species to the era which immediately succeeded
it, so as to leave a thin sprinkUng of the same
remains over the next formation in the series of
the world's changes. But it would appear from
the observations of Cuvier and others — that though
in this way an occasional species may have survived
one or two of these destructive revolutions ; yet
that each catastrophe annihilated the great majo-
rity of the existing genera, and that a very few
more swept every trace of them away from the
surface of the globe. In none of the old formations
hath he ascertained the vestige of the human skele-
ton— marking the recent origin of our own species.
It is only in the latest of these formations that he
discovered traces indeed of any of our existing
genera of animals. And, in proportion as he
carries his observation upward among the senior
formations, does he lose sight of all resemblance to
any of the known living creatures by which our
earth is peopled. But there is still, it is affirmed,
a most distinct and various and perfectly ascer-
tained population ; and these older formations are
crowded with the remains of it. But they are

ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD. 241

wholly distinct from the animals of the present
system. Or, in other words, at each new catas-
trophe old races must have perished — and the
world been stocked with new races distinct and
diverse from the former ones.

16. It is to this pecuhar object that the inquiries
of the celebrated M. Cuvier are directed. Upon
the former conclusions of geologists respecting the
positions of the different strata, and the order of
their formation — ^he grafts his own speculations as
to the fossil remains which exist in them ; ajid he
finds that in proportion to the antiquity of the
strata, is the dissimilarity of these remains to the
present genera. Of the remains of sea animals,
he says, " that their species and ev^i their genera
change with the strata; and altliough the same
species occasionally recurs at small distances, it is
generally the case that the shells of the ancient
strata have forms pecuhar to themselves — that
they gradually disappear till they are not to be
seen at all in the recent strata — still less in the
existing seas, in which indeed w^e never discover
their corresponding species, and where several
even of their genera are not to be found — that on
the contrary the shells of the recent strata resem-
ble, as it respects the genera, those which still
exist in the sea — and that in the last formed and
loosest of these strata, there are some species which
the eye of the most expert naturalist cannot dis-
tinguish from those which at present inhabit the
ocean."

17. From this extract it will be perceived that
the alleged revolutions are numerous. From the

VOL. I. L

242 ON THE COMSJENCEMFjSri C¥ THE WOJILD.

marks of rapidity and violence which are to be mej;
with, it would also appear that they have been
sudden. To this purpose might be alleged the
breaking ^nd overturning of the strata; and the
heaps of debris and rounded pebbles which are
found among tlie solid strata in various places.

18. And at length to bring our argument to a
point. In conjunction with these phenomena,
take the two following doctrines which are now
held as being among the most firmly established in
natural' history. In the first place, were it not for
certain residual phenomena v/hich can with diffi-
culty be disposed of, there is now about utterly
exploded the old doctrine of a spontaneous or
equivocal generation. As far as can be traced
with positive certainty by the eye of observation,
it is not knovrn that either animal or vegetable is
brought into existence in any other way than by
transmission from an animal or vegetable of the
same species. Many of those appearances which
v/ere at one time conceived to indicate the contrary
to this, on a more strict and close examination,
have been reduced to the ordinary process — and
the iix)re narrowly that the search is prosecuted,
the ntore is the semblance of exception done away
— insomuch that we might hold it as being neariy
the universal creed of naturalists, that throughout
both the animal and tlie vegetable Kingdom, each
individual hath had a parent of his own likeness.
This may at least be afiirmed of all the distinct and
definite specimens which compose the great bulk
whether of the zoology or botany of our present era
— so far at least, as that it mip-ht with all sai'ety be

ON THE COMMtNCEAlENT OF THE WOHJ.D. 243

affirmed of all the species which are known to
propagate themselves, that there has not yet been
discovered the slightest tendency to the formation
of the individuals of these species in any other way
than by ordinary generation. However indeter-
minate the questions may yet be which respect
certain obscure or animalcular cases, this surely
does not affect the generality or invariableness of
the doctrine in regard to all the well-known mem-
bers whether of the vegetable or animal family

to the palpable trees or plants of the former, to
the palpable quadrupeds or birds of the latter, as
exemplified in the lion the horse the dog or the
elephant. Whatever discovery might have yet
been made, or whatever lack of discovery might
yet remain in the microscopic or otherwise dark
and perhaps inaccessible departments of nature —
this does not affect the obvious and unexcepted
truth as it relates to the overwhelming majority of
our living generations; viz., that among all the
other complicated processes, whether of fermenta-
tion or of putrefaction or of electric and chemical
agency, which are now goiiig o" in the vast
laboratory of nature, there is not one of them which
approximates in the least towards the formation of
such organic beings — each of which in fact is the
link of a chain composed of links that are altogether
similar to itself — each formed, and formed in no
other way, than by a derivative process along the
steps of a successive generation. It will at once
be seen therefore how many are those exquisite
and complex structures which are formed by the
collocation of parts; and such a collocation as a

244 ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD.

well known physical law doth transmit, but which
no physical law can originate that we are acquainted

with insomuch that we perceive not the sUghtest

tendency to aught hke the spontaneous formation
of them. This holds true of all those individuals
in our existing animal and vegetable races that
come forth in the estabUshed hne of their trans-
mission, so perfectly organized — ^yet without that
line we never observe even the smallest abortive
or partial approximation to them. The mecha-
nical and the chemical, however variously they
are blended, never once approach in any of their
results to the physiological, at least in such speci-
mens as these. So that if we can but demonstrate
a beginnmg for any such separate and independent
races in the physiological kingdom, we shall obtain
in our opinion the nearest possible view that is
anywhere afforded within the limits of our creation
of the fiat of a God.

19. The next doctrine which we have now to
make use of is no less the universal faith of
naturahsts than the former. It is that the species
do not run the one into the other. They are
separated ; and that, by barriers which are perma-
nent and invincible. Should there even be a
minghng of two contiguous species — the power
either of transmitting this one anomaly, or of
extending it any further, ceases as in the mule,
with the immediate offspring. There is thus an
instantaneous check in the way of that transfor-
mation by which the species may have been
confounded and merged into one another — or at
length been metamorphosed into other races which

ON THE COiVIMENCExMENT OF THE WORLD. 245

bore no resemblance whatever to their progenitors.
Within the limits of a species there might be
manifold varieties — ^but these limits can never be
transgressed to the formation of another distinct
and enduring species in the animal kingdom. Let
us combine these two doctrines. There is in
reference to almost, if not universally, to all actual
races no spontaneous generation — therefore in the
existing generation of each species we behold the
present link of a chain, all whose preceding links
have been similar to the one that is before our
eyes. There is no transition of the species into
each other — therefore they present us with so many
separate chains, and wliich have maintained the
separation during the whole currency of their
existence. They diverge not into other species,
nor is one species appended to another. They
have either had distinct origins, or they have been
distinct from all eternity. If the latter, it is not
likely that they would have survived an indefinite
number of catastrophes each of which might have
swept off whole genera from the face of our earth,
and all of which would (but for new collocations
which no observed law can account for) have by
this time left it in a state of desolation. But it is
more distinct and decisive than any likeliliood — that
in the older formations no vestiges of our present
genera are to be found ; and that under our present
economy, or even in the more recent formations,
there are no vestiges of the older genera. A few
of the earlier species, it would appear, may have
survived one or two of those dreadful shocks to
which our planet is exposed — but in the whole

246 ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD.

amount, it seems palpable, that on the one hand
there has been an entire destruction of the ancient
species, and on the other an entire renovation of
species wholly distinct and dissimilar from the
former. The older chains of succession have been
suddenly terminated, as if broken off at their lower
extremities. And the more recent chains, instead
of being to be traced through the midway passage
of a great geological tempest, for the older forma-
tions, those earlier records of our globe hold out
no indication of them — the recent chains have after
a catastrophe had their first and definite origin.
Now the question is. Who or what is the origi-
nator ? All the busy processes of nature which
are going on around us, fail towards even so much
as the formation of an organic being, endowed
with the faculty of self-transmission. All the
possible combinations which human ingenuity can
devise, are baffled in the enterprise. And, save
by that peculiar tie which connects the one link
of this concatenation with the other, there is not
in all the known resources of nature and art,
another method by which such a creature can be
formed. liow then are the first links to be
accounted for? Is there aught in the rude and
boisterous play of a great physical catastrophe that
can germinate those exquisite structures, which
during our yet undisturbed economy have been
transmitted in pacific succession to the present
day ? What is there in the rush and turbulence
and mighty clamour of such great elements — of
ocean heaved from its old resthig place, and lifting
its billows above the Alps and the Andes of a

former continent — what is there in this to charm
into being the embryos of an infant family where-
with to stock and to repeople a now desolated
world ? We see in the sv/eeping energy and up-
roar of this elemental war, enough to account for
the disappearance of all the old generations — but
nothing that might cradle any new generations into
existence, so as to have effloresced on ocean's
deserted bed the life and the loveliness which are now
before our eyes. At no juncture, we apprehend,
in the history of the world — is the interposition of
Deity more manifest than at this — nor can we
better account for so goodly a creation emerging
again into new forms of animation and beauty from
the wreck of the old one, than that the spirit of God
moved on the face of the chaos — and that nature,
turned by the last catastrophe into a wilderness,
was again repeopled at the utterance of His word.
20. Those rocks which stand forth in the order
of their formation, and are each imprinted with
their own pecuhar fossil remains, have been termed
the archives of nature where she hath recorded the
changes that have taken place in the history of the
globe. They are made to serve the purpose of
scrolls or inscriptions on which we might read of
those great steps and successions by which the
earth has been brought to its present state. And
should these archives of nature be but truly deci-
phered, we are not afraid of their being openly
confronted with the archives of revelation. It is
unmanly to blink the approach of light from M'hat-
ever quarter of observation it may fall upon us —
and these are not the best friends of Christianity

248 ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD.

who feel either dislike or alarm, when the torch oi
sci-ence or the torch of history is held up to the Bihle.
For ourselves, we are not afraid, when the eye of
an intrepid, if it be only of a sound philosophy,
scrutinizes however jealously all its pages. We
have no dread of any apprehended conflict between
the doctrines of scripture and the discoveries of
science — ^persuaded as we are, that whatever story
the geologists of our day shall find to be engraven
on the volume of nature, it will only the more
accredit that story which is graven on the volume
of revelation.

21. "And God said. Let the Araters bring forth
abundantly the moving creature that hath life, and
fowl that may fly above the earth in the open firma-
ment of heaven. And God created great whales,
and every living creature that moveth, which the
waters brought forth abundantly after their kind,
and every winged fowl after his kind: and God
said that it was good. And God blessed them,
saying. Be fruitful, and multiply, and fill the waters
in the seas, and let fowl multiply in the earth.
And the evening and the morning were the fifth
day. And God said. Let the earth bring forth the
living creature after his kind, cattle, and creeping
thing, and the beast of the earth after his kind : and
it was so. And God made the beast of the earth
after his kind, and the cattle after their kind, and
every thing that creepeth upon the earth after his
kind ; and God saw that it was good. And God
said. Let us make man in our image, after our
likeness ; and let them have dominion over the fish
of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over

OM THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WOULD. 249

the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every
creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So
God created man in his own image ; in the image
of God created He him ; male and female created
He them."

22. We have again to repeat that our reasoning is
applicable not to one only but to all the Ante- Mosaic
theories. To have place for it indeed, we have
only to assume that the world has undergone such
revolutions or been the subject of such violent
operations as have been destructive of entire species
that formerly existed upon its surface. Of this it
is admitted bv all that there are midoubted vestiges
— giving us therefore sound reason to believe, that
on the supposition of an eternal world, all the
species by which it was peoj)led at some highly
remote period must, by the continuance and repe-
tition of the causes which destroyed several of them,
have at length been Swept away. The question
would thus meet us — whence arose the species now
in actual being ? seeing that they have not subsisted
from eternity. All nature and experience reclaim
against the spontaneous generation of them — thus
leaving us no other inference, than that organic
structures of collocation so manifold and exquisite
could only have sprung from the hands of a designer,
from the fiat of a God.

23. There are many who, in expounding the
science of natural theology, would shrink from all
recognition of scripture — as if this were a mixing
together of things altogether disparate or incon-
gruous. There is a want, we shall not say of

250 ON THE COMMENCFMEXT OF THE WORLD.

good feeling, but of good philosophy in this — unless
we confine ourselves to the express object, of ascer-
taining how much of evidence for a God is furnished
by the light of nature alone. The strength of the
argument, upon the whole, on the side of religion, is
often weakened by this jealous or studied disunion
of the truth in one department from the truth in
another ; but believing as we, do that, instead of a
conflict, there is a corroborative harmony between
them — w^e shall advert once more to the Mosaic
account of the Creation ; and, more especially as
the reconciliation of this history with the indefinite
antiquity of the globe seems not impossible ; and
that without the infliction of any violence on any
of the literalities of the record.

24. The following are the two first verses in
the book of Genesis. '' In the beginning God
created the heaven and the earth. And the earth
was without form, and void ; and darkness was
upon the face of the deep : and the Spirit of God
moved upon the face of the waters." Now let it
be supposed that the work of the first day in the
Mosaic account of the creation, begins with the
Spirit of God moving upon the face of the waters.
The detailed history of creation in the first chapter
of Genesis begins at the middle of the second verse ;
and what precedes might be understood as an
introductory sentence, by which we are most appo-
sitely told both that God created all things at the
first; and that afterwards, by what interval of
time it is not specified, the earth lapsed into a
chaos, from the darkness and disorder of which
the present system or economy of things was made

ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD. 21)1

to arise. By this hypothesis neither the first
verse, nor the first half of the second verse forms
any part of the narrative of the first day's opera-
tions,— the whole forming a preparatory sentence
disclosing to us the initial act of creation at some
remote and undefined period; and the chaotic
state of the world, at the commencement of those
successive acts of creative power, by which out of
rude and undigested materials the present harmony
of nature was ushered into being. Between the
initial act and the details of Genesis, the world for
aught we know might have been the theatre of
many revolutions, the traces of which geology
may still investigate, and to which she in fact has
confidently appealed as the vestiges of so many
successive continents that have now passed away.
The whole speculation has mhiistered a vain
triumph to uifidelity — seeing first that the Historical
Evidence of Scripture is quite untouched by those
pretended discoveries of natural science ; and that,
even should they turn out to be substantial dis-
coveries, they do not come into collision with
the narrative of Moses. Should, in particular, the
explanation that we now ofi^r be sustained, this
would permit an indefinite scope to the conjectures
of geology — and without any undue liberty with
the first chapter of Genesis. We may here state
that there is no argument, saving that grounded oa
the usages of popular language, which would tempt
us to meddle with the literalities of that ancient,
and as appears to us authoritative record. lu
main difficulty lies in the work of the fourth day,
upon which God is said to have made two greal

252 ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD.

lights, the greater to rule the day and the lesser
to rule the night, and the stars also. Yet even
this could be got over, if we adopt a principle
which even Granville Penn has found necessary
for the adjustment of his views — though himseK a
violent and we think an unnecessary alarmist upon
this question. He supposes the Mosaic descrip-
tion to proceed not in the order of creation actu-
ally, but in its order optically — or in other words,
that the sun and moon were not first made, but
first made visible on the fourth day. We earnestly
recommend, however, the perusal of his mineral
and Mosaical geologies-*-not because of our great
confidence in his skill or science as a naturalist,
but because of a certain admirable soundness in
many of those views that are purely theological.
If he have erred in the one science, there is a
redeeming force in the worth and stability of
certain weighty aphorisms that he has given forth
in relation to the other science. He does not
respect enough the indications of nature and expe-
rience— and certain it is, that these might be so far
disregarded as to invalidate some of our best
arguments on the side of theism. If, for example,
fossil remains are not to be looked upon as the
vestiges of hving creatures, it would follow, that
what we have been in the habit of considering as
forms of nice and excellent adaptation may have
been produced without an object, and so after all
be perfectly meaningless. We may assume with
all safety that real shells were never formed by
nature without the design of covering an animal —
and hence, if we ever meet in any situation, how-

ON THE COMxMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD. 253

ever novel or unexpected, with a shell or a tooth,
we should confidently refer to the fish which the
one inclosed, to the jaw-bone in which the other
was inserted. Else we shall give countenance to
the atheist's argument, that even animals them-
selves might have been casual productions.*

* Bishop Patrick's theory was that of au elemental chaos ; and
at the beginning of his commentary he argues for such a chaos,
between the first production of which and the creation of light
he imagines an indefinite period. He then supposes a work of six-
days,

RosenmuUer again, the German commentator and critic, con-
ceives a previous earth, or a first production and a subsequent
renovation.

The chief difficulty in the way of this supposition is the work
of the fourth day, of which by our translation it is said — " Let
there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day
from the night ; and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and
for days, and years : and let them be for lights in the firmament
of the'heaven to give light upon the earth : and it was so. And
God made two great lights ; the greater light to rule the day,
and the lesser light to rule the night : he made the stars also.
And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light
upon the earth, and to rule over the day, and over the night, and
to divide the light from the darkness : and God saw that it was
good. And the evening and the morning were the fourth day."

Even Granville Penn- contributes some help to the solution of
tliis difficulty, when he tolls us that the description in the first
chapter of Genesis proceeds not in the order of the creation actu-
ally, but in Its order optically.

But the most complete solution of this difficulty of which wo
know, has been furnished by RosenmuUer. On the fourth day lie
savs, that " if any one who is conversant with the genius of the
Hebrew, and free from any previous bias of his judgment, will
read the words of this article in their natural connexion, lie will
immediately perceive that they import a direction or determi-
nation of the heavenly bodies to certain uses which they were to
supply to the earth. The words nn«?D ^H"* (in the 14th verse)
are not to be separated from the rest, or to be rendered ' fiant
luminaria,' let there be lights — that is ' let lights be made ;' but
rather ♦ let lights be' — that is, ' serve in the expanse of heaven'

' inserviant in expanso cojlorum' — for distinguishing between

day and night, and let them be or serve for signs and for seasons,
and for days and years. For we are to observe that the verb H^H

251 ON 'inK C().M.\it;Nci:.\ii-:NT or tiik \v.)5ii.i>.

25. We regret that Peiiii, or Gisborne, or any
other of our Scriptural geologists, should have
entered upon this controversy v/ithout a sufficient
preparation of natural science ; and laid as much
stress too on the argument Vvhich they employed,
as if the v/ hole truth and authority of revelation
depended on it. It is thus that the cause of truth
has often suffered from the misguided zeal of its
advocates, anxiously struggling for every one
position about which a question may have been
raised; and so landing themselves at times in a
situation of most humiliating exposure to the
argument or ridicule of their adversaries. They

in be m co!istruction with the prefix S ' for,' is gouin-ally employed
tx) express the direction or determination of a thing- to an end,
and not the production of the thing — for example, Numbers x.
31 ; Zechariah viii. 19, and in many other places.''

He further argues thus — "But the difference between the
sinirular V.^ and the plural Vm in the 14th verse, demands a
corresponding- difference in the interpretation ; and, therefore, if
we would make that difference literally apparent we must thus
literally interpret — ' Fiat, luminaria in tirmamento coeli ad
dividendnm inter diem et noctem, ut sint, in signa, et tempora,
et in dies, et in annos, et sint ad illuminandura super terrara,'
That is ' Fiatut luminaria sint in signa &c. et ad illuminandum
&c.' The particle T signifies ' ut' in three hundred passages, and
Vm signifies ' ut sint' in several of them. This interpretation
therefore yields this literal sense in our language — ' Let it be,
that the lights in the firmament of heaven, for dividing between
the day and the night, be for signs, and for seasons, and for days,
and years.' — that is finally — .' Let the lights in the firmament of
heaven, for dividing between the day and night, be for signs, and
for seasons, and for days and years ; and let^ them be for lights
in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth :
and it was so :' so that Rosenmuller's induction from the construc-
tion of this passage is ' de determinatione astrorum ad certos
quosdam usus orbi terrarum prsestandis, esse sermonem — non de
productione' — or that the narrative in these verses respects the
.determination of the heavenly bodies to the performance of some
Cf?rtain use«; to the earth — not to Ihe production of these bodies.*

ON TIIK COMMENCEMENT OF 'VUK WOULD. 255

weaken the line of defence l>y extending it. They
multiply their yuhieral)le points ])y spreading their
detachments and their outworks over too great a
surface, when they might have concentrated their
strength within the limits of an impregnable for-
tress. They raise too loud an outcry of alarm,
and lift too high a note of preparation, on the
assault by their enemies of some insignificant
outpost which might with all safety be conceded
to them — so that when it does come to be occupied
by assailants, there is just as tremendous a shout
of victory on the one side, as there w^as of misplaced
dread and violence upon the other. Meanwhile
the citadel abideth in its ancient security, as com-
manding in its site and as strong in all its essential
battlements as ever — and, in the consciousness of
this strength, might they who look abroad from
its turrets, eye with perfect tolerance, if not with
complacency, the petty warfare that is occasionally
breaking out at their remoter outskirts. It is
right to be vigilant. — but it is not right to w^aste
the strength or the credit of a good cause upon
the defence of an untenable position — and more
especially, if that position be wholly insignificant.
It is thus that in the management of what may be
called intellectual tactics, it is good to keep by the
strong points of an argument, and to abstain by
all means from laying any more of weight on the
minor or collateral reasonings than these reason-
ings will bear.

26. We have long regarded the contest between
the cause of revelation on the one hand, and the
infidehty of the geological schools upon the other,

256 ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD.

as merely an affair of outposts, which, however
terminating, will leave the main strength of the
Christian argument unimpaired. We have already
endeavoured to show, how without any invasion
even on the literalities of the Mosaic record, the
indefinite antiquity of the globe might safely be
given up to naturaUsts, as an arena whether for
their sportive fancies or their interminable gladi-
atorship. On this supposition the details of that
operation narrated by Moses, which lasted for six
days on the earth's surface, will be regarded as the
steps, by which the present economy of terrestrial
things was raised, about six thousand years ago,
on the basis of an earth then without form and
void. While, for aught of information we have in
the Bible, the earth itself may, before this time,
have been the theatre of many lengthened pro-
cesses— the dwelling place of older economies that
have now gone by ; but whereof the vestiges sub-
sist even to the present day, both to the needless
alarm of those who befriend the cause of Christi-
anity, and to the unw^arrantable triumph of those
who have assailed it.

27. Let us never quit the strongholds of the
Christian argument in hazarding a mere affair of
outposts, unless we are quite sure of the ground
we stand upon. There are certain zealous
defenders of Christianity who in this way have done
an injury to the cause. And it does give rise to a
most unnecessary waste of credit and confidence,
it does give the enemies of religion a most unneces-*
sary triumph, when its defenders expose their
ignorance in the maintenance of a position, which

ON THE COMMENCEMENT OF THE WORLD. 257

even though given up leaves Christianity as firmly
based as ever, on those miraculous and prophetic
and experimental evidences which substantiate the
Bible as the authentic record of an authentic com-
munication from Heaven to Earth, as a Book
indited by holy men of God, who stood charged,
not with the matters of physical science, but with
those transcendently higher matters which relate to
the moral guidance and the moral destiny of our
species.

28. Yet whatever room there might be for wise
and sound policy in managing the Christian argu-
ment, there is no reason at all for the pusillanimous
feeling of dismay. Our cause may suffer a partial
and temporary discredit from the mismanagement
of its friends — ^but not all the strength and subtlety
of its most powerful adversaries can achieve its
permanent overthrow. Those days have gone by
of triumphant anticipation to the enemies of the
cros?, when the wit of Voltaire, and the eloquence
of Rousseau, and the sophistry of Hume, entered
into menacing combination on the side of infideUty.
These have all been withstood — and on the arena,
too, of literary and intellectual debate — where many
a feat of championship has been performed, in
repelling those successive attacks, which under the
semblance of philosophy have been made upon the
Faith, For after all it is but a semblance and
nothing more. That demi-infidel spirit, which for
a generation or two has kept such hold of the seats
of philosophy, did not find its ascendancy there till
we had sunk down to an age of little men. Those
great master-spirits of a former age, after whom

258 RECAIMTULATION OF EVIDENCE.

there appeared the .pigmies of what may be called
a second-rate philosophy, were wholly exempted
from it. In the days of proudest achievement and
most colossal minds it was comparatively unknown
— and so far from feeling a chsgrace or a descent
in Christianity, the illustrious names of Newton
and Locke and Bacon and Boyle stand all associated
wdth the defence and illustration of it.

CHAPTER III.

On the Strength of the Evidences for a God in the
Phenomena of Visible and External Nature,

1. We include among the phenomena of external
nature whatever can be exposed to the observation
of human eyes — and therefore, the organization and
mechanism of our own bodies. There is distinct
and additional evidence for a God — and that too,
we think, the strongest and most influential of any,
grounded on a phenomenon purely mental, and so
coming under the dominion of consciousness alone.
This we shall advert to afterwards — but mean-
while, we should hke to ot'er a brief recapitulation
of what we deem to be the strong points of the
Theistical argument, as far as it has yet been pro-
ceeded in ; that by means of a condensed view -we
may perceive distinctly wherein it is that the main
force of the reasoning lies.

2. 'i'he tirst strong poiiit of this argument is
groin)ded on the distinction v.hich v>e have already

UECAPITULATIOX OF EVIDENCE. 259

endeavoured to make palpable between tbe laws of
matter and the collocations of matter. In the
reasonmg for a God from the mere existence of
matter, we certainly do not remark any strong
point of argument whatever. And then, when
this argument from the existence of matter is given
up, there remains another obscure and indetermin-
able controversy about its properties, as to which
of them may be essential, and which of them must
have been communicated at the will and by the
appointment of a devising and purposing and intelli-
gent Being. Now so long as the argument tarries
either at the existence or at the laws of matter, we
do not think that we have yet come to any lucid or
effective consideration upon the subject. We hold
that at this part of the question the cause of
Natural Theology has sutFered from the confidence
joined with the obscurity of those reasonings which
have been made use of by its supporters ; and that
it were therefore a mighty service to the cause did
we separate what in it is decisive and what in it is
doubtful from each other.

3. They are the collocations, then, which form
by far the most unequivocal tokens of a Divinity
that the material world has to offer. We under-
stand the term, in a more comprehensive sense than
ihat which is conveyed by its mere etymology.
We mean not only that the parts of matter have
been placed in right correspondence to each other ;
but that these parts, so placed, have been rightly
sized and rightly shaped, for some obviously bene-
ficial end of the combination in questioji — and
moreover that forces of a right intensity and direc*

260 RECAPITULATION OF EVIDENCE.

tion have been made to meet together so as to be
productive of some desirable result. The world is
full of such collocations — and the strong circum-
stance is, that there is nothing in the yet ascertained
laws of matter that could have given rise to them
— insomuch that if at this moment any of them
w^ere destroyed, there appears nothing in these
laws which could possibly replace them. It is
true, that in astronomy, the argument founded
on these, is all the less impressive, that it requires
but the concurrence of few independent circum-
stances to complete the astronomical system.
Such a concurrence however is indispensable — and
in virtue of this it is, that the planetarium has been
so exquisitely formed as never to deviate far from
a mean state, but only to oscillate a little way on
either side of it — else the system would have
contained wdthin itself the elements of its own
destruction. It marks what the atheistical tendency
is, that La Place should have ascribed this beau-
tiful result to a law, and not to the collocations.
He seems to have felt throughout his reasonings,
wherein it was that the plausibiUty of atheism
chiefly lay. But this also carries in it an intimation
to us, wherein it is that the main strength lies of
the argument for a Divinity. No doubt, the law
is indispensable, and enters as one element into
the calculation. But we have already noticed that
the collocations are equally indispensable ; and
they enter as other elements into the calculation.
So that if ever a time was when these collocations
were not, if the present order of the heavens have
tiad a commencement, — there seems nothing in

RECAPITULATION OF EVIDENCE. 261

any of the discovered laws or forces of matter
which could have originated them. They seem
only referable to the fiat and finger of a God.

4. But the argument gathers prodigiously in
strength, when we descend from the celestial to
the terrestrial collocations of things ; from the
contingencies which meet together in the formation
of an astronomical, to those which meet together
in the formation of an anatomical system ; from the
simple mechanism of the heavens into which so
few simphcities are required to enter, to those
complex organic mechanisms which require such
a prodigiously varied and manifold combination.
Could we but demonstrate a commencement for
them, then the argument rises to almost the force
of infinity for a God. And it seems impossible to
escape from the belief of such a commencement,
whatever opinion we may entertain as to the
authority of the professed historical vouchers for
the historical fact of a creation. If that authority
be deferred to, then there is no practical need, at
least, for any further reasoning on the subject.
But if, on the other hand, it be set aside, «is has
been done by many on the strength of certain
geological theories, then our argument is complete
if in these very theories, there be the palpable
proofs of a commencement to the present order of
things. This is what we have endeavoured to
demonstrate — not that we have any distrust in the
authority of Moses as an historian — but that wo
hold it right to show as it were all the sides of our
argument, and that all round it is impregnable — .
capable, therefore, of being shaped to every variety

^.^'2. RECAIMTULATION OF EVIDENCE.

of speculation, and of gaming proselytes to its high
cause from the disciples of all the sciences.

5. Now the most essential stepping-stone of
this argument is a doctrine that has become the
almost universal creed of naturalists — that there ia
no spontaneous generation, at least in reference to
the vast majority of known species ; to which we
superadd the equally admitted doctrine — that there
is no transmutation of the species. It is now
upwards of a century since the evidence of the
former became so palpable, as to constitute it into
an article of philosophical belief — and the advocates
of Theism in that day, were not blind to the im-
portance of it. We will find it, and deservedly,
the subject of gratulation and triumph to Bentley
and others. It goes to establish an impassable
barrier between the physiological on the one hand,
and the chemical or the mechanical on the other —
insomuch that we have never distinctly made out of
all the processes in chemistry, or of all the principles
and powers in natural philosophy, that they even
approximate to the formation of an organic being,
at least of an organic being which has the property
of self-transmission. Of almost all our lining races
it may be said that we do not perceive so much as
a rudimental or abortive tendency to it — whereas,
had there been an equivocal generation, and had
our present animal and vegetable races originated
in such a lucky combination as favoured their
complete development, we should for one instance
that succeeded have witnessed a thousand fi-us-
trated in the progress — all nature teeming, as it
were 'w ith abortions innumerable ; and for each

RECAPITULATION OF EVIDENCE. 203

new species brought to perfection under our eyes,
we should have beheld millions falling short ai
the incipient and at all the progressive stages
of formation, with some embryo stifled in the bud,
or some half-finished monster checked by various
adverse elements and forces in its path to vitality.
Now in the whole compass of observation, no sucli
phenomena are to be found. V/e do not see any
of the species with which we are at all familiar
brousrht forward in this wav — and wait in vain for
such from the immatured buddings of animal and
vegetable formation. Each actual variety through
the great extent of the ascertained physiological
kingdom is perfect in its way — and there is a
distinct mvariable lino of transmission in which,
but nevser out of which, we behold the production
of each of them. Could we only demonstrate then
a commencement for all or for any of these lines,
we should be conducted to the period when there
took place a most skilful, a most complete, a most
varied collocation — and that, by means which
nature, that great goddess of the infidel philosophy,
as far as the eye of philosophy ever has explored,
does not hold in anv of her maa^azines. ^Ye should
see, in striking exemplification, the collocations of
matter taking place, and by other means than by
any laws of matter which we at least are acquainted
with — and on comparing the maniibld fitness of the
collocations with the impotency of the laws, vre
should have the nearest experimental argument that
can be given for the energy of a creative wordj for
the fiat and the forthgoings of a Deity.

6. The commencement, then, even of any of oiu*

564 RECAPITULATION OF EVIDENCE.

aninial or vegetable races would seem to decide
tins question. Let us by any means be made to
know of any of the existing generations, that histori-
cally it had a first and a definite orighi ; and this of
itself would carry in it the demonstration of a God.
But the proper argument in behalf of this or of any
historical fact is historical evidence — and to over-
look the strength of such evidence for a creation in
the Jewish Scriptures were not merely unchristian
but unphilosophical. Yet it is with the air, and
apparently under the sanction of philosophy that
this evidence has of late been contravened. The
plausibilities of geological science or speculation
have been brought to bear against it. Instead of
looking to the narrative of scripture, we are called
upon to look at the demonstration of certain
lengthened processes which this science would
substitute, and wherewith it would set aside the
authority of Moses. Yet in these very processes
do we behold, and in characters the most vivid and
discernible, the footsteps of a Deity. In the
attempt to escape from Christianity, geologists
have been caught or involved, more surely in
theism. Under all systems which ascribe to matter
an indefinite antiquity, each successive economy in
our world is supposed to contain within itself the
elements of decay, or to be exposed to certain
processes of violence and destruction. This vexed
and agitated globe has been conceived of as the
theatre of such revolutions, that though the earth
itself in matter and substantive being has survived
them, the frail organic creatures upon its surface
cculd not have survived them. It matters not how

RECAPITULATION OF EVIDENCi:. 265

the alleged catastrophes have been brought about
— whether by fire from the centre, or by ocean
heaved from its old resting-place, and, in one
mighty resistless tide, sweeping, as with the besom
of destruction, those continents on which the
animals of a former era had for thousands of ages
held their unmolested habitation. It is enough if
by one catastrophe whole species or genera have^
been extinguished ; and if by an indefinite number of
them throughout past eternity all the genera at one
time in the world might now have disappeared.
The question still is unresolved, what the origin,
or whence the existence of our present races?
Not by spontaneous generation, we are taught by
natural science, in one of its most authoritative
lessons. Not as we know from another of its
lessons, by the transmutation of old species into
new ones. Not by any combination that we have
ever observed of all the known powers and prin-
ciples in creation — and thus are we enabled to
refer those things in nature which of all others have
most exquisite and manifold collocations — the most
certainly to a definite origin, the most nearly to the
finger of a Creator.

7. There is another strong point in the argu-
ment ; and which has been turned with great effect
by theistical writers to the service of the cause.
In reasoning on the perfect symmetry and com-
modiousness of the animal machine, there is a cer-
tain infidel evasion that has been made from the
argument. It has been afiirmed that most of the
alleged fitnesses, in the construction of an organic
being, are not only indispensable to comfort but

VOL. I. M

2C}<J RFXAPITULATION OF EVIDENCE.

indispensable to life, so that the race could not
liave survived the want of them ; and, that there-
fore, it is impossible from the nature of the thing
that any of the opposite unfitnesses can ever be
found in any of our existing specimens. At this
rate it will be observed of the actual races, that
they are regarded but as the fortunate relics, vvhich,
amid an infinity of chances, have realized all the
necessary conditions for the upholding of vitality,
and for the transmitting of it to successive genera-
tions. They are the lucky few, which, by tlie
mathematical doctrine of probabilities, were cer-
tainly to be looked for, in a countless multitude of
failures or abortions. Any mal-convenance which
is incompatible with life cannot from the very
nature of the case be presented to observation ;
and therefore cannot be appealed to by reasoners
on the atheistical side of the argument. Now
they complain of this as the loss of an advantage — ■
whereas on the side of their antagonists there are
so many random productions, they afnrm, which in
a,n infinity of combinations are not more than might
have been expected, but a plausible and confident
appeal to which will make the worse appear the
better argument.

8. Our first reply to this has in some measure
been anticipated. Any such embryo formations
as we have supposed have never once been vrit-
nessed by us. Exterior to the established line of
transmission, there is not even an incipient move-
ment to be seen, in any department of nature,
towards the production of animals or vegetables
endowed v.ith the faculty of afterwards transmitting

RECAPiTLLATION OF EVIDENCE. 267

themselves. We see no example in all the multi-
form combinations of chemistry and mechanics,
however aided by various and variously blended
physical influences, of any half-formed mechanism
of this sort passing onward to its completion, but
arrested in its progress and thrown back again,
because of some deficient sense or organ that is
essential to vitality. The argument represents
nature as teeming with abortions, whereas in the
whole compass of nature, no such abortion, and
not even the tendency to it has been found.

9. But our second reply we hold to be still more
satisfactory. There can be conceived many thou-
sands of mal-adjustments, each of which would be
incompatible with comfort and not incompatible
with life — yet none of which we ever see realized.
The argument of the atheists presupposes of every
adaptation in the animal frame, which we plead in
proof of design, that it is essential to vitality — ^but
it is not so. The nails, for example at the extre-
mities of our fingers, and the position of which we
ascribe to collocation but they to the blind direc-
tion of a physical law — may be conceived to have
been otherwise situated, without any such hazard
to the life of man as would have led to the extinc-
tion of the race. They might have been ranged
in separate horny excrescences round the wrist,
instead of being ranged as now at the places where
they are most serviceable. In like manner the
teeth might have been less conveniently posited
than they are actually — or the cutting and grinding
teeth might have changed places, instead of being
fixed and arranged in the very way tliat makes

26.8 RECAPITULATION OF EVIDENCE.

them the most effective. We are quite sure that
by going in detail over the human body, many
thousands of changes could be pointed out, each
entailing severe trouble and discomfort upon man,
yet without hazard to the being of the individual
or to the endurance of the species. How then is
the actual optimism of the human frame to be
accounted for ? Why is it that no alteration
can be proposed either in shape or locality which
would not deteriorate the mechanism ? There is,
no doubt, a certain limit, beyond which if the
changes were to proceed, they would prove incom-
patible with life, and so expunge the specimen
altogether from observation — ^but how comes it,
that between this limit and the actual state of
every existing species we see nothing awkward,
nothing misplaced, nothing that admits of being
mended — without one of those inaptitudes or dis-
proportions which either a blind nature, or a
sportive and capricious chance, must have infallibly
and in myriads given rise to ? W hence no idle
excrescences in those complicated systems ? How
comes each part to be in such exquisite harmony
with the whole ? What but manifold experience
could have taught the anatomist to ground such
confident inferences on the uses of every thing that
he discovers in the animal framework — and whence
can it be, but from the actual design which pre-
sided over these formations, that, when reasoning
on final causes, he is in the best possible track for
the enlargement of his science ? Whence the
certainty, the almost axiomatic certainty of. the
position, that there is nothing useless in the anatQ -

IIECAPITLLATIOX OT J'.VIDEN'CE. 269

mlcal structure ? And that, on the contrary,
anatomists never reason more safely, than when
they presume and reason on an universal useful-
ness. And this principle so far from misleading,
which in a random economy of things it would
infallibly have done, has often been the instrument
of anatomical discovery. Could this have been
the case under a mere system either of headlong
forces, or of fortuitous combinations ? Would not
the monstrous and the grotesque and the incon-
gruous have ever and anon been obtruded upon
our view — and when instead of this we behold such
significancy in every part and in every function of
the physiological system, does not this tell most
significantly of a God ?

10. There is an infinity of examples to the same
effect in the inferior creation. As one instance
out of the many, we find wings attached to the
animals, who, from the smallness or comparative
lightness of their bodies, can obtain the benefit of
them. ^Vhy not wings on horses and other large
animals, w^ho could shift well enough to live though
they could not use their wings ? And here there
occurs to us the remarkable instance of a congruity
in the parts of animals, greatly subservient to their
accommodation, yet experimentally proved in a
familiar case to be not essential to hfe. We all
know that the necks of quadrupeds, as is magnifi-
cently set forth in the camelopard, are in general
commensurate with their fore legs. The same
proportion is observed in birds especially those
which feed upon grass. The obvious design of
this collocation is that thev may be enabled t/;

270 RECAPITULATION OF EVIDENCE.

reach the ground conveniently v/ith their bills.
Now there is no exception to this rule by whif.h
the length of the neck keeps pace with that of the
legs in land fowls — but there is an exception in the
case of those water-fowls that feed on the produce
of water bottoms — as the swan whose neck is
much larger in proportion than its legs, and also the
goose, both of which birds seek for their food in
the shmy bottom of lakes or pools. Now it so
happens of the goose that it can live upon land with
its long neck and short legs — though the dispro-
portion under which it labours gives an obvious
awkwardness to its appearance and gait — besides,
we have no doubt, subjecting it to a certain degree
of inconvenience in feeding. Here then is one
example of an incongruity consistent with life,
and fully authorizing the question, why under a
random or unintelligent economy of things, there
is not an infinite multitude of such examples among
living animals ? It will be perceived of this one
example, that, while it both furnishes and illus-
trates the argument on which we now insist, it
carries in it no exception to the wisdom of the
Creator. The animal is amphibious. Its natural
habitat is the margin of lakes. It may live on
land, but it can live on water — and is furnished
with its long neck for the sake of the additional
food obtained from this latter element.

1 1. Before quitting this subject we may remark
that the exception which takes place in the propor-
tion between the necks and the legs is peculiar to
those birds that are webfooted. Now is theie
aught, we v^'ould ask, in a disproportion between

IIECAPI'IULATION OF EVIDENCE. 271

necks and legs that is fitted by the mere operation
of a blind and physical energy to produce these
webs ? Or, can the adjustment of parts so remote
and unconnected be ascribed to any thing but
collocation ?

12. There is a very pleasing information re-
cently given in a most entertaining book of travels
by Mr. Waterton. It respects the sloth — an animal
which creeps along the ground with every symptom
of distress, as if it laboured under the pain and
discomfort of some very grievous mal~adjustment.
According to the narrative of this very adventurous
traveller, he has cleared up this apparent exception
to the order of perfect adaptation throughout the
animal kingdom. The creature, it would appear,
when on the ground, is out of its element. Its
natural habitat is among the branches of trees,
which branches interlaced with each other afford
a continuous path for hundreds of miles in the
extensive forests of SoXith America. Its feet, it
would appear, were not made for pressing upon
the earth, but for lapping into each other, so as to
suspend the animal with its back undermost on
those horizontal branches, along vvhich it warps its
way from one tree to another. When it regains
its' natural situation, it instantly recovers, it is said,
its natural alacrity, and exchanges the agoPA' it
experienced, when in a state of violence, for the
ease and enjoyment of one who feels himself at
home. The frame and habitudes of the creature
are thus found, as with all other animals, to be
exactly suited to the place of its proper occupation
— so as no longer to stand in the way of the general

27*2 RECAPITULATION OF EVIDENCE,

doctrine, that each creature is perfect in its kind
and all very good.*

13. In order to taste the richness and power of
the theistical argument, one would need to enter
upon the details of it. For doing aught hkv-?
adequate justice to the theme, we should go piece-
meal-over the face of this vast and voluminous
creation ; and show how in the exquisite textures of
every leaf and every hair and every membrane^
Nature throughout all her recesses was instinct
with contrivance, and in the minute as well as the
magnificent announced herself the workmanship
of a [Master's hand. We cannot venture on the
statistics of so wide and so exuberant a territory.
The variety in which we should lose ourselves, the
Psalmist hath expressively designed by the epithet
of "manifold" — and this sets forth the significancy
of thaf scriptural expression, " the manifold wisdom
of God." It is to us interminable. When told
that w^e might expatiate fof wrecks together on the
habitudes and economy of a single insect, we may
guess how arduous the enterprise would be, to
traverse the whole length and breadth of a land, so
profusely overspread and so densely peopled with
the tokens of a planning and presiding Deity. It

* Dr. Buckland has treated this subject scientifically in a
recent paper, " On the Adaptation of the Structure of the Sloths
to their peculiar mode of Life," in which he demonstrates, that,
so far from being chargeable with imperfection or monstrosity,
the construction of the sloth " adds another striking case to the
endless instances of perfect mechanism and contrivance, which
we find pervading every organ of every creature, when viewed
in relation to the office it is destined to fulfil ; and afi'ords a new
exemplification of the principle, which has been so admii-ably
illustrated by the judicious Paley, * that the animal is fitted to
its state/**

RECAPITULATION OF EVIDENCE. 2/3

would be to compass all philosophy — it would be
to describe the Encyclopedia of human knowledge ; .
and, out of the spoils collected from every possible
quarter of contemplation, to make an offering to
Ilim of whom it has been eloquently said, that He
sits enthroned on the riches of the universe. It
would be to trace the footsteps of a Being, who,
while He wields with giant strength the orbs of
immensity, pencils every flower upon earth and
hangs a thousand dew-drops around it — at one
time walking in greatness among the wonders of
the firmament, and at another, or rather at the
same time, Mattering beauty of all sorts in count-
less hues and inimitable touches around our lowly
dwelling-places. He hath indeed lighted up
most gloriously the canopy that is over our heads
— He hath shed unbounded grace and decora-
tion on the terrestrial platform beneath us. Yet
these are only parts of his ways — for the whole of
his Productiveness and Power who can compre-
hend ? This will be the occupation of Eternity —
amid that diversity of operations at present so
baffling, to scan the counsels of the God who
worketh all in all.

14. Our limits do not permit so much as an
entrance upon this field — ^let us therefore recom-
mend the study of those authors w ho have ventured
upon the enterprise, and have followed it up with
a more or a less successful execution. Mixed up
with the unsatisfactory metaphysics of that period,
the reader will find a good deal of solid argumenta-
tion, in the Sermon preached about the beginning
of the last rentury at the Boyle Lectureship — .
M 2

274 TlECAPITULATfON OF KVIUENCE.

though we confess that on this question, we ha^ve
greater value for the works of Ray and Derham
than for them all put together. Even these
however have been now superseded by the masterly
performance of Dr. Paley — a writer of whom it is
not too much to say, that he has done more than
any other individual who can be named to accom-
modate the defence both of the Natural and the
Christian .Theology to the general understanding
of our times. He, in particular, has illustrated
wdth great feUcity and eflfect the argument for a
God from those final causes which may be descried
in the appearances of nature — and, altJ||/Dugh he has
confined himself chiefly to one depart ment, that is
the anatomical, yet that being far the most prolific
of this sort of evidence, he has altogether composed
from it a most impressive pleading on the side of
Theism. He attempts no eloquence; but there
is all the power of eloquence in his graphic repre-
sentation of natural scenes and natural objects —
just as a painter of the Flemish School may without
any creative faculty of his own, but on the strength
of his imitative faculties only, minister to the specta-
tors of his art all those emotions both of the Sublime
and Beautiful which the reality of visible things is
fitted to awaken. And so without aught of the
imaginative, or aught of the etherial about him —
but in virtue of the just impression which external
things make upon his mind, and of the admirable
sense and truth wherewith he reflects them back
again, does our author by acting merely the part
of a faithful copyist, give a fuller sense of the
richness and repleteness of this argument, than is

itMLAPl'I'Ll.a'riON n[- i:Vt IJI.NCI:. L i ..>

ov c:in be effected by all tho eialKn-atioiis of iv.i
aiil.-itioiis oratory. Of liim it may be said, and
v.'irh as emphatic justice as of any man who ever
wrote, that there is no nonsense about him-^and
so, with all his conceptions most appropriate to the
.subject that he is treating, and these bodied forth
hi words each of which is instinct with significanc-y
and most strikingly appropriate — we have alto-
gether a performance neither vitiated in expression
by one clause or epithet of verbiage, nor vitiated
in substance by one impertinence of prurient or
misplaced imagination. His predomlnent faculty
IS judgment — and therefore it is, that ho is always
sure to seize on the relevancies or srruib^^ points of
an argument, which never suffer -from his mode of
rendering them, because, to use a lamihar but
expressive phrase, they are at all times exceedingly
well put. His perfect freedom from all aim and
all affectation is a mighty disencumbrance to
him — he having evidently no other object, than
to give forth in as clear and correct deUneation
as possible, those impressions which nature and
truth had spontaneously made on his own just
and vigorous understanding. So that, altogether,
although we should say of the mind of Paley that
it was of a decidedly prosaic or secular cast —
although w^e should be at a loss to find out wha^s
termed the poetry of his character, and doubt m
fact w^hether any of the elements of poetry were
there — although never to be found in the walk of
sentiment or of metaphysics, or indeed in any high
transcendental walk whatever whether of the reason
or of the fancy — yet to him there most unquestioii-

276 RECAPITULATION OF EVIDENCE.

ably belonged a very high order of faculties. His
most original work is the Hora? Paulinae, yet even
there he discovers more of the observational than
the inventive ; for after all, it was but a new track
of observation which he opened up, and not a noAv
species of argument which he devised that mi^ht
immortalize its author, like the discovery of a before
unknown calculus in the mathematics. AH the
mental exercises of Paley lie v»ithin the limits of
sense and of experience — nor would one over think
of awarding to him the meed of genius. \'et in
the whole staple and substance of his thoughts
there was something better than genius — the home-
bred product of a hale and well-conditioned intellect,
that dealt in the ipsa corpora of truth, and studied
use and not ornament in the drapery wherewith he
invested it. We admit that he had neither the
organ of high poetry nor of high metaphysics — and
perhaps would have recoiled from both as from
some unmeaning mysticism of which nothing could
be made. Yet he had most efficient organs not-
withstanding— and the Volumes he has given to
the world, plain perspicuous and powerful, as was
the habitude of his own understanding — fraught
throughout with meaning, and lighted up not in the
gorgeous colouring of fancy but in the clearness of
truth's own element — these Volumes form one of
wS most precious contributions which, for the last
half century, have been added to the theological
literature of our land.

15. It has been said that there is nothing more
uncommon than common sense. It is the perfection
of his common sense which makes Paley at once so

RECAPITULATION OF EVIDENCE. 277

I are and so valuable a specimen of our nature.
The characteristics of his mind make up a most
interesting variety, and constitute him into what may
be termed a literary phenomenon. One likes to
behold the action and reaction of dissimilar minds
— and therefore it were curious to have ascertained
how he would have stood affected by the perusal
of a volume of Kant, or by a volume of lake poetry.
We figure that he would have liked Franklin ; and
that, coming down to our day, the strength of
Cobbett would have had in it a redeeming quality
to make even his coarseness palatable. He would
have abhorred all German sentimentalism — and of
the a priori argument of Clarke, he would have
wanted the perception chiefly because he wanted
patience for it. His appetite for truth and sense
would make him intolerant of all which did not
engage the discerning faculties of his soul — and
from the sheer force and promptitude of his decided
judgment, he would throw off instanter all that he
felt to be uncongenial to it. The general solidity
of his mind posted him as if by gravitation on the
terra firma of experience, and restrained his flight
into any region of transcendental speculation.
Yet Coleridge makes obeisance to him — and diflfer-
ently moulded as these men were, this testimony
from the distinguished metaphysician and poet
does honour to both.

16. Having thus dwelt as long as our limits will
admit, on the evidences of design in external
nature — it is all important to remark, that on the
one hand there might be innumerable most lucid
indications of design in p^irticnlar instances, while

*273 IlLCAPiTULATION OF EVIDEXCE.

on the other a mystery impenetrable may hang
over the general design of creation. The lesson
that there is a presiding intelligence, ma\^ shine
most vividly forth in the details of the universe —
and yet tlie drift, or what we should term the policy
of the universe, may be wrapt in profoundest
secrecy from our view. The world may teem all
over with the indications of contrivance — and yet
the end which the contriver had in view, the
moving cause which impelled him to the formation
of the world, or the final destination that awaits it,
may all baffle the comprehension of men, who
nevertheless can read the inscription of a manifold
and marvellous wisdom on every page in the
volume of nature. So that on the one hand there
may be overpowering light, v.hile on the other
there is hopeless and unconquerable darkness.
In the workmanship of nature we behold an infinity
of special adaptations to special objects, each of
which bespeaks a sovereign mind that plans and
purposes — yet there may the deepest obscurity
hang over the question, what is the plan or pur-
pose of this workmanship on the whole ? It is
just as when looking to an individual man, we cannot
but recognise the conceptions of an architect in
the teeth, and the eyes, and the hands, and all the
parts of manifest subserviency which belong to
him — ^yet remain unable to solve the enigma of
his being, or to fathom the general conception of
the Divinity in thus ushering a creature to exis-
tence, that he may live in restless vanity, and die
in despair. And what is true of an individual is
true of a species or of a imiverse. Throughout,

RECAPITL'I.ATION OF rVIDENCE. '270

and in its separate parts, it may be pregnant Avith
the notices of a Divinity — yet in reference both to
its creation. and its government, to the principle in
which it originated and the consummation in which
it issues, there may be an overhanging mystery —
and man, all clear and confident on the question
that God is, may abide notwithstanding in deepest
ignorance of His purposes and His ways.

BOOK III.

PROOFS FGll THE BEING AND CHARACTER
OF GOD IN THE CONSTITUTION OF THE
HUMAN MIND.

CHAPTER I.

General Considerations on the Evidence afforded
by the Phenomena and Constitution of the
Human Mind for the Being of a God.

1. There are many respects in which the evidence
for a God, given forth by the constitution of the
human body, differs from the evidence given forth
by the constitution of the human spirit. It is with
the latter evidence that we have now more pecuh-
arly to deal ; but at present we shall only advert
to a few of its distinct and special characteristics.
The subject will at length open into greater detail,
and development — yet a brief preliminary exposi-
tion may be useful at the outset, should it only
convey some notion of the difficulties and particu-
larities of this bra.nch of the argument.

2. A leading distinction between the material
and the mental fabrications is, the iax greater
complexity of the former, at least greater to all
human observation. Into that system of means
which has been formed for the object of seeing,
there enter at least twenty separate contingencies,
the abgence of anv one of which would either

ON THE EVIDENCE FOR A GOD, &C. 281

derange the proper function of the eye, or alto-
gether destroy it. We have no access to aught
Hke the observation of a mental structure ; and all
of which our consciousness inforn)s us is a succes-
sion of mental phenomena. Now in these we are
sensible of nothing but a very simple antecedent
followed up, and that generally on tlie instant,
by a like simple consequent. We have the feeling
and still more the purpose of benevolence, followed
up by complacency. We have the feeling or pur-
pose, and still more the execution of malignity, or
rather the recollection of that execution, followed
up by remorse. However manifold the apparatus
may be which enables us to see an external object
— when the sight itself, instead of the consequent
in a material succession, becomes the antecedent
in a mental one ; or, in other w ords, when it passes
from a material to a purely mental process ; then,
as soon, does it pass from the complex into the
simple ; and, accordingly, the sight of distress is
followed up, without the intervention of any curi-
ously elaborated mechanism that w^e are at all
conscious of, by an immediate feeling of compas-
sion. These examples will, at least, suffice to
mark a strong distinction between the two inqui-
ries, and to show that the several arguments drawn
from each must at least be formed of very different
materials.

3. There are two distinct ways in which the
mind can be viewed, and which constitute different
modes of conception, rather than diversities of sub-
stantial and scientific doctrine. The mind may
either be regarded as a congeries of different

2S2 ON THE EVIDENCE FOR A GOD

faculties ; or as a simple and indivisible substance,
with the susceptibility of passing into different
states. By the former mode of viewing it, the
memory, and the judgment, and the conscience,
and the will, are conceived of as so many dis-
tinct but co-existent parts of mind, which is thus
represented to us somewhat in the light of an
organic structure, having separate members, each
for the discharge of its own appropriate mental
function or exercise. By the latter, which we
deem also the more felicitous mode of viewing it,
these distinct mental acts, instead of being referred
to distinct parts of the mind, are conceived of as
distinct acts of the whole mind, — insomuch that the
whole mind remembers, or the whole mind judges,
or the w^hole mand wills, or, in short, the whole
mind passes into various intellectual states or states
of emotion, according to the circumstances by
which at the time it is beset, or to the present
nature of its employmxcnt. We might thus either
regard the study of mind as a study in contempo-
raneous nature ; and we should then, in the delinea-
tion of its various parts, be assigning to it a natu-
ral history, — or we might regard the study of mind
as a study in successive nature ; and we should
then, in the description of its various states, be
assigning to it a natural philosophy. When such
a phrase as the anatomy of the human mind is
employed by philosophers, we may safely guess that
the former is the conception which they are in-
ciined to form of it.* When such a phrase again

It is under this conception too that writers propose
down a map of the liumaa tUcuUics.

IN THE MENTAL CONSTITUTION. 283

as the piiysiology of the human mind is made use
of, the latter is the conception by which, in all
probability, it has been suggested. It is thus that
Dr. Thomas Brown designates the science of mind
as mental physiology. With him, in fact, it is alto-
gether a science of sequences, his very analysis
being the analysis of results, and not of compounds.
4. Now, in either view of our mental constitu-
tion there is the same strength of evidence for a
God. It matters not for this, whether the mind
W regarded as consisting of so many useful parts,
or as endovv-ed with as many useful properties. It
is the number, whether the one or other, of these —
out of w^hich the product is formed of evidence for
a designing cause. The only reason why the useful
dispositions of matter are so greatly more prolific
of this evidence than the useful laws of matter, is,
that the former so greatly outnumber the latter.
Of the twenty independent circumstances which
enter into beneficial concurrence in the formation
of an eye, that each of them should be found in a
situation of optimism, and none of them occupying
either an mdifferent or a hurtful position — it is this
which speaks so emphatically against the hypothe-
sis of a random distribution, and for the hypothesis
of an intelligent order. Yet this is but one out of
the many like specimens, wherewith the animal
economy thickens and teems in such marvellous
profusion. By the doctrine of probabilities, the
mathematical evidence, in this question between
the two suppositions of intelligence or chance, will
be found, even on many a single organ of the
human framework, to preponderate vastly more

284 ON THE EVIDENCE FOR A GOD

than a million-fold on the side of the former. We
do not affirm of the human mind that it is so des-
titute of all complication and variety, as to be
deficient altogether in this sort of evidence. Let
there be but six laws or ultimate facts in the men-
tal constitution, with the circumstance of each of
them being beneficial ; and this of itself would yield
no inconsiderable amount of precise and calculable
proof, for our mental economy being a formation
of contrivance, rather than one that is fortuitous or
of blind necessity. It will at once be seen, how-
ever, why mind, just from its greater simplicity
than matter, should contribute so much less to the
support of natural theism, of that definite and
mathematical evidence which is founded on com-
bination.

5. But, although in the mental department of
creation, the argument for a God that is gathered
out of such materials, is not so strong as in the
other great department — yet it does furnish a
peculiar argument of its own, v.hich, though not
grounded on mathematical data, and not derived
from a lengthened and logical process of reasoning,
is of a highly encctive and practical character not-
withstanding. It has not less in it of the substance,
though it may have greatly less in it of the sem-
blance of demonstration, that it consists of but one
step between the premises and the conclusion. It
is briefly, but cannot be more clearly and emphati-
cally expressed than in the following sentence .

" He that formed the eye, shall he not see ? He
that planted the ear, shall he not hear ? He that
teacheth man knowledge, shall he not know?"

IN THE MENTAL CONSTITUTION. '285

That the parent cause of intelligent beings shall be
itself intelligent is an aphorism, which, if not de-
monstrable in the forms of logic, carries in the very
announcement of it a challenging power over the
acquiescence of almost all spirits. It is a thing of
instant conviction, as if seen in the light of its own
evidence, more than a tiling of lengthened and
laborious proof. It may be stigmatized as a mere
impression — nevertheless the most of intellects go
as readily along with it, as they would from one
contiguous step to another of many a stately argu-
mentation. If it cannot be exhibited as the conclu-
sion of a syllogism, it is because of its own inherent
right to be admitted there as the major proposition.
To proscribe every such truth, or to disown it from
being truth, merely because incapable of deduction,
would be to cast away the first principles of all
reasoning. It would banish the authority of intui-
tion, and so reduce all philosophy and knowledge
to a state of universal scepticism — for what is the
first departure of every argument but an hituition,
and what but a series of intuitions are its successive
stepping-stones ? We should soon hivolve ourselves
in helpless perplexity and darkness, did we insist on
every thing being proved and on nothing being
assumed — for valid assumptions are the materials
of truth, and the only office of argument is to weave
them together into so many pieces of instruction for
the bettering or enlightening of the species.

6. \Ve are not to estimate the strength or clear-
ness of that Natural Theology which obtains
tlu-oughout the mass of our popidation, by the
impression of our scientific arguments upon their

286 ON THE EVIDENCE FOR A GOD

imderstaiidings — whether these be metaphysical, or
drawn i'rom the study of external nature. Whether
they comprehend the reasoning that is grounded on
the arrangements of the material world or not, they
arc in immediate contact with other phenomena,
which far more promptly suggest and far more
powerfully convince them of a God. With all the
defect and inferiority w hich have been ascribed to
the department of mind, as being less fertile of
evidence for a God than the department of matter,
it is really in the form^er where the most influential
of that evidence is to be found. There may be
a greater difficulty in evolving the mental than the
material proofs ; but they are not on that account
the less effective on the popular understanding —
when, without the formality of an inferential pro-
cess, the most illiterate of the species recognise a
presiding Deity in the felt workings of their own
spirit, and more especially the felt supremacy of
conscience within them. There seems but one
Hep from the consciousness of the mind that is felt,
jo the conviction of the mind that originated — for
that blind and unconscious matter cannot, by any
of her combinations, evolve tlie phenomena of mind,
is a proposition seen in its own immediate light,
and felt to be true w ith all the speed and certainty
of an axiom. It is to such truth, as being of in-
stant and almost universal consent, that, more than
to any other, we owe the existence of a natural
theology among men : yet, because of the occult
mysticism wherewith it is charged, it is weJl that
ours is a cause of such rich and various argument ;
that in her service we can build up syllogisms, and

IN THE MENTAL CONSTITUTION. 287

expatiate over wide fields of induction, and amass
stores of evidence, and, on tiie useful dispositions
of matter alone, can ground such large computa-
tions of probability in favour of an intelligent cause
or maker for all things, as might silence and satisfy
the reasoners.

7. Still both with philosophers and with the
common people, the belief of a God may be
altogether a thing of inference, and not of direct
intuition — and perhaps it were safer, did we confine
ourselves to this idea. Yet let us advert though
but briefly and incidentally to the notion, that
among all men there is a certain immediate and
irresistible sense of God. We are by no means
sure but there may. We at least conceive that
with but one fact within the hold and the intimate
conviction of all, and but one step of an inferential
process therefrom, we come to the most powerful
and practical impression which nature gives of a
Deity. This fact is the felt suprema'Cy of con-
science v/ithin us — and the conclusion is the actual
supremacy of a living Judge and Ruler over us.
We shall not pretend to say whether there may
not be a quicker discernment than this — nay even
the instantaneous view of a God in the light of a
still more direct manifestation. We should feel as
it liable to the charge of mysticism, did we make
any confident averment of such an intuition.
But we may at least say of all innate thoughts and
impressions of the Divinity, that, if they do exist,
it is no mysticism to affirm of them, that they will
be oi* great practical effect in religion — even though
we should not be able to ascertain them. They

288 ON THE EVIDENCE FOR A GOU

are not the less influential, though unseen — moraiiy
of powerful operation, though metaphysically never
analyzed or beyond the reach of analysis. Even if
they suggest but the imagination of a God they
are not without their importance in Theology — .
laying man under a most direct obligation to enter-
tain the subject, and fastening a great moral
delinquency upon his irreligious neglect of it.

8. And there is one inquiry in Natural Theology,
which the constitution of the mind, and the adap-
tation of that constitution to the external world,
are pre-eminently fitted to illustrate — we mean
the character of the Deity. We hold that the
material universe affords decisive attestation to
His natural perfections, but that it leaves the
question of His moral perfections involved in pro-
foundest mystery. The machinery of a serpent's
tooth, for the obvious infliction of pain and death
upon its victims, may speak as distinctly for the
power and intelligence of its Maker as the machinery
of those teeth which, formed and inserted for simple
mastication, subserve the purposes of a bland and
beneficent economy. An apparatus of suffering
and torture might furnish as clear an indication of
design, though a design of cruelty, as does an
apparatus for the ministration of enjoyment furnish
the indication also of design, but a design of
benevolence. Did we confine our study to the
material constitution of things, we should meet
■with the enigma of many perplexing and contra-
dictory appearances. We hope to make it manifest,
that in the study of the mental constitution, this
enigma is greatly alleviated, if not wholly done

IN THE MENTAL CONSTITUTION. 289

away; and, at all events, that within this peculiar
department of evidence there lie the most full and
unambiguous demonstrations, which nature hath
any where given to us, both of the benevolence
and the righteousness of God.

9. If, in some respects, the phenomena of mind
tell us less decisively than the phenomena of
matter, of the existence of God, they tell us far
more distinctly and decisively of His attributes.
We have already said that, from the simplicity of
the mental system, we met with less there of that
evidence for design which is founded on combina-
tion, or on that right adjustment and adaptation of
the numerous particulars, which enter into a com-
plex assemblage of things, and which are essential
to some desirable fulfilment. It is not, therefore,
through the medium of this particular evidence —
the evidence which lies in combination; that the
phenomena and processes of mind are the best for
telling us of the Divine existence. But if other-
wise, or previously told of this, we hold them to
be the best throughout all nature for telling us of
the Divine character! For if once convinced, on
distinct grounds, that God is, it matters not how
simple the antecedents or the consequents of any
particular succession may be. It is enough that
we know what the terms of the succession are, or
what the effect is wherewith God wills any given
thing to be followed up. The character of the
ordination, and so the character of the ordainer,
depends on the terms of the succession ; and not
on the nature of that intervention or agency,
whether more or less complex, by which it is

VOL. T. N

290 OK TUB EVIDENCB FOS A GOD

brought about. And should either term of the
succession, either the antecedent or consequent, be
some moral feeling, or characteristic of the mind,
then the inference comes to be a very distinct and
decisive one. That the sight of distress, for
example, should be followed up by compassion, is
an obvious provision of benevolence, and not of
cruelty, on the part of Him who ordained our
mental constitution. Again, that a feehng of kind-
ness m the heart should be followed up by a feeUng
of complacency in the heart, that in every vb:tuous
affection of the soul there should be so much to
gladden and harmonize it, that there should always
be peace within when there is conscious purity
or rectitude within ; and, on the other hand, that
mahgnity and Hcentiousness, and the sense of any
moral transgression whatever, should always* have
the effect of discomforting, and sometimes even of
agonizing the spirit of man — that such should be
the actual workmanship and working of our nature,
speaks most distinctly, we apprehend, for the
general righteousness of Him who constructed its
machinery and estabhshed its laws. An omni-
potent patron of vice would have given another
make, and a moral system with other and opposite
tendencies to the creatures whom he had formed.
He would have established different sequences;
and, instead of that oil of gladness which now
distils, as if from a secret spring of satisfaction,
upon the upright; and, instead of that bitterness
and disquietude which are now the obvious atten-
dants on every species of deUnquency, we should
iiave had the reverse phenomena of a reversely

Hf THE MENTAL CONSTITUTION. 29\

constituted species, whose minds were in their
state of wildest disorder when kindling with the
resolves of highest excellence; or were in their
best and happiest, and most harmonious mood,
when brooding over the purposes of dishonesty, or
frenzied with the passions of hatred and revenge.

1 0. In this special track of observation, we have
at least the means or data for constructing a far
more satisfactory demonstration of the divine attri-
butes, than can possibly be gathered, we think,
from the ambiguous phenomena of the external
world. In other words, it will be found that the
mental phenomena speak more distinctly and
decisively for the character of God thaiwlo the
material phenomena of creation. And it should
not be forgotten that whatever serves to indicate
the character, serves also to confirm the existence
of the Divine Being. For this character, whose
signatures are impressed on nature, is not an
abstraction, but must have residence on a concrete
and substantive Being, who hath communicated a
transcript of Himself to the workmanship of His
own hands. It is thus, tha.t, although in this
special department there is greater poverty of
evidence for a God, in as far as that evidence is
grounded on a skilful disposition of parts, — ^yet, in
respect of another kind of evidence, there is no
such poverty ; for, greatly more replete as we hold
it to be with the unequivocal tokens of a moral
character, we, by that simple but strong Hgament
of proof which connects a character with an
existence, can, in the study of mind alone, find a
firm steppmg-stone to the existence of a God.

292 ON THE EVIDENCE FOR A GOD

Our universe is sometimes termed the mirror of
Him who made it. But the optical reflection,
whatever it may be, must be held as indicating the
reahty which gave it birth ; and, whether we dis-
cern there the expression of a reigning benevolence,
or a reigning justice, these must not be dealt with
as the aerial qr the fanciful personifications of
qualities alone, but as the substantial evidences of
a just and benevolent, and, withal, a Hving God.
So that after all, if the constitution of our moral
nature bear upon it decisive indications of the
character of God, it must furnish at the same time
strong indications of his Being. The discovery
of a chajpicter implies the dicovery of an existence.
We cannot separate qualities of any description
from the proper substance in which they reside ;
and, if told of an absolute goodness and rightness
in the economy of the universe, we cannot dissever
our observation of such attributes as these from our
beUef of a good, and righteous, and withal a hving
Governor by whom they are reahzed.

11. But beside this peculiar evidence afforded
by mind for the being of a God, we shall, in con-
nexion with the study of its phenomena and its
laws meet with much of that evidence, which lies
in the manifold, and, withal, happy conjunction of
many individual things, by the meeting together of
which, some distinctly beneficial end is accom-
plished, brought about in that one way and in
no other. For it ought further to be recollected,
that, simple as the constitution of the human .mind
is, and proportionally unfruitful, therefore, as it
may be of that argument for a God, which is

IN THE MENTAL CONSTITUTION. 293

founded on the right assortment and disposition of
many parts, or even of many principles ; yet, on
reflection will it be found that the materials even
of this peculiar argument lie abundantly within the
province of this contemplation. For f)eside the
mental constitution of man, we can view the adap-
tation of that constitution to external nature. We
might demonstrate, not only that the mind is
rightly constituted in itself, but that the mind is
rightly placed in a befitting theatre for the exercise
of its powers. We might prove of the world and its
various objects that they are suited to the various
capacities of this inhabitant — this moral and inteUi-
gent creature, of whom it is palpable that the
things which are around him bear a fit relation to
the laws or the properties which are within him.
There is ample room here for the evidence of collo-
cation. Yet there remains this distinction between
the mental and coporeal economy of man, that
whereas the evidence arising from collocation is
more rich and manifold in the bodily structure
itself, than even in its complex and numerous adapta-
tions to the outer world ; * the like evidence in the
mental department, is meagre, as afforded by the
subjective mind, when compared with the evidence
of its various adjustments and fitnesses to the
objective universe around it, whether of man's
moral constitution to the state of human society,
or of his intellectual to the various objects of
physical investigation.

* Yet Paley has a most interesting chapter on the adaptations
of external nature to the human framework, though the main
strength and copiousness of his argument lie in the anatomy of
the framewcrk itself.

294 ON THE ETIDENCE FOR A GOD

12. The great object of philosophy is to ascer-
tain the simple or ultimate principles, into which
all the phenomena of nature may by analysis be
resolved. But it often happens that in this attempt
she stops thort at a secondary law, which might be
demonstrated by further analysis to be itself a com-
plex derivative of the primitive or elementary laws.
Until this work of analysis be completed, we shall
often mistake what is compound for what is simple,
both in the philosophy of mind and the philosophy
of matter — ^being frequently exposed to intractable
substances or intractable phenomena in both, which
long withstand every effort that science makes for
their decomposition. It is thus that the time is
not yet come, and may never come, when we shall
fully understand what be all the simple elements or
simple laws of matter ; and what be all the distinct
elementary laws, or, as they have sometimes been
termed, the ultimate facts in the constitution of the
human mind. But we do not need to wait for this
communication, ere we can trace, in either depart-
ment, the wisdom and beneficence of a Deity ^for

many are both the material and mental processes
which might be recognised as pregnant with utility,
and so, pregnant with evidence for a God, long
before the processes themselves are analyzed.
The truth is, that a secondary law, if it do not
exhibit any additional proof of design in a distinct
useful principle, exhibits that proof in a distinct
and useful disposition of parts — for, generally
speaking, a secondary law is the result of an opera-
tion by some primitive law, in peculiar and new
curcumstances. For example, the law of the tides

IN THE MENTAL CONSTITUTION. 295

is a secondary law, resolvable into one more general
and elementary— even the law of gravitation.
But we might imagine a state of things, in which
the discovery of this connexion would have been
impossible, — as a sky perpetually mantled with a
cloudy envelopment, which, whUe it did not inter-
cept the light either of the sun or moon, still hid
these bodies from our direct observation. In these
circumstances, the law of the tides and the law of
gravitation, though identical in themselves, could
not have been identified by us ; and so, we might
have ascribed this wholesome agitation of the sea
and of the atmosphere to a distinct power or prin-
ciple in nature — affording the distinct indication of
both a kind and intelligent Creator. Now this
inference is not annihilated — ^it is not even enfeebled
by the discovery in question; for although the
good arising from tides in the ocean and tides in
the air, is not referable to a pecuUar law — it is at
least referable to a peculiar collocation. And this
holds of all the useful secondary laws in the ma-
terial world. If they cannot be alleged in evidence
for the number of beneficial principles in nature-^
they can at least be alleged in evidence for the
number of nature's beneficial arrangements. If
they do not attest the multitude of useful properties,
they at least attest the multitude of useful parts in
nature ; and the skill guided by benevolence which
has been put forth in the distribution of them. So
that long ere the philosophy of matter is perfected,
or all its phenomena and its secondary laws have
been resolved into their original and constituent
principles — ^may we, in then* obvious and immediate

296 ON THE EVIDENCE FOR A GOD

utility alone, detect as many separate evidences in
nature as there are separate facts in nature, for a
wise and benevolent Deity.

13. And the same will be found true of the
secondary laws in the mental world, which, if
not as many distinct beneficial principles in the
constitution of the mind, are the effect of as many
distinct and beneficial arrangements in the objects
or circumstances by which it is surrounded. We
have not to wait the completion of its still more
subtle and difficult analysis, ere we come within
sight of those varied indications of benevolent
design which are so abundantly to be met with,
both in the constitution of the mind itself, and in
the adaptation thereto of external nature. Some
there are, for example, who contend that the laws
of taste are not primitive but secondary ; that our
admiration of beauty in material objects is resolv-
able into other and original emotions, and, more
especially, by means of the associating principle,
into our admiration of moral excellence. Let the
justness of this doctrine be admitted ; and its only
effect on our peculiar argument is, that the bene-
volence of God in thus multiplying our enjoyments,
instead of being indicated by a distinct law for
suiting the human mind to the objects which
surround it, is indicated both by the distribution
of these objects and by their investment with such
qualities as suit them to the previous constitution
of the mind — that He hath pencilled them with the
very colours, or moulded them into the very shapes
which suggest either the graceful or the noble of
human character; that He hath imparted to the

IN THE MENTAL CONSTITUTION. 297

violet its hue of modesty, and clothed the lily in its
robe of purest innocence, and given to the trees of
the forest their respective attitudes of strength or
dehcacy, and made the whole face of nature o^
bright reflection of those virtues which the mind
and character of man had originally radiated. If
it be not by the implantation of a peculiar law in
mind, it is at least by a peculiar disposition of tints
and forms in external nature, that He hath spread
so diversified a loveliness over the panorama of
visible things ; and thrown so many walks of
enchantment around us ; and turned the sights and
the sounds of rural scenery into the ministers of so
much and such exquisite enjoyment; and caused
the outer world of matter to image forth in such
profusion those various qualities, which at first had
pleased or powerfully affected us in the inner world
of consciousness and thought. It is by the modi-
fying operation of circumstances that a primary is
transmuted into a secondary law ; and if the
blessings which we enjoy under it cannot be ascribed
to the insertion of a distinct principle in the nature
of man, they can at least be ascribed to a useful
disposition of circumstances in the theatre around
him.

14. In like manner there are some who would
resolve our sense of property into an original
instinct, an ultimate fact in the mental constitution;
and then quote it as the distinct instance of a wise
and beneficial ordination — connecting with it, as we
have a right to do, all the advantages which accrue
to society from the desire of property and from the
reepect for it which exists among men. Others

298 ON THE EVIDENCE FOR A GOD

again think they can reduce this appropriating
tendency in the mind to a simpler and more
primitive law ; yet they do not thereby annihilate
the evidence for design — for, if not a distinct
principle in human nature, it is at least a distinct
effect or development of that nature placed in cir-
cumstances which call forth this peculiar affection
— to the obvious good of whole communities, in
the stimulus given to industry, in the order and
security attendant on a distribution which is
the object of general acquiescence. The same
observation appUes to the relative affections, which
may either be regarded as peculiar instincts of our
nature, or as modifications of a simpler nature in
pecuUar circumstances. On either supposition we
might stm recognise the wisdom of a God, if not in
the estabhshment of certain additional laws, in
having implanted so many distinct and original
feelings within the human breast — at least in the
estabhshment of certain dispositions, in having
arranged the human species into so many distinct
famihes.

15. It is thus that philosophical discovery, which
is felt by many to enfeeble the argument for a God,
when it reduces two or more subordinate to simpler
and anterior laws, does in fact leave that argument
as entire as before — ^for if, by analysis, it diminish
the number of beneficial properties whether in
matter or mind, it replaces the injury which it may
be supposed to have done in this way to the cause
of theism, by presenting us with as great an addi-
tional number of beneficial arrangements in nature.
And further, it may not be out of place to observe.

IN THE MENTAL CONSTITUTION. 299

that there appear to be two distinct ways by which
an artificer might make manifest the wisdom of his
contrivances. He may either be conceived of, as
forming a substance and endowing it with the fit
properties ; or as finding a substance with certain
given properties, and arranging it into fit disposi-
tions for the accomphshment of some desirable end. ^
Both the former and the latter of these we ascribe
to the Divine Artificer — of whom we imagine, that
He is the Creator as well as the Disposer of all
things. It is only the latter that we can ascribe
to the human artificer, who creates no substance,
and ordains no property ; but finds the substance
with all its properties ready made and put into
his hands, as the raw material out of which he
fashions his implements and rears his structures
of various design and workmanship. Now it is a
commonly received, and has indeed been raised
into a sort of universal maxim, that the highest
property of wisdom is to achieve the most desirable
end, or the greatest amount of good, by the fewest
possible means, or by the simplest machinery.
When this test is apphed to the laws of nature —
then we esteem it, as enhancing the manifestation
of intelligence, that one single law, as gravitation,
should, as from a central and commanding eminence,
subordinate to itself a whole host of most important
phenomena; or that from one great and parent
property, so vast a family of beneficial consequences
should spring. And when the same test is appHed
to the dispositions, whether of nature or art — then
it enhances the manifestation of wisdom, when
some great end is brought about with a leee

300 ON THE EVIDENCE FOR A GOD

complex or cumbersome instrumentality, as often
takes place in the simplification of machines, when,
by the device of some ingenious ligament or wheel,
the apparatus is made equally, perhaps more effec-
tive, whilst less unwieldy or less intricate than
before. Yet there is one way in which, along
. with an exceeding complication in th^ mechanism,
there might be given the impression, of the very
highest skill and capacity having been put forth on
the contrivance of it. It is when, by means of a
very operose and complex instrumentality, the
triumph of art has been made all the more conspi-
cuous, by a very marvellous result having been
obtained out of very unpromising materials. It is
true, that, in this case too, a still higher impression
of skiU would be given, if the same or a more
striking result were arrived at, even after the
intricacy of the machine had been reduced, by
some happy device, in virtue of which certain of
its parts or circumvolutions had been superseded ;
and thus, without injury to the final efi*ect, so
much of the complication had been dispensed with.
Still, however, the substance, whether of the ma-
chine or the manufacture, may be conceived so
very intractable as to put an absolute limit on any
further simplification, or as to create an absolute
necessity for aU the manifold contrivance which
had been expended on it. When this idea pre-
dominates in the mind — then all the complexity
which we may behold, does not reduce our admira-
tion of the artist, but rather deepens the sense that
we have, both of the reconditeness of his wisdom,
and of the wondrous vastne&s and variety of his

IN THE MENTAL CONSTITUTION. 301

resources. It ' is the extreme wideness of the
contrast, between the sluggishness of matter, and
the fineness of the results in physiology, which so
enhances our veneration for the great Architect of
Nature, when we behold the exquisite organizations
of the animal and vegetable kingdoms.* The two
exhibitions are wholly distinct from each other-
yet each of them may be perfect in its own way.
The first is held forth to us, when one law of per-
vading generality is found to scatter a myriad of
beneficent consequences in its train. The second
is held forth, when, by an indefinite complexity of
means, a countless variety of expedients with their
multiform combinations, some one design, such as
the upholding of life in plants or animals is ac-
complished. Creation presents us in marvellous
profusion with specimens of both these — at once
confirming the doctrine, and illustrating the signi-
ficancy of the expression in which Scripture hath
conveyed it to us, when it tells of the manifold
wisdom of God.

16. But while, on a principle already often
recognised, this multitude of necessary conditions
to the accomplishment of a given end, enhances the
argument for a God, because each separate con-
dition reduces the hypothesis of chance to a more
violent improbability than before ; yet it must not be
■ disguised that there is a certain transcendental mys-
tery which it has the effect of aggravating, and which
it leaves unresolved. We can understand the com-

* Dr. Paley would state the problem thus. The laws of matter
being given, so to organize it, as that it shall produce or sii^tiia
thf phenomona, whether of vegetation or of life.

802 , ON THE EVIDENCE FOll A GOD

plex machinery and the circjiitous processes to
which a human artist must resort, that he might
overcome the else uncomplying obstinacy of inert
matter, and bend it in subserviency to his special
designs. But that the Divine Artist who first
created the matter and ordained its laws, should find
the same complication necessary for the accom-
plishment of His puposes ; that such an elaborate
workmanship, for example, should be required to
establish the functions of sight and hearing in the
animal economy, is very like the lavish or ostensible
ingenuity of a Being employed in conquering the
difficulty which himself had raised. It is true, the
one immediate purpose is served by it which we
have just noticed — that of presenting, as it were, to
file eye of inquirers a more manifold inscription of
the Divmity. But if, instead of being the object of
inference, it had pleased God to make himself the
object of a direct manifestation, then for the mere
purpose of becoming known* to his creatures, this
reflex or circuitous method of revelation would
have been altogether uncalled for. That under
the actual system of creation, and with its actual
proofs, He has made His existence most decisively
known to us, we most thankfully admit. But
v/hen question is made between the actual and the
conceivable systems of creation which God might
have created, we are forced to confess, that the
very circumstances which, in the existing order of
things, have brightened and enhanced the evidence
of His being, have also cast a deeper secrecy over
what may be termed the general poUcy of His
government and ways. And this is but one of tho

IN THE MENTAL CONSTITUTION. 303

many difficulties, which men of unbridled specula-
tion and unobservant of that sound philosophy that
keeps within the limits of human observation, will
find it abundantly possible to conjure up on the
field of natural theism. It does look an imprac-
ticable enigma that the Omnipotent God, who
Gould have grafted all the capacities of thought and
feeling on an elementary atom, should have deemed
fit to incorporate the human soul in the midst of
so curious and complicated a framework. For
what a variegated structure is man's animal eco-
nomy. What an apparatus of vessels and bones
and ligaments. What a complex mechanism.
What an elaborate chemistry. What a multitude
of parts in the anatomy, and of processes in the
physiology of this marvellous system. What a
medley, we had almost said, what a package of
contents. What an unwearied play of secretions
and circulations and other changes incessant and
innumerable. In short, what a laborious compU-
cation ; and all to uphold a hving principle, which,
one might think, could by a simple fiat of omnipo-
tence, have sprung forth at once from the great
source and centre of the spiritual system, and
mingled with the world of spirits — just as each
new particle of light is sent forth by the emanation
of a sunbeam, to play and glisten among fields of
radiance.

17. But to recall ourselves from this digression
among the possibilities of what might have been,
to the realities of the mental system, such as it
actually is. Ere we bring the very general ob-
servations of this chapter to a close, we would

304 ON THE EVIDENCE FOR A GOI>

briefly notice an analogy between the realities of
the mental and those of the corporeal system. The
inquirers into the latter have found it of substantial
benefit to their science to have mixed up with the
prosecution of it a reference to final causes. Their
reasoning on the hkely uses of a part in anatomy,
has, in some instances, suggested or served as a
guide to speculations, which have been at length
verified by a discovery. We believe, in like manner,
that reasoning on the nkely or obvious uses of a
principle in the constitution of the human mind,
might lead, if not to the discovery, at least to the
confirmation of important truth — not perhaps in
the science itself, but in certain of the cognate
sciences which stand in no very distant relation to
it. For example, we think it should rectify certain
errors which have been committed both in juris-
prudence and poHtical economy, if it can be demon-
strated that some of the undoubted laws of human
nature are traversed by them ; and so, that violence
is thereby done to the obvious designs of the
Author of Nature. We do not hold it out of
place, though we notice one or two of these in-
stances, by which it might be seen that the mental
philosophy, when studied in connexion with the
palpable views of Him by whom all its principles
and processes were ordained, is fitted to enlighten
the practice of legislation, and more especially to
determine the wisdom of certain arrangements which
have for their object the economic well-being of
society.

18. AMiatever may be thought of the relative
strength of the argument for a God, as drawn first

IN THE MENTAL CONSTITUTION. 305

from the material and then from the mental world
— ^we cannot but feel that m the latter, there is, if
not a superior strength, at least a superior and
surpassing dignity. The superiority of mind to
matter has often been the theme of eloquence
to moralists. For .what were all the wonders
of the latter and all its glories, without a spectator
mind that could intelligently view and that could
tastefully admire them? Let every eye be
irrevocably closed, and this were equivalent to the
entire annihilation in nature of the element of
light ; and in like manner, if the light of all con-
sciousness were put out in the world of mind, the
world of matter, though as rich in beauty, and in
the means of benevolence as before, were thereby
reduced to a virtual non-entity. In these circum-
stances, the lighting up again of even but one
mind would restore its being, or at least its signi-
ficancy, to that system of materialism, which, un-
touched itself, had just been desolated of all those
beings in whom it could kindle reflection, or to
whom it could minister the sense of enjoyment. It
were tantamount to the second creation of it — or, in
other words, one living intelligent spirit is of higher
reckoning and mightier import than a dead universe.

CHAP. II.

On the Supremacy of Conscience.

i. An abstract question in morals is distinct from
a question respecting the constitution of man's

306 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

moral nature ; and the former ought no more to be
confounded with the latter, than the truths of
geometry with the faculties of the reasoning mind
which comprehends them. The virtuousness of
justice was a stable doctrine in ethical science, ante-
rior to the existence of the species; and would
remain so, though the species were destroyed — just
as much as the properties of a triangle are the endur-
ing stabilities of mathematical science ; and that,
though no matter had been created to exempUfy
the positions or the figures of geometry. The
objective nature of virtue is one thing. The sub-
jective nature of the human mind, by which virtue
is felt and recognised, is another. It is not from
the former, any more than from the eternal truths
of geometry, that we can demonstrate the existence
or attributes of God — but from the latter, as be-
longing to the facts of a creation emanating from
His will, and therefore bearing upon it the stamp
of His character. The nature and constitution of
virtue form a distinct subject of inquiry from the
nature and constitution of the human mind. Vir-
tue is not a creation of the Divine will, but has had
everlasting residence in the nature of the Godhead.
The mind of man is a creation ; and therefore
indicates, by its characteristics, the character of
Him, to the fiat and the forthgoing of whose will
it owes its existence. We must frequently, in the
course of this discussion, advert to the principles
of ethics; but it is not on the system of ethical
doctrine that our argument properly is founded. It
is on the phenomena and the laws of actual human
nature, which itself, one of the s:reat facts of crea-

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 307

tion, may be regarded like all its facts, as bearing
on it the impress of that mind which gave birth to
creation.

2. But further. It is not only not with the
system of ethical doctrine — it is not even with the
full system of the philosophy of our nature that we
have properly to do. On this last there is still a
number of unsettled questions ; but our peculiar
argument does not need to wait for the conclusive
determination of them. For example, there is
many a controversy among philosophers respecting
the primary and secondary laws of the human oon-
stitution, Now, if it be an obviously beneficial
law, it carries evidence for a God, in the mere
existence and operation of it, independently of the
rank which it holds, or of the relation in which it
stands to the other principles, of our internal me-
chanism. It is thus that there may, at one and
the same time, be grounded on the law in question
a clear theological inference ; and yet there may be
associated with it an obscure philosophical specu-
lation. It is well that we separate these two;
and, more especially, that the decisive attestation
given by any part or phenomenon of our nature to
the Divine goodness, shall not be involved in the
mist and metaphysical perplexity of other reason-
ings, the object of which is altogether distinct and
separate from our own. The facts of the human
constitution, apart altogether from the philosophy
of their causation, demonstrate the wisdom and
benevolence of Him who framed it : and while it is
our part to follow the light of tliis philosophy, as
far as the light and the guidance of it are sure, we

308 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

are not, in those cases, when the final cause is
obvious as day, though the proximate efficient cause
should be hidden in deepest mystery — we are not,
on this account, to confound darkness with light,
or Hght with darkness.

3. By attending throughout to this observation,
we shall be saved from a thousand irrelevancies
as well as obscurities of argument ; and it is an
observation peculiarly applicable, in announcing
that great fact or phenomenon of mind, which, for
many reasons, should hold a foremost place in our
deij^onstration. We mean the felt supremacy of
conscience — a phenomenon of much greater weight
and prominency than are commonly assigned to it
in the demonstrations of Natural Theism — a phe-
nomenon without which we should, in the multitude
of processes around us with the infinite diversity of
their efiects, feel ourselves but as in a world of
enigmas ; but which, singly and of itself, serves the
office of a great light to overrule the cross or con-
tradictory intimations that are given by the lesser
ones. Philosophers there are, who have attempted
to resolve this fact into ult-erior or ultimate ones in
the mental constitution ; and who have denied to
the faculty a place among its original and uncom-
pounded principles. Sir James Macintosh tells us
of the generation of human conscience; and, not
merely states, but endeavours to explain the phe-
nomenon of its felt supremacy within us. Dr.
Adam Smith also assigns a pedigree to our moral
judgments; but, with all his peculiar notions re-
specting the origin of the awards of conscience, he
never once disputes their authority; or, that, by

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 309

the general consent of mankind, this authority is,
in sentiment and opinion at least, conceded to
them.* It is somewhat Hke an antiquarian con-
troversy respecting the first formation and subse-
quent historical changes of some certain court of
government, the rightful authority of whose deci-
sions and acts is, at the same time, fully recog-
nised. And so, philosophers have disputed regard-
ing the court of conscience — of what materials it is
constructed, and by what line of genealogy from
the anterior principles of our nature it has sprung.
Yet most of these have admitted the proper right
of sovereignty which belongs to it; its legitimate
place as the master and the arbiter over aU the
appetites and desires and practical forces of human
nature. Or, if any have dared the singularity of
denying this, they do so in opposition to the gene-
ral sense and general language of mankind, whose
very modes of speech compel them to affirm that
the biddings of conscience are of paramount autho-
rity— its pecuUar office being to tell what all men
should, or all men ought to do.

4. The proposition, however, which we are now

• *• Upon whatever," observes Dr. Adam Smith, " we Bupposa
our moral faculties to be founded, whether upon a certain modifi-
cation of reason, upon an original instinct called a moral sense, or
upon some other principle of our nature, it cannot be doubted that
they were given us for the direction of our conduct in this life.
They carry along with them the #Dst evident badges of this
authority, which denote that they were set up within us to be the
supreme arbiters of all our actions, to superintend all our senses,
passions and appetites, and to judge how far each of them was
either to be indulged or restrained. It is the peculiar office of
these faculties to judge, to bestow censure or applause upon all
the other principles of our nature." — Theory of Moral Sentimentt,
Part iii. chap. v.

310 ON THE SUPftEMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

urging, is not that the obligations of virtue are
binding, but that man has a conscience which tells
him that they are so — not that justice and truth
and humanity are the dogmata of the abstract
moral system, but that they are the dictates of
man's moral nature — ^not that in themselves they
are the constituent parts of moral rectitude, but
that there is^a voice within every heart which thus
pronounces on them. It is not with the constitu-
tion of morality, viewed objectively, as a system or
theory of doctrine, that we have properly to do ;
but with the constitution of man's spirit, viewed as
the subject of certain phenomena and laws — and,
more particularly, with a great psychological fact
in human nature, namely, the homage rendered by
it to the supremacy of conscience. In a word, it
is not of a category, but of a creation that we are
speaking. The one can tell us nothing of the
Divine character, while the other might afford most
distinct and decisive indications of it. We could
found no demonstration whatever of the Divine
purposes, on a mere ethical, any more than we
could, on a logical or mathematical category. But
it is very different with an actual creation, whethei;
in mind or in matter — a mechanism of obvious
contrivance, and whose workings and tendencies,
therefore, must be referred to the design, and so
to the disposition or cl^racter of that Being, whose
spirit hath devised ana whose fingers have framed
it.

5. For it is not an abstract question in Moral
Science that we are now discussing. It is a
question of Fact, respecting man*s moral nature--^

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 311

and as much to be decided by observation, as the
nature or properties of any substantive being. It
is a Fact which we learn or become acquainted with,
just as we become acquainted with the constitution
of a watch by the inspection of its mechanisn^
Conscience in Man is as much a thing of observation
— as the regulator in a watch is a thing of observa-
tion. It depends for its truth, therefore, on an
independent and abiding evidence of its own, under
all the diversities of speculation on the nature of
Virtue. By the supremacy of Conscience we affirm
a truth which respects not the nature of Virtue but
the nature of Man. It is, that in every human
heart, there is a faculty — not, it may be, having
the actual power, but having the just and rightful
pretension to sit as judge and master over the whole
of human conduct. Other propensities may have
too much sway — but the moral propensity, if I
may so term it, never can — for to have the presiding
sway in all our concerns, is just that which properly
and legitimately belongs to it. A man under
anger may be too strongly prompted to deeds of
retaliation — or under sensuality be too strongly
prompted to indulgence — or under avarice be too
closely addicted to the pursuit of wealth — or even
under friendship be too strongly inchned to partiaUty
— ^but he never can under conscience be too strongly
inclined to be as he ought and to do as he ought.
We may say of a watch that its main-spring is too
powerful : but we would never say that a Regulator
is too powerful. We may complain of each of its
other parts that it has too much influence over the
rest— but not that the part whose office it is to

312 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

regulate and fix the rate of going has too much
influence. And just as a watch cannot move too
regularly, man cannot walk too conscientiously.
The one cannot too much obey its regulator — the
other cannot too much obey his conscience. In other
words, Conscience is the rightful Sovereign in man
— and if any other, in the character of a ruUng
passion, be the actual Sovereign — it is an usurper.
In the former case, 'the mind is felt to be in its
proper and well- conditioned state; in the latter
case, it is felt to be in a state of anarchy. Yet
even in that anarchy. Conscience though despoiled
of its authority, still lifts its remonstrating claims.
Though deprived of its rights, it continues to assert
them. Long after being stripped of its dominion
over man, it still has its dweUing-place in his
bosom; and even when most in practice disre-
garded, then it makes itself to be felt and heard.

6. The supremacy of Conscience does not seem
to have been sufficiently adverted to by Dr. Thomas
Brown. He treats the moral feeling rather as an
individual emotion which takes its part in the
enumeration along with others in his list, than as
the great master-emotion that is not appeased but
by its ascendancy over them aU. Now, instead of
a single combatant in the play of many others^
and which will only obtain the victory, if physically
of greater power and force ; it should be viewed as
separate and signalized from the rest by its own
felt and inherent claim of superiority over them.
Each emotion hath its own characteristic object
wherewith it is satisfied. But the specific object
of this emotion is the regulation of all the active

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 313

powers of the soul — and without this, it is not
satisfied. The distinction made by the sagacious
Butler between the power of a principle and its
authority, enables us in the midst of all the actual
anomalies and disorders of our state, to form a precise
estimate of the place which Conscience naturally
and rightfully holds in man's constitution. The
desire of acting virtuously, which is a desire conse-
quent on our sense of right and wrong, may not
be of equal strength with the desire of some criminal
indulgence — and so, practically, the evil may pre-
ponderate over the good. And thus it is that the
system of the inner man, from the weakness of
that which claims to be the ascendant principle of
our nature maybe thrown into a state of turbulence
and disorder. So it may happen of a system of
Civil Government — and just, from the real power
and the rightful authority being dissevered the one
from the other. But still this does not hinder
there being a rightful authority somewhere — and
that it may have existence, although it may not
have force to carry the execution of its dictates.
It is the very same of the Government within.
There might be pride and passion and sensuahty
and the love of ease, and a thousand more affec-
tions each having their own object and their own
degree of strength — and withal a Conscience that
clauns the supremacy over all these ; but which
often of inferior strength to them all may suffer
them to lord it over that domain of which it right-
fully is the master and proprietor. To it belongs
the mastery — although the mastery is often wrong-
fully taken away from it. But still our urgent

VOL. I, O

314 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

and unescapeable sense of the wrong ; our remorse
and self-dissatisfaction when conscience is disobeyed;
the happiness and harmony which are felt within,
when the voice of authority which it emits is also a
voice of power ; the well-conditioned state of th^
soul, when the moral faculty overrules all, and
subordinates all — ^these are so many badges of tho
proper and native supremacy of Conscience ; and
they evince that its part and office in the mechanism
of our moral system is to act as regulator of the
whole.

7. And neither do we urge the proposition that
conscience has in every instance the actual direc-
tion of human affairs, for this were in the face of
aU experience. It is not that every man obeys
her dictates, but that every man feels he ought to
obey them. These dictates are often in life ana
practice disregarded : so that conscience is not the
sovereign de facto. Still there is a voice within
the hearts of all vv^hich asserts that conscience is the
sovereign dejure ; that to her belongs the command
rightfully, even though she do not possess it actu-
ally. In a season of national anarchy, the actual
power and the legitimate authority are often dis-
joined from each other. The lawful monarch may
be dethroned, and so lose the might ; while he con-
tinues to possess — ^nay, while he may be acknow-
ledged throughout his kingdom to possess the right
of sovereignty. The distinction still is made, even
under this reign of violence, between the usurper
and the lawful sovereign; and there is a similar
distinction among the powers and principles of tba
human ■ constitution, when an insurrection take^

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 315

place of the inferior against the superior ; and con-
science, after being dethroned from her place of
mastery and control, is still felt to be the superior,
or rather supreme faculty of our nature notwith-
standing. She may have fallen from her dominion,
yet still wear the badges of a fallen sovereign,
having the acknowledged right of authority, though
the power of enforcement has been wrested away
from her. She may be outraged in all her prero-
gatives by the lawless appetites of our nature — but
not without the accompanying sense within of an
outrage and a wrong having been inflicted, and a
reclaiming voice from thence which causes itself to
be heard and which remonstrates against it. The
insurgent and inferior principles of our constitution
may, in the uproar of their wild mutiny, lift a louder
and more effective voice than the small still voice
of conscience. They have the might but not the
right. Conscience, on the other hand, is felt to
have the right though not the might — the legislative
office being that which properly belongs to her,
though the executive power should be wanting to
enforce her enactments. It is not the reigning but
the rightful authority of conscience that we, under
the name of her supremacy, contend for ; or, rather
the fact that, by the consent of all our higher prin-
ciples and feelings, this rightful authority is reputed
to be hers; and, by the general concurrence of
mankind awarded to her.

8. And here it is of capital importance to dis-
tinguish between an original and proper tendency,
and a subsequent aberration. This has been well
illustrated by the regulator of a watch, whose office

316 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

and primary design, and that obviously announced
by the relation in which it stands to the other parts
of the machinery, is to control the velocity of its
movements. And we should still perceive this to
have been its destination, even though, by accident
or decay, it had lost the power of command which
at the first belonged to it. We should not mis-
understand the purpose of its maker, although, in
virtue of some deterioration or derangement which
the machinery had undergone, that purpose were
now frustrated. And we could discern the purpose
in the very make and constitution of the mechanism.
We might even see it to be an irregular watch ;
and yet this needs not prevent us from seeing, that,
at its original fabrication, it was made for the
purpose of moving regularly. The mere existence
and position of the regulator might suffice to indicate
this — although it had become powerless, either
from the wearing of the parts, or from some
extrinsic disturbance to which the instrument had
been exposed. The regulator, in this instance, may
be said to have the right, though not the power of
command, over the movements of the time-piece ;
yet the loss of the power has not obhterated the
vestiges of the right; so that, by the inspection
of the machinery alone, we both learn the injury
which has been done to it, and the condition in
which it originally came from the hand of its maker — .
a condition of actual as well as rightful supremacy,
on the part of the regulator, over all its movements.
And a similar discovery may be made, by examina-
tion of the various parts and principles which make
up the moral system of man : for we see various

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 317

parts and principles there. We see Ambition,
having power for its object, and without the attain-
ment of which it is not satisfied; and Avarice,
having wealth for its object, without the attainment
of which it is not satisfied; and Benevolence, having
for its object the good of others, without the attain-
ment of which it is not satisfied ; and the love of
Reputation, having for its object their applause,
without w hich it is not satisfied ; and lastly, to
proceed no further in the enumeration. Conscience,
which surveys and superintends the whole man,
whose distinct and appropriate object it is to have
the entire control both of his inward desires and
outward doings, and without the attainment of this
it is thwarted from its proper aim, and remains
unsatisfied. Each appetite, or affection of our nature,
has its own distinct object; but this last is the object
of Conscience, which may be termed the moral affec-
tion. The place which it occupies, or rather which
it is felt that it should occupy, and which naturally
belongs to it, is that of a governor, claiming the
superiority, and taking to itself the direction over
all the other powers and passions of humanity. If
this superiority be denied to it, there is a felt
violence done to the whole economy of man. The
sentiment is, that the thing is not as it should be :
and even after conscience is forced, in virtue of
some subsequent derangement, from this station of
rightful ascendancy, we can still distinguish between
what is the primitive design or tendency, and what
is the posterior aberration. We can perceive, in
the case of a deranged or distempered watch, that
the mechanism is out of order ; but even then, on

318 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. .

the bare examination of its workmanship, and more
especially from the place and bearing of its regula-*
tor, can we pronounce that it was made for moving
regularly. And in like manner, on the bare in-
spection of our mental economy alone, and more
particularly from the place which conscience has
there, can we, even in the ease of the man who
refuses to obey its dictates, affirm that he was made
for walking conscientiously.

9. The distinction which we now labour to esta-
bhsh between conscience, and the other principles
of our nature, does not respect the actual force or
prevalence-which may, or may not, severally belong
to them. It respects the universal judgment which,
by the very constitution of our nature, is passed on
the question, which of all these should have the
prevalence, whenever there happens to be a contest
between them. All which we affirm is, that if
conscience prevail over the other principles, then
every man is led, by the very make and mechanism
of his internal economy, to feel that this is as it
ought to be ; or, if these others prevail over con-
science, that this is not as it ought to be. One, it
is generally felt, may be too ambitious, or too much
set on wealth and fame, or too resentful of injury,
or even too facile in his benevolence, when carried
to the length of being injudicious and hurtful ; but
no one is ever felt, if he have sound and enlightened
views of morality, to be too conscientious. When
we affirm this of conscience, we but concur in the
homage rendered to it by all men, as being the
rightful, if not the actual superior, among all the
feelings and faculties of our nature. It is a truth.

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 319

perhaps, too simple for being reasoned ; but this is
because, hke many of the most important and
undoubted certainties of human behef, it is a truth
of instant recognition. When stating the supre-
macy of conscience, in the sense that we have
explained it, we but state w^hat all men feel ; and
our only argument, in proof of the assertion, is — ■
our only argument can be, an appeal to the expe-
rience of all men.

10. Bishop Butler has often been spoken of as
the first discoverer of this great principle in our
nature ; though, perhaps, no man can properly be
said to discover what all men are conscious of.
But certain it is, that he is the first who hath made
the natural supremacy of conscience the subject of
a full and reflex cognizance — and by this achieve-
ment alone hath become the author of one of the
most important contributions ever made to moral
science. It forms the argument of his three first
sermons, in a volume which may safely be pro-
nounced, the most precious repository of sound
ethical principles extant in any language. The
authority of conscience, says Dugald Stewart,
"although beautifully described by many of the
ancient moralists, was not sufficiently attended to by
modern writers, as a fundamental principle in the
science of ethics, till the time of Dr. Butler." It
belongs to the very essence of the principle, that
we clearly distinguish, between what we find to be
the actual force of conscience, and what we feel to
be its rightful authority. These two may^exist in
a state of separation from each other just as in a
Civil Government, the reigning power may, in sea-

320 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

sons of anarchy, be dissevered from that supreme
court or magistrate to whom it rightfully belongs.
The mechanism of a political fabric is not ade-
quately or fully described by the mere enumeration
of its parts. There must also enter into the
description, the relation which the parts bear to
each other; and more especially, the paramount
relation of rightful ascendancy and direction, which
that part, in which the functions of Government
are vested, bears to the whole. Neither is the
mechanism of man's personal constitution fully or
adequately described, by merely telling us in succes-
sion the several parts of which it is composed — as
the passions, and the appetites, and the affections,
and the moral sense, and the intellectual capacities,
which make up this complex and variously gifted
creature. The particulars of his mental system
must not only be stated, each in their individuaUty ;
but the bearing or connexion which each has with
the rest — else it is not described as a system at all.
In making out this description, we should not only
not overlook the individual faculty of conscience,
but we must not overlook its relative place among
the other feelings and faculties of our nature.
That place is the place of command. Wliat con-
science lays claim to is the mastery or regulation
over the whole man. Each desire of our nature
rests or terminates in its own appropriate object,
as the love of fame in applause, or hunger in food,
or revenge in the infliction of pain upon its object,
or affection for another in the happiness and com-
pany of the beloved individual. But the object of
the moral sense is to arbitrate and direct among all

ON THE SUPriEMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 321

these propensities. It claims the station and tho
prerogative of a mistress over them. Its peculiar
office is that of superintendence, and there is a
certain feeling of violence or disorder, when the
mandates which it issues in tliis capacity, are not
carried into effect. Ewery affection in our nature
is appeased by the object that is suited to it. The
object of conscience is the subordination of the
whole to its dictates. Without this it remains
unappeased, and as if bereft of its rights. It is not
a single faculty, taking it^ own separate and un-
connected place among the other feelings and
faculties which belong to us. Its proper place is
that of a guide or a governor. It is the ruling
power in our nature ; and its proper, its legitimate
business, is to prescribe that man shall be as he
ought, and do as he ought. But instead of expa-
tiating any further at present in language of our
own, let us here admit a few brief sentences from
Butler himself, that great and invaluable expounder
both of the human constitution, and of moral
science. " That principle by which we survey,
and either approve or disapprove our own heart,
temper, and actions, is not only to be considered as
what in its turn is to have some influence, which
may be said of every passion, of the basest appe-
tites : but likewise as being superior ; as from its
very nature manifestly claiming superiority over all
others : insomuch that you cannot form a notion of
this faculty conscience, without taking in judgment
direction and superintendency. This is a consti-
tuent part of the idea, that is of the faculty itself:
and to preside and govern, rrom the very ecoBomy
o2

322 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

and constitution of man, belongs to it. Had it
strength, as it has right ; had it power, as it has
manifest authority ; it would absolutely govern the
world." " This faculty was placed within us to be
our proper governor; to direct and regulate all
under principles, passions, and motives of action.
This is its right and office. Thus sacred is its
authority. And how often soever men violate and
rebelHously refuse to submit to it, for supposed
interest which they cannot otherwise obtain, or for
the sake of passion which they cannot otherwise
gratify; this makes no alteration as to the natural
right and office of conscience." " As the idea of a
civil constitution implies in it united strength, vari-
ous subordinations under one direction that of the
supreme authority, the different strength of each
particular member of the society not coming into
the idea; whereas if you leave out the subordina-
tion, the union, and the one direction, you lose it ;
so reason, several appetites, passions and affections,
prevailing in different degrees of strength, is not
that idea or notion of human nature, which is
meant when virtue is said to consist in following it,
and vice in deviating from it ; but that nature
consists in these several principles considered as
having a natural respect to each other, in the several
passions being naturally subordinate to the one
superior principle of reflection or conscience.
Every bias, instinct, propension within, is a real
part of our nature, but not the whole : Add to
these the superior faculty, whose office it is to
adjust, manage and preside over them, and take in
this its natural superic^ty, and you complete the

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 323

idea of human nature. And as in civil government
the constitution is broken in upon, sfll violated by
power and strength prevailing over authority; so
the <|Ewistitution of man is broken in upon and
violated by the lower faculties or principles within
prevailing over that, which is in its nature supreme
over them all. Thus when it is said by ancient
writers, that tortures and death are not so contrary
to human nature as injustice ; by this, to be sure,
is not meant, that the aversion to the former in
mankind is less strong and prevalent than their
aversioi^o the latter : But that the former is only
contrary to our nature considered in a partial view,
and which takes in only the lowest part of it, that
which we have in common with the brutes; whereas
the latter is contrary to our nature, considered in
a higher sense, as a system and constitution,
contrary to the whole economy of man." The
conclusion on the whole is — that " man cannot be
considered as a creature left by his Maker to act
at random, and live at large up to the extent of his
natural power, as passion, human willfulness, happen
to carry him ; which is the condition brute creatures
are in ; But that from his make, constitution, or
nature, he is, in the strictest and most proper
sense, a law to himself. He hath the rule of
right within : WTiat is wanting is only that he
honestly attend to it."

1 1 . Now it is in these phenomena of Conscience
that Nature oifers to us, far her strongest argument,
for the moral character of God. Had He been an
unrighteous Being himself, would He have given
to this the obviously superior faculty in man, so

324 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

difitinct and authoritative a voice on the side of
rignteousnessW Would He have so constructed
the creatures of our species, as to have planted in
every breast a reclaiming witness against hiinteelf ?
Would He have thus inscribed on the tablet of
every heart the sentence of his own condemnation ;
and is not this just as unhkely, as that He should
have inscribed it in written characters on the
forehead of each mdividual ? Would He so have
fashioned the workmanship of His own hands ; or,
if a God of cruelty, injustice, and falsehood, would
He have placed in the station of master a0l ji^idge
that faculty which, felt to be the highest in our
nature, would prompt a generous and high-minded
revolt of all our sentiments against the Being who
formed us ? From a God possessed of such
characteristics, we should surely have expected a
differently-moulded humanity ; or, in other words,
from the actual constitution of man, from the testi-
monies on the side of all righteousness, given by
the vicegerent within the heart, do we infer the
righteousness of the Sovereign who placed it there.
He would never have estabhshed a conscience in
man, and invested it with the authority of a
monitor, and given to it those legislative and
judicial functions which it obviously possesses ;
and then so framed it, that all its decisions should
be on the side of that virtue which He himself
disowned, and condemnatory of that vice which
He himself exemphfied. This is an e\idence for
the righteousness of God, which keeps its ground,
amid all the disorders and aberrations to which
humanity is liable ; and can no more, indeed, be

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 325

deafened or overborne by these, than is the rightful
authority of pubhc opinion, by the occasional out-
breakings of iniquity and violence which take
place in society. This public opinion may, in
those seasons of misrule when might prevails over
right, be deforced from the practical ascendancy
which it ought to have ; but the very sentiment
that it so ought, is our reason for believing the
world to have been originally formed, in order
that virtue might have the rule over it. In like
manner, when, in the bosom of every individual
man, we can discern a conscience, placed there
with the obvious design of being a guide and a
commander, it were difficult not to believe, that,
whatever the partial outrages may be which the
cause of virtue has to sustain, it has the public
mind of the universe in its favour ; and that there-
fore He, who is the Maker and the Ruler of such
a universe, is a God of righteousness. Amid all
the subsequent deteriorations and errors, the
original design, both of a deranged watch and of a
deranged human nature, is alike manifest ; first,
of the maker of the watch, that its motions should
harmonize with time ; second, of the maker of
man, that his movements should harmonize with
truth and righteousness. We can, in most cases,
discern between an aberration and an original law ;
between a direct or primitive tendency and the
effect of a disturbing force, by which that tendency
is thwarted and overborne. And so of the consti-
tution of man. It may be now a loosened and
disproportioned thing, yet we can trace the original
Structure — even as from the fragments of a ruin,

326 ON THE SUPREJL.\CY Of CONSCIENCE.

we can obtain the perfect model of a building from
its capital to its base. It is thus that, however
prostrate conscience may have fallen, we can still
discern its place of native and original pre-eminence,
as being at once the legislator and tlie judge in the
moral system, though the executive forces of the
system have made insurrection against it, and
thrown the whole into anarchy. By studying the
constitution, or what Butler calls the make of any
thing, we may divine the purpose of the Maker.
No one can mistake the design of the artificer in
putting a regulator into a watch. It was to make
it move regularly. And as httle should we mistake
the design of the Creator in putting a Conscience
into man's bosom. It was to make hiii^ walk con-
scientiously. Even although from some derange-
ment in me machinery, the regulator had lost its
power of control — yet from its plan of control the
original purpose of it may stiU be abundantly
manifest. And in like manner, though from the
unhingement of man's moral economy, Conscience
may have fallen from the actual sway, it still
bespeaks itself to be^ a fallen sovereign, and that
the place of sovereignty is that which natively and
rightfully belongs to it. When what is obviously
the regulating pov*er has quitted its hold, whether
of the material or the spiritual mechanism, we
distinctly recognise of each that it is not in its
natural state but in a state of disorder, arising in
the one case from the wear of the materials or from
some shake that the machinery has received, arising
in the other case either from some incidental dis-
turbance, or from some inherent frailtv and defect

'^ ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE, 327

that attaches to the creature. There is a depth
of mystery in every thing connected with the exis-
tence and origin of evil in creation ; yet, even in the
fiercest uproar of our stormy passions, Conscience,
though in her softest whispers, gives to the supremacy
of rectitude the voice of an undying testimony ; and
her hght still shining in a dark place, her unquelled
^accents stiU heard in the loudest outcry of Nature's
rebellious appetites, form the strongest argument
within reach of the human faculties, that, in spite
of all partial or temporary derangements, Supreme
Power and Supreme Goodness are at one. It is
true that rebellious man hath, with daring footstep,
trampled on the lessons of Conscience ; but why,
in spite of man's perversity, is conscience, on
the other hand, able to lift a voice so piercing
and so powerful, by which to remonstrate against
the wrong, and to reclaim the honours that are due
to her ? How comes it that, in the mutiny and
uproar of the inferior faculties, that faculty in man,
which wears the stamp and impress of the highest,
should remain on the side of truth and holiness ?
Would humanity have thus been moulded by a false
and evil spirit ; or would he have committed such
impolicy against himself, as to insert in each member
of our species a principle which would" make him
feel the greatest complacency in his own rectitude,
when he feels the most high-minded revolt of indig-
nation and dislike against the Being who gave him
birth ? It is not so much that Conscience takes a
part among the other faculties of our nature; but
that Conscience takes among them the part of a
governor, and that man, if he do not obey her

328 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

suggestions, Still, in despite of himself, acknowledges
her rights. It is a mighty argument for the virtue
of the Governor above, that all the laws and
injunctions of the governor below are on the side
of virtue. It seems as if He had left this repre-
sentative, or remaining witness, for Himself, in a
world that had cast off its aUegiance ; and that,
from the voice of the judge within the breast, we
may learn the will and the character of Him who
hath invested with such authority His dictates. It
6 this which speaks as much more demonstratively
\0T the presidency of a righteous God in human
affairs, than for that of impure or unrighteous
demons, as did the rod of Aaron, when it swallowed
the rods of the enchanters and magicians in Egypt.
In the wildest anarchy of man's insurgent appetites
and sins, there is still a reclaiming voice — a voice
which, even when in practice disregarded, it is
impossible not to own ; and to which, at the very
moment that we refuse our obedience, we find that
we cannot refuse the homage of what we ourselves
do feel and acknowledge to be the best, the highest
principles of our hature.

12. The question then is, would any other than
a God of righteousness have made creatures of
such a moral constitution at the first — and, how-
ever inexplicable its subsequent derangement may
be, would He have left a conscience in every
breast which gave such powerful testimony to the
worth and the permanent importance of morality ?
Shaded in all its original lineaments as the character
of man now is, and dethroned although virtue be
from the actual sovereignty, is there not stiJl

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 329

amongst us a general and abiding sense of her
rightful sovereignty ? Would even this imperfect
but universal homage continue to be given, were it
a wicked Being who presided over the great family
of Nature, or breathed hfe and spirit and sentiment
into the human framework? Would He have
placed so deeply within us that faculty by which
as if with moral compulsion we are constrained to
hold in supreme reverence, the goodness which in
all its characteristics is the reverse and the counter-
part of his own nature ? Would He have endowed
the creatures which himself hath made with an
admiration of all that is most opposite to himself — .
and how, if He be unrighteous hath He put into
every bosom such an indelible sense of the obliga-
tion and precedency of righteousness? Right-
eousness does not bear actual and unexcepted rule
in the world — ^but there is a conscience in every
man which proclaims that this rule it ought to
have, and that though wrested from it, it is by the
force of principles which are felt to be in their own
nature inferior to Conscience. Had there been no
Conscience in man, each propensity may at times
have had its own temporary sway — as if gods of
unequal strength shared the dominion over them.
But there being a Conscience, invested with a
rightful if not with an actual ascendancy which still
keeps a remaining hold of our nature, and within
the recesses of a Moral System, in evident disorder
still causes its voice to be heard — this phenomenon,
of itself, gives a blow to impure Polytheism, or at
least degrades each member thereof to the rank of
an inferior deity. The question is whether He be

330 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

a good or an evil spirit who presides over the
destinies of our species. Were he an unrighteous
God v/ho has full sway over us, why is Conscience,
that faculty which disowns unrighteousness and
outlaws it, permitted by him to assume the rank of
an arbiter and not only to speak but to speak as
one having a,uthority ? If the actual Artificer of
man's moral mechanism be a wicked or a malignant
spirit, it seems inexplicable that he should have
placed such a judge and arbiter within us — one
who bore constant testimony against the wrongness
and the worthlessness of his own character. Thus
to have written reproach against himself in every
heart is just as inexplicable as if he had legibly
written his own disgrace upon every forehead. It
is true on the other hand, that if he be a righteous
God who governs our world, Humanity is in a
state of revolt against him — the result however not
of the principles but of the passions, or of what
Humanity itself judges and feels to be the inferior
of its faculties — still He is borne witness to by that
within the breast which claims to be the superior,
the supreme faculty, and which obviously announces
itself to be if not de facto, at least de jure the
ruling power.

13. Ho vv ever difficult from the very simpHcity
of the subject it may be, to state or to reason the
argument for a God, which is founded on the
supremacy of Conscience, still historically and
experimentally, it will be found, that it is of more
force than all other arguments put together, for
originating and upholding the natural theism which
there is in the world. The theology of Conscience

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 331

is not only of wider diffusion, but of far niore
practical influence than the theology of academic
demonstration. The ratiocination by which this
theology is established, is not the less firm or the
less impressive, that, instead of a lengthened
process, there is JDut one step between the premises
and the conclusion — or, that the felt presence of a
judge within the breast, powerfully and immedi-
ately suggests the notion of a Supreme Judge and
Sovereign, who placed it there. Upon this ques-
tion, the mind does not stop short at mere abstrac-
tion; but, passing at once from the abstract to
the concrete, from the law of the heart it makes
the rapid inference of a lawgiver. It is the very
rapidity of this inference which makes it appear
like intuition; and which has given birth to the
mystic theology of innate ideas. Yet the theology
of Conscience disclaims such mysticism, built, as
it is, on a foundation of sure and sound reasoning;
for the strength of an argumentation in nowise
depends upon the length of it. The sense of a
governing principle within, begets in all men the
sentiment of a living Governor without and above
them, and it does so with all the speed of an
instantaneous feehng ; yet it is not an impression,
it is an inference notwithstanding — and as much so
as any inference from that which is seen, to that
which is unseen. There is, in the first instance,
cognizance taken of a fact — if not by the outward
eye, yet as good, by the eye of consciousness which
has been termed the faculty of internal observa-
tion. And the consequent belief of a God, instead
of being an instinctive sense of the Divinity, is the

332 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

fruit of an inference grounded on that fact. There
is instant transition made, from the sense of a
Monitor within to the faith of a Hving Sovereign
above ; and this argument, described by all, but
with such speed as almost to warrant the expres-
sion of its being felt by all, may be regarded,
notwithstanding the force and fertility of other
considerations, as the great prop of natural religion
among men.

14. At all events it is of the utmost value in
Theology — that there should be so much of Truth
and of supremely important Truth placed so near
us as to be laid hold of immediately by the mind ;
without the intervention of reasoning and without
any sensible exertion on the part of the discursive
faculty, or of that faculty by which it is, that we
arrive at some distant conclusion by a train of
inferences. Such for example are those truths
which are seen, not merely in the hght of the
external senses but in the light of consciousness,
and which instantly become manifest on the atten-
tion of the mind being turned towards them.
There needs in these instances no lengthened
argumentation to carry the belief — for the thing in
question becomes palpable by our own vivid and
intimate consciousness of our own nature. The
supremacy of Conscience is one of those truths —
not come at by a series of stepping-stones — but
-seen at once, in the light of what may be termed
an instant manifestation. Now certain it is, that
this Fact or Phenomenon in our nature, depones
strongly both for a God and for the supreme
righteousness of His Nature. But it drones to

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 333

these immediately ; or, at most, there is but one
inferential step which leads from the consciousness
of what we feel to be in ourselves, to the imj)ression
of what we apprehend to be in Him from whom we
derived our constitution and our being. There
may here be one transition from the premises to
the conclusion — ^but done with such rapidity by the
mind that it is not conscious of an argument. And
this it is, we believe, which has given a certain
innate or a prior character to some of the notions
and feelings of Natural Theism. They may be
soundly bottomed notwithstanding — so that though
mingled with the fears or the fancies of superstition,
we can discern the substantial workings of Truth
and Reason on the subject of a God, even in
countries of grossest Heathenism. For the felt
supremacy of Conscience established even there,
a certain natural regimen of Morality — and gave •
the impression of a Jurisprudence wherewith the
idea of an avenger and judge stood irresistibly
associated. The Law written on the Heart
suggested a Lawgiver however indistinct their
personification of him may have been. Even the
barbarous Theology of Greece and Rome, ifnpure
and Hcentious as it was, did not wholly obliterate
what may be called the Theology of Natural
Conscience.

15. And we mistake, if we think it was ever other-
wise, even in the ages of darkest and most licentious
Paganism. This Theology of Conscience has often
been greatly obscured, but never, in any country or
at any period in the history of the world, has it beeu
wholly obliterated. We behold the vestiges of it

334 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

in the simple Theology of the desert ; and, perhaps,
more distinctly there, than in the complex super-
stitions of an artificial and civilized neathenism.
In confirmation of this, we might quote the invoca-
tions to tho Great Spirit from the wilds of North
America. But, indeed, in every quarter of the
globe, where missionaries have held converse with
savages, even with the rudest of Nature's children
. — when speaking on the topics of sin and judgment,
they did not speak to them in vocables unknown.
And as this sense of a universal Law and a Supreme
Lawgiver never waned into total extinction among
the tribes of ferocious and untamed wanderers — so
neither was it altogether stifled by the refined and
intricate polytheism of more enhghtened nations.
The whole of classic authorship teems with allusions
to a Supreme Governor and Judge : iVnd when the
'guilty Emperors of Rome were tempest-driven by
remorse and fear, it was not that they trembled
before a spectre of their own imagination. When
terror mixed, which it« often did, with the rage and
cruelty of Nero, it was the theology of conscience
which haunted him. It was not the suggestion of
a capricious fancy which gave him the disturbance
— but a voice issuing from the deep recesses of a
moral nature, as stable and uniform throughout the
species as is the material structure of humanity ;
and in the Hneaments of which we may read that
there is a moral regimen among men, and therefore
a moral Governor who hath instituted, and who
presides over it. Therefore, it was that these
imperial despots, the worst and haughtiest of
recorded monarchs, stood aghast at the spectacle

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 335

of their own worthlessness. It is true, there is a
wretchedness which naturally and essentially be-
longs to a state of great moral unhingement ; and
this may account for their discomforts, but it will
not account for their fears. They may, because
of this, have felt the torments of a present misery.
But whence their fears of a coming vengeance ?
They would not have trembled at Nature's law,
apart from the thought of Nature's Lawgiver. The
imagination of an unsanctioned law would no
more have given disquietude, than the imagination
of a vacant throne. But the law, to their guilty
apprehensions, bespoke a judge. The throne of
heaven, to their troubled eye, was filled by a
living monarch. Righteousness, it was felt, would
not have been so enthroned in the moral system
of man, had it not been previously enthroned in the
system of the imiverse ; nor would it have held
such place and pre-eminence in the judgment of all
spirits, had not the Father of Spirits been its friend
and ultimate avenger. This is not a local or
geographical notion. It is a universal feeling — to
be found wherever men are found, because inter-
woven with the constitution of humanity. It is
not, therefore, the peculiarity of one creed, or of
one country. It circulates at large throughout the
family of man. We can trace it in the Theology
of savage life ; nor is it wholly overborne by the
artificial Theology of a more complex and idola-
.trous Paganism. Neither crime nor civilization
can extinguish it ; and whether in the " conscientia
scelerum" of the fierce and frenzied Catiline, or in
the tranquil contemplative musings of Socrates and

336 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

Cicero, we find the impression of at once a righteous
and a reigning Sovereign.

16. y^^ this felt Supremacy of Conscience, we
cannot oBurselves of the impression that whatever
the actual power or prevalence of vice may be in
the world, it is but the tumult and insurrection of
lower against higher elements — and that moral
rectitude still undislodged from its empire in the
pure region of Sentiment and Thought, sits aloft
as it were in empyreal dignity ; and from an
eminence whence no Power in Earth or Heaven
can dethrone her, commands the homage of all that
is best and worthiest in Nature. When there is
war betwixt Opinion and Force, the latter may
have the physical ascendancy, yet the former is
ever counted the nobler antagonist — and thus it is,
that although vice should have enhsted under its
standard of rebelhon all the families of mankind,
there remains the moral greatness of Virtue, as
erect in the consciousness of its strength as if it
had the public mind of the Universe upon its side.
It is difficult to resist the feeling, that amid all the
mystery of present appearances, the highest power
is at one with the highest principle. And it
confirms still more our idea of a government — that
conscience not only gives forth her mandates with
the tone and authority of a Superior ; but, as if on
purpose to enforce their observance, thus follows
them up with an obvious discipline of rewards and
punishments. It is enough but to mention, on the .
one hand, that felt complacency which is distilled,
like some precious eUxir, upon the heart by the
recollection of virtuous deeds and virtuous sacrifices j

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 337

and, on the other hand, those inflictions of remorse,
which are attendant upon wickedness, and where-
with, as if by the whip of a secret tormentor, the
heart of every conscious sinner is agonized. We
discern in these the natural sanctions of morality,
and the moral character of Him who hath ordained
them. We cannot otherwise explain the peace and
triumphant satisfaction which spring from the con-
sciousness of well doing — nor can we otherwise
explain the degradation as well as bitter distress,
which a sense of demerit brings along with it. Our
only adequate interpretation of these phenomena is,
that they are the present remunerations or the
present chastisements of a God who loveth right-
eousness, and who hateth iniquity. Nor do we view
them as the conclusive results of virtue and vice, but
rather as the tokens and the precursors either of a
brighter reward or of a heavier vengeance, that are
coming. It is thus that the delight of self-approba-
tion, instead of standing alone, brings hope in its
train ; and remorse, instead of standmg alone, brings
terror in its train. The expectations of the future
are blended with these joys and sufferings of the
present ; and all serve still more to stamp an
impression, of which traces are to be found in
every quarter of the earth — that we live under a
retributive economy, and that the God who reigns
over it takes a moral and judicial cognizance of the
creatures whom He hath formed.

17. What then are the specific injunctions of
conscience ? for on this question essentially depends
every argument that we can derive from this power
or property of our nature, for the moral character

VOL. I. p

338 ON THE SLPUEMACV OF CON'SCIEXCE.

of God. If, on the one hand, the lessons given
forth by a faculty, which so manifestly claims to he
the pre-eminent and ruling faculty of our nature,
be those of deceit and licentiousness and cruelty —
then, from the character of such a law, should we
infer the character of the lav/giver ; and so feel the
conclusion to be inevitable, that we are under the
government of a malignant and unrighteous God,
at once the patron of vice and the persecutor of
virtue in the world. If on the other hand, tem-
■ perance, and chastity, and kindness, and integrity,
and truth, be the mandates which generally, if not
invariably proceed from her — then, on the same
principles of judgment, should we reckon that He
who is the author of conscience, and who gave it
the place of supremacy and honour, which it so
obviously possesess in the moral system of man,
was himself the friend and the exemplar of all
those virtues which enter into the composition of
perfect moral rectitude. In the laws and the
lessons of human conscience, would we study the
character of the Godhead, just as we should study
the views and dispositions of a monarch, in the
instructions given by him to the viceroy of one of
his provinces. If, on the one hand, virtue be
prescribed by the authority of conscience, and
followed up by her approval, in which very approval
there is felt an inward satisfaction and serenity of
spirit, that of itself forms a most delicious reward ;
and if, on the other hand, the perpetrations of
wickedness are followed up by the voice of her
rebuke, in which, identical with remorse, there is
a sting of agony and discom.fort, amounting to the

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 339

severest penalty — then, are we as naturally disposed
to infer of Hira who ordained such a mental
constitution that He is the righteous Governor of
men, as, if seated on a visible throne in the midst
of us, He had made the audible proclamation of
His law, and by His own immediate hand, had
distributed of His gifts to the obedient, and in-
flicted chastisements on the rebellious. The law
of conscience may be regarded* as comprising all
those virtues which the hand of the Deity hath
inscribed on the tablet of the huip^n heart, or on
the tablet of natural jurisprudence ; and an argu-
ment for these being the very virtues which
characterize and adorn Himself, is that they must
have been transcribed from the prior tablet of His
own nature.

18. We are sensible that there is much to
obscure this inference in the actual circumstances
of the world. More especially — it has been alleged,
on the side of scepticism, that there is an exceeding
diversity of moral judgments among men; that,
out of the multifarious decisions of the human
conscience, no consistent code of virtue can be
framed ; and that, therefore, no consistent character
can be ascribed to Him, who planted this faculty
in the bosom of our species, and bade it speak so
uncertainly and so variously.* But to this it may

* On the imiformity of our moral judgments, we would refer
to the 74th and 75th of Dr. Brown's Lectures on the Philosophy
of the Human Mind. " If we bear in mind," says Sir James
Macintosh, " that the question relates to the coincidence of all
men in considering the same qualities as virtues, and not to the
preference of one class of virtues by some, and of a different
class by others, the exceptions from the agreement of mankind,
in their systems of practical morality, will be reduced to absolute

340 ON THE suprp:macy of conscience.

be answered, in the first place, that the apparent
diversity is partly reducible into the blinding, or,
at least, the distorting effect of passion and interest,
which sometimes are powerful enough to obscure
our perception, even of mathematical and historical
truths, as well as of moral distinctions ; and without
therefore affecting the stability of either. It is thus,
for example, that mercantile cupidity has bhnded
many a reckless adventurer to the enormous injustice
of the slave-trade ; that passion and interest together
have transmutpl revenge into a virtue; and that
the robbery, which, if prosecuted only for the sake
of individual gain, would have appeared to all
under an aspect of most revolting selfishness, puts
on the guise of patriotism, when a whole nation
deliberates on the schemes, or is led by a career
of daring and lofty heroism, to the spoliations of
conquest. In all such cases, it is of capital im-
portance to distinguish between the real character
of any criminal action, when looked to calmly,
comprehensively, and fully ; and what that is in
the action which the perpetrator singles out and
fastens upon as his plea, when he is either de-
fending it to others, or reconciling it to his own
conscience. In as far as he knows the deed to
be incapable of vindication, and yet rushes on the
performance of it, there i^ but delinquency of con-
duct incurred, not a diversity of moral judgment ;
nor does Conscience, in this case, at aU betray any

insignificance; and we sliall learn to view them as no more
affecting the harmony of the moral faculties, than the resemblance
of the limbs and features is affected by monstrous conformations,
or by the unfortunate effects of accident and disease in a very few
individuals."

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 341

caprice or uncertainty in her decisions. It is but
the conduct, and not the conscience, which is in
fault; and to determine whether the latter is in
aught chargeable with fluctuation, we must look
not to man's performance, but to his plea. Two
men may differ as to the moral character of an
action ; but if each is resting the support of his
own view on a different principle from the other,
there may still be a perfect uniformity of moral
sentiment between them. They own the authority
of the same laws ; they only disagree in the appli-
cation of them. In the first place, the most vehe-
ment denouncer of a guilty commerce is at one
with the most strenuous of its advocates, on the
duty which each man owes to his family ; and again,
neither of them would venture to maintain the
lawfulness of the trade, because of the miseries
inflicted by it on those wretched sufferers who
were its victims. The defender of this ruthless
and rapacious system disowns not, in sentiment
at least, however much he may disown in prac-
tice, the obligations of justice and humanity — nay,
in all the palliations which he attempts of the
enormity in question, he speaks of these as un~
doubted virtues, and renders the homage of his
moral acknowledgments to them all. In the sophis-
try of his vindication, the principles of the ethical
system are left untouched and entire. He meddles
not with the virtuousness either of humanity or
justice ; but he tells of the humanity of slavery, and
the justice of slavery. It is true, that he heeds not
the representations which are given of the atroci-
ties of his trade — ^that he does not attend because

342 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

he wills not to attend ; and in this there is practi-
cal unfairness. Still it but resolves itself into
perversity of conduct, and not into perversity of
sentiment. The very dread and dislike he has for
the informations of the subject, are sjTuptoms of a
feeling that his conscience cannot be trusted with
the question ; or, in other words, prove him to be
possessed of a conscience which is just like that of
other men. The partialities of interest and feeling
may give rise to an infinite diversity of moral judg-
ments in our estimate of actions ; while there may
be the most perfect uniformity and stabihty of
judgment in our estimate of principles : and, on all
the great generalities of the ethical code. Con-
science may speak the same language, and own one
and the same moral directory all the world over.

19. When consciences then pronounce differently
of the same action, it is for the most part, or rather,
it is almost always, because understandings view it
differently. It is either because the controversial-
ists are regarding it with unequal degrees of know-
ledge ; or, each, through the medium of his own
partialities. The consciences of all would come
forth with the same moral decision, were all equally
enlightened in the circumstances, or in the essential
relations and consequences of the deed in question ;
and, what is just as essential to this uniformity of
judgment, were all viewing it fairly as well as fully.
It matters not, whether it be ignorantly or wilfully,
that each is looking to this deed, but in the one
aspect, or in the one relation that is favourable to
his own peculiar sentiment. In either case, the
diversity of judgment on the moral qualities of the

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 3-l."i

same action, is just as little to be wondered at as a
similar diversity on the material qualities of the
same object — should any of the spectators labour
under an involuntary defect of vision, or voluntarily
persist either in shutting or in avertnig his eyes.
It is thus that a quarrel has well been termed a
misunderstanding, in which each of the combatants
may consider, and often honestly consider, himself
to be in the right : and that, on reading the hostile
memorials of two parties in a litigation, we can
perceive no diiierence in their moral prhicipies, but
only in their historical statements ; and that, in the
public manifestoes of nations when entering upon
war, we can discover no trace of a contrariety of
conflict in their ethical systems, but only in their
differently put or differently coloured representa-
tions of fact — all proving, that, with the utmost
diversity of judgment among men respecting the
moral quahties of the same thing, there may be a
perfect identity of structure in their moral organs
notwithstanding; and that Conscience, true to. her
office, needs but to be rightly informed, that she
may speak the same language, and give forth the
same lessons in all the countries of the earth.

20. It is this which explains the moral peculi-
arities of different nations. It is not that justice,
humanity, and gratitude are not the canonized
virtues of every region ; or that falsehood, cruelty,
and fraud would not, in their abstract and unasso-
ciated nakedness, be viewed as the objects of moral
antipathy and rebuke. It is, that, in one and the
same material action, when looked to in all the
lights of which, whether in reality or by the power

344 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

of imagination, it is susceptible, various, nay, oppo-
site moral characteristics may be blended ; and that
while one people look to the good only without the
evil, another may look to the evU. only without the
good. And thus the identical acts which in one
nation are the subjects of a most reverent and
religious observance, may, in another be regarded
with a shuddering sense of abomination and horror.
And this, not because of any difference in what
may be termed the moral categories of the two
people, nor because, if moral principles in their
unmixed generality were offered to the contempla-
tion of either, either would call evil good or good
evil. When theft was publicly honoured and
rewarded in Sparta, it was not because theft in
itself was reckoned a good thing; but because
patriotism, and dexterity, and those services by
which the interests of patriotism might be supported,
were reckoned to be good things. When the
natives of Hindostan assemble with delight around
the agonies of a human sacrifice, it is not because
they hold it good to rejoice in a spectacle of pain ;
but because they hold it good to rejoice in a spec-
tacle of heroic devotion to the memory of the dead.
When parents are exposed or children are destroyed,
it is not because it is deemed to be right that there
should be the infliction of misery for its own sake ;
but because it is deemed to be right that the
wretchedness of old age should be curtailed, or
that the world should be saved from the miseries of
an over-crowded species. In a word, in the very
worst of these anomalies, some form of good may
be detected, which has led to their establishment ;

ON THE SUPKEMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 345

and still some universal and undoubted principle of
morality, however perverted or misapplied, can be
alleged in vindication of them. A people may be
deluded by their ignorance ; or misguided by their
superstition ; or, not only hurried into wrong deeds,
but even fostered into v/rong sentiments, under the
hifluences of that cupidity or revenge, which are
so perpetually operating in the warfare of savage
or demisavage nations. Yet, in spite of all the
topical moralities to which these have given birth,
there is an unquestioned and universal morality
notwithstanding. And in every case, where the
moral sense is unfettered by these associations;
and the judgment is uncramped, either by the
partialities of interest or by the inveteracy of
national customs which habit and antiquity have
rendered sacred — CoTiscience is found to speak the
same language ; nor, to the remotest ends of the
world, is there a country or an island, where the
same uniform and consistent voice is not heard
from her. Let the mists of ignorance and passion
and artificial education be only cleared away ; and
the moral attributes of goodness and righteousness
and truth be seen undistorted, and in their own
proper guise ; and there is not a heart or a con-
science throughout earth's teeming population,
which could refuse to do them homage. And it is
precisely because the Father of the human family
has given such hearts and consciences to all his
children, that we infer these to be the very sancti-
ties of the Godhead, the very attributes of his own
primeval nature.

21. There is a countless diversity of tastes in
p 2

346 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

the world, because of the mfinitely various circum-
stances and associations of men. Yet is there a
stable and correct standard of taste notwithstanding,
to which all minds, that have the benefit of culture
and enlargement, are gradually assimilating and
approximating. It holds far more emphatically
true, that, in spite of- the diversity of moral judg-
ments, which are vastly less wide and numerous
than the former, there is a fixed standard of morals,
rallying around itself all consciences, to the greater
principles of which, a full and unanimous homage
is rendered from every quarter of the globe ; and
even to the lesser principles and modifications of
which, there is a growing and gathering consent,
with every onward step in the progress of light and
civilization. In proportion as the understandings
of men become more enlightened, do their con-
sciences become more accordant with each other.
Even now there is not a single people on the face of
the earth, among whom barbarity and licentiousness
and fraud are deified as virtues — where it does not
require the utmost strength, whether of superstition
or of patriotism in its most selfish and contracted
form, to uphold the delusion. Apart from these
local and, we venture to hope, these temporary
exceptions, the same moralities are recognised and
honoured; and, however prevalent in practice, m
sentiment at least, the same vices are disowned
and execrated all the world over. In proportion
as superstition is dissipated, and prejudice is
gradually weakened by the larger intercourse of
nations, these moral peculiarities do evidently wear
away ; till at length, if we may judge from the

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 347

obvious tendency of things, conscience will, in the
full manhood of our species, assert the universality
and the unchangeableness of her decisions. There
is no speech nor language where her voice is not
heard ; her line is gone out through all the earth ;
and her words to the ends of the world.

22. On the whole, then, conscience, whether it
be an original or a derived faculty, yet as founded
on human nature, if not forming a constituent part
of it, may be regarded as a faithful witness for
God the author of that nature, and as rendering
to his character a consistent testimony. It is not
necessary, for the establishment of our particular
lesson, that we should turn that which is clear into
that which is controversial by our entering into the
scientific question respecting the physical origin of
conscience, or tracing the imagined pedigree of its
descent from simpler or anterior principles in the
constitution of man. For, as has been well
remarked by Sir James Macintosh — " If Con-
science be inherent, that circumstance is, according
to the common mode of thinking, a sufficient proof
of its title to veneration. But if provision be made,
in the constitution and circumstances of aU men for
uniformity, producing it by processes similar to
those which produce other acquired sentiments,
may not our reverence be augmented by admu-ation
of that supreme wisdom, which, in such mental
contrivances, yet more highly than in the lower
world of matter, accomplish mighty purposes by
instruments so simple ?" It is not therefore the
physical origin, but the fact, of the uniformity of
Conscience, wherewith is concerned the theological

348 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

inference that we attempt to draw from it. This
ascendant faculty of our nature, which has been so
often termed the divinity within us, notwithstanding
the occasional sophistry of the passions, is on the
whole, representative of the Divinity above us ;
and the righteousness and goodness and truth the
lessons of which it gives forth every where, may
well be regarded, both as the laws which enter into
the juridical constitution, and as the attributes
which enter into the moral character of God.

23. We admit a considerable diversity of moral
observation in the various countries of the earth,
but without admitting any correspondent diversity
of moral sentiment between them. When human
sacrifices are enforced and applauded in one
nation — this is not because of their cruelty, but
notwithstanding of their cruelty. Even there,
the universal principle of humanity would be
acknowledged, that it were wrong to inflict a
wanton and uncalled for agony on any of our
fellows — ^but there is a local superstition which
counteracts the universal principle, and overbears
it. When in the repubhc of Sparta, theft, instead
of being execrated as a crime, was dignified into
an art and an accompHshment, and on that footing
admitted into the system of their youthful educa-
tion— ^it was not because of its infringement on
the rights of property, but notwithstanding of that
infringement, and only because a local patriotism
made head against the universal principle, and
prevailed ovei^ it. Apart from such disturbing
forces as these, it will be found that the sentiments
of men gravitate towards one and the same standard

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 349

all over the globe ; and that, when once the obscu-
rations of superstition and selfishness are dissipated,
there will be found the same moral light in every
mind, a recognition of the same moral law, as the
immutable and eternal code of righteousness for all
countries and all ages. We have already quoted
the noble testimony of a heathen, who tells us
with equal eloquence and truth, that, even amid
all the perversities of a vitiated and endlessly
diversified creed. Conscience sat mistress over the
whole earth, and asserted the supremacy of her
own unalterable obligations.*

24. Such then is our first argument for the
moral character of God, and which, as a character
implies an existence, might be resolved into an
argument for the being of God — even the moral
character of the law of conscience ; that conscience
which He hath inserted among the faculties of our
nature; and armed with the felt authority of a
master; and furnished with sanctions for the
enforcement of its dictates ; and so fi-amed, that,
apart h'om local perversities of the understanding
or the habits, all its decisions are on the side of
righteousness. The inference is neither a distant
nor an obscure one, from the character of such a
law to the character of its lawgiver. Neither is it
an inference, destroyed by the insurrection which
has taken place on the part of our lower faculties,
or by the actual prevalence of vice in the world.
For this has only enabled Conscience to come
forth with another and additional demonstration of

•Boolvl. c. I. §33.

350 ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE.

its sovereignty — just as the punishment of crime in
society bears evidence to the justice of the govern-
ment which is estabhshed there. In general, the
inward complacency felt by the virtuous, does, not
so impressively bespeak the real purpose and
character of this the ruling faculty in man, as do
the remorse, and the terror, and the bitter dissatis
faction, wherewith the hearts of the wicked are
exercised. It is true, that, by every act of iniquity,
outrage is done to the law of conscience ; but there
is a felt reaction within which tells that the outrage
is resented ; and then it is, that Conscience makes
most emphatic assertion of its high prerogative,
when, instead of coming forth as the benign and
generous dispenser of its rewards to the obedient,
it comes forth like an offended monarch in the
character of an avenger. Were we endowed with
prophetic vision, so as to behold, among the yet
undisclosed secrets of futurity, the spectacle of a
judge, and a judgment-seat, and an assembled
world, and the retributions of pleasure and pain to
the good and to the evil ; this were fetching from
afar an argument for the righteousness of God.
But the instant pleasure and the instant pain where-
with conscience follows up the doings of man,
brings this very argument within the limits of
actual observation. Only, instead of being mani-
fested by the light of a preternatural revelation, it
is suggested to us by one of the most familiar
certainties of experience, for in these phenomena
and feelings of oyir own moral nature, do we behold
not only a present judgment, but a present execu-
tion of the sentence.

ON THE SUPREMACY OF CONSCIENCE. 351

25. Some perhaps may imcagine the same sort
of transition in this reasoning from the abstract to
the concrete, that there is in the a priori argument.
The abettors of this argument talk of our notion of
any part of space as an inch, being but itself a
part of our entire and original notion of immensity ;
and in like manner, that our notion of any part of
time as an hour, is but part of the entire and
original notion of eternity that is in every mind.
They regard our ideas of infinite space and infinite
time as belonging to the simplest elements of
Thought ; and that therefore the certainty of the
things which they represent, carries in it all the
light and authority of a first principle. And then
upon the maxim that every attribute or quality
implies a substantive Being in which it resides,
they step from the abstract to the concrete, from
the infinite extent and the infinite duration to an
infinitely extended and an infinitely enduring God.
We confess, though it should be called a similar
transition from the abstract to the concrete, that
we feel vastly greater confidence in passing by
inference from a Law to a Lawgiver. The supre-
macy of Conscience is a fact in the constitution of
human nature*-seen in the light of consciousness
by each man, of his own individual specimen ; and
verified in the light of observation, as extending to
every other specimen within the compass of his
knowledge. And however quick the inference
may be from the supremacy of Conscience within
the breast, to the Supreme Power who estabhshed
it there being himself a righteous Sovereign — ^yet
this is strictly an argument a jmsteriori both for

352 PLrEASURE 01 VIRTUOUS, AND

the Being and the Character of God. It is the
strongest, we apprehend, which Nature furnishes
for the Moral Perfections of the Deity ; and even
with all minds, or certainly with most minds, the
most effective argument for His Existence — though
ushered into the creed of Nature not by a train of
inferences, but by the hght of an almost unmediate
perception. It is thus that in our first addresses
to any human Being on the subject of religion, we
may safely presume a God without entering on the
proof of a God. He has already the lesson within
himself— and it is a lesson which tells him more, or
at least speaks to him with greater force than the
whole of external Nature. Instead of bidding him
look to its collocations, he will be more powerfully
impressed and occupied with the idea of a God,
if he but hearken to the voice of his own Con-
science. It gave direct suggestion of a ruling and
a righteous God, even in the days of corrupted
Paganism — And still with the unlettered of our
present day and apart fi*om the light of Christi-
anity, along with the popular demonology of inferior
spirits, there is the paramount impression of a one
moral Governor amons: men.

CHAPTER III.

On the inherent Pleasure of the Virtuous, ana
Misery of the Vicious Affections,

1 . We are often told by moralists, that there is a
native and essential happiness in moral worth ; and

MISERY OF VICIOUS AFFECTIONS. 353

A like native and essential wretchedness in moral
depravity— insomuch that the one may be regarded
as its own reward, and the other as its own
punishment. We do not always recollect that this
happiness on the one hand, and this misery on the
other, are each of them made up, severally of
distinct ingredients; and that thus, by mental
analysis, we might strengthen our argument both
for the being and the character of God. When
we discover, that, into this alleged happiness of the
good there enter more enjoyments than one, we
thereby obtain two or more testimonies of the Divine
regard for virtue ; and the proof is enhanced in the
same pecuhar way, that the evidence of design is,
in any other d^^artment of creation, when we
perceive the concurrence of so many separate and
independent elements, which meet together for the
production of some complex and beneficial result.

2. We have already spoken of one such ingre-
dient. There is a felt satisfaction in the thought
of having done what we know to be right ; and, in
counterpart to this complacency of self-approbation,
there is a felt discomfort, amounting often to bitter
and remorseful agony, in the thought of having
done what conscience tells us to be wrong. This
implies a sense of the rectitude of what is virtuous.
But without thinking of its rectitude at all, without
viewing it in reference either to the law of conscience
or to the law of God, with no regard to jurispru-
dence in the matter — there is, in the virtuous affec-
tion itself, another and a distinct enjoyment. We
ought to cherish and to exeicise benevolence ; -and
there is a pleasure in the consciousness of doing

p.')4 PLEASURE or VIRTUOUS, AND

what we ought : but beside this moral sentiment,
and beside the pecuUar pleasure appended to bene-
volence as moral, there is a sensation in the merely
physical affection of benevolence; and that sensation,
of itself, is in the highest degree pleasurable. The
primary or instant gratification which there is in
the direct and immediate feeling of benevolence is
one thing : the secondary or reflex gratification
which there is in the consciousness of benevolence
as moral is another thing. The two are distinct of
themselves ; but the contingent union of them, in
the case of every virtuous affection, gives a multiple
force to the conclusion, that God is the lover, and,
because so, the patron or the rewarder of virtue.
He hath so constituted our nature, that, in the very
flow and exercise of the good affections, there shall
be the oil of gladness. There is instant delight in
the first conception of benevolence. There is
sustained delight in its continued exercise. There
is consummated delight in the happy smiling and
prosperous result of it. Kindness, and honesty,
and truth, are, of themselves, and irrespective of
their rightness, svveet unto the taste of the inner
man. MaUce, envy, falsehood, injustice, irre-
spective of their wrongness, have of themselves, the
l)itterness of gall and wormwood. The Deity hatli
annexed a high mental enjoyment, not to the
consciousness only of good affections, but to the
very sense and feeling of good affections. However
closely these may follow on each other — nay, how-
ever implicated or blended together they may be
at the same moment into one compour d state of
feeling ; they are not the less distinc t on that

MISERY OF VICIOUS AFFFX'TKiNS. 2bo

accqunt, of themselves. They form two pleasure-
able sensations, mstead of one; and then* apposition,
in the case of every virtuous deecT or virtuous
desire, exhibits, to us that very concurrence in the
world of mind, which obtains with such frequency
and fulness in the world of matter — affording, in
every new part that is added, not a simply repeated
only, but a vastly multiplied evidence for design,
throughout all its combinations. There is a
pleasure in the very sensation of virtue ; and there
Is a pleasure attendant on the sense of its rectitude.
These two phenomena are independent' of each
other. Let there be a certain number of chances
against the first in a random economy of things,
and also a certain number of chances against the
second. In the actual economy of things, where
there is the conjunction of both phenomena — it is
the product of these two numbers which represents
the amount of evidence alForded by them, for a moral
government in the world, and a moral Governor
over them.

3. In the calm satisfactions of virtue, this
distinction may not be so palpable, as in the
pungent and more vividly felt disquietudes which
are attendant on the wrong afTections of our nature.
The perpetual corrosion of that heart, for example,
which frets in unhappy peevishness all the day
long, is plainly distinct from the bitterness of that
remorse which is felt, in the recollection of its
harsh and injurious outbreakings on the innocent
sufferers \\ ithin its reach. It is saying much for
the moral character of God, that he has placed a
conscience within us, which admmisters painful

35G

rebuke on every indulgence of a wrong affection.
But it is saying still more for such being the
character of our Maker — so to have framed our
mental constitution, that, in the very working of
these bad affections there should be the painfulness
of a felt discomfort and discordancy. Such is the
make or mechanism of our nature, that it is
thwarted and put out of sorts, by rage and envy,
and hatred ; and this, irrespective of the adverse
moral judgments which conscience passes upon
them. Of themselves, they are unsavoury ; and
no sooner do they enter the heart, than they shed
upon it an immediate distillation of bitterness.
Just as the plaicd smile of benevolence bespeaks
the felt comfort of benevolence; so, in the frown
and tempest of an angry countenance, do we read
the unhappiness of that man who is vexed and
agitated by his own malignant affections — eating
inwardly as they do on the vitals of his enjoyment.
It is, therefore, that he is often styled, and truly, a
self-tormentor; or, his own worst enemy. The
delight of virtue in itself, is a separate thing from
the delight of the conscience which approves it.
And the pain of moral evil in itself, is a separate
thing from the pain inflicted by conscience in the
act of condemning it. They offer to our notice two
distinct ingredients, both of the present reward
attendant upon virtue, and of the present penalty
attendant upon vice; and so, enhance the evidence
that is before our eyes, for the moral character of
that administration, under which the world has
been placed by its Author. The appetite of hunger
is rightly alleged, in evidence of the care, wherewith

MISERY OF VICIOUS AFFECTIONS. 357

the Deity hath provided for the well-being of our
natural constitution ; and the pleasurable taste of
food is rightly alleged as an additional proof of the
same. And so, if the urgent voice of conscience
within, calhng us to virtue, be alleged in evidence
of the care, wherewith the Deity hath provided for
the well-being of our moral constitution ; the plea-
surable taste of virtue in itself, with the bitterness
of its opposite, may well be alleged as additional
evidence thereof. They ahke afford the present
and the sensible tokens of a righteous administra-
tion, and so of a righteous God.

4. Our present argument is grounded, neither
on the rectitude of virtue, nor on its utility in the
grosser and more palpable sense of that term — ^but
on the immediate sweetness of it. It is the office
of conscience to tell us of its rectitude. It is by
experience that w^e learn its utility. But the
sweetness of it — the dulce of virtue, as distinguished
from its utile, is a thing of instant sensation. It
may be decomposed into two ingredients, with one
of which conscience has to do — even the pleasure
we have, when any deed or any affection of ours
receives from her a favourable verdict. But it has
another ingredient which forms the proper and the
distinct argument that we are now urging — even
the pleasure we have in the mere relish of the
affection itself. If it be a proof of benevolence in
God, that our external organs of taste should have
been so framed, as to have a liking for wholesome
food ; it is no less the proof both of a benevolent
and a righteous God, so to have framed our mental
economy, as that right and wholesome morality

358 PLEASURE OF VIIITUOLS, AND

should be palatable to the taste of the inner man»
Virtue is not only seen to be right — it is felt to be
delicious. There is happiness in the very wish to
make others happy. There is a heart's ease, or a
heart's enjoyment, even in the first purposes of
kindness, as well as in its subsequent performances.
There is a certain rejoicing sense of clearness in
the consistency, the exactitude of justice and truth.
There is a triumphant elevation of spirit in magna-
nimity and honour. In perfect harmony with this,
there is a placid feeling of serenity and blissful
contentment in gentleness and humility. There
is a noble satisfaction in those victories, which, at
the bidding of principle, or by the power of self-
command, may have been achieved over the
propensities of animal nature. There is an elate
independence of soul, in the consciousness of having
nothing to hide, and nothing to be ashamed of. In
a word, by the constitution of our nature, each
virtue has its appropriate charm; and virtue, on
the whole, is a fund of varied, as well as of perpetual
enjoyment, to him who hath imbibed its spirit, and
is under the guidance of its principles. He feels
all to be health and harmony within ; and without,
he seems as if to breathe in an atmosphere of
beauteous transparency — ^proving how much the
nature of man and the nature of virtue are in unison
with each other. It is hunger which urges to the
use of food ; but it strikingly demonstrates the care
and benevolence of God, so to have framed the
organ of taste, as that there shall be a superadded
enjoyment in the use of it. It is conscience which
urges to the practice of virtue ; but it serves to

MISERY OF VICIOUS AFFECTIONS. 359 ■

enhance the proof of a moral purpose, and there-
fore of a moral character in God, so to have
framed our mental economy, that, in addition to
the felt obligation of its rightness, virtue should
of itself, be so regaling to the taste of the inner
man.

5. In counterpart to these sweets and satis-
factions of virtue, is the essential and inherent
bitterness of all that is morally evil. We repeat,
that, with this particular argument, we do not mix
up the agonies of remorse. It is the wretchedness
of vice in itself, not the wretchedness which we
suifer because of its recollected and felt wrongness
that we now speak of. It is not the painfulness of
the compunction felt because of our anger, upon
which we at this moment insist ; but the painfulness
of the emotion itself ; and the same remark apphes
to all the malignant desires of the human heart.
True, it is inseparable from the very nature of a
desire, that there must be some enjoyment or
other, at the time of its gratification ; but, in the
case of these evil afi'ections, it is not unmixed
enjoyment. The most ordinary observer of his
own feelings, however incapable of analysis;, must
be sensible, even at the moment of wreaking, in
full indulgence of his resentment, on the man who
has provoked or injured him, that all is not perfect
and entire enjoyment within ; but that, in this,
and indeed in every ither malignant feeling, there
is a sore burden of disquietude — an unhappiness
tumultuating in the heart, and visibly pictured
on the countenance. The ferocious tyrant who
has only to issue forth his mandate, and strike

360 Pleasure of virtuous, and

dead at pleasure the victim of his wrath, with any
circumstance too of barbaric caprice and cruelty,
which his fancy in the very waywardness of passion
unrestrained and power unbounded might suggest
to him — he may be said to have experienced
through life a thousand gratifications, in the solaced
rage and revenge, which, though ever breaking
forth on some new subject, he can appease again
every day of his life by some new execution. But
we mistake it if we think otherwise than that, in
spite of these distinct and very numerous nay daily
gratifications if he so choose, it is not a life of fierce
internal agony notwithstanding. It seems indis-
pensable to the nature of every desire, and to form
part indeed of its very idea, that there should be a
distinctly felt pleasure, or at least, a removal at
the time of a distinctly felt pain, in the act of its
fulfilment — yet, whatever recreation or relief may
have thus been rendered, without doing away the
misery, often in the whole amount of it the intense
misery, inflicted upon man by the evil propensities
of his nature. Who can doubt for example the
unhappiness of the habitual drunkard ? — and that,
although the ravenous appetite, by which he is
driven along a stormy career, meets every day,
almost every hour of the day, with the gratification
that is suited to it. The same may be equally
affirmed of the voluptuary, or of the depredator,
or of the extortioner, or of the liar. Each may
succeed in the attainment of his specific object ;
and we cannot possibly disjoin from the conception
of success, the conception of some sort of pleasure
— ^yet in perfect consistency, we affirm, with a .sad

*IISERY OF VICIOUS AFFECTIONS. 36i

and heavy burthen of unpleasantness or unhappi-
ness on the whole. He is little conversant with
our nature who does not know of many a passion
belonging to it, that it may be the instrument of
many pleasurable, nay delicious or exquisite sensa-
tions, and yet be a wretched passion still; the
domineering tyrant of a bondsman, who at once
knows himself to be degraded, and feels himself to
be unhappy. A sense of guilt is One main ingre-
dient of this misery — yet physically, and notwith-
standing the pleasure or the relief inseparable at
the moment from every indulgence of the passions,
there are other sensations of bitterness, which of
themselves, and apart from remorse, would cause
the suiFering to preponderate.

6. There is an important discrimination made
by Bishop Butler in his sermons ; and, by the help
of which, this phenomenon, of apparent contradic-
tion or mystery in our nature, may be satisfactorily
explained. He distinguishes between the final
object of any of our desires, and the pleasure
attendant on or rather inseparable from its gratifi-
cation. The object is not the pleasure, though
the pleasure be an unfailing and essential accom-
paniment on the attainment of the object. This
is well illustrated by the appetite of hunger, of
which it were more proper to say that it seeks
for food, than that it seeks for the pleasure which
there is in eating the food. The food is the
object; the pleasure is the accompaniment. We
do not here speak of the distinct and secondary
pleasure which there is in the taste of food, but of
that other pleasure which strictly and properly

VOL. I. Q

362 FLEASUKE OF VIRTUOUS, AND

attaches to the gratification of the appetite of
hunger. This is the pleasure, or rehef, which
accompanies the act of eating ; while the ultimate
object, the object in which the appetite rests and
terminates, is the food itself. The same is true of
all our special affections. Each has a proper and
peculiar object of its own, and the mere pleasure
attendant on the prosecution or the indulgence of
the affection is not, as has been clearly established
by Butler and fully reasserted by Dr. Thomas
Brown, is not that object. The two are as dis-
tinct from each other, as a thing loved is distinct
jFrom the pleasure of loving it. Every special
inclination has its special and counterpart object.
The object of the inclination is one thing ; the
pleasure of gratifying the inclination is another;
and, in most instances, it were more proper to say,
that it is for the sake of the object than for the
sake of the pleasure that the inclination is gratified.
The distinction that we now urge though felt to be
a subtle, is truly a substantial one ; and pregnant,
both with important principle and important apph^
cation. The discovery and clear statement of it
by Butler may well be regarded as the highest
service rendered by any philosopher to moral sci-
ence ; and that, from the light which it casts, both
on the processes of the human constitution and on
the theory of virtue. As one example of the latter
service, the principle in question, so plainly and
convincingly unfolded by this great Christian phi-
losopher in his sermon on the love of our neighbour,
Strikes, and with most conclusive effect, at the rrot
of the selfish system of morals ; a system which

r MISERY OF VICIOUS AFFECTIONS. 363

professes that man's sole object, in the practice of
all the various moraUties, is his own individual
advantage.* Now, in most cases of a special, and
more particularly of a virtuous affection, it can be
demonstrated, that the object is a something out of
himself and distinct from himself. Take compas-
sion for one instance out of the many. The object
of this affection is the relief of another's misery,
and, in the fulfilment of this, does the affection
meet with its full solace and gratification ; that is,
in a something altogether external from himself.
It is true, that there is an appropriate pleasure in
the indulgence of this affection, even as there is in
the indulgence of every other ; and in proportion,
too, to the strength of the affection, will be the
greatness of the pleasure. The man who is doubly
more compassionate than his fellow, will have
doubly a greater enjoyment in the relief of misery ;
yet that, most assuredly, not because he of the two
is the more intently set on his own gratification,
but because he of the two is the more intently set on
an outward accomplishment, the relief of another's
:g^retchedness. The truth is, that, just because
more compassionate than his fellow, the more intent
is he than the other on the object of this affection,
and the less intent is he than the other on himself
the subject of this affection. His thoughts and
feelings are more drawn away to the sufferer, and
therefore more drawn aiwayjrom himself. He is

* How is it that the utilitarians of our day make so little
account of Butler, whom nevertheless some of them profess to
idolize ? The truth is, that the distinction which he has estab-
lished between the object of an affection and its accompanying
pleasure, strikes at the foundation of their system ?

364 PLEASURE OF VIRTUOUS, AND

the most occupied with the object of this affection ;
and, on that very account, the least occupied with
the pleasure of its indulgence. And it is precisely
the objective quality of these regards, which stamps
upon compassion the character of a disinterested
affection. He surely is the most' compassionate
whose thoughts and feelings are most drawn away
to the sufferer, and most drawn away from self;
or, in other words, most taken up with the direct
consideration of him who is the object of this affec-
tion, and least taken up with the reflex considera-
tion of the pleasure that he himself has in the
indulgence of it. Yet this prevents not the plea-
sure from being actually felt ; and felt, too, in very
proportion to the intensity of the compassion ; or,
in other words, more felt the less it has been
thought of at the time, or the le^s it has been
pursued for its own sake. It seems unavoidable
in every affection, that, the more a thing is loved,
the greater must be the pleasure of indulging the
love of it : yet it is equally unavoidable, that the
greater in that case will be our aim towards the
object of the affection, and the less will be our aim
towards the pleasure which accompanies its gratifi-
cation. And thus, to one who reflects profoundly
and carefully on these things, it is no paradox that
he who has had doubly greater enjoyment than
another in- the exercise of compassion, is doubly
the more disinterested of the two ; that he has had
the most pleasure in this affection who has been
the least careful to please himself with the indul-
gence of it; that he whose virtuous desires, as
being the strongest, have in their gratification

MISERY OF VICIOUS AFFECTIONS. 365

ministered to self the greatest satisfaction, has been
the least actuated of all his fellows by the wishes,
and stood at the greatest distance from the aims of
selfishness.*

7. And moreover, there is a just and philosophi-
cal sense, in which many of our special aiFections,
besides the virtuous, are alike disinterested with
these; even though they have been commonly
ranked among the selfish aflfections of our nature.
The proper object of self-love is the good of self;
and this calm general regard to our own happiness
may be considered, in fact, as the only interested
affection to which our nature is competent. The
special affections are, one and all of them, distinct
from self-love, both in their objects, and in the real
psychological character of the affections themselves.
The object of the avaricious affection is the acquire-
ment of wealth; of the resentful, the chastisement'
of an offender; of the sensual, something appro-
priate or suited to that corporeal affection which
forms the reigning appetite at the time. In many
of these, is the good of self the proper discrimina-
tive object of the affection ; and the mind of him
who is under their power, and engaged in their
prosecution, is differently employed from the mind
of him, who, at the time, is either devising or doing
aught for the general or abstract end of his own
happiness. None of these special affections is
identical with the affection which has happiness for
its object. So far fi*om this, the avaricious man
often, conscious of the strength of his propensity,

* The purely disinterested character of a right religious affec-
tion might be proved by these considerationa. .

366 PLEASURE OF VIRTUOUS, AND

and at the moment of being urged forward by it to
new speculations, acknowledges in his heart, that
he would be happier far, could he but moderate its
violence, and be satisfied with an humbler fortune
than that to which his aspirations would carry him.
And the resentful man, in the very act of being
tempest-driven to some furious onset against the
person who has affronted or betrayed him, may
yet be sensible that, instead of seeking for any
benefit to himself, he is rushing on the destruction
of his character, or fortune, or even life. And
many is the drunkard who under the goadings of
an appetite which he cannot withstand, in place of
self-love being the principle, and his own greatest
happiness the object, knows himself to be on the
road to inevitable ruin. There is an affection
which has happiness for its object; but this is nof
the afi^ection which rules and has the ascendancy in
any of these instances. These are all special
affections, grounded on the affinities which obtain
between certain objects and certain parts of human
nature ; and which cannot be indulged beyond a
given extent, without distemper and discomfort to
the whole nature ; so that, in spite of all the par-
ticular gratifications which follow in their train,
the man over whom they tyrannise may be unhappy
upon the whole. The very distinction between
the affection of self-love and the special affections
proves that there is a corresponding distinction in
their objects; and this again, that many o'f the
latter may be gratified, while the former is disap-
pointed,— or, in other words, that, along with
many particular enjoyments, the general state of

MISERY OF VICIOUS AFFECTIONS. 367

man may be that of utter and extreme wretchedness.
It is therefore a competent question, what those
Special affections arc, which most consist with the
general happiness of the mind ; and this, notwith-
standing that they all possess one circumstance in
coram.on — the unavoidable pleasure appendant to
the gratification of each of them.*
• 8. This explanation will help us to understand
v/herein it is that the distinction in point of enjoy-
ment, between a good and an evil affection of our
nature, properly lies. For there is a certain species

* The following are the clear and judicious observations of Sir
James Macintosh on this subject : —

♦' In contending-, therefoi'e, that the benevolent affections are
disinterested, no more is claimed for them than must be granted
to mere animul appetites and to malevolent passions. Each of
these principles alike seeks its own object, for the sake simply of
obtaining it. Pleasure is the result of the attainment, but no
separate part of the aim of the agent. The desire that another
person may be gratified, seeks that outward object alone, according
to the genei-al course of human desire. Resentment is as disin-
terested as gratitude or pity, but not more so. Hunger or thirst
may be as much as the purest benevolence, at variance with self-
love. A regard to our own general happiness is not a vice, but
in itself an excellent quality. It were well if it prevailed more
generally over craving and short-sighted appetites. The weakness
of the social affections, and the strength of tlie private desires,
properly constitute selfishness ; a vice utterly at vai-iance with the
happiness of him who harbours it, and as such, condemned by
self-love. There are as few who attain the greatest satisfaction to
themselves, as who do the greatest good to others. It is absurd
to say with some, that the pleasure of benevolence is selfish,
because it is felt by self Understanding and reasoning are acts
of self, for no man can think by proxy ; but no man ever called
them scljish, why ? Evidently because they do not regard self.
Precisely the same reason applies to benevolence. Such an argu-
ment is a gross confusion of self, as it is a subject of feeling or
thought, with self considered as the ohject of either. It is no more
just to refer the private appetites to self-love because they
commonly promote happiness, than it would be to refer them
to self-lnitred, iu those frequent cases where their gi'atiScatioa
obstructs it."

368 PLEASURE OF VIRTUOUS, AND

of enjoyment common to them all. It were a
contradiction in terms to affirm otherwise ; for it
were tantamount to saying, that an affection may
be gratified, without the actual experience of a
gratification. There must be some sensation or
other of happiness, at the time when a man obtains
that which he is seeking for ; and if it be not a
positive sensation of pleasure, it will at least be the
sensation of a relief from pain, as when one meets
with the opportunity of wreaking upon its object,
that indignation which had long kept his heart in a
tumult of disquietude. We therefore would mis-
take the matter, if we thought, that a state even of
thorough and unquahfied wickedness was exclusive
of all enjoyment — for even the vicious affections
must share in that enjoyment, which inseparably
attaches to every affection, at the moment of its
indulgence. And thus it is, that even in the
veriest Pandemonium, might there be lurid gleams
of ecstasy, and shouts of fiendish exultation — the
merriment of desperadoes in crime, who send forth
the outcries of their spiteful and savage delight,
when some deep-laid villany has triumphed; or when
in some dire perpetration of revenge, they have
given full satisfaction and discharge to the malig-
nity of their accursed nature. The assertion there-
fore may be taken too generally, when it is stated,
that there is no enjoyment whatever in the veriest
hell of assembled outcasts ; for even there, might
there be many separate and specific gratifications.
And we must abstract the pleasure essentially
involved in every affection, at the instant of its
indulgence, and which cannot possibly be disjoined

MISERY OF VICIOUS AFFECTIONS. 369

from it, ere we see clearly and distinctively wherein
it is that, in respect of enjoyment, the virtuous and
vicious affections differ from each other. For it is
true, that there is a common resemblance between
them ; and that, by the universal law and nature
of affection, there must be some sort of agreeable
sensation, in the act of their obtaining that which
they are seeking after. Yet it is no less true, that,
did the former affections bear supreme rule in the
heart, they would brighten and tranquillize the
whole of human existence — whereas, had the latter
the entire and practical ascendancy, they would
distemper the whole man, and make him as com-
pletely wretched as he were completely worthless.
9. There is one leading difference then between
a virtuous and a vicious affection — that there is
always a felt sweetness in the very presence and
contact of the former ; whereas, in the presence
and contact of the latter, there is generally or very
often at least, a sensation of bitterness. Let them
agree as they may in the undoubted fact of a grati-
fication in the attainment of their respective ends,
the affections themselves may be long in existence
and operation before their ends are arrived at ; and
then it is, we affirm, that if compared, there will
be found a wide distinction and dissimilarity betw^een
them. The very feeling of kindness is pleasant to
the heart ; and the very feeling of anger is a painful
and corrosive one. The latter, we know, is often
said to be a mixed feeling — because of both the
pleasure and the pain which are said to enter into
it. But it will be found that the pleasure, in this
case, lies in the prospect of full and final gratificar
q2

370 PLEASURE or vinruous, and

tion ; and very often, in a sort of current or partial
gratification which one may experience before-
hand, in the mere vent or utterance by words, of
the labouring violence that is within — seemg that
words of bitterness, when discharged on the object
of our wrath, are sometimes the only, and even the
most effective executioners of all the vengeance that
we meditate ; besides that by their means, we may
enlist in our favour the grateful sympathy of other
men — thus obtaining a solace to ourselves, and
aggravating the punishment of the offender, by
exciting against him, in addition to our own
hostility, the hostile indignation of his fellows.
And thus too is it, that, in the case of anger, there
may not only be a completed gratification at the
last, by the infliction of a full and satisfactory
chastisement ; but a gratification, as it were by
instalments, with every likely purpose of retaliation
that we may form in our bosoms, and every sentence
of keen and reproachful eloquence that may fall
from our lips. And so anger has been affirmed to
be a mixed emotion, from confounding the pleasure
that lies in the gratification of the emotion, with the
pleasure that is supposed to lie in the feeling of the
emotion. But the truth is, that, apart from the
gratification, the emotion is an exceedingly painful
one — insomuch that the gratification mainly lies in
the removal of a pain, or in the being ridded of a
felt uneasiness. Compassion may in . the same
way be termed a mixed feeling. But on close
attention to these two affections and comparison
between them, it will be found, that all the pleasure
of anger lies in its gratification, and all the pain of

MISERY OF VICIOUS AFFECTIONS. 371

it in the feeling itself — whereas all the pain of com-
passion lies in the disappointment of its gratifica-
tion, while in the feeling itself there is nought but
pleasure. Let the respective gratifications of these
two affections — the one, by the fulfilled retaUation
of a wrong ; the other, by the fulfilled relief of a
suffering — 1^ these gratifications be put out of
notice altogether, that we might but attend to the
yet ungratified feelings themselves : and we cannot
imagine a greater difference of state between two
minds, than that of one which luxuriates in the
tenderness of compassion, and that of another
which breathes and is infuriated with the dark
passions and the still darker purposes of resent-
ment. Or we may appeal to the experience of
the same mind, which at one time may have its
hour of meditated kindness, and at another its hour
of meditated revenge. We speak of these two,
hot in the moment of their respective triumphs,
not of the sensations attendant on the success of
each — ^but of the direct and instant sensations which
lie m the feelings themselves. They form two as
distinct states in the moral world, as sunshine- and
tempest are in the physical world. We have but
to name the elements which enter into the com-
position of each, in order to suggest the utter
contrariety which obtains between them — between
the calm and placid cheerfulness on the one hand
of that heart which is employed in conceiving the
generous wishes, ^ or in framing the Uberal and
fruitful devices of benevolence ; and, on the other
hand, the^prbulence and fierce disorder of the
same heart, when burning disdain, or fell and

872 PLEASURE OF VIRTUOUS, AND

implacable hatred has taken possession of it — the
reaction of its own aifronted pride, or aggrieved
sense of the injury which has been done to it.

10. But perhaps the most favourable moment
for comparison between them, is when each is
frustrated of its peculiar aim ; and so each is sent
back upon itself, with that common suffering to
which all the affections are liable — the suffering of
a disappointment. We shall be at no loss to
determine on which side the advantage lies, if we
have either felt or witnessed benevolence in tears,
because of the misery which it cannot alleviate;
and rage, in the agonies of its defeated impotence,
because of the haughty and successful defiance of
an enemy, whom with vain hostility it has tried to
assail, but cannot reach. We have the example
of a good affection under disappointment, in the
case of virtuous grief or virtuous indignation ; and
of a bad affection under disappointment, in the
case of eiiTy, when, in spite of every attempt to
calumniate or depress its object, he shines forth to
universal acknowledgment and applause, in all* the
lustre of his vindicated superiority. It marks how
distinct these two sets of feelings are from each
other, that, with the former, even under the pain
of disappointment, there is a something in the
very taste and quality of the feelings themselves,
which acts as an emollient or a charm, and mitigates
the painfulness — while, with the latter, there is
nought to mitigate, but every thing to exasperate,
and more fiercely to agonize. The ma%nant
feelings are no sooner turned inwa|^y, by the
arrest of a disappointment from without, than they

MISERY OF VICIOUS AFFECTIONS. 373

eat inwardly ; and, when foiled in the discharge of
their purposed violence upon others, they recoil—
and, without one soothing ingredient to calm the
labouring effervescence, they kindle a hell in the
heart of the unhappy owner. Internally there is
a celestial peace and satisfaction in virtue, even
thouffh in the midst of its outward discomfiture, it
be compelled to w^eep over the unredressed wrongs
and sufferings of humanity. On the other hand, the
very glance of disappointed maleyolence, bespeaks
of this evil affection, that, of itself, it is a fierce
and fretting distemper of the soul, an executioner
of vengeance for all the guilty passions it may have
fanned into mischievous activity, and for all the
crimes it may have instigated.

11. And this contrast between a good and an
evil affection, this superiority of the former to the
latter is fully sustained, when, instead of looking to
the state of mind which is left by the disappointment
of each, we look to the state of mind which is left
by their respective gratifications — the one a state
of sated compassion, the other of sated resentment.
There is one most observable distinction between
the states of feeling, by which an act of compassion
on the one hand, and of resentment on the other,
are succeeded. It is seldom that man feasts his
eyes on that spectacle of prostrate suffering which,
in a moment of fury, he hath laid at his feet ; in
the same way that he feasts his eyes on that picture
of family comfort which smiles upon him from
some cottage home, that his generosity had reared.
This looks as if the sweets of benevolence were
lasting, whereas the sweets of revengeful malice.

374 PLEASURE OF VIRTUOUS, AND

such as they are, are in general but momentary.
An act of compassion may extinguish for a time
the feeUng of compassion, by doing away that
suffering which is the object of it; but then it
generally is followed up by a feeling of permanent
regard. An act of revenge, when executed to the
full extent of the desire or purpose, does extinguish
and put an end to the passion of revenge ; and is
seldom, if ever, followed up by a feeling of per-
manent hatred. An act of kindness but attaches
the more, and augments a friendly disposition
"towards its object. It were both untrue in itself,
and unfair to our nature to say, that an act of
revenge but exasperates the more, and always
augments, or even often augments, a hostile dispo-
sition towards its object. It has been said that we
hate the man whom we have injured : but whatever
the truth of this observation may be, certain it is,
that we do not so hate the man of whom we have
taken full satisfaction for having injured us; or,
if we could imagine aught so monstrous, and happily
so rare, as the prolonged, the yet unquelled satis-
faction of one, who could be regaled for hours with
the sighs of him whom his own hands had wounded;
or, for months and years, with the pining destitution
of the household whom himself had impoverished
and brought low : this were because the measure
of the revenge had not equalled the measure of the
felt provocation, only perhaps to be appeased and
satiated by death. This, at length, would terminate
the emotion. And here a new insight opens upon
us into the distinction between a good and a bad
affection. Benevolence, itself of immortal quality,

MISERY OF VICIOUS AFFECTIONS. 375

would immortalize its objects : malignity, if not
appeased, by an infliction short of death, would
destroy them/* The one is ever strengthening
itself upon old objects, and fastening upon new
ones ; the other is ever extinguishing its resentment
towards old objects by the pettier acts of chastise-
ment, or, if nothing short of a capital punishment
will appease it, by dying with their death. The
exterminating blov/, the death which "clears all
scores" — this forms the natural and necessary limit
even to the fiercest revenge ; whereas, the outgoings
of benevolence are quite indefinite. In revenge,
the affection is successively extinguished; and, if
relumed, it is upon new objects. In benevolencs,
the affection is kept up for old objects, while ever
open to excitement from new ones; and hence a
living and a multiplying power of enjoyment,
which is peculiarly its own. On the same principle
that we water a shrub just because w^e had planted
it, does our friendship grow and ripen the more
towards him on whom we had formerly exercisea
It. The affection of kindness for each individual
object survives the act of kindness, or, rather, is
strengthened by the act. Whatever sweetness may
have been originally in it, is enhanced by the
exercise ; and, so far from being stifled by the
first gratification, it remains in greater freshness
than ever for higher and larger gratifications than
before. It is the perennial quality of their gratifi-
cation, which stamps that superiority on the good
atfections, we are now contending for. Benevolence

• So true it is, that he who hateth hb brother with implacable
hatred is a murderer.

376 PLEASURE OF VIRTUOUS, AND

both perpetuates itself upon its old objects, and
expands itself into a wider circle as it meets with
new ones. Not so with revenge, which generally
disposes of the old object by one gratification ; and
then must transfer itself to a new object, ere it can
meet with another gratification. Let us grant that
each aifection has its peculiar walk of enjoyment.
The history of the one walk presents us with a
series, of accumulations ; the history of the other
with a series of extinctions.

12. But in dwelling on this beautiful peculiarity,
by which a good affection is distinguished from a
bad one, we are in danger of weakening our im-
mediate argument. We bring forward the matter
a great deal too favourably for thie malignant
desires of the human heart, if, while reasoning on
the supposition of an enjoyment, however transitory
in their gratification, we give any room for the
imagination that even this is unmixed enjoyment.
We have already stated, that, of themselves, and
anterior to their gratification, there is a painfulness
in these desires ; and that when by their gratification
we get quit of this painfulness, we might after all
obtain little more than a relief from misery. But
the truth is, that, generally speaking, we obtain a
great deal less on the side of happiness than this ;
for, in most cases, all that we obtain by the gratifi-
cation of a malignant passion, is but the exchange
of one misery for another ; and this apart still from
the remorse of an evil perpetration. There is one
famihar instance of it, which often occurs in con-
versation— when, piqued by something offensive in
the remark or mJ^nner of our fellows, we react with

MISERY OF VICIOUS AFFECTIONS. 377

A severity which humbles and overwhelms him.
In this case, the pain of the resentment is succeeded
by the pain we feel in the spectacle of that distress
which ourselves have created; and this, too, ag-
gravated perhaps by the reprobation of all the
by-standers, affording thereby a miniature example
of the painful alternations which are constantly
taking place in the history* of moral evil ; when the
misery of wrong affections is but replaced, to the
perpetrator himself, by the misery of the wrong
actions to which they have hurried him. It is thus
that a life of frequent gratification may, notwith-
standing, be a life of int'ense wretchedness. It mq|||||k
help our imagination of such a state, to conceive or
one, subject every hour to the agonies of hunger,
with such a mal-conformation at the same time in
his organ of taste, that, in food of every description,
he felt a bitter and universal nausea. There were
here a constant gratification, yet a constant and
severe endurance — a mere alternation of cruel
sufferings — the displacement of one set of agonies,
by the substitution of other agonies in their room.
This is seldom, perhaps never realized in the
physical world ; but in the moral world it is a great
and general phenomenon. The example shows at
least the possibility of a constitution, under which
a series of incessant gratifications may be nothing
better than a restless succession of distress and
disquietude; and that such should be the consti-
tution of our moral nature as to make a life of
vice a life of vanity and cruel vexation, is strong
experimental evidence of Him who ordained this

378 PLEASURE OF VIRTUOUS, AND

constitution, that He hatoth iniquity, that He
loveth righteousness.

13. But the pecuharity which we have been
incidentally led to notice, is, in itself, pregnant with
inference also. We should augur hopefully of the
final issues of our moral constitution, as well as
conclude favourably of Him who hath ordained it
— when we find its workmgs to be such, that, on
the one hand, the feeling of kindness towards an
individual object, not only survives, but is inde-
finitely strengthened by the acts of kindness ; and,
^1 the other hand, that, not only does an act of
^R^enge satiate and put an end to the feeling of
revenge, but even, that certain acts of hostility
towards the individual object of our hatred will
make us relent from this hatred, and at length
extinguish it altogether. May we not perceive in
this economy a balance in point of tendency, and
at length of ultimate effect on the side of virtue ?
May it not warrant the expectation, that, while
benevolence, that great conservative principle of
being, has in it a principle conservative of itself as
well as of its objects, the outbreakings of evil are
but partial and temporary; and that the moral
world, viewed as a progressive system and now
only in its transition state, has been so constructed
as to secure both the perpetuity of all the good
affections, and the indefinite expansion of them to
new objects and over a larger and ever-widening
territory ? At all events, whatever reason there
may be to fear, that, in the future arrangements of
nature and providence, both virtue and vice will

MISERY or VICIOUS AFFECTIONS. 379

be capable of immortality — we might gather from
what passes mider our eyes, in this rudimental and
incipient stage of human existence, that even with
our present constitution virtue alone is capable of
a blissful immortaUty. For malice and falsehood
carry in them the seeds of their own wretchedness,
if not of their own destruction. Only grant the
soul to be imperishable; and. if the character of
the governor is to be gathered from the final issues
of the government over which he presides — it says
much for the moral character of Him who framed
us, that, unless there be an utter reversal of the
nature which Himself has given, then, in respect to
the power of conferring enjoyment or of main-
taining the soul in its healthiest and happiest mood,
it is righteousness alone which endureth for ever,
and charity alone which never faileth.

14. And beside taking account of the special
enjoyments which attach to the special virtues, we
might observe on the general state of that mind,
which, under the consistent and comprehensive
principle of being or doing what it ought, studies
rightly to acquit itself of all the moral obhgations.
Beside the perpetual feast of an approving con-
science, and the constant recurrence of those
particular, gratifications which attach to the indul-
gence of every good afi'ection — is it not quite
obvious of every mind which places itself under a
supreme regimen of morality, that then, it is in its
best possible condition with regard to enjoyment :
like a well-strung instrument, in right and proper
tone, because all its parts are put in right adjust-
ment with each other ? If conscience be indeed

380 PLEASURE OF VIRTUOUS, AND

the superior faculty of our nature, then, every
tune it is cast down from this pre-eminence, there
must be a sensation of painful dissonance ; and the
whole man feels out of sorts, as one unhinged or
denaturalized. This perhaps is the main reason
that a state of well-doing stands associated with a
state of well-being ; and why the special virtue of
temperance is not more closely associated with the
health of the body, than the general habit of virtue
is with a wholesome and well-conditioned state of
the soul. Inhere is then no derangement as it
were in the system of our nature — all the powers,
whether" superior or subordinate, being in their
right places, and all moving without discord and
without dislocation. It were anticipating our argu-
ment, did we refer at present to the confidence
and regard wherewith a virtuous man is surrounded
in the world. We have not yet spoken of the
adaptations to man's moral constitution from
without, but only of the inward pleasures and
satisfactions which are yielded in the workings of
the constitution itself. And surely when we find
it to have been so constructed and attuned by its
Maker, that, in all the movements of virtue there is
a felt and grateful harmony, while a certain jarring
sense of violence and discomposure ever attends
upon the opposite — ^we cannot imagine how the
moral character of that hehvj: who Himself devised
this constitution and established all its tendencies,
can be more clearly or convincingly read, than in
phenomena like these.

15. We have already said that the distinction so
well established by Butler, between the object of

MISERY OF VICIOUS AFFECTIONS. 381

our affection and its accompanying, nay, insepar-
able pleasure, was the most effectual argument
that could be brought to bear against the selfish
system of morals. The virtuous affection that is
in a man's breast simply leads him to do what he
ought ; and in that object he rests and terminates.
Like every other affection, there must be a pleasure
conjoined with the prosecution of it ; and at last,
a full and final gratification in the attainment of
its object. But the object must be distinct from
the pleasure, which itself is founded on a prior
suitableness between the mind and its object.
When a man is actuated by a virtuous desire ; it is
the virtue itself that he is seeking, and not the
gratification that is in it. . His single object is to
be or to do rightly — though, the more intent he is
upon this object, the greater will, the greater must
be his satisfaction if he succeed in it. Neverthe-
less, it is not the satisfaction which he is seeking ;
it is the object which yields the satisfaction — the
object too for its own sake, and not for the sake of
its accompanying or its resulting enjoyment. Nay,
the more strongly and therefore the more exclu-
sively set upon virtue for its own sake ;' the less
will he think of its enjoyment, and yet the greater
will his actual enjoyment be. In other words,
virtue, the more disinterested it is, is the more
prolific of happiness to him who follows it; and
then it is, that, when freest of all from the taints
of mercenary selfishness, it yields to its votary the
most perfect and supreme enjoyment. Such is
the constitution of our nature, that virtue loses no*
its disinterested character; and yet man loses not

382 PLEASURE OF VIIITUOUS, &C.

bis reward ; and the author of this constitution.
He who hath ordained all its laws and its conse-
quences, has given signal proof of His own supreme
regard for virtue, and therefore of the supreme
virtue of His own character, in that He hath so
framed the creatures of His will, as that their
perfect goodness and perfect happiness are at one.
Yet the union of these does not constitute their
unity. The union is a contingent appointment of
the Deity; and so is at once the evidence. and the
effect of the goodness that is in His own nature.

16. This then is our second argument for the
moral character of God, grounded on the moral
constitution of man; and prior, as yet, to any
view of its adaptation to external nature. It is
distinct from the first argument, as grounded on
the phenomena of conscience, which assumes the
office of a judge within the breast, all whose
decisions are on the side of benevolence and justice ;
and which is ever armed with a certain power of
enforcement, both in the pains of remorse and the
pleasures of self-approbation. These, however,
are distinct and ought to be distinguished from the
direct pleasures of virtue in itself, and the direct
pains of vice in itself, which form truly separate
ingredients, on the one hand of a present and often
very painful correction, on the other hand, of a
present and very precious reward.

POWER AND OPERATION OF HABIT. 383

CHAPTER IV.

The Power and Operation of Habit.

1. We have as yet been occupied with what may be
termed the instant sensations, wherewith morality
is beset in the mind of man — with the voice of con-
science which goes immediately before, or with
the sentence whether of approval or condemnation,
which comes immediately after it ; * and latterly,
with those states of feeling which are experienced
at the moment when under the power of those
affections, to which any moral designation, be it of
virtue or vice, is applicable — the pleasure which
there is in the very presence and contact of the
one, the distaste, the bitterness which there is in
the presence and contact of the other.

2. These phenomena of juxtaposition, as they
may be termed ; these contiguous antecedents and
consequents of the moral and the immoral in man,
speak strongly the purpose of Him who ordained
our mental constitution, in having inserted there
such a constant power of command and encourage-
ment on the side of the former, and a like constant
operation of checks and discouragements against
the latter. But, perhaps, something more may be
collected of the design and character of God, by
stretching forward our observation prospectively
in the history of man, and so extending our regards
to the more distant consequences of virtue or vice,
both on the frame of his character and the state of

384 THE POWER AND OPERATION OF HABIT.

his enjoyments. By studying these posterior
results, we approximate our views towards the
final issues of that administration under which we
are placed. That defensive apparatus, wherewith
the embryo seed of plants is guarded and protected,
might indicate a special care or design in the pre-
server of it. What that design particularly is
comes to be clearly and certainly known, when, in
the future history of the plant, we learn what the
functions of the seed are, after it has come to
maturity; and then observe, that, had it been
suffered universally to perish, it would have led
— not to the mortality of the individual, for that is
already an inevitable law, but to the extinction and
mortality of the species.

3. For tracing forward man's moral history, or
the changes which take place in his moral state, it
is necessary that we should advert to the influence
of habit. Yet it is not properly the philosophy of
habit wherewith our argument is concerned, but
with the leading facts of its practical operation.
A beneficial effect might stiU remain an evidence
of the divine goodness, by whatever steps it should
be efficiently or physically brought about — its
power in this way depending not on the question
how it is, but on the fact that so it is. It were
really, therefore, deviating from our own strict and
pertinent line of inquiry, did we stop to discuss
the philosophic theory of habit, or suspend our
own independent reasoning till that theory was
settled — beside most unwisely and unnecessarily
attaching to our theme, all the discredit of an
obscure or questionable speculation ^ * th

POWER AND OPERATION OF HABIT. 385

palpable and sure results both in the material and
mental world, more than with the recondite pro-
cesses in either, that theism has chiefly to do ; and
it is by the former more than by the latter that
the cause of theism is npholden.

4. We might only observe, in passing, that the
modification introduced by Dr. Thomas Brown into
the tlieory of habit, was perhaps uncalled for, even
for the accomplishment of his own purpose, which
was to demonstrate that it required no peculiar or
original law of the human constitution to account
for its phenomena. He resolves the whole opera-
tion of habit into the law of suggestion — only, he
would extend that law to states of feelings, as well
as to thoughts or states of thought.* We are all
aware that if two objects have been seen or thought
of together on any former occasion, then the
thought of one of them is apt to suggest the thought
of the other, and the more apt the more frequently
that the suggestion has taken place — insomuch,
that, if the suggestion have taken place very often,

• The following is the passage taken from his forty-third lec-
ture, in which Dr. Brown seems to connect feeUng with feeUng
by the same mental law which connects thought with thoughi.
"To explain the influence of habit ia increasing the tendency to
certain actions I must remark— what I have already more than
once repeated— that the suggesting influence which is usually ex-
pressed in the phrase associat'iGn of ideas, though that very im-
proper phrase would seem to limit it to our ideas or conceptions
only, and has unquestionably produced a mistaken belief of this
partial operation of a general influence — is not Umited to those
more than to any other states of mind, but occurs also with
equal force in other feelings, which are not commonly termed
»deas or conceptions; that our desires or other emotions, for ex-
ample, may, like them, form apart of our trains of suggestion," &c.
S^e another equally ambiguous passage in his sixty-fourth lecture.
VOL. I. R

388 POWER AND OPERATION OP HABIT.

we shall find it extremely difficult, if not impossiLIo,
to break the succession between the thought which
suggests and the thought which is suggested by it.
Now Dr. Brown has conceived it necessary to
extend this principle to feelings as well as thoughts
— insomuch, that, if on a former occasion a certain
object have been followed up by a certain feeling,
or even if one feeling have been foUov/ed up by
another, then the thought of the object introduces
the feeling, or the one feeling introduces the other
feeling into the mind, on the same principle that
thought introduces thought. Now we should rather
be inclined to hold that thought introduces feeling,
not in consequence of the same law of suggestion
whereby thought introduces thought, but in virtue
of the direct power which lies in the object of the
thought to excite that feeling. When a voluptuous
object awakens a voluptuous feeling, this^ is not by
suggestion, but by a direct influence of its own.
When the picture of thai voluptuous object awakens
the same voluptuous feeiirpf, we v\^ould not ascribe
it to suggestion, but still put it down to the power
of the object, whether presented or only represented,
to awaken certain emotions. And as litde would
we ascribe the excitement of the feeling to sugges-
tion, but still to the direct and original power ol
the object — though it were pictured to us only in
thought, instead of being pictured to us in visible
imagery. In like manner, when the thougjit of
an injury awakens in us anger, even as the injury
itself did at the moment of its infliction, we should
not ascribe this to that peculiar law which is termed
the law of sus^gestion, and which undoubtedh"

POWER AND OPF.RATinx OF HABIT. 387

connects thought with thought. But wo should
ascribe it wholly to that law which connects an
object with its appropriate emotion — whether that
object be present to the senses, or have only been
recalled by the memory and is present to the
thoughts. Vve sustain an injury, and we feel
resentment in consequence, without surely, the
law of suggestion having had aught to do with the
sequence. We see the aggressor afterwards, and
our ano:er is revived against him, and with this
particular sur/'ession the law of suggestion has
certainly had lo do — not, however, in the way of
thought suggesting feeling, but only in the way of
thouiJ:ht sucrcrestinof thouo-ht. In truth it is a
succession of three terms. The sight of the man
awakens a recollection of the injury ; and the
thought of the injury aw^akens the emotion. The
first sequence, or that which obtains between the
first and second term, is a pure instance of the
suggestion of thought by thought, or, to speak in
the old language, of the association of ideas. The
second sequence, or that which obtains between
the middle and last term, is still, Dr. Brown would
say, not an instance of suggestion, but of thought
suggesting the feeling wherewith it was formerly
accompanied. Whereas, in our apprehension, it is
due, not to the law of suggestion, but to the law
which connects an .object, whether present at the
time or thouo^ht uoon afterwards, with its counter-
part emotion. Still the result is the same, Iiowever
differently accounted for. One can think, surely,
of the resentment which now occupies him, as well
as he can think of a past resentment — indeed it i.?

38S POWER AND OPERATION OF HABIT.

difficult to imagine how he can feel a resefitment
without thinking of it. Let some one thought,
then, by the proper law of sugo^estion, have intro-
duced the thought of an injury that had been
done to us; this second thonght introduces -the
feeling of resentment, not by the law of su2;-gestion,
but by the law which relates an object, whether
present or thought upon, to its appropriate emotion ;
this emotion is thought upon, and, not the emotion,
but the thouo^ht of the emotion recalls the thoucrht
of the first emotion that was felt at the orio^inal
infliction of the injury; and this thought again
recalls to us the thought of the injury itself, and
perhaps the thought of other or similar injinies,
which, as at the first, excites anew the feeling of
anger, but, at this particular step, by means of a
law different from that of suggestion, even the law
of our emotions, in virtue of which, certain objects,
when present in any way to the cognizance of the
understanding, awaken certain sensibilities in the
heart. It is thus that thoughts and feelings might
reciprocally introduce each other, not by means of
but one law of suggestion extending in common to
them both, but by the intermingling of two laws in
this repeating or circulating process, — even the law
of suggestion, acting only upon the thoughts ; and
the law of emotion, by which certain objects, when
presented to the senses or (o the memory, have the
power to awaken certain correspondent emotions.
We in this way get quit of the mysticism which
attaches to the notion of mere feelings either
suggesting or being suggested by other feelings,
separately from thouofhts — more esoecially wheUj

POWEIl AND OPEUATiON OF liABiT. 389

by the association of thoiigbts or of ideas alone,
and the direct power which hes in the objects of
these ideas to awaken certain emotions, all the
phenomena, as far as they depend on suggestioUy
are capable of being explained. A certain thought
or object may suggest the thought of a former
provocation ; this thought might excite a feeling
of resentment ; the resentment, thus felt or thought
upon, might send back the mind to a still more
vivid impression of its original cause ; and this
as^ain might prolong or awaken the resentment
anew, and in greater freshness than before. The
ultimate effect might be a fierce and fiery effer-
vescence of irascible feeling. Yet not by the
operation of one law, ])ut of two distinct laws in
the human constitution ; the first that, in virtue of
which, thoughts snggest thoughts; the second that,
in virtue of which, the object thus thought upon
awakens the emotion that is suited to it,

5. But while we have ventured to offer this
correction on the language of Dr. Brown, we are
far from being satisfied that the law of suggestion
alone will account for the evergrowing inveteracy
of habit. It supplies, we think, a strong auxiliary
force ; but is not the only force concerned in th«
operation. It accounts for the increased impor-
tunity of the solicitations from without ; but, over
and above this, we apprehend that the progress of
repeated indulgence induces a subjective change
upon the mind — in virtue of which, there is an in-
creasing susceptibility, or rather a greater strength,
if it may be so called, of inertia or passiveness
within— so that tlie propensities become every day

390 POWER AN!) OPEIIATION OF HABIT.

more headlong, and that too with a less power of
resistance than before.

6. Bat though for oace we have thus adverted
to the strict philosophy of the siihject, it will be
apparent, that, in this instance, it is of no prac-
tical necessity for the purposes of oar argument ;
and it is truly the same in many other instances,
where, if instead of reasoning theologically on the
palpable operations of t'le mechanism, we should
reason scientifically on the modus opci^andi, we
would run into really irrelevant discussions. The
them.e of our present chapter is the effects of
Habit, in as far as these efects serve to indicate
the design or character of Him Vvho is the author
of our mental constitution. It matrers not to any
conclusion of ours, by what recondite, or, it may
be, yet undiscovered process these effects are
brought about : and whether the common theory,
or that of Dr. Brown, or that ao;ain as modified
ana corrected by ourselves, is the just one. It is
enough to know, that, it" any given process of
intermingled thought and feeling liave been de-
scribed by us once, there are laws at work, which,
on the first step of that process again recurring,
would incline us to describe the whole of the
process over again ; and with the greater power
and certainty, the more frequently that process has
been repeated. We arci perfectly sure that the
more frequently any particular sequence between
thought and thought may have occurred, the more
readily will it recur ; — so tliat when once the first
thought has entered the mind, we may all the
more confidently reckon on its being followed up

POWEU AND OPEIIATION OF HABIT. 391

by the second. This, so far at least as suggestion
is concerned, we hold enough for explaining the
ever recurring force and faciUty, wherewith feehngs
also will arise and be followed up by their indul-
gence— and that, just in proportion to the frequency
wlierewith in given circumstances they have been
awakened and indulged formerly. In as far as the
objects of gratification are the exciting causes which
stimulate and awaken the desires of gratification,
then, any process ivhich ensures the presence and
application of the causes, will also ensure the
fulfilment of the effects which result from them.
If it be the presence or perception of the wine that
stands before us which stirs up the appetite ; and
if, instead of acting on the precept of looking not
unto the wine when it is red, we continue to look
till the appetite be so inflamed that the indulgence
becomes inevitable — th^, as we looked at it con-
tinuously when present, will we, by the law oi
sugo^estion, be apt to think of it continuously when
absent. If the one continuity was not broken by
any considerations of principle or prudence — so the
less readily will the other continuity be broken in
like manner. When we revisit the next social
company, we shall probably resign ourselves to
the very order of sensations that we did formerly ;
and the more surely, the oftener that that order
has already been described by us. And as the
order of objects with their sensations wher present,
so is the order of thoughts with their deslic*: when
absent. This order forces itseif upon tLa mind
with a strength proportional *c the frequency of
it's repetition ; and desires, v/hen not evaded by

392 POWER AND OPERATION OF HABIT.

the mind shifting its attention away from the
objects of them, can only be appeased by their
indulgence.

7. It is thus that he who entei's on a career of
vice, enters on a career of headlong degeneracy.
If even for once we have described that process of
thought and feeling, which leads, whether through
the imagination or the senses, from the first pre-
sentation of a tempting object to a guilty indulgence
— this of itself establishes a probability, that, on
the recurrence of that object, we shall pass onward
by the same steps to the same consummation.
And it is a probability ever strengthening with
every repetition of the process, till at length it
advances towards the moral certainty of a helpless
surrender to the tyranny of those evil passions,
which we cannot resist, just because the will itself
is in thraldom, and we choose not to resist them.
It is thus that we might trace the progress of
intemperance and licentiousness, and even of dis-
honesty, to whose respective solicitations we have
yielded at the first — till by continuing to yield, we
become the passive, the prostrate subjects of a
force that is uncontrollable, only because we have
seldom or never in good earnest tried to control it.
It is not that we are struck of a sudden with moral
impotency ; but we are gradually benumbed into it.
The power of temptation has not made instant
seizure upon the faculties, or taken them by storm.
It proceeds by an influence that is gentle and
almost insensibly progressive — ^just as progressive
in truth, as the association between particular ideas
is strengthened by the frequency of their succession.

POWER AND OPERATION OF HABIT. 393

iiut even as that association may at length become
inveterate, insomuch that when the lirst idea finds
eniry into the mind, we cannot withstand the
importunity wherewith the second insists upon
followino- it ; so miglit the moral habit become
alike inveterate — thonirhts succeeding thoughts,
and urging onward their counterpart desires, in
that wonted order, which had hitherto connected
the beginning of a temptation with its full and
final victory. At each repetition, would he find it
more difficult to break this order, or to lay an arrest
upon it — til] at length, as the fruit of this wretched
regimen, its unhappy patient is lorded over by a
power of moral evil, v/hich possesses the whole
man, and wields an irresistible or rather an unre-
sisted ascendancy over him.

8. But this melancholy process, leading to a
vicious indulgence, may be counteracted by an
opposite process of resistance, though with far
greater facility at the first — yet a facility ever
augmenting, in proportion as the efl^ectual resistance
of temptation is persevered in. That balancing
moment, at which pleasure would allure, and con-
science is urging us to refrain, may be regarded as
the point of departure or divergency, whence one
or other of the two processes will take their com-
mencement. Each of them consists in a particular
succession of ideas with their attendant feelings ;
and whichever of them may happen to be described
once, has, by the law of suggestion, the greater
chance, in the same circumstances, of being
described over again. Should the mind dwell oi:
an object of allurement, and the consideration of g
r2

394 POWER ANI> OPERATION OF HABIT.

principle not to be entertained — it will pass onward
from the first incitement to the final and guilty
indulgence by a series of stepping-stones, each of
v/hich will present itself more readily in future;
and with less chance of arrest or interruption by
the suggestions of conscience than before. But
should these suggestions be admitted, and far more
should they prevail — then, on the principle of
association, will they be all the more apt to inter-
vene, on the repetition of the same circumstances ;
and again break that line of continuity, wliich,
but for this intervention, would have led from a
temptation to a turpitude or a crime. If on the
occurrence of a temptation formerly, conscience
did interpose, and represent the evil of a compli-
ance, and so impress the man with a sense of
oblio:ation, as led him to dismiss the fascinatina"
object from the presence of his mind, or to hurry
away from it — the likelihood is, that the recurrence
of a similar temptation will suggest the same train
of thoughts and feelings and lead to the same
beneficial result ; and this is a likelihood ever
increasing with every repetition of the process.
The train which would have termrnated in a
vicious indulgence, is dispossessed by the train
which conducts to a resolution and an act of vir-
tuous self-denial. The thoughts v.diich tend to
awaken emotions and purposes on the side of duty
find readier entrance into the mind ; and tho
thoughts which awaRen and urge forward the
desire of what is evil more readily give way. The
positive force on the side of vitrne is augmented,
ly every repetition of the train which leads to a

POWER AND OPERATION OF KABIT. 395

virtnous determination. The resistance to this
force on the side of vice is weakened, in proportion
to the frequency wherewith that train of suggestions
which would have led to a vicious indulgence, is
broken and discomfited. It is thus that when
one is successfully resolute in his opposition to
evil, the power of maidng the achievement and the
facility of the achievement itself are both upon the
increase ; and virtue makes double gain to herself,
by every separate conquest v.'hich she may havo
won. The humbler attainments of moral worth
are first mastered and secured ; and the aspiring
disciple may pass onward in a career that is quite
indefinite io nobler deeds and nobler sacrifices.

9. And this law of habit when enlisted on the
side of righteousness, not only strengthens and
makes sure our resistance to vice, but facilitates
the most arduous performances of virtue. The
man whose thoughts, with the purposes and doings
to which they lead, are at the bidding of conscience,
v/ill, by frequent repetition, at length describe
the same track almost spontaneously — even as in
physical education, things laboriously learned at
the first, come to be done at last without the
feeling of an effort. And so, in moral education,
every new achievement of principle smooths the
way to future achievements of the same kind ; and
<he precious fruit or purchase of each moral victory
is to set us on higher and firmer vantage-ground
for the conquests of principle in all time coming.
He who resolutely bids away the suggestions of
avarice, when they come into conflict with the
incumbent generosity : or the suggestions of

396 PO^VER AND OPERATION OF HABIT..

voluptuousness, when they come into conflict with
the incumbent self-denial ; or the sugo-estions of
anger, when they come into conflict with the incum-
bent act of magnanimity and forbearance — will at
length obtain, not a respite only, but a final
deliverance from their intrusion. Conscience, the
longer it has made way over the obstacles of
selfishness and passion — the less will it give way
to these adverse forces, tliemselves weakened by
the repeated defeats which they have sustained in
warfare of moral discipline : Or, in other words, the
oftener that conscience makes good the supremacy
which she claims — the greater would be the work of
violence, and less the strength for its accomplish-
ment, to cast her down from that station of practical
guidance and command which of riirht belono-s
to her. It is in great part because, in virtue
of the law of suggestion, those trains of thought
and feelinsf, which connect her first biddinsfs with
their final execution, are the less exposed at every
/.ew instance to be disturbed, and the more likely
to be repeated over again, that every good principle
is more strengthened by its exercise, and every good
afiection is more strengthened by its indulgence
than before. The acts of virtue ripen into habits ;
and the goodly and permanent result is, the forma-
tion or establishment of a virtuous character.

10. This then forms a distinct argument in the
mental constitution for the virtuous character of
Him who ordained it. The voice of authority
within, bidding us to virtue ; and the immediat-^
delights attendant on obedience, certainly, speak
strongly for the moral ch.arncter of that administra-

POWER AND OPERATION OF HABIT. 397

don under which we are placed. Bat, by looking
to posterior and permanent results, we have the
advantage of viewing the system of that adminis-
tration in progress. Instead of the insulated acts,
we are led to reo-ard the abiding and the accumu-
lating consequences — and by stretching forward
our observation throui>:h laro^er intervals and to
more distant points in the moral history of men ;
we are in likelier circumstances for obtaining; a
glimpse of their final destination ; and so of seizing
on this mighty and mysterious secret — the reigning
policy of the divine government, whence we might
collect the character of Him who hatii ordained it.
And surely, it is of prime importance to be noted in
this examination, that by every act of virtue wo
become more powerful for its service ; and by every
act of vice we become more helplessly its slaves.
Or, in other words, were these respective moral
regimens fully developed into their respective con-
summations, it would seem, as if by the one, we
should be conducted to that state, where the faculty
within, which is felt to be the rightful, would also
become the reigning sovereign, and then we should
have the full enjoyment of all the harmony and
happiness attendant upon virtue — whereas, by the
other, those passions of our nature felt to be
inferior, would obtain the lawless ascendency, and
subject their wretched bondsmen to the turbulence,
and the agou}^, and the sense of degradation, which,
by the very constitution of our being, are inseparable
from the reign of moral evil.

11. We might not fully comprehend the design
or meaning of a process, till we have seen the end

398 POWER AND Ot>ERATIO^; OF HABIT.

of it. Had there been no death, the mystery of
our present state might have been somewhat
alleviated. We might then have seen, in bolder
rehef and indelible character, the respective con-
summations o{ vice and virtue — perhaps the world
partitioned into distinct moral territories, where the
habit of many centuries had given fixture and
establishment, first, to a society of the upright,
now in the firm possession of all goodness, as the
well-earned result of that wholesome discipline
through which they had passed ; and, second, to a
society of the reprobate, now hardened in all
iniquity, and abandoned to the violence of evil
passions no lonjrer to be controlled and never to be
eradicated. We might then have witnessed the
peace, the contentment, the universal confidence
and love, the melody of soul, that reigned in
the dwellings of the righteous ; and contrasted
these with the disquietudes, the strifes, the fell
and fierce collisions of injustice and mutual disdain
and hate implacable, the frantic bacchanalian
excesses with their dreary intervals of remorse
and lassitude, which kept the other region in
perpetual anarchy, and which, constituted as we
are, must trouble or dry up all the well-springs of
enjoyment, whether in the hearts of individuals or
in the bosom of families. We could have been at
no loss, to have divined, from the history and state
of such a \Vorld, the policy of its ruler. We
should have recognised in that peculiar economy,
by which every act, whether of virtue or vice, made
its performer still more virtuous or more vicious
than before, a moral remuneration on the one hand

POWER AND OPERATION OF HAR!T. 399

and a moral penalty on the otlier — witli an cnlianco-
nient of all the consequences, whether good or
evil, which flowed from each of tliem. AVc could
not have mistaken the purposes and mind of tlie
Deity — when we saw thus palpahly, and throuo-h
the demonstrations of experience, the ultimate
effects of these respective processes ; and, in this
total diversity of character, with a like total diver-
sity of condition, were made to perceive, that
riohteousness was its own eternal reward, and that
wickedness was followed up, and that for ever, with
the bitter fruit of its own ways.

12. Death so far intercepts the view of this re-
sult, that it is not here the object of sio;ht or of
experience. Still, however, it remains the ubject
of our Ij^cely anticipation. The truth is, that the
process which we are now contemplatino:, the pro-
cess by which character is formed and strength-
ened and perpetuated, suggests one of the strongest
arguments within compass of the light of nature,
for the immortality of the soul. In the system of
the world we behold so many adaptations, not
only between the faculties of sentient beings, and
their counterpart objects in external nature; but
between every historical progression in nature,
and a fulfilment of corresponding interest or mag-
nitude which it ultimately lands in — that we cannot
believe of man's moral history, as if it terminated in
death. More especially when we think of the
virtuous character, how laboriously it is reared,
and how slowly it advances to perfection ; but, at
lenoth, how indefinite its capabilities of power and
of eniovment are. afier tin's education of habits has

400 POWER AND OPERATION OF HABIT.

been completed — it seems like the breach of a
great and general analogy, if man is to be suddenly
arrested on his way to the magnificent resalt, for
which it might well be deemed that the whole of
his life was bnt a preparation ; having just reached
the full capacity of an enjoyment, of which he had
only been permitted, in this evanescent scene, a
few brief and passing foretastes. It were like the
infliction of a violence on the continuity of things,
of which we behold no similar example, if a being
so gifted were thus left to perish in the full matu-
rity of his powers and moral acquisitions. The
very eminence that he has won, we naturally look
upon as the guarantee and the precursor of some
great enlargement beyond it — warranting the hope,
therefore, that Death but transforms without destroy-
ing him, or, that the present is only an embryo or
rudimental state, the final development of which is
in another and future state of existence.

13. This is not the right place for a full expo-
sition of this argument. We might only observe,
that there is an evidence of man's immortality, in
the moral state and history of the bad upon earth,
as well as of the good. The truth is. that nature's
most vivid anticipations of a conscious futurity on
the other side of death, are the forebodings of
guilty fear, not the bright anticipations of confident
and rejoicing hope. We speak not merely of the
unredressed wrongs inflicted by the evil upon the
righteous, and which seem to demand an afterplace
of reparation and vengeance. Beside those un-
settled questions between man and man, which
death breaks off nt the middle, and for the adjust-

POWELl AND OPERATION OF 11 ABIT. 401

ment of which one feels as if it were the cry of
eternal justice that there should be a reckonino^
afterwards — beside these, there is felt, more directly
and vividly still, liie sense of a yet unsettled
controversy, between the sinner and the God
whom he has ofiended. The notion of immortality
is far more powerfully and habitually suggested by
the perpetual hauntings or misgivings of this sort
of undefined terror, by the dread of a coming
penalty — rather than by the consciousness of merit,
or of a yet unsatisfied claim to a well-earned
reward. Nor is the argument at all lessened by
that observed phenomenon in the history of guilt,
the decay of conscience ; a hebetude,^if it may be
so termed, of the moral sensibilities, which keeps
pace with the growth of a man's wickedness, and,
at times, becomes quite inveterate towards the
termination of his mortal career. The very torpor
and tranquillity of such a state, would only appear
all the more emphatically to tell, that a day of
account is yet to come, when, instead of rioting,
as heretofore, in the impunity of a hardihood that
shields him alike from reproach and fear, conscience
will at length re-awaken to upbraid him for his
misdoings ; at once the asserter of its owii cause,
and the executioner of its own sentence. And
even the most desperate in crime, do experience,
at times, such gleams and resuscitations of moral
light, as themselves feel to be the precursors of a
revelation still more tremendous — when their own
conscience, fully let loose upon them, shall, in the
hands of an angry God, be a minister of fiercest
vengeance. Certain it is, that, if death, instead

402 POWER AND OPERATION OF HABIT.

of an entire aniiihilalioii, be but a removal lO
another and a different scene of existence, we =>ee
in this, when combined with the known laws and
processes of the mind, the possibility, at least,
of snch a consummation. There is much in the
business, and entertainments, and converse, and
day-light of that urgent and obtruding world by
which we are surrounded, to carry off the attention
of the mind from its own guiltiness, and so, to
snspen.d that agony, which, when thrown back
upon itself and dissevered from all its objects of
gratification, will be felt, without mitigation and
without respite. In the busy whirl of life, the
mind,, drawn upon in all directions, can find,
outwardly and abroad, the relief of a constant
diversion from the misery of its own internal
processes. But a slight change in its locality or
its circumstances, would deliver it up to the full
burden and agony of these ; nor can we imagine a
more intense and intolerable wretchedness, than
that which would ensue, simply by rescinding the
connexion which obtains in this world between a
depraved mind and its external means of gratifica-
tion— when, forced inwardly on its own haunted
tenement, it met with nothing^ there but reveno^e
unsatiated ; and raging appetites, that never rest
from their unappeased fermentation ; and withal,
joined to this perpetual sense of want, a pungent
and pervading sense of worthlessness. It is the
constant testimony of criminals, that, in the horrors
and the tedium of solitary imprisonment, they
undergo the most appalling of all penalties — a
penalty, therefore, made up of moral elements

PO\rER AND OPEIIATIOX OF HACIT. 403

•

alone : as neitlier pain, nor Imnger, nor sickness,
necessarily forms any of its ingredients. Il strik-
ino-ly demonstrates tiie cliaracter of Him who so
constrncted onr moral natnre, tliat from the work-
ings of its mechanism alone, there should be evolved
a suffering so tremendous on tlie children of
iniquity, insomuch- that a sinner meets with sorest
vens^eance when simply letl to the fruit of his own
ways— whether by the death which carries his
disembodied spirit to its Tartarus ; or by a resur-
rection to another scene of existence, where, in
full possession of his earthly habits and earthly
passions, he is nevertheless doomed to everlasting
separation from their present counterpart and earthly
enjoyments.

14. There is a distinction sometimes made
between the natural and arbitrary rewards of
virtue, or between the natural and arbitrary punish-
ments of vice. The arbitrary is exemplified in
the enactments of human lav/ ; there in general
being no natural or necessary connexion between
the crimes which it denounces, and the penalties
vv^hich it ordains for them — as betv^^een the fine, or
the imprisonment, or the death, upon the one
hand ; and the act of violence, whether more or
less outraii:eons, upon the other. The natural
again is exemplified in the workings of the human
constitution ; there being a connexion, in necessity
and nature, between the temper which prompted
the act of violence, and the wretchedness which it
inflicts on him who is the unhappy subject, in his
own bosom, of its fierce and restless agitations. It
is thus that not only is virtue termed its own

404 POWER AND OPERATION OF HABIT.

reward, but vice its own greatest plague or self-
tormentor. We have no information of the arbi-
trary rewards or punishments in a future state,
but from revelation alone. But of the natural,
we have only to suppose that the existing consti-
tution of man, and his existing habits, shall be
borne with him to the land of eternity : and we
may inform ourselves now of these, by the expe-
rience of our own felt and familiar nature. Our
own experience can tell that the native delights of
virtue, unaided by any high physical gratifications,-
and only if not disturbed by grievous physical
annoyances, were enough of themselves to consti-
tute an elysium of pure and perennial happiness :
and again, that the native agonies of vice, unaided
by any inflictions of physical suflering, and only if
unalleviated by a perpetual round of physical
enjoyments, were enough of themselves to consti-
tute a dire and dreadful Pandemonium. They
are not judicially awarded, but result from the
workings of that constitution which God hath
given to us; and they speak as decisively the
purpose and character of Him who is the author
of that constitution — as would any code of juris-
prudence proclaimed from the sanctuary of heaven,
and which assigned to virtue on the one hand, the
honours and rewards of a blissful immortality, to
vice on the other a place of anguish among the out-
casts of a fiery condemnation.

END OF VOLUME 1.

Date Due

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