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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 circumstances 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 applies to the relative affections, which may either be regarded as peculiar instincts of our nature, or as modifications of a simpler nature in peculiar circumstances. On either supposition we might still recognise the wisdom of a God, if not in the establishment of certain additional laws, in having implanted so many distinct and original feelings within the human breast at least in the establishment of certain dispositions, in having arranged the human species into so many distinct families.

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 additional number of beneficial arrangements in nature. And further, it may not be out of place to observe,

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 i properties; or as finding a substance with certain given properties, and arranging it into fit disposi tions for the accomplishment 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 applied to the laws of naturethen 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 applied to the dispositions, whether of nature or art-then it enhances the manifestation of wisdom, when some great end is brought about with a less

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 effective, whilst less unwieldy or less intricate than. before. Yet there is one way in which, along with an exceeding complication in the 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 conspicuous, 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 skill 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 effect, so much of the complication had been dispensed with. Still, however, the substance, whether of the machine 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 all the manifold contrivance which had been expended on it. When this idea predominates in the mind-then all the complexity which we may behold, does not reduce our admiration of the artist, but rather deepens the sense that we have, both of the reconditeness of his wisdom, and of the wondrous vastness and variety of his

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 otheryet each of them may be perfect in its own way. The first is held forth to us, when one law of pervading 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 accomplished. Creation presents us in marvellous profusion with specimens of both these at once confirming the doctrine, and illustrating the significancy 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 condition reduces the hypothesis of chance to a more violent improbability than before; yet it must not be disguised that there is a certain transcendental mystery 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 sustain the phenomena, whether of vegetation or of life.

plex machinery and the circuitous 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 accomplishment 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 the eye of inquirers a more manifold inscription of the Divinity. 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 when 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 policy of His government and ways. And this is but one of the

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