of the same fact, more general than either, and comprehending many others, all reducible within its compass-that the air-pump, the steam-engine, the fly's foot, are all the same fact, and come within a description still more general and compendiousthat the rusting of iron, the burning of inflammable air, and the partial consumption of the blood in the lungs, are likewise the same fact in different shapes, and resolvable into a fact much more comprehensive.

course of those fall exactly within it, who, having upon a certain class of phenomena, built a conclusion legitimately and by strict induction, employ that conclusion to explain other phenomena, which they have not previously shown to fall within the same description? Take the example of the Torricellian vacuum. Having by that experiment proved the weight of the atmosphere, we have a right to conclude that a tube filled with water forty feet high, would have a vacuum in the uppermost

gravities of water and mercury, and might predict from thence that the lighter fluid would stand at the height of thirty-three feet; and this conclusion we have a right to draw, without any experiments to ascertain the existence of a vacuum in the upper part of the tube. But we should have no right whatever to draw this conclusion, without ascertaining the specific gravities of the two fluids: for if we did, it would be assuming that the two facts belonged to the same class. So respecting the power of the walrus or the fly to walk up a vertical plane. We know the effects of exhausting the air between any two bodies, and leaving the external atmosphere to press against them: they will cohere. But if from thence we explain the support given to the walrus or the fly without examining their feet, and ascertaining that they do exhaust or press out the air-if, in short, we assume the existence of a vacuum under their feet, merely because, were there a vacuum, the pressure of the air would produce the cohesion, and thus account for the phenomena-we really only propound an hypothesis.We suppose certain circumstances to exist, in order to classify the fact with other facts actually observed, and the existence of which circumstances is necessary, in order that the phenomena may be reducible under the same head.

If, then, the distinction of investigation and ex-seven feet-because we know the relative specific planation, or the analytical and synthetical process, is to be retained, it can only be nominal; and it is productive of but little if any convenience. On the contrary, it is calculated to introduce inaccurate habits of philosophizing, and holds out a temptation to hypothetical reasoning. Having obtained a general law, or theory, we are prone to apply it where no induction shows that it is applicable; and perceiving that it would account for the observed phenomena, if certain things existed, we are apt to assume their existence, that we may apply our explanation. Thus, we know that if the walrus's foot, or the fly's, make a vacuum, the pressure of the air will support the animal's weight, and hence we assume that the vacuum is made. Yet it is clear that we have no right whatever to do so; and that the strict rules of induction require us to prove the vacuum before we can arrange this fact in the same class with the other instances of atmospheric pressure. But when we have proved it by observation, it will be said we have gained nothing by our general doctrine. True; but all that the science entitles us to do is, not to draw facts we are half acquainted with under the arbitrary sway of our rule, but to examine each fact in all its parts, and bring it legitimately within the rule by means of its ascertained resemblances-that is, classify it with those others to which it bears the common relation. Induction gives us the right to expect that the same result will always happen from the same action operating in like circumstances; but it is of the essence of this inference that the similarity be first shown.

There is no reason whatever for asserting that this view of the subject restricts the use of induction by requiring too close and constant a reference to actual observation. The inductive principle is this-that from observing a number of particular facts, we reason to others of the same kind-that It may be worth while to illustrate this further, from observing a certain thing to happen in certain as it is an error very generally prevailing, and circumstances, we expect the same thing to happen leads to an exceedingly careless kind of inquiry. in the like circumstances. This is to generalize; The fundamental rule of inductive science is, that but then this assumes that we first show the identity no hypothesis shall be admitted-that nothing shall of the facts, by proving the similarity of the cirbe assumed merely because, if true, it would ex- cumstances. If not, we suppose or fancy, and do plain the facts. Thus, the magnetic theory of not reason or generalize. The tendency of the Epinus is admitted by all to be admirably con- doctrine that a proposition being demonstrated by sistent with itself, and to explain all the pheno-one set of facts, may be used to explain another set, mena-that is, to tally exactly with the facts ob- has the effect of making us suppose or assume the served. But there is no proof at all of the accu- identity or resemblance which ought to be proved. mulation of electrical or magnetic fluid at the one The true principle is, that induction is the generalpole, and other fundamental positions; on the con- izing or classifying of facts by observed resemtrary, the facts are rather against them: therefore, blances, and diversities. the theory is purely gratuitous; and although it would be difficult to find any other, on any subject, more beautiful in itself, or more consistent with all the phenomena, it is universally rejected as a mere hypothesis, of no use or value in scientific research. The inductive method consists in only admitting those things which the facts prove to be true, and excludes the supposing things merely because they square with the facts. Whoever makes such suppositions upon observing a certain number of facts, and then varies those suppositions when new facts come to his knowledge, so as to make the theory tally with the observation-whoever thus goes on, touching and re-touching his theory each time a new fact is observed which does not fall within the original proposition, is a mere framer of hypotheses, not an inductive inquirer-a fancier, and not a philosopher.

Now, this being the undoubted rule, does not the

Nothing here stated has any tendency to shackle our experimental inquiries, by too rigidly narrowing the proof. Thus, although we are not allowed to suppose any thing merely because, if it existed, other things would be explained; yet, when no other supposition will account for the appearances, the hypothesis is no longer gratuitous; and it eonstantly happens, that an inference drawn from an imperfect induction, and which would be, on that state of the facts, unauthorized because equivocal, and not the only supposition on which the facts could be explained, becomes legitimate on a further induction, whereby we show that, though the facts first observed might be explained by some other supposition, yet those facts newly observed could to no other supposition be reconciled. Thus, the analytical experiment on the constitution of water, by passing steam over red hot iron, is not conelusive because, although it tallies well with the position

that water consists of oxygen and hydrogen, yet it vould also tally with another supposition that those gases were produced in the process, and not merely separated from each other; so that neither oxygen nor hydrogen existed in the water, any more than acid and water exist in coal and wood, but only their elements, and that, like the acid and water, the products of the destructive distillation of those vegetable substances, the oxygen and hydrogen, were compounded, and in fact produced by the process. But when, besides the analytical, we have the synthetical experiments of Mr. Cavendish and Dr. Priestley-when we find that by burning the two gases in a close vessel, they disappear, and leave a weight of water equal to their united weights-we have a fact not reconcileable to any other supposition, except that of the composition of this fluid. It is as when, in solving a problem, we fix upon a point in one line, curved or straight, because it answers one of the conditions-it may be the right point, or it may not, for all the other points of the line equally answer that condition; but when we also show that the remaining conditions require the point to be in another line, and that this other intersects the former in the very point we had assumed, then no doubt can exist, and the point is evidently the one required, none other fulfilling all the conditions.

through the same steps to the particular phenomena from the general fact. But it is a spurious synthesis, unlike the mathematical, and not warranted by induction, to prove the proposition by one set of facts, and by that proposition to explain—that is, classify-another set, without examining it by itself. If we do examine it by itself, and find that it is such as the proposition applies to, then also is it such as might prove the proposition; and the synthesis is here, as in the case of the mathematical investigation, the analysis reversed. As far as any resemblance or analogy goes, there is even a greater affinity between the inductive analysis and the geometrical synthesis, than between those operations which go by the same name; and I hardly know any thing in experimental investigation resembling the mathematical analysis, unless it be when, from observing certain facts, we assume a position, and then infer, that if this be true, some other facts must also exist, which we find (from other proofs) really do exist. This bears a resemblance rather to the analytical investigation than to the composition or synthetical demonstration of theorems in the ancient geometry. It is not the course of reasoning frequently pursued in experimental sciences; but a most beautiful example of it occurs in the Second Part of Dr. Black's Experiments on Magnesia Alba and Quick Lime, the foundation of the modern gaseous chemistry.

Upon the whole, the use of these terms is apt to mislead; and, for the reasons which have been assigned, there seems no solidity in the division of inductive inquiry into the two classes.*

PART THE SECOND.

OF NATURAL THEOLOGY.

We have used the words analytical and synthetical as applicable to the experiments of resolution and composition; and in this sense these terms are strictly correct in reference to inductive operations. But the use of the terms analysis and synthesis as applicable to the processes of induction-the former being the investigation of truths by experiment or observation, and the latter the explaining other facts by means of the truths so ascertained-is by no means so correct, and rests upon an extremely fal- OF THE ADVANTAGES OF THE STUDY lacious analogy, if there be, indeed, any analogy, for identity, or even resemblance, there is none. The terms are borrowed from mathematical science, where they denote the two kinds of investigaTHE uses of studying the science to which our tion employed in solving problems and investigat- inquiries have been directed, now demand some ing theorems. When, in order to solve a problem, consideration. These consist of the pleasures which we suppose a thing done which we know not how to attend all scientific pursuits, the pleasures and the do, we reason upon the assumption that the pre-improvement peculiar to the study of Natural Thescribed conditions have been complied with, and ology, and the service rendered by this study to the proceed till we find something which we already doctrines of Revelation. possess the means of doing. This gives us the construction; and the synthetical demonstration consists in merely retracing the steps of the analysis. And so of a theorem: we assume it to be true, and reasoning on that assumption, we are led to something which we know from other sources to be true, the synthesis being the same operation reversed. The two operations consist here, of manifest necessity, of the very same steps-the one being the steps of the other taken in the reverse order. In Physics, to make the operations similar to these, the same facts should be the ground or component parts of both. In analysis, we should ascend not only from - particulars to generals, but from the same particulars, and then the synthesis would be a descent

* Dr. Priestley drew no conclusion of the least value from his experiments. But Mr. Watt, after thoroughly weighing them, by careful comparison with other facts, arrived at the opinion that they proved the composition of water. This may justly be said to have been the discovery of that great truth in chemical science. I have examined the evidence, and am convinced that he was the first discoverer, in point of time, although it is very possible that Mr. Cavendish may have arrived at the same truth from his own experiments, without any knowledge of Mr. Watt's earlier process of reasoning.

SECTION I.

OF THE PLEASURES OF SCIENCE.

As we have established the position that Natural Theology is a branch of Inductive Science, it follows that its truths are calculated to bestow the same kind of gratification which the investigation and the contemplation of scientific truth generally is fitted to give.

That there is a positive pleasure in such researches and such views, wholly independent of any regard to the advantages derived from their

*When this section was written, I had not seen Mr. Stewart's learned remarks upon analysis and synthesis in the second volume of his Elements, nor was aware of the observations of Dr. Hook, quoted by him, and which show a remarkable coincidence with one of the observations in the text. Mr. Stewart's speculations do not come upon the same ground with mine; but Dr. Hook having reversed the use of the terms analysis and synthesis in experimental science, affords a strong confirmation of the remark which I have ventured to make upon the inaccuracy of this application of mathematical language.-(See Elem. of Phil. of Human Mind, vol. ii. p. 354, 4to.)

If the mere centemplation of scientific truth is the source of real gratification, there is another pleasure alike remote from all reference to practical use or benefit, and which is obtained by tracing the investigations and demonstration-the steps that lead analytically to the discovery, and synthetically to the proof of those truths. This is a source of pleasure, both by giving the assurance that the propositions of generalization-the statements of resem blance and diversity are true in themselves, and also by the consciousness of power which it imparts and the feeling of difficulty overcome which it involves. We feel gratified when we have closely followed the brilliant induction which led Newton to the discovery that white is the union of all colors; and when we have accompanied him in the series of profound researches, from the invention of a new calculus or instrument of investigation, through innumerable original geometrical lemmas, to the final demonstration that the force of gravitation deflects the comet from the tangent of its elliptical orbit; and we feel the gratification because the pursuit of these investigations assures us that the marvellous propositions are indeed true-because there is a consciousness of man's power in being able to penetrate so far into the secrets of nature, and search so far into the structure of the universe-and because there is a pleasure, which we enjoy individually, in having accomplished a task of considerable difficulty. In these gratifications, derived from the contemplation and the investigation of general laws, consists the Pleasure of Science properly so called, and apart from all views of deriving particular advantages from its application to man's use.

application to the aid of man in his physical neces- of the mathematician to the lightest efforts of the sities, is quite undeniable. The ascertaining by de- wit. To trace the same equality, or other relation monstration any of the great truths in the mathe-between figures apparently unlike, is the chief glory matics, or proving by experiment any of the import- of the geometrician; to bring together ideas of the ant properties of matter, would give a real and solid most opposite description, and show them in unexpleasure, even were it certain that no practical use pected, yet when suddenly pointed out, undeniable could be made of either the one or the other. To connection, is the very definition of wit. Nay, the know that the square of the hypotenuse is always proposition which we have just enunciated, is a exactly equal to the sum of the squares of the sides striking instance of the same general truth; for we of a right-angled triangle, whatever be its size, and have been surveying the resemblance, or rather the whatever the magnitude of the acute angles, is pleas- identity, in one important particular of two puring; and to be able to trace the steps by which the suits, in all other respects the most widely remote absolute certainty of this proposition is establish- from each other-mathematics and wit. ed, is gratifying, even if we were wholly ignorant that the art of guiding a ship through the pathless ocean mainly depends upon it. Accordingly, we derive pleasure from rising to the contemplation of the much more general truth, of which the discovery of Pythagoras (the forty-seventh proposition of the First Book of Euclid) is but a particular case, and which is also applicable to all similar triangles, and indeed to circles and ellipses also, described on the right-angled triangle's sides; and yet that general proposition is of no use in navigation, nor indeed in any other practical art. In like manner the pleasure derived from ascertaining that the pressure of the air and the creation of a vacuum alike cause the rise of the mercury in the barometer, and give the power to flies of walking on the ceiling of a room, is wholly independent of any practical use obtained from the discovery, inasmuch as it is a pleasure superadded to that of contemplating the doctrine proved by the Torricellian experiment, which had conferred all its practical benefits long before the cause of the fly's power was found out. Thus, again, it is one of the most sublime truths in science, and the contemplation of which, as mere contemplation, affords the greatest pleasure, that the power which makes a stone fall to the ground keeps the planets in their course, moulds the huge masses of those heavenly bodies into their appointed forms, and reduces to perfect order all the apparent irregularities of the system: so that the handful of sand which for an instant ruffles the surface of the lake, acts by the same law which governs, through myriads of ages, the mighty system composed of myriads of worlds. There is a positive pleasure in generalizing facts and arguments; in perceiving the wonderful production of most unlike results from a few very simple principles; in finding the same powers or agents reappearing in different situations, and producing the most diverse and unexpected effects; in tracing unexpected resemblances and differences; in ascertaining that truths or facts apparently unlike are of the same nature, and observing wherein those apparently similar are various: and this pleasure is quite independent of all considerations relating to practical applicationnay, the additional knowledge that those truths are susceptible of a beneficial application, gives a further gratification of the like kind to those who are certain never to have the opportunity of sharing the benefits obtained, and who indeed may earnestly desire never to be in the condition of being able to share them. Thus, in addition to the pleasure re- The branch of science which we are here parceived from contemplating a truth in animal physi- ticularly considering differs in no respect from the ology, we have another gratification from finding other departments of philosophy in the kind of gratithat one of its corollaries is the construction of an fication which it affords to those who cultivate it.instrument useful in some painful surgical opera- Natural Theology, like the other sciences, whether tion. Yet, assuredly, we have no desire ever to re- physical or mental, bestows upon the student the ceive advantage from this corollary; and our sci- pleasures of contemplation-of generalization; and entific gratification was wholly without regard to it bestows this pleasure in an eminent degree. To any such view. In truth, generalizing-the disco- trace design in the productions and in the operations very of remote analogies-of resemblances among of nature, or in those of the human understanding, unlike objects-forms one of the most pleasing em- is, in the strictest sense of the word, generalization, ployments of our faculties in every department of and consequently produces the same pleasure with mental exertion, from the most severe investigation | the generalizations of physical and of psychological

This pleasure is increased as often as we find that any scientific discovery is susceptible of practical applications. The contemplation of this adaptation is pleasing, independent of any regard to our own individual advantage, and even though we may desire never to be in a condition to reap benefit from it. We sympathise, perhaps, with those who may be so unfortunate as to require the aid afforded by such applications to relieve and assuage pain; but the mere knowledge that such a corollary follows from the discovery of the scientific truth, is pleasing. Of course the gratification is increased, if we know that individually we shall profit by it, and we may perhaps always more or less contemplate this possibility; but this is a pleasure, properly speaking, of a different kind from that which science, as such, bestows.

through the veins whose valves did not oppose its course that way."* Even the arts have borrowed from the observation of the animal economy. Those valves-the hollow bones of birds-the sockets of the joints-have all furnished suggestions upon which some of our most useful machinery is constructed. Nor can any abuse arise from this employment of the argument, so long as we take care only to let it occupy the subordinate place of a suggestor-an originator of inquiry-and never suffer it to usurp the station of a sole guide, or a substitute for that induction which alone can be relied on in forming our conclusions. The ancients were ignorant of this caution, and would probably have rested satisfied with the consideration which only set Harvey upon making experiments, instead of proving in this way what the argument from Final Causes only rendered probable. Hence, much of what, as we have already explained, Lord Bacon has said upon the subject of this speculation, abused as it certainly has been in all ages, but especially in ancient times.

SECTION II.

science. Every part of the foregoing reasoning, therefore, applies closely and rigorously to the study of Natural Theology. Thus, if it is pleasing to find that the properties of two curves so exceedingly unlike as the ellipse and the hyperbola closely resemble each other, or that appearances so dissimilar as the motion of the moon and the fall of an apple from the tree are different forms of the same fact, it affords a pleasure of the same kind to discover that the light of the glow-worm and the song of the nightingale are both provisions of nature for the same end of attracting the animal's mate, and continuing its kind-that the peculiar law of attraction pervading all matter, the magnitude of the heavenly bodies, the planes they move in, and the directions of their courses, are all so contrived as to make their mutual actions, and the countless disturbances thence arising all secure a perpetual stability to the system which no other arrangement could attain. It is a highly pleasing contemplation of the self-same kind with those of the other sciences to perceive every where design and adaptation-to discover uses even in things apparently the most accidental-to trace this so constantly, that where peradventure we cannot find the purpose of nature, we never for a mo ment suppose there was none, but only that we have hitherto failed in finding it out-and to arrive at the intimate persuasion that all seeming disorder is HITHERTO We have only shown that the gratificaharmony-all chance, design--and that nothing is tion which the contemplation of scientific truth is made in vain; nay, things which in our ignorance calculated to bestow belongs to Natural Theology, we had overlooked as unimportant, or even com- in common with the other branches of Philosophy. plained of as evils, fill us afterwards with content- But there are several considerations which make it ment and delight, when we find that they are sub-plain that the pleasure must be greater which flows servient to the most important and beneficial uses. Thus, inflammation and the generation of matter in a wound we find to be the effort which Nature makes to produce new flesh, and effect the cure; the opposite hinges of the valves in the veins and arteries are the means of enabling the blood to circulate; and so of innumerable other arrangements of the animal economy. So, too, there is the highest gratification derived from observing that there is a perfect unity, or, as it has been called, a personality, in the kind of the contrivances in which the universe abounds; and truly this peculiarity of character, or of manner, as other writers have termed it, affords the same species of pleasure which we derive from contemplating general resemblances in the other sciences.

OF THE PLEASURE AND IMPROVEMENT PECULIAR TO
NATURAL THEOLOGY.

from the speculations of this than any which the other sciences confer.

In the first place, the nature of the truths with which Natural Theology is conversant is to be considered. They relate to the evidences of design, of contrivance, of power, of wisdom, of goodness-but let us only say, of design or contrivance. Nothing can be more gratifying to the mind than such contemplations: they afford great scope to the reasoning powers; they exercise the resources of our ingenuity; they give a new aspect to the most ordinary appearances; they impart life as it were to dead matter; they are continually surprising us with novel and unexpected proofs of intentions plainly directed to a manifest object. If some scoffers and superficial persons despise the enthusiasm with which these investigations have at times been pursued, and hold the exercise given by them to the ingenuity of inquirers to be rather a play of imagination than of reasoning, it is equally undeniable that in some of the most important and most practically useful of the sciences, design, so far from being a matter of fanciful conjecture, is always assumed as incontestable, and the inquiry, often with a merely practical view, is confined to discovering what the object of the design is. Thus, when the physiologist has discovered some part of the animal body before unknown, or observed some new operation of the known organs, he never doubts that design exists, and that some end is to be answered.This he takes for granted without any reasoning; and he only endeavors to find out what the purpose is-what use the part can have-what end the operation is intended to accomplish; never supposing it possible that either the part could be created, or the function appointed, without an object. The investigation conducted upon the assumption of this postulate has frequently led to the most brilliant discoveries--among others, as we have just seen, to by far the most important ever made in physiological science. For the mere exercise of the intellectual

We may close this branch of the subject with the observation that those other sciences have often in their turn derived aid from Natural Theology, at least from the speculation of Final Causes, for which they, generally speaking, lay the foundation. Many discoveries in the physiology both of animals and plants owe their origin to some arrangement or structure being, remarked, the peculiar object of which was not known, and the ascertaining of which led to the knowledge of an important truth. The well-known anecdote of Harvey, related by Mr. Boyle, is the best example of this which can be given. In his tract on Final Causes he thus writes: -"I remember that when I asked our famous Harvey, in the only discourse I had with him, (which was but a while before he died,) what were the things that induced him to think of a circulation of the blood, he answered me, that when he took notice that the valves in the veins of so many parts of the body were so placed that they gave free passage to the blood towards the heart, but opposed the passage of the veinal blood the contrary way, he was incited to imagine that so provident a cause as Nature had not so placed so many valves without design, and no design seemed more probable than that since the blood could not well, because of the interposing valves, be sent by the veins to the limbs, it Disquisition about the Final Causes of Natural should be sent through the arteries, and return Things.--Works, v. 427. 4to.

faculties, or gratification of scientific curiosity, we power of him who made and sustains and moves may refer to almost all the singular phenomena those prodigious bodies, and all that inhabit them. which form the bases of the reasonings as to design Now, all the gratification of which we have been -the structure of the ear, and still more of the eye treating, is purely scientific, and wholly independent -the circulation of the blood-the physiology of of any views of practical benefit resulting from the the fœtus in the uterus, as contrasted with the econo- science of Natural Theology. The pleasure in my of the born animal, and the prospective contri-question is merely that double gratification which vances of a system which until the birth is to be every science bestows-namely, the contemplation wholly useless-the structure of the eye and the of truth, in tracing resemblances and differences, nictitating membrane in different birds, and the and the perception of the evidence by which that haw in certain quadrupeds-the powers of the eye truth is established. Natural Theology gives this in birds of prey-perhaps more than any thing else, double pleasure, like all other branches of science the construction of their cells by bees, according to like the mathematics-like physics-and would the most certain principles discovered by men only give it if we were beings of an order different from with the help of the most refined analytical calculus. man, and whose destinies never could be affected The atheist can only deny the wonderful nature of by the truth or the falsehood of the doctrines in such operations of instinct by the violent assump-question. Nay, we may put a still stronger case, tion that the bee works as the heavenly bodies roll, one analogous to the instance given above of the and that its mathematically correct operations are pleasure derived from contemplating some fine inno more to be wondered at than the equally mathe-vention of a surgical instrument. Persons of such matically adjusted movements of the planets--a lives as should make it extremely desirable to them truly violent assumption, and especially of those that there was no God and no Future State, might who angrily deny that men have a soul differing very well, as philosophers, derive gratification from in kind from the sentient principle in the lower contemplating the truths of Natural Theology, and animals. from following the chain of evidence by which Secondly. The universal recurrence of the facts these are established, and might in such sublime on which Natural Theology rests deserves to be re- meditation, find some solace to the pain which regarded as increasing the interest of this science.--flection upon the past, and fears of the future are The other sciences, those of Physics at least, are calculated to inflict upon them. studied only when we withdraw from all ordinary pursuits, and give up our meditations to them.Those which can only be prosecuted by means of experiment can never be studied at all without some act of our own to alter the existing state of things, and place nature in circumstances which force her, by a kind of question, as Lord Bacon phrases it, to reveal her secrets. Even the sciences which depend on observation have their fields spread only here and there, hardly ever lying in our way, and not always accessible when we would go out of our way to walk in them. But there is no place where the evidences of Natural Religion are not distributed in ample measure. It is equally true that those evidences continually meet us in all the other branches of science. A discovery made in these almost certainly involves some new proofs of design in the formation and government of the universe.

Thirdly, and chiefly, Natural Theology stands far above all other sciences from the sublime and elevating nature of its objects. It tells of the creation of all things-of the mighty power that fashioned and that sustains the universe-of the exquisite skill that contrived the wings and beak, and feet of insects invisible to the naked eye--and that lighted the lamp of day, and launched into space comets a thousand times larger than the earth, whirling a million of times swifter than a cannon ball, and burning with a heat which a thousand centuries could not quench. It exceeds the bounds of material existence, and raises us from the creation to the Author of Nature. Its office is, not only to mark what things are, but for what purpose they were made by the infinite wisdom of an all-powerful being, with whose existence and attributes its high prerogative is to bring us acquainted. If we prize, and justly, the delightful contemplations of the other sciences; if we hold it a marvellous gratification to have ascertained exactly the swiftness of the remotest planets-the number of grains that a piece of lead would weigh at their surfaces-and the degree in which each has become flattened in shape by revolving on its axis: it is surely a yet more noble employment of our faculties, and a still higher privilege of our nature, humbly, but confidently, to ascend from the universe to its Great First Cause, and investigate the unity, the personality, the intentions, as well as the matchless skill and mighty

But it is equally certain that the science derives an interest incomparably greater from the consideration that we ourselves who cultivate it, are most of all concerned in its truth-that our own highest destinies are involved in the results of the investigation. This, indeed, makes it, beyond all doubt, the most interesting of the sciences, and sheds on the other branches of philosophy an interest beyond that which otherwise belongs to them, rendering them more attractive in proportion as they connect themselves with this grand branch of human knowledge, and are capable of being made subservient to its uses. See only in what contemplations the wisest of men end their most sublime inquiries! Mark where it is that a Newton finally reposes after piercing the thickest veil that envelops nature-grasping and arresting in their course the most subtile of her elements and the swiftesttraversing the regions of boundless space-exploring worlds beyond the solar way-giving out the law which binds the universe in eternal order! He rests, as by an inevitable necessity, upon the contemplation of the great First Cause, and holds it his highest glory to have made the evidence of his existence, and the dispensations of his power and of his wisdom, better understood by men.

If such are the peculiar pleasures which appertain to this science, it seems to follow that those philosophers are mistaken who would restrict us to a very few demonstrations, to one or two instances of design, as sufficient proofs of the Deity's power and skill in the creation of the world. That one sufficient proof of this kind is in a certain sense enough cannot be denied; a single such proof overthrows the dogmas of the atheist and dispels the doubts of the skeptic; but is it enough to the gratification of the contemplative mind? The great multiplication of proofs undeniably strengthens our positions; nor can we ever affirm respecting the theorems in a science, not of necessary but of contingent truth, that the evidence is sufficiently cogent without variety and repetition. But, independently altogether of this consideration, the gratification is renewed by each instance of design which we are led to contemplate. Each is different from the other. Each step renews our delight. The finding that at every step we make in one science, and with one object in view, a new proof is added to those before