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Show 264 XXPLAN ATIO.NS. d~rns crver the earth, would still, perhaps, be traceable 311 faintly at work, especially in those lower families where life and the modifiable '1uality are most abundantly intparted. The evidence for the existence of such laws is pate~t to the ~xact observation which will give it philosophical certainty, and to such observation I trust it will in titne, be subjected. Meanwhile, I claim its being re: ceived as a provisional aid to the theory of development. Thus closes my review of the objections which have been made to the evidences for an organic creation by law. Such a mode of that creation was, I said at the first, render~d likely by .the manifestation of a presidency of l~w both Jll t~e rhystcal arrangements of the universe and In the const1tuhon of our own minds. It seemed to me that, with evidences of law in these things we had a strong probability established that law had bee~ the mode of the divine working in the whole system revealed to our senses and reason, throughout all ages of its existence. And I b~lieye that ~·e.were c.aped upon, not to gr&sp at e"!ery obJection to th1s ~dea which could be conjured out vt the dark~css .of our 1mper~ect knowledge, as if to save us from a d1srehshed conclusion, but rather to look with candjd minds into nature, and endeavor to dis<.;over In wh~t \1\'e do _know the tr~ces o~ such an origin of organization as m1ght harmonize with the conceptions forced upon us from other quarters; trusting that there nevei could he any disadvantage from embracing that view which the balance of reason might show to be the nearest to truth. The question is, to which view does the balance nO\\' incline? Whether is it most likely that the Deity produced Being and its many-staged theatre in the manner of order or law, or by any different mode of a more arbitrary character; whether, consequently, are we to regard him as ruling the affairs of the world in the manner of an invarjable order or othcn·•ise? I say likely, because we are not to expect on (:ny such questions thA absolute demonstration which attends a mathematical problem or an unchallengeable wnting. We must ba content if we only can see a preponderance of reasons for regarding the universe and it Author in one or other oJ those lif?hts. To be prepared Tor a dec.ision upon this ques. tion, it 1& proper that the reader should be presented with a sketch of the theory opposed to that of universal order. DR. WHEWELL's PALJETIOLOGICAL SCIENCES. 26~ When we s~t a?-out describing this system, we are ~truck by find1n~ It ~ague ~nd. unstea~y, varying with every degree of 1ntelhgence 111 Its votanes and e¥ery addition made to sr.ience. The uneducated man n~f!ards the v:hole system of. the W?rld as resulting from, a·ad dependmg upon, the nnmed1ate working and guidance of an Almighty being who acts in each case as~may seem to him most meet, exactly as human creatures do. Persons of intelligence, again, usually admit a system of general laws, but for the most part entertain it under great reserv~ ti .s, or in connection with views totally inconsistent w1th It. "\Ve finu Dr. Clark, for instance, admitting a course ?f nature as the "will of God producing certain effects In a regular and uniform n1anner," but this will ., being arbitrary [an assumption, as far as natural means of knowledge are concerned], is, he says, as easy to be altered at any time as to be preserved." . Others cut off particular provinces of nature as exceptwns fron1 the plan of constant order. Whatever part is dubious or obscure, to mankind generally or to themselves in particular, there they rear the torn standard of the arbitrary system of divine rule. Human volitions form such a region to many who know not that Quetelet has reduced these to mathematical formulffi, and that one of our own most popular divines has written a Bridgewater Treatise, to show the predominance of natural law over mind, as a proof of the existence and Wisdom of God. Some who give up this domain to law, find footing in other departments of na~ure upon which science has not as yet poured any clear ltght. "\Ve shall presently see by what weak argurnent such exceptions are maintained. Meanwhile, it must be noted as important that all is uncertainty on this side of the question-a strong presumption, were there no other against it. One of the most remarkable reservations made of late years from the ~ystem of invariable order is that presented in.D~·· "\Vhewell's History of the Inductive Scie?'fces. Admlthng that nature, as revealed to our senses, 1s a system of causation, this writer halts when he comes to consider the origin of language and of arts, the origin of species and f~,rmation of globes. These he calls palretiological scif'nces, hec(luse, in his opinion, we have to seek for an ancient and different class of causes, as affecting them, from any which are now seen operating. " In no palretio- 21 |