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Show "t~PLANATlONS. i~ exactly what a fluid mass ro~ating at such a r.ate of speed would assume any day we m1ght try the experiment The relative distances of the planets have been deter· mined by the relation of two laws of matter, so ~boroughly patent in their working to ~node~·n ob~ervatlon, that a 1nathematician could ascertain this their result and an· nounce it from his closet, although he never. had h~ard o! n plc:.netary system in which it was ~xemphfied. . ~here 19 surely here anything but a likellho.od that d1fier.ent eauses from those now existing ann ac~1ng were the liD· mediate means of producing the cosm1cal arrangements. May we nol rather say that, whatever may have been :he Jetails of the formation of globes, we pos~ess ample ptoof that it was a phenomenon evolved by v1rtu.e of ~xa~tly the same svstem of order which we see .shll ?peratmg upon earthw? As to the origin of .or~antc. b~tngs, our knowledae of geolocry comes to precisely a similar effect. Admitti~a that we ~ee not now any such fact as t~e pro· duction of new species, we at least know that, wh1le ~uch facts were occurring upon earth, there were ass.o~tat~d phenomena in progress of a ch:iracte~ per~ectly mdtnaty. For example, when the earth rec.eiV~d 1ts first fi~h~, sandstone and limestone were forming tn the m~nnet extan lified a few years ago in the ingeniOUS expenments ot fiirpJ ames Hall : basaltic r.olu~ns ~·ose for .the f~.tur~ wo~· uer of man, according to the prtnctple whtch D~. Gtegor~ vVatt showed in operation before the eyes of ?ur fathers, and hollows in the igneous rocks were .fillc<.l w1th cry.stals, wecisely as they could now be by Vll'tue of electnc aclion, a~ shown within the last few ~ears by Crosse afid .Bee uerel. The s as obeyed the Impulse of gen e bree~es and rippled their sJ.ndy bottoms as seas of the resent' day are doin~; the trees grew as now l;>Y. faV?l ~f sun and wind thri vi n~ in good seasons and p1nmg 1n oacl· thi , while' the animals above fishes were yet t~ bi . 'ted The mov ·ment of the sea, the meteorolog1~a ~~c·~ci~s, the ·di po ition which we see ~n t~e g_e~neral1t{ u.f plants to thrive when heat and mo~sture VI ere ~0~1 abundant were kept up in silent erenlty, as matlets imply n~tural order, throughout th~ wh~lc of the arle: ~vhich 1w r ptile ent r in their various 1orms upon 1 sea and land. It was abo .It the time. of !he .fir t mam~a. 9 that the forest of the Dirt Bed was tnln~g In, ~atu~al ~~~~ amid:i• the sea sludge, as forests of the P. antaoene s DR. WHEWELL S VIEWS CONDEMNE~. 26~ been doing for several centuries upon the coast of England. In short, ~.ll the ~01nm~n operations of the ph'l/sical world were !Jmng on !n thez,1· usua! simplicity, obeying that order whuh. we st'tll see governtng them, while the supposed extraordinary c~uses were in sequisition for the development of the a!'lunal and vegetable kingdoms Thet·e surelJ hence anses a strong presu1nption against any such causes. It becomes much more likely that the latte~ phenomena were evolved in the manner of law also, and that we only dream of extraordinary causes here, as men one~ dreamed of a special action of deity in every c.hange o~ w1nd and the results of each season, merely because they d1d not know the laws by which the events in question were evolved. The writer of the. critique ~h .the Edin.burgh Review is another representattve ot op1n1on on this subject whose ideas are worthy of notice. These ideas are not very clear, but I shall endeavor to gather them from the various parts of his paper where they are expres3ed. He says of certain animals (p. 60)-" They were not called into being by any law of nature, but by a power above nature." If he means by a law of nature somethina independent of the Deity, I entirely concur with him. lvlost unq uestiorrably the animals resulted from a power which is above nature, in the sense of its beinO' the Author of nature. He adds-" They were creat~d by the hand of God, and adapted to the conditions of the period." If he here means a special exertion of the powers of tha Deity, ha~ing a re;gard. to special condi~ions, we part company, for my obJect 1s to show that antmals ·were in~ ebted for their grada.tions of advance to a law generally Impressed by the De1ty upon matter, and that their external peculiarities are owing immediately to the agency of those very conditions to which they are supposed to have been adapted. I contend that there was no more need for a special exertion to produce (for instance) mammalia, than there is for one to carry a human fcetus on from the sixth to the seventh, or from the eighth tn. the ninth month. I had remarked in no irreverent spirit, but the contrary, that the supposition of frequent special exertion antbropornorphises the Deity; I find a sirnila1 idea expressed by one who will not be suspected of irrev .. erence <"1 such a subject, the pious and arniable Dod .. dridgp-•• When we assert," says he, " a perpetual divinb |