exerting power in ordering our thoughts and actions. But this experience is surely of too narrow a foundation for a general conclusion, that all things that have had or shall have a beginning, must have a cause.

"In the way of abstract reasoning," says the same philosopher, "I know only of three or four arguments that have been urged to prove this point. And in my opinion they have all been shown by Mr. Hume to take for granted the thing to be proved."

If then it depends for its evidence neither upon experience nor abstract reasoning, we must either reject it as we would "any other nonentity of the imagination," to use the language of Dr. Chalmers, or admit it as a first and self-evident principle. To reject it, would be to annihilate all philosophy as well as all Natural Theology, and put an end to all reasoning. But in favour of considering it a fundamental principle of human belief, we can urge the consent of all mankind, both in speculation and in practice, except Mr. Hume, and perhaps Dr. Chalmers. "Felix qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas," says Dr. Reid, "is the universal sense of men; but to say any thing can happen without a cause, shocks the common sense of a savage." When a treasure is sought for without being found in the place where it is remembered to have been deposited, the first reflection in every man's mind is, that it could not have gone without hands. This reflection forces itself upon his mind irresistibly, and without any concurring effort of his own. Besides, to what have not men resorted to account for the origin of things? Chance, necessity, a fortuitous concourse of atoms, and a thousand things equally absurd, have each in their turn been proposed as the solution of this great problem; while not a man, before the two just mentioned, ever thought of removing the difficulty by putting the previous question, whether they had a cause or not.

We may therefore safely conclude, that the proposition under consideration contains a first and self-evident principle. It seems almost idle to add, that in so far as Natural Theology rests upon this, its foundation is sure-it can neither be gainsaid nor resisted-it is entitled to complete respect--and merits not in the least the epithets of "mere assumption," "speculation," and "taste," with which Dr. Chalmers has branded all its conclusions.

The second principle which I proposed to examine is-“ The character of the cause may be inferred with certainty from the character of the effect"--or, which is the same thing, "Intelligence and design in the cause, may be inferred with certainty from marks of it in the effect." This, like the first, is taken to be a first or self-evident principle; and the same reasoning is used to prove it to be one.

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In each of the judgments we pronounce upon the moral or intellectual characters of our fellow-men, this general principle is always implied. We say a man has courage, because we see the marks of it in his conduct; and attribute to him wisdom, justice, or benevolence, according as his actions show in a greater or less degree their respective signs. Neither his courage, nor his wisdom, his justice, nor his benevolence, are the objects of our senses, or of our consciousness. "And even in ourselves," we are told by metaphysicians, and must perceive the truth of what they assert, we are conscious only of the operations of mind, in which they are exerted; and know that we possess them only in the way we know other men possess them-by their effects." This man we are sure is shrewd, another simple, and a third deceitful. And though in each case, our decision depends entirely upon the marks of such qualities exhibited in their words and actions, we can no more refuse to make it, than we can refuse to see what is before our eyes. But such decisions are nothing more than an application of the general principle we are considering. It has therefore the strongest claims to be admitted as a first and selfevident truth.

Were it obtained by abstract reasoning, why is it universal? why is it so difficult, if not impossible, to account for it? and when there is occasion to enforce it, why is the appeal invariably made to the common sense of mankind, and never to reasoning? why, instead of argument, do men always make use of ridicule and wit?

It owes as little of its evidence to experience as it does to abstract reasoning. Like that we first considered, it is not a contingent, but a necessary truth. But experience can teach only what is, or what has been, never what must be.

Further, experience can discover to us a connexion between a sign and the thing signified by it, only when both are and always have been perceived together. But where the sign only is perceived, experience can show no connexion it has with the thing signified. "Thus, for example," says the philosopher from whom I have already quoted so largely, "thought is a sign of a thinking principle or mind. But how do we know that thought cannot be without a mind? If any man should say that he knows this by experience, he deceives himself. It is impossible he can have any experience of this; because, though we have an immediate knowledge of the existence of thought in ourselves by consciousness, yet we have no immediate knowledge of a mind. The mind is not an immediate object either of sense or of consciousness. We may therefore justly conclude, that the necessary connexion beween thought and a mind, or thinking being, is not learned from

experience. The same reasoning may be applied to the connexion between a work excellently fitted for some purpose, and design in the author or cause of that work. One of these, to wit, the work, may be an immediate object of perception. But the design and purpose of the author cannot be an immediate object of perception; and therefore experience can never inform us of any connexion between the one and the other, far less of a necessary connexion.'

To the same purpose is a passage of Stewart's Elements. "Our knowledge of our own existence, as sentient and intelligent beings, is not an inference from experience, but a fundamental law of human belief. All that experience can teach me of my internal frame, amounts to a knowledge of the various mental operations whereof I am conscious; but what light does experience throw on the origin of my notions of personality and identity? Is it from having observed a constant conjunction between sensations and sentient beings; thoughts and thinking beings; volitions and active beings; that I infer the existence of that individual and permanent mind, to which all the phenomena of my consciousness belong? Our conviction that other men are, like ourselves, possessed of thought and reason, together with all the judgments we pronounce on their intellectual and moral characters, cannot (as is still more evident) be resolved into an experimental perception of the conjunction of different objects or events. They are inferences of design from its sensible effects, exactly analogous to those which, in the case of the universe, Philo [Mr. Hume]" and we may add, Dr. Chalmers "would reject as illusions of the fancy."

Thus I think it appears, that the maxim "that intelligence and design in the cause may be inferred with certainty from marks of it in the effect," must, like that first considered, be admitted as a first or self-evident principle, the evidence of which is instantly discovered to us whenever we have need to apply it. It is the major proposition of the argument of Natural Theology for the existence and character of the Deity. He that denies it, “must, if he will be consistent, see no evidence of the existence of any intelligent being but himself."

The third and last proposition we were to examine, which constitutes the minor proposition of the same argument, is"There are the clearest marks of wisdom and design in the universe." Hence is the conclusion, that the universe owes its existence to a wise and intelligent cause. We cannot set aside this conclusion, but by denying one of the premises. The first we have already considered, and shown that we must admit it, or give up every thing like philosophy or religion, renounce all reasoning and all knowledge, except perhaps that of the immediate and

momentary state of our own minds, and bid adieu to all prudence in the common concerns of life. Must not, then, Dr. Chalmers be supposed to rest his rejection of all theological conclusions, except those derived from revelation, upon his inability to discover in the works of creation those marks of intelligence and design, which appear so obvious to the minds of other men? But to this I shall only say, that the celebrated Galen was a disciple of Epicurus. Yet the structure of the human body was of itself enough to compel him to renounce the philosophy in which he had been educated. Nay, so deep and operative was his conviction, that he not only threw off the weight of a system, which, early imposed, had been long settling deeper and deeper into his mind, but actively employed his powers to convince mankind of what was so evident to himself-that chance could not be the cause of a contrivance so admirable. If such was the effect of one proof out of millions upon the mind of a philosopher of the second century, is he, who in the nineteenth can see no such evidence at all, to be reasoned with?

There is but one argument more, that can possibly be thought of to set aside the conclusions I am endeavouring to establish. It is stated formally by Mr. Hume, and passages have already been quoted from Dr. Chalmers' work, which make it appear that he admits its force. It is introduced by the first of these writers, thus." Will any man tell me with a serious countenance, that an orderly universe must arise from some thought and art, like the human, because we 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." This is the objection. Let Mr. Stewart give the answer. "This celebrated argument," he says, "appears to me to be little more than an amplification of that which Xenophon puts into the mouth of Aristodemus. 'I behold (says he) none of those governors of the world whom you speak of; whereas here, I see artists actually employed in the execution of their respective works.'The reply of Socrates, too, is in substance the same with what has since been retorted on Philo, by some of Mr. Hume's opponents. Neither yet, Aristodemus, seest thou thy soul, which, however, most assuredly governs thy body: although it may well seem, by thy manner of talking, that it is chance and not reason which governs thee." "

It has now, I hope, been satisfactorily shown, that Natural Theology is founded upon necessary truths; and, consequently, that we may rest with security in its conclusions respecting the existence and character of God. According to Dr. Chaliners,

however, "it is all disowned by the severe and scrupulous spirit of the modern inductive philosophy." This is a most extraordinary mistake. But as I have already taken up much room, in addition to what I have quoted from Reid and Stewart, who must be allowed to understand the spirit of that philosophy of which they are disciples so able and distinguished, I shall only state the opinions of Lord Bacon himself, and of Sir Isaac Newton,-" well aware," to use the language of Stewart upon the same subject, that authorities are not arguments; but when a prejudice, to which authority alone has given currency, is to be combated, what other refutation is likely to prove effectual?"

"I had rather," says Bacon, "believe all the fables in the Legend, and the Talmud, and the Alcoran, than that this universal frame is without a mind. And, therefore, God never wrought a miracle to convince atheism, because his ordinary works convince it. It is true that a little philosophy inclineth man's mind to atheism; but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion; for while the mind of man looketh upon second causes scattered, it may sometimes rest in them, and go no farther; but when it beholdeth the chain of them confederate and linked together, it must needs fly to Providence and Deity."

But all this, however sublime and admirable, Dr. Chalmers would say is nothing to the purpose. For "though lord Bacon pointed out the method of true philosophizing; yet in practice he abandoned it." But Sir Isaac Newton is not an authority so exceptionable. Dr. Chalmers has himself asserted, that "Newton completed in his own person the true philosopher.-He not only saw the principle, but obeyed it." Yet this great man tells him and the world "The main business of Natural Philosophy is to argue from phenomena without feigning hypotheses; and to deduce causes from effects, till we come to the very first cause, which certainly is not mechanical; and not only to unfold the mechanism of the world, but chiefly to resolve these and such like questions-Whence is it that nature does nothing in vain? And whence arises all that order and beauty which we see in the world? How came the bodies of animals to be contrived with so much art, and for what ends were their several parts? Was the eye contrived without skill in opticks, and the ear without knowledge of sounds ?""

It is not a little amusing that Dr. Chalmers constantly holds up the philosophy of Des Cartes as a thing to be avoided, when we are told by Dr. Reid-" that having invented a way of his own for proving the existence of the Deity, he maintained that physical causes only should be assigned for phenomena-that philosophy has nothing to do with final causes-and that it is presump