TELEOLOGY OF THE EVOLUTIONIST. 29 



without consciousness, and found it difficult to depart 

 from a habitual method of procedure. 



We turn, then, on Paley, and say to him : " We 

 have admitted your design and your designer. Where 

 is he ? Show him to us. If you cannot show him to 

 us as flesh and blood, show him as flesh and sap ; show 

 him as a living cell ; show him as protoplasm. Lower 

 than this we should not fairly go ; it is not in the bond 

 or nexus of our ideas that something utterly inani- 

 mate and inorganic should scheme, design, contrive, 

 and elaborate structures which can make mistakes : it 

 may elaborate low unerring things, like crystals, but it 

 cannot elaborate those which have the power to err. 

 Nevertheless, we will commit such abuse with our 

 understandings as to waive this point, and we will ask 

 you to show him to us as air which, if it cannot be seen, 

 yet can be felt, weighed, handled, transferred from 

 place to place, be judged by its effects, and so forth ; or 

 if this may not be, give us half a grain of hydrogen, 

 diffused through all space and invested with some of 

 the minor attributes of matter; or if you cannot do 

 this, give us an imponderable like electricity, or even 

 the higher mathematics, but give us something or 

 throw off the mask and tell us fairly out that it is your 

 paid profession to hoodwink us on this matter if you 

 can, and that you are but doing your best to earn an 

 honest living." 



We may fancy Paley as turning the tables upon us 

 and as saying : " But you too have admitted a designer 

 you too then must mean a designer with a body and 

 soul, who must be somewhere to be found in space, and 



