THE UNIFORMITY OF NATURE. 259 



the life of one greater than St. Francis, on the like ground. I am not 

 going into the argument concerning the miracles and resurrection of 

 the'Lord ; but I wish to suggest that if the potency of a divine will 

 be admitted, we have in the case of these events to take account of a 

 power which does not present itself in the discussion of natural phe- 

 nomena. We may well as philosophers admit, in consideration of the 

 special circumstances of the case, the possibility of these supernatural 

 facts, while prizing the principle of uniformity as a working hyjDothe- 

 sis, or as more than this. For in truth even the action of the ordinary 

 human will introduces strange breaches of uniformity into Nature. 

 Conceive some observer endowed with human scientific faculties con- 

 templating this earth of ours in the j)re-human period. He sees the 

 continents covered with forests, beasts of all kinds disporting them- 

 selves in the same, a great vigor of vegetable and animal life both in 

 the sea and on the dry land. But all is absolutely wild, not a single 

 glimpse anywhere of human purpose and contrivance. Suppose our 

 observer to speculate upon the future of this scene of life and activity 

 by the help of the working hypothesis of the uniformity of Nature, 

 of which we will liberally allow him the use out of the scientific reper- 

 tory of oar own times. Would it be possible that this working hy- 

 pothesis could present to his view, as a possible future of the globe, 

 anything essentially different from what he could then see? The 

 limits of land and water might have been observed to vary, and further 

 variation might be anticipated ; volcanic action would have been seen 

 to be very active, and it might be expected that volcanoes would still 

 be a potent agent ; nay, I will even suppose that an observer is keen 

 enough from his observations to deduce the theory of evolution, and 

 so to expect that the flora and fauna which he witnesses are in process 

 of transformation into something higher ; but could he possibly, in his 

 happiest moment, and when his genius was highest, ever have con 

 ceived or guessed the change which would come upon the globe when 

 man appeared as the head and crown of the creation ? It is not that 

 man would be a stronger, or more active, or more crafty beast, than 

 had ever appeared before, but that he would be a new creature alto- 

 gether ; a creature with plans and purposes of his own, capable of say- 

 ing, " I intend to do this or that, and I will do it " ; a creature, in fact, 

 with a will which, joined to an intelligence infinitely higher than any- 

 thing exhibited before, would enable him to treat the earth as his own, 

 to subdue the powers of Nature, and fashion the earth's surface after 

 his own pleasure ; which also would make him a moral agent, and so 

 a creature different in kind from all those which had preceded him. 

 This, however, is not the point upon which I intend to dwell now ; 

 what I wish to point out is, that the appearance of man upon the earth 

 would break to fragments any theory which an observer might have 

 formed with the aid of the working hypothesis of the uniformity of 

 Nature. The forests disappear, except so far as man finds them con- 



