BIOGRAPHICAL NOTICE OF THE LATE REV DR. CHALMERS. 513 



to the study of mathematics was not dissonant to the proper habit of a clergyman, 

 he thus concluded : — 



" Alas ! Sir, so I thought in my ignorance and pride. I have now no reserve in 

 saying that the sentiment was wrong, and that, in the utterance of it, I penned 

 what was most outrageously A\Tong. Strangely blinded that I was ! What, Sir, 

 is the object of mathematical science ? Magnitude, and the proportions of mag- 

 nitude. But then. Sir, I had forgotten tivo magnitudes, I thought not of the little- 

 ness of Time, — I recklessly thought not of the greatness of Eternity." 



An important class of productions and of labours come under this head, and 

 occupy a place somewhat intermediate between the pulpit and the public meeting. 

 I refer to his Lectures on Moral Philosophy,— on Evidences,— and on Theology. These 

 lectures were all composed and written with gi-eat care ; but he introduced, paren- 

 thetically, further explanations and illustrations extempore. The remarks made, 

 on his manner of discussion in the pulpit, apply also to his manner of discussion 

 in the Chair. The same fulness of illustration, the same energetic and irresistible 

 enforcement of some leading and fimdamental truth, — the same fervour, and the 

 same sincerity. These did not fail to secure the attention, and to engage the af- 

 fections, of his class. Many persons, not intended for the ministry, attended these 

 lectures ; and we have reason to believe that his discussions on Evidences, on But- 

 ler's Analogy, and on Natural Theology, have, in this generation, exercised con- 

 siderable influence upon the supposed sceptical tendencies of the northern mind. 

 I will only adduce one passage in illustration of his lecture style. In his Lectures 

 on Natural Theology, he draws an argument in favour of an imquestionable act of 

 God in creation, from the geological appearances of the world. The commencement 

 of the present economy, after the destruction of the previous economy, is a convincing 

 argument against the eternity of creation. The whole reasoning is ably and inge- 

 niously conducted, and, at the same time, clothed in language of a high and ima- 

 ginative eloquence. He thus asks. How could the present world, after former de- 

 struction, be produced otherwise than by a new and palpable act of creation ? 

 " Is there ought in the rude and boisterous play of a great physical catastrophe 

 that can germinate those exquisite structures, which, in our yet undisturbed eco- 

 nomy, have been transmitted in pacific succession to the present day ? What is 

 there in the rush and turbulence, and mighty clamour of such great elements of 

 ocean, heaved from its old resting-place, and lifting its billows above the Alps and 

 the Andes of a former continent ? What is there in this to charm into being the 

 embryos of an infant family, wherewith to stock and to people a now desolate 

 world ? We see, in the sweeping energy and uproar of this elemental war, enough 

 to account for the disappearance of all the oZtZ generations, but nothing that might 

 cradle any new generations into existence, so as to have effloresced on ocean's de- 

 serted bed, the life and the loveliness which are now before our eyes. At no junc- 

 ture, we apprehend, in the history of the world, is the interposition of Deity more 



VOL. XVI. PART V. 6 Q 



