THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION. 



To gratify the sense of feeling, he has con 

 nected pleasure with the contact of almost every 

 thing we have occasion to touch, and has ren 

 dered it subservient for warning us of whatever 

 /nay be disagreeable or dangerous. Had a male 

 volent being constructed the body of man, and 

 formed tlie arrangements of external nature, he 

 might have rendered the contact of every object 

 of touch as acutely painful as when we clasp a 

 prickly shrub, or thrust our fingers against the 

 point of a needle. 



To gratify the sense of taste, and to nourish 

 our bodies, he has furnished us with a rich va 

 riety of aliments, distributed not with a niggardly 

 and a sparing hand, but with a luxuriant pro 

 fusion, suited to the tastes of every sentient 

 Deing, and to the circumstances of the inhabit 

 ants of every clime. He has not confined his 

 bounty merely to the relief of our necessities, by 

 confining us to the use of a few tasteless herbs 

 and roots, but has covered the surface of the earth 

 with an admirable profusion of plants, herbs, 

 grains, and delicious fruits of a thousand differ 

 ent qualities and tastes, which contribute to the 

 sensitive enjoyment and comfort of man. In 

 almost every region of the earth, corn is to be 

 found in the valleys surrounded by the snowy 

 mountains of the North, as well as in the verdant 

 plains of the Torrid Zone. In warm regions, 

 cool and delicious fruits are provided for the re 

 freshment of the inhabitants, and the trees are 

 covered with luxuriant foliage to screen them 

 from the intensity of the solar heat !* Every 

 season presents us with a variety of fruits pecu 

 liar to itself, distributed by the munificent hand 

 of the &quot; Giver of all good.&quot; The month of June 

 presents us with cabbages, cauliflowers, and 

 cherries ; July, with gooseberries, raspberries, 

 peaches, and apricots ; August and September 

 scatter before us, in luxuriant abundance, plums, 

 figs, apples, pears, turnips, carrots, cresses, po 

 tatoes, and, above all, wheat, oats, rye, and bar 

 ley, which constitute the &quot; staff of bread&quot; for the 

 support of man and beast ; and although we are 

 indebted chiefly to the summer and autumn for 

 these rich presents, yet, by the assistance of 



* The manner in which the Creator has contrived 

 a supply for the thirst of imn, in sultry places, is 

 worthy of admiration. He has placed amidst the 

 burning sands of Africa, a plant, whose leaf, twisted 

 round like a cruet, is always tilled with a large glass 

 full of fresh water ; the gullet of this cruet is shut 

 by the extremity of the leaf itself so as to prevent 

 the water from evaporating. He has planted in some 

 other districts of the same country, a great tree, 

 called by the negroes boa, the trunk of which, of a 

 prodigious bulk, is naturally hollowed like a cistern. 

 In the rainy season, it receives its fill of water, which 

 continues fresh and cool in the greatest heats, by 

 means of the tufted foliage which crowns its sum 

 mit. In some of the parched, rocky islands in the 

 &quot;West Indies, there is found a tree called the water 

 lianne, so full of sap, that if you cut a single branch 

 of it, as much water is immediately discharged as a 

 man can drink at a draught, and it is perfectly pure 

 and limpid. See Pierre s &quot; Studies of Nature.&quot; 



human art, we can preserve and enjoy the Create; 

 part during winter and spring. The soil which 

 produces these dainties has never yet lost its fer 

 tility, though it has brought forth the harvests of 

 six thousand years, but still repay* our labour 

 with its annual treasures ; and, were selfish 

 man animated with the same liberal and generous 

 views as his munificent Creator, every individual 

 of the human family would be plentifully supplied 

 with a share of these rich and delicious bounties 

 of nature. 



In fine, the happiness of man appears to be 

 the object of the divine care, every returning 

 season, every moment, by day and by night. By 

 day, He cheers us with the enlivening beams of 

 the sun, which unfolds to us the beauty and the 

 verdure of the fields ; and lest the constant 

 efflux of his light and heat should enfeeble our 

 bodies, and wither the tender herbs, he com 

 mands the clouds to interpose as so many mag 

 nificent screens, to ward off the intensity of the 

 solar rays. When the earth is drained of its 

 moisture, and parched with heat, he bids the 

 clouds condense their watery treasures, and fly 

 from other regions on the wings of the wind, to 

 pour their waters upon the fields, not in over 

 whelming and destructive torrents, but in small 

 drops and gentle showers, to refresh the thirsty 

 soil, and revive the vegetable tribes. He has- 

 spread under our feet a carpet of lovely green 

 richer than all the productions of the Persiai 

 loom, and has thrown around our habitation ar 

 azure canopy, which directs our view to the dis 

 tant regions of infinite space. By night, he 

 draws a veil of darkness over the mountains and 

 the plains, that we may be enabled to penetrate 

 to the regions of distant worlds, and behold the 

 moon walking in brightness, the aspects of the 

 planetary globes, the long trains of comets, and 

 the innumerable host of stars. At this season, 

 too, all nature is still, that we may enjoy in quiet 

 the refreshments of sleep, to invigorate our men 

 tal and corporeal powers. &quot; As a mother stills 

 every little noise, that her infant be not dis 

 turbed ; as she draws the curtain around its 

 bed, and shuts out the light from its tender eyes 

 so God draws the curtains of darkness around 

 us, so he makes all things to be hushed and still, 

 that his large family may sleep in peace.&quot; In 

 a word, if we look around us to the forests which 

 cover the mountains, or if we look downward? 

 to the quarries and mines in the bowels of the 

 earth, we behold abundance of materials for 

 constructing our habitations, for embellishing 

 the abodes of civilized life, and for carrying 

 forward improvements in the arts and sciences. 

 And, if we consider the surrounding atmosphere, 

 we shall find it to contain the principle of life, 

 and the element of foe, by means of which our 

 winter evenings are cheered and illumina^d in 

 the absence of the sun. Contemplating ail these 

 benign agencies as flowing from the care and 



