14 THE ARGUMENT CUMULATIVE, 



forms the proper action of the organ ; the provision in ii> 

 muscular tendons for turning its pupil to the object, sim- 

 ilar to that which is given to the telescope by screws, and 

 upon which power of direction in the eye, the exercise of 

 its office as an optical instrument depends ; the further 

 provision for its defence, for its constant lubricity and 

 moisture, which we see in its sockets and its lids, in its 

 glands for the secretion of the matter of tears, its outlet or 

 communication with the nose tor carrying off the liquid 

 after the eye is washed with it ; these provisions compose 

 altogether an apparatus, a system of parts, a preparation of 

 means, so manifest in their design, so exquisite in their 

 contrivance, so successful in their issue, so precious, and 

 so infinitely beneficial in their use, as, in my opinion, to 

 bear down all doubt that can be raised upon the subject. 

 And what I wish, under the title of the present chapter, 

 to obser\e is, that, if other parts of nature were inaccessi- 

 ble to our inquiries, or even if other parts of nature present- 

 ed nothing to our examination but disorder and confusion, 

 the validity of this example would remain the same. If 

 there were but one watch in the world, it would not be less 

 certain that it had a maker. If we had never in our lives 

 seen but one single kind of hydraulic machine; yet, if of 

 that one kind we understood the mechanism and use, we 

 should be as perfectly assured that it proceeded from the 

 hand, and thought, and skill of a workman, as if we visited 

 a museum of the arts, and saw collected there twenty dif- 

 ferent kinds of machines for drawing water, or a thousand 

 different kinds for other purposes. Oi this point each ma- 

 chine is a proof, independently of the rest. So it is 

 with the evidences of a divine agency. The proof is not 

 a conclusion, which lies at the end of a chain of reasoning, 

 of which chain each instance of contrivance is only a link, 

 and of which, if one link fail, the whole fails : but it is an 

 argument separately supplied by every separate example. 

 An error in stating an example affects only that example. 

 The argument is cumulative in the fullest sense of that 

 term. The eye proves it without the ear ; the ear without 

 the eye. The proof in each example is complete ; for 

 when the design of the part, and the conduciveness of its 

 structure to that design, is shown, the mind may set itself 

 at rest ; no future consideration can detract any thing 

 from the force of the example. 



