THE NATURAL PROVIDENCE 



ing God's ways — arc so different from ours; "no de- 

 liberate and thoughtful action," as Renan puts it, 

 no economy of time or material, no short cuts, no 

 cutting-out of non-essentials, no definite plan, no 

 specific ends, few straight lines or right angles; her 

 streams loiter and curve, her forces are unbridled; 

 no loss or gain; her accounts always balance; the 

 loss at one point, or with one form, is a gain with 

 some other — all of which is the same as saying that 

 there is nothing artificial in Nature. All is Natural, all 

 is subject to the hit-and-miss method. The way Na- 

 ture trims her trees, plants her forests, sows her gar- 

 dens, is typical of the whole process of the cosmos. 

 God is no better than man because man is a part of 

 God. From our human point of view he is guilty 

 of our excesses and shortcomings. Time does not 

 count, pain does not count, waste does not count. 

 The wonder is that the forests all get planted by 

 this method, the pines in their places, the spruces in 

 theirs, the oaks and maples in theirs; and the trees 

 get trimmed in due time, now and then, it is true, by 

 a very wasteful method. A tree doctor could save 

 and prolong the lives of many of them. The small 

 fountains and streams all find their way to larger 

 streams, and these to still larger, and these to lakes 

 or to the sea, and the drainage system of the con- 

 tinents works itself out with engineering exacti- 

 tude. The decay of the rocks and the formation of 

 the soil come about in due time, but not m man's 



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