NATURAL THEOLOGY. 



at the framing of such an object ? Or, for that 

 matter, how do we come to assume the existence 

 of other intelligences round about us in life at all ? 

 Simply by an irresistible compulsion of our own 

 consciousness and experience of ourselves. We 

 have become acquainted with order and arrange- 



At the same time, unity of plan is not maintained 

 in natural theology as entirely precluding a plu- 

 rality of divinities, inasmuch as unity may be the 

 result of the harmonious action of a variety of co- 

 operating agents who understand each other, as 

 well as of a single agent But the same advance of 



ment, and learned to understand it, in the act of | science which reveals the unity and inter-depend- 

 producing order and arrangement ourselves. And : ence of natural phenomena, points also more and 

 wherever we see the adaptation of means to end, : more to its boundlessness, and suggests the idea 

 we cannot avoid attributing it to some being who of infinity. On the polytheistic basis, an infinite 



is essentially a repetition of ourselves, endowed 



universe would require a plurality of infinite intel- 



with a consciousness and intelligence identical ligences, since each would require to understand 

 with our own. We infer the existence of other ! the whole scheme, in order to co-operation for 

 intelligences because we observe them engaging j unity. A plurality of infinites, however is in- 

 in various processes, which our experience of our- 

 selves assures us can spring only from such will 

 and intelligence as we possess. We conclude that 

 a watch must have had a watch-maker, because 

 we know contrivance only as the offspring of mind, theological equivalent is a single efficient will, 



admissible ; while on the ground of experience 

 and observation, the tendency of science, in its 

 doctrine of the correlation of forces, to reduce all 

 the energies of nature to one central force, whose 



corroborates the monotheistic inference reached 

 by speculative deduction. 



The Teleological argument is further held to 

 establish a certain moral intention in the plan of 

 nature, and so to cast a measure of light upon the 



_1 _ r /- _ j T- . t 



and if the universe is not less manifestly a con- 

 trivance than a watch, a universe-maker is as un- 

 avoidable a conclusion as a watch-maker. The 

 whole question is, whether nature and art are 

 reducible under the same category of contrivance : 



that is an ultimate question which each thinker j character of God. Existence has an aim ; the 

 will determine for himself ; but where it is deter- j universe is fashioned and regulated so as to attain 

 mined affirmatively, it does not seem possible to I an end. That aim is the production of beauty 

 impugn the natural theologian's conclusion. j and order in physical nature ; of happiness among 



The main difficulties of the teleological argu- j sentient beings ; of enlightenment and virtue in 

 ment lie in establishing will and intelligence as the intellectual and moral sphere. The testimony 



the cause of the order and arrangement which we 

 observe pervading nature. If it be granted that 

 this point has been reached, the ideas of suprem- 

 acy, unity of plan, and moral intention can be 

 managed with comparative ease. By the Divine 

 Supremacy is meant, that the will and intelligence 

 which we have found in the universe, are there, not 

 as a mere part, or product, or necessary evolution 

 of the universe itself, but as the controlling and 

 formative power of the universe, extra-mundane 

 or supra-mundane, in the sense of dominating and 

 shaping things and events according to the aim 

 and plan selected. In ourselves, and within our 

 limited sphere, we know that will and intelligence 

 can mould material nature to its designs. Our 

 plans and arrangements are not evolved by 

 material nature (including under that term our 

 own physical organisms), but by ourselves (as 

 distinct from our physical organisms, although 

 possessing and using them as instruments), and 

 we can compel material nature, within certain 

 limits, to take on the complexion and form of our 

 designs. This datum of experience we have no 

 difficulty in transferring to the boundless will and 

 intelligence which we behold everywhere, as matter 



of nature, of individual experience, of the history 

 of the race, is appealed to as demonstrating the 

 gradual but certain development of this purpose. 

 Against this, there is to be set off the unquestion- 

 able fact of evil in its various forms ; deformity, 

 pain, disease, grief, death, ignorance, sin. In deal- 

 ing with these difficulties, the natural theologian 

 seeks to shew, with respect to some of them, that 

 they are evil rather in appearance than in reality ; 

 as being in different ways the conditions of a 

 higher good, and so really good in disguise. Sin 

 he admits, but throws the responsibility of it on 

 the free-will of man, and denies that its introduc- 

 tion is any impeachment of the righteous design 

 of God. Certain other forms of evil, also, he 

 admits, but maintains that they cannot be fairly 

 permitted to overturn the clear and powerful wit- 

 ness of the universe and its history to the goodness 

 of the divine purpose, and that they ought to be 

 treated simply as difficulties and exceptions which 

 await explanation from another quarter. 



The criticism of Kant on the value of the 

 Teleological argument has been accepted by 

 many natural theologians as substantially correct 

 Admitting (under qualification) its validity for 



of fact, irresistibly impressing its yoke upon ; proof of the existence of a world architect or 

 nature ; and so recognising God, not as the mere j artist, he denied that it demonstrated a Creator 



thought of the universe, but as its Lord, subjecting 

 it to his thought 



Unity of plan points to unity of authorship, and 



in the strict sense of the term. The God whom 

 it demonstrates is adequate to the production of 

 the order and arrangement which we observe in 



is an argument for the monotheistic as opposed i the form of the world, but He is not adequate to 

 to the polytheistic scheme of a divine govern- \ the causation of the matter which He has worked 



ment. A childish and primitive natural theology, 

 not contemplating existence as a whole, assumed 

 a God for every group of phenomena ; but with the 

 rise of the notion of a universe,* monotheism natu- 

 rally recommended itself to the speculative instinct. 



* It may be maintained, however, that many polytheisms are 

 corruptions of an originally pure monotheism, through popular 

 misunderstandings of names of God, and the ordinary influences 

 that create mythology. 



up into the adaptations which we see. It has 

 not been found easy to meet this criticism. The 

 proof of intelligence and will as the source of the 

 order in the world, comes, as has been seen, from 

 our own conviction of the capacity and necessity 

 of mind for effecting change and arrangement in 

 physical nature. The key for the interpretation 

 of the universe to this extent we find in ourselves. 

 But we have no key to the problem of creation, 



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