UNI FORM IT Y OF NA TURE i o i 



the Providence of an All-wise Deity 1 is simple and intelligible. 

 By reasoning from effect to cause, by means of a posteriori argu 

 ments whereby we apply self-evident principles, like the principle 

 of causality, to the facts of sense experience, we establish with 

 certitude the existence of an All-powerful, All-wise, Supreme 

 Being, who has freely created the universe, freely conserves it in 

 existence, and freely concurs with the activity of all created 

 agencies ; who has manifestly ordered and arranged and designed 

 the universe, the &quot; cosmos &quot; as it is rightly called ; who has 

 evidently endowed the agencies of this visible universe with^Jra/ 

 tendencies, in virtue of which they act uniformly unless whenever 

 or wherever He chooses to interfere (miraculously) with the 

 established physical order for some higher (moraF) end. Know 

 ing all this, we know that natural causes will continue to exist 

 and to act uniformly in accordance with His will and as long as 

 He wills. Knowing, too, that He is All-wise, we know and 

 believe that He will not interfere with the uniformity of physical 

 nature capriciously, so as to render our reliance on it uncertain. 

 Since He created its agencies &quot;for man s use and benefit,&quot; this 

 Divine purpose forms a firm basis for our trust in their stability. 

 His occasional miraculous suspensions of its laws are for our 

 greater good, and cannot in any way weaken our belief in its 

 general uniformity (cf. 2 1 7). 



Thus it is that our conception of physical nature as the work 

 of an All-wise Creator and Ruler, forms the ultimate rational 

 justification of that belief in the uniformity of nature, which is 

 partially embodied in the formulation and application of every 

 physical law. This, of course, does not mean that we must have 

 deliberately convinced ourselves of God s existence, creation, and 

 providence, before we can make a single inductive generalization 

 from actual experience in any department of natural research : we 

 may assume the uniformity of nature provisionally, and utilize 

 our postulate as scientists, without justifying to ourselves the use 

 we make of it. But if we want to justify this usage philosophically ; 

 we must, of course, put some rational interpretation on both nature 

 and thought i.e. on our experience as a whole. 



1 The Scottish school of philosophers are content to say that this belief is the 

 natural expression of an innate, instinctive law. There is no denying the natural 

 tendency to the belief; but to say that the latter must be &quot; the effect of instinct, 

 not of reason,&quot; is hardly to explain it. The tendency to the belief should not be 

 called an &quot;instinct&quot;; for, although its exercise is spontaneous and unreflective, 

 still, on reflection, we can assign a rational basis for it. 



