202 LAY SERMONS, ESSAYS, AND REVIEWS. [xi. 



therefore, of this physical inquiry is, that we find no vestige of a 

 beginning, no prospect of an end.&quot; l 



Yet another influence worked strongly upon Hutton. Like 

 most philosophers of his age, he coquetted with those final 

 causes which have been named barren virgins, but which might 

 be more fitly termed the hetairce of philosophy, so constantly 

 have they led men astray. The final cause of the existence of 

 the world is, for Hutton, the production of life and intelligence. 



&quot; We have now considered the globe of this earth as a machine, 

 constructed upon chemical as well as mechanical principles, by 

 which its different parts are all adapted, in form, in quality, and 

 in quantity, to a certain end ; an end attained with certainty or 

 success ; and an end from which we may perceive wisdom, in 

 contemplating the means employed. 



&quot; But is this world to be considered thus merely as a machine, 

 to last no longer than its parts retain their present position, 

 their proper forms and qualities ? Or may it not be also con 

 sidered as an organized body ? such as has a constitution in 

 which the necessary decay of the machine is naturally repaired, 

 in the exertion of those productive powers by which it had been 

 formed. 



&quot; This is the view in which we are now to examine the globe ; 

 to see if there be, in the constitution of this world, a repro 

 ductive operation, by which a ruined constitution may be again 

 repaired, and a duration or stability thus procured to the machine, 

 considered as a world sustaining plants and animals.&quot; 5 



Kirwan, and the other Philistines of the day, accused Hutton 

 of declaring that his theory implied that the world never had a 

 beginning, and never differed in condition from its present 

 state. Nothing could be more grossly unjust, as he expressly 

 guards himself against any such conclusion in the following 

 terms : 



&quot; But in thus tracing back the natural operations which have 

 succeeded each other, and mark to us the course of time past, we 



1 The Theory of the Earth, vol. i. p. 200. - Ibid. pp. 16, 17. 



