/O Natural Theology. 



show the proof of the handiwork of the same Being 

 in every department of nature we are prepared for 

 the possibility of a written Word, and of His con- 

 stant government and control of His works. If we 

 do not see in all this proof of the existence of such 

 a Being, then further search in nature is useless. 

 We must admit the existence of a Being before we 

 can intelligently seek to understand His character 

 and relations. Throwing aside all study of nature 

 as useless, there may, indeed, be metaphysical spe- 

 culations in regard to the existence of God ; but 

 all natural theology and natural religion, as these 

 terms are now understood, vanish. The human 

 mind, even, would not be absolute proof of the ex- 

 istence of such a Being ; for it, according to the 

 speculations of Plato, may have existed from all 

 eternity. It is the body alone that we know began 

 to be ; and in its perfect adaptation to our personali- 

 ty, created or uncreated, must we find our first argu- 

 ment for a personal Creator, and in the provisions 

 made for it, the first indications of His fatherly care. 

 But the adaptation 6f the body to the world and its- 

 physical forces is not perfect. There is pain and 

 premature death, an absolute struggle for existence. 

 And this antagonism is plainly not necessary in the 

 nature of things. We shall endeavor, in some future 

 lectures, to show that the world, with all its antago- 

 nisms, is best for man as he is. His physical nature 

 is rendered liable to suffer, by the very constitution 

 of things, for the benefit of his moral nature, to 

 which the physical is subservient. But why, we 



