158 Natural Theology. 



tal. But the law of secondary forms adds new 

 beauty, by the variety it gives in modifying, with 

 mathematical exactness, the faces and angles of the 

 primary. We may be told that there is no design 

 in all this arrangement of matter. It is so, is all 

 that we can say. Because we admire the beauty of 

 the crystal, and wonder at this law by which its 

 beauty is increased, we are told that we are not to 

 believe that the original beauty of the gem, or that 

 the law of variation, was made for us, or with any 

 reference to us. Nor are we to believe, necessarily, 

 that they were made at all. They arc they always 

 have been ; and they would be the same they now 

 are, were there no intelligent being in the universe 

 to behold them. We may believe that they have a 

 purpose, or not. If one doubts it, there is certainly 

 little room for argument. When the facts are stated, 

 different minds will be differently affected by them, 

 and argument will have little effect upon either 

 class. 



But when we study the kingdom of life, the facts 

 that meet us are entirely different in kind. There 

 is here a succession of beings, descending one from 

 another ; there is a complicated machinery by 

 which the individual is built up and preserved. It 

 is certainly a legitimate inquiry : For what purpose 

 is each part of these beings ? For what purpose 

 or, if any object to this word for what use are the 

 various organs of the plant ? To answer this ques- 

 tion is the work of the botanist. He examines the 

 root, the stem, the leaf, the flower, and the fruit. 



