228 Natural Theology. 



those already passed. And never before did man 

 stand on such mountain heights, with such a back- 

 ground over which he can cast his eye ; with such 

 a landscape before him, inviting to new discoveries, 

 the whole conspiring to proclaim him the offspring 

 of God, standing in the very midst of the temple 

 reared by his Father's hand. 



We are, in chemistry, beyond the reach of all 

 development-theories, for the ancient mountains 

 that have been waiting on their rocky thrones for 

 long ages, while countless generations have come and 

 gone, now invoked by the chemist's power, lift up 

 their voices and declare the power and the laws of 

 chemistry, the same to-day that they were when 

 darkness and desolation were upon the face of the 

 earth. 



And the history of man declares that he has not 

 developed any new faculties or powers under the 

 influence of these laws. He was the same, centu- 

 ries ago, when these laws of chemistry were unknown, 

 that he is now. He has increased in knowledge, 

 but is not changed in his nature by their discovery. 

 The child, who has never heard of atomic weights, 

 and whose ancestors have all been as ignorant of 

 chemical science as though Dalton and Davy had 

 never lived, may be just as ready to enter into its 

 wonders, and to grasp its principles, as though his 

 father were a Liebig, or a Bunsen. His power to 

 grasp science, comes from a higher paternity. He 

 is the offspring of God, and is thus ever ready to 

 comprehend a portion of his Father's works. 



