Thus we are brought face to face with a mighty operating 

 personality, all whose work tends to the preservation, and 

 development, and perfecting of the universe ; of which, so far 

 as this world is concerned, man is the head and the only 

 being capable of understanding the Author's purpose, and of 

 employing the vast resources He has provided for our use 

 according to that purpose. This greatly increases the range 

 and the force of our responsibility. The man who is placed 

 at the head of a grand operative establishment, having a large 

 capital and many subordinates under his control, is bound to 

 greater carefulness, diligence, and fidelity than any one under 

 him. By this rule, how truly boundless is our responsibility 

 to the Creator and Upholder of all things. We can conceive 

 of no capability of our nature, no relation we sustain to 

 others, and no donation of His providence, for which we are 

 not bound to answer. 



But is there a Creator ? Have not all things come into 

 being by the independent operation of matter, and from 

 properties inherent in itself? Before we can answer this 

 question, we necessarily meet another. How came the 

 material substance of the universe into existence ? It could 

 not produce itself, because, if capable of acting, it could not 

 act before it existed, and especially so mighty a work as 

 creation could not come from a nonentity. But, in nearly 

 all the discussions on the supposed action of matter, a hidden 

 fallacy lies. Matter is spoken of as though it were one 

 homogeneous substance, possessing unvarying and uniform 

 properties and powers, and therefore capable of simple and 

 immediate action. It is, however, well known that this is 

 not its true character, but that the substance of the earth 

 consists of sixty-three different elements, every one of which 

 has a fixed and unchangeable nature, utterly incapable of 

 transmutation, and some of them have an unalterable incom- 

 patibility with others; so that united action, for any such 

 purpose as the creation and arrangement of the substance of , 

 our earth, is simply inconceivable. We could as well suppose 

 that lions, tigers, bears, sheep, deer, and cows could unite 

 in any undertaking for the general good. And there is 

 equal difficulty in supposing that one element could produce 

 another. 



If hydrogen were the first which evolved itself from 

 nothingness, how could it have produced gold, or iron, or 

 carbon ? If we suppose them all to have come into being 

 spontaneously, who fixed the order of birth, and whence 

 came the adjustment of proportions in the mass, so that 



