Philosophic Evohition. 205 



ment which has convulsed and refashioned the surface of 

 the earth. 



" The most insignificant or unsightly insect is from Him, 

 and good in its kind ; the ever teeming, inexhaustible 

 swarms of animalculae, the myriads of living motes in- 

 visible to the naked eye, the restless, ever spreading vege- 

 tation which creeps like a garment over the whole .earth, 

 the lofty cedar, the umbrageous banana, are His. His 

 are the tribes and families of birds and beasts, their 

 graceful forms, their wild gestures, and their passionate 

 cries. And so in the intellectual, moral, social, and 

 political world. Man, with his motives and works, his 

 languages, his propagation, his diffusion, is from Him. 

 Agriculture, medicine, and the arts of life, are His gifts. 

 Society, laws, government, He is their sanction. The 

 pageant of earthly royalty has the semblance and the 

 benediction of the Eternal King. Peace and civilisation, 

 commerce and adventure, wars when just, conquest when 

 humane and necessary, have His co-operation and His 

 blessing upon them. The course of events, the revolu- 

 tion of empires, the rise and fall of states, the periods 

 and eras, the progresses and the retrogressions of the 

 world's history, not indeed the incidental sin, over 

 abundant as it is, but the great outlines and the issues 

 of human affairs, are from His dispositions. The elements 

 and types and seminal principles and constructive powers 

 of the moral world, in ruins though it be, are to be 



