126 EXPLANATIONS. 



Whatever part is dubious or obscure, to mankind 

 generally or to themselves in particular, there they 

 rear the torn standard of the arbitrary system of 

 divine rule. Human volitions form such a region 

 to many who know not that Quetelet has reduced 

 these to mathematical formulae, and that one of 

 our own most popular divines has written a Bridge- 

 water Treatise, to show the predominance of 

 natural law over mind, as a proof of the existence 

 and wisdom of God. Some who give up this do- 

 main to law, find footing in other departments of 

 natiu-e upon which science has not as yet poured 

 any clear light. We shall presently see by what 

 weak arguments such exceptions are maintained. 

 Meanwhile, it must be noted as important, that all 

 is uncertainty on this side of the question — a 

 strong presumption, were there no other, against it. 

 One of the most remarkable reservations made 

 of late years from the system of invariable order 

 is that presented in Dr. Whewell's History of 

 the Inductive Sciences. Admitting that nature, 

 as revealed to our senses, is a system of causation, 

 this writer halts when he comes to consider the 

 origin of language and of arts, the origin of 

 species and fonnation of globes. These he calls 

 palaetiological sciences, because, in his opinion, we 



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