148 EXPLANATIONS. 



of fluids to distribute themselves so as to equalize 

 the pressure on every side of each of their par- 

 ticles ; as in the case of the trade winds, and the 

 monsoons. Lightning might once have been sup- 

 posed to obey no laws ; but since it has been as- 

 certained to be identical with electricity, we know 

 that the very same phenomenon, in some of its 

 manifestations, is implicitly obedient to the action 

 of fixed causes. / do not believe that there is now 

 one object or event in all our experience of nature, 

 within the bounds of the solar system at least, which 

 has not either been ascertained by direct observation to 

 follow laws of its own, or been proved to be exactly 

 similar to objects and events, which, in more familiar 

 manifestations, or on a more limited scale, follow strict 

 laws : oiu" inability to trace the same laws on the 

 larger scale, and in the more recondite instances 

 being accounted for by the number and compli- 

 cation of the modifying causes, or by their in- 

 accessibility to observation "* 



The whole question, then, stands thus. For 

 the theory of universal order — that is, order as 

 presiding in both the origin and administration ot 

 the world — we have the testimony of a vast num 

 ber of facts in natm*e, and this one in addition, — 

 * System of Logic, ii. 116. 



