88 THE MEANING OF EVOLUTION 



draw was that the design shown in nature argued 

 clearly for a Designer above nature; in other words, 

 that nature was unintelligible without God. Every- 

 one in the class believed in God without this prelim- 

 inary, and consequently the book was unnecessary, so 

 far as we were concerned. We started with the con- 

 dition of mind which the author hoped to produce. 

 One effect the book did have; in the absence of any 

 other reputable course in zoology, it gave us an as- 

 tonishing collection of interesting facts about animals. 



Some of Paley's statements were certainly peculiar. 

 His Malay pig with its upper teeth wonderfully 

 curved was said to be in the habit of hanging its head 

 upon a bush while it slept, in order to save the strain 

 upon its porcine neck. This was too much even for 

 our credulity. None the less the impression made 

 upon some of us by the evidence for design in nature 

 has never left us. 



Among many scientists to-day it is supposed to be 

 crude to speak of purpose in nature, and there is rea- 

 son for their attitude. But the statement that there is 

 no such plan conveys to the ordinary thinker a mean- 

 ing that is far more erroneous than could possibly ex- 

 ist in his mind should he believe implicitly in design 

 and purpose. As between design in the universe in 

 the usual sense of the word, and a purely accidental 

 connection of events in the universe, there can be no 



