236 THE TWO FLORAS, 



in his Essai Philosophique sur les Prohabilites ; but we do 

 detect its influences operative tliroughout the entire work. 

 It is because of some felt impracticability on the part of its 

 author, of attaining to the prevailing belief in the miracle 

 of creation, that he has recourse, instead, to the so-called law 

 of development. The law and the miracle are the alterna- 

 tives placed before him ; and, rejecting the miracle, he closes 

 with the law. Now, in such circumstances, he can have no 

 more cause of complaint, if, presenting him with the experi- 

 ence argument of Hume and La Place, we demand that he 

 square the evidence regarding the existence of his law strictly 

 according to its requirements, than the soldier of an army 

 that charged its field-pieces with rusty nails would have cause 

 of complaint if he found himself wounded by a missile of a 

 similar kind, sent against him by the artillery of the enemy. 

 You cannot, it might be fairly said, in addressing him, ac- 

 quiesce in the miracle here, because, as a violation of the 

 laws of nature, there are certain objections, founded on in- 

 variable experience, which bear direct against your belief in 

 it. Well, here are the objections, in the strongest form in 

 which they have yet been stated ; and here is your hypothe- 

 sis respecting the development of marine algae into terrestrial 

 plants. We hold that against that hypothesis the objections 

 bear at least as directly as against any miracle whatever, — 

 nay, that not only is it contrary to an invariable experience, 

 but opposed also to all testimony. We regard it as a mere 

 idle dream. Maillet dreamed it, — ^and Lamarck dreamed it; 

 — and Oken dreamed it ; but none of them did more than 

 merely dream it : its existence rests on exactly the same basis 

 of evidence as that of Whang the miller's " monstrous pot of 

 gold and diamonds," of which he dreamed three nights in 

 succession, but which he never succeeded in finding. If we 

 are in error in our estimate, here is the argument, and here 

 the hypothwiis : give us in support of the hypothesis, tho 



