GENEliAL VIEW OF NATURE. 233 



LECTURE XLIY. 



GENERAL VIEW OF NATURE ORGANIZED AND INORGANIZED BODIES 



CLASSIFICATION OF ANIMALS. 



365. Having considered the vegetable kingdom under its 

 various aspects, it may be proper before closing our course of 

 botanical study to take a general view of that external world 

 of matter, of which the part we have examined extended and 

 diversitied as it is, constitutes but a very small portion. The 

 science we have been investigating is a branch of Natii/ral Sci- 

 ence. The study of nature presents in a lively and forcible 

 manner the power and wisdom of the Creator, and offers to the 

 enlightened mind a never-failing source of the most pure and 

 refined enjoyment. Those who know nothing of this source oi 

 happiness cannot appreciate its value ; they may ask the use oi 

 studying into the nature of objects without reference to the en- 

 joyment of the senses, or to personal gain or honor. 



366. ISTaturalists to the great discredit of science have some- 

 times shown an unhappy tendency to skepticism ; enabled to 

 comprehend some of the great operations of nature, they have 

 presumed to set up their own reason against the revelation of 

 God, and impiously refused to believe any thing which could 

 not be explained according to the principles of human science. 

 Searching into 'the elements which compose the human body, 

 and observing the dispersion of the same and their incorpora- 

 tion into other substances, they have afiirmed that it was " a 

 thing impossible for God to raise the dead." Well might we, 

 in addressing such a philosopher, say, with the Apostle, '' Thou 

 fool !" Cannot He who formed all things of nothing, reanimate 

 the sleeping dust, and reunite the spirit to its own body? 

 Happily, this melancholy j)erversion of human learning seems 

 passing away, and we now see many of the enlightened inves- 

 tigators of the principles of science, among the humble disciples 

 of Jesus. 



367. By the word N'ature^ derived from a term signifying 

 horn OY jproducecl^ in a general sense we mean all the works oi* 

 God. Using a figure of speech called metonor)iy^ we often put 

 the effect for the cause ; as when we speak of the " works of 

 nature," meaning what the Almighty has brought forth : or we 

 often mean by nature the Deity himself; as when we say that 

 " nature ]iroduces plants and animals." 



368. With respect to the heavenly hodies which manifest 

 themselves to us with so much magnificence, we know tliem to 



305. Study of nature. —3G6. Naturalists ioclined to skepticism.— 367. Definition of nature.— 36a Th« 

 heavenly Iio-IIl-s. 



