217 



who has long ago set his instruments at work, and 

 guarded against all their possible dificiences ; who has 

 provided to replenish the world with plants and ani. 

 mals to the end of time, by the wondrous contrivance 

 of his creation, and the laws h then ordained. 



Thus every whale, eagle, and apple-tree, every lion 

 and rose, fly and worm in our age, are as really the 

 work of God, as the first which he made of the kind. 

 It is so far from being a derogation to his honour to 

 perpetuate all the species by such instruments of his 

 agency for many age?, that it rather aggrandizes the 

 character of the Creator,and gives new lustre to divine 

 wisdom: for if any thing can be said to be easier or 

 harder in this sort of almighty work, we may suppose 

 it a more glorious difficulty for a God to employ a 

 sparrow or an oyster to make a sparrow or an oyster, 

 than to make one immediately with his own hand. Per* 

 haps there is not a wasp or a butterfly now in the world, 

 but has gone through almost six thousand ancestors, 

 and yet the work of the last parent is exquisitely per- 

 fect in shape, in colour, and in every perfection of 

 beauty : but it is all owing to the first cause. 



This is wisdom becoming a God, and demands au 

 eternal tribute of wonder and worship. 



SECT. III. 



Oj the Nourishment and Growth of Plants. 



IN the beginning of time and nature, at the com- 

 mand of God, the earth brought forth plants and 

 herbs, and four footed animals in their various kinds, 

 but the birds of the air, as well as the fishes, were 

 produced by the same command out of the wafers. 

 This was intimated in a former section. The water 

 and the earth were the first appointed mothers, if I 

 may so express it, of all the animal and vegetable cre- 

 ation. Since that time they cease to be parents in- 

 deed, but they are the common nurses of all that 

 breathes, and of all that grows. Nor is the wisdom 



VOL, II. L 



