OF THE EARTH. 509 



assign in a general manner, as compared to the a>ras 

 of the earth itself. 



I read, that as the variations which astronomers 

 have discovered are periodical, and that as the 

 solar system presents no marks of a termination, 

 so it discovers no indications of a commencement. 

 I read also that the phenomena of the earth coincide 

 with those of the Celestial mechanism, and further, 

 that the laws of animated conform to those of inani- 

 mate existence. I read in the first assertion a partial 

 truth, whence the mathematician has deduced what is 

 not deducible, forgetting the very rules of his own 

 science; and in the two latter assertions, I read what 

 are not truths. If I am surprised at the more than 

 oversight in the whole of these assertions, I will not 

 note the purpose, since it is evident. But I must an- 

 swer the mathematician: for this is my duty. The 

 answer cannot indeed now reach him: but it will reach 

 those whom he has misled. 



That a machine may perform an appointed duty, it 

 must he a finished work: it must he perfect from its 

 commencement; and while it does continue to perform 

 that duty, it remains perfect. The celestial mecha- 

 nism was designed by its Creator for a final cause, an 

 End; and that end is still in view. Unless therefore 

 we doubt His Power or His Wisdom, that mechanism 

 could be no other than it has been and is. The order 

 of the planetary system on which the mathematician 

 dwells, is its necessary condition: but no sound logi- 

 cian will infer from this that its past duration has been 

 eternal, or that its future has no bounds. It must 

 have heen precisely what it is, though its duties were 

 temporary; and it may therefore be temporary, as well 

 as eternal, for all that its regularity proves. Of its 

 future limitation AVC can- infer nothing: except that 

 this is within the power of Him who designed and ex- 



