354 SPARKS FROM A GEOLOGIST'S HAMMER. 



organism moulded to the environment, the more clearly 

 we see reflected the intellectual element of that efficiency. 

 If the existing world is the genealogical result of primi- 

 tive conditions, then the efficiency which the cycles of the 

 past have witnessed in the transformation of successive 

 terms has been enlightened by intelligence, directed by 

 choice, and impelled by will. We cast our glances back 

 over the awful chasm of cosmic aeons, and contemplate 

 it as the theater of the display of an infinity of miracles, 

 revealed in an unbroken, sustained, adaptive and all- 

 embracing system of evolution. 



III. What is the Final Cause of Variative Derivation 

 of Species? 



We are properly reminded by the agnostic school that 

 we must not presume to know fully the motives which 

 actuate an infinite will. At the same time we feel fully 

 persuaded that no intelligence acts without some motive 

 not even an infinite intelligence; for motive stands corre- 

 lated to intelligence as such, and not the greatness of 

 intelligence. We feel it, therefore, perfectly legitimate to 

 inquire after the motives which have controlled divine 

 activity in the ordering of the world. It is only the dis- 

 closure of motive which brings us into any relation of 

 sympathy or mutual interest with another being. Absence 

 of motive implies absence of feeling. The conception of 

 activity without motive is the conception of a grim, heart- 

 less necessity. As to motive in the world, we shall not 

 attempt to point out all which may be suggested. We 

 are certain, in the first place, that the accomplishment 

 of a result was a motive for the exertion of cosmic effi- 

 ciency. And we are certain that coordinated parts of the 

 cosmos have never assumed their places without the help 



