414 NATURE AND MAN. 



said by Dr. Whewell to have effected for astronomy — the " transfer 

 " of the notion of design and end from the region of facts to that 

 " of laws." 



For the thorough consideration of this question, I think it 

 very important that we should start with a clear conception of 

 what the " Argument from Design " really means, and with a right 

 appreciation of the probative value of the evidence on which it 

 rests ; and these will therefore be the subjects to which I shall 

 first direct your attention. 



It is a mere truism to assert that design implies a designer ; 

 because the definition of design is "the intentional adaptation 

 "of means to a preconceived end." We do not perform any 

 voluntary motion without a preconception of the action we "will" 

 to perform. It is this preconception of result that constitutes the 

 foundation of the effort made to carry it out. I may determine 

 the action itself; as when I 'will' to bend my fore-arm on my 

 arm. Or I may ' will ' to do something — as to lift a book from 

 the table, or to carry a spoon to my mouth — which requires this 

 flexion to carry my purpose into effect. But no action, in which 

 there is not such a preconception, is "intentional" or "volun- 

 tary." We are constantly using the word "design" in this sense. 

 An architect "designs" a building; a ship-builder "designs" a 

 ship; an artist "designs" a picture, and so on. In all such 

 works, we unhesitatingly recognize an intentional adaptation of 

 means to a preconceived end (though the designer and his pur- 

 pose may be alike unknown to us), from our personal experience 

 of other cases more or less familiar. 



But we have now to deal with cases in which we have had no 

 such experience ; and to consider the grounds on which, in any 

 individual instance, we should feel justified in concluding that 

 an obvious adaptiveness has been " intentional," or, in other 

 words, that the object has been "designed" for the use which 

 we find it to answer. I do not affirm that we can in any case 

 obtain logical or demonstrative proof of such " designed " adapta- 

 tion ; but I think I can make it clear that this is one of the 

 numerous instances in which a convergence of separate probabilities 

 acquires the probative value of a moral certainty. 



