THE ARGUMENT STATED. 15 



and order, either of the parts which the new watch contain- 

 ed, or of the parts by the aid and instrumentality of which it 

 was produced. We might possibly say, but with great lati- 

 tude of expression, that a stream of water ground corn ; but 

 ao latitude of expression would allow us to say, no stretch 

 cf conjecture could lead us to think, that the stream of water 

 built the mill, though it were too ancient for us to know who 

 the builder was. What the stream of water does in the affair 

 is neither more nor less than this : by the application of an 

 unintelligent impulse to a mechanism previously arranged, 

 arranged independently of it and arranged by intelligence, 

 an effect is produced, namely, the corn is ground. But the 

 effect results from the arrangement. The force of the stream 

 cannot be said to be the cause or the author of the effect, still 

 less of the arrangement. Understanding and plan in the 

 formation of the mill were not the less necessary for any share 

 which the water has in grinding the corn ; yet is this share 

 the same as that which the watch would have contributed 

 to the production of the new watch, upon the supposition 

 assumed in the last section. Therefore, 



III. Though it be now no longer probable that the indi- 

 vidual watch which our observer had found was made imme- 

 diately by the hand of an artificer, yet doth not this alteration 

 in anywise affect the inference, that an artificer had been 

 originally employed and concerned in the production. The 

 argument from design remains as it was. Marks of design 

 and contrivance are no more accounted for now than they 

 were before. In the same thing, we may ask for the cause 

 of different properties. We may ask for the cause of the 

 color of a body, of its hardness, of its heat ; and these causes 

 may be all different. We are now asking for the cause of 

 that subserviency to a use, that relation to an end, which 

 we have remarked in the watch before us. No answer is 

 given to this question, by telling us that a preceding watch 

 produced it. There cannot be design without a designer ; 

 contrivance, without a contriver ; order, without choice ; ar- 



