CONCLUSION. 347 



can produce upon the thoughts. ' More especially may this 

 difference be perceived in the degree of admiration and of 

 awe with which the Divinity is regarded, when represented 

 to the understanding by its own remarks, its own reflections, 

 and its own reasonings, compared Avith what is excited by 

 any language that can be used by others. The works of 

 nature want only to be contemplated. When contemplated, 

 they have every thing in them which can astonish by their 

 greatness ; for, of the vast scale of operation through which 

 our discoveries carry us, at one end we see an inteUigent 

 Power arranging planetary systems, fixing, for instance, the 

 trajectory of Saturn, or constructing a ring of two hundred 

 thousand miles diameter, to surround his body, and be sus- 

 pended like a magnificent arch over the heads of his inhabi- 

 tants ; and, at the other, bending a hooked tooth, concerting 

 and providing an appropriate mechanism for the clasping 

 and reclasping of the filaments of the feather of the hum- 

 ming-bird. We have proof, not only of both these works 

 proceeding from an inteUigent agent, but of their proceeding 

 from the same agent : for, in the first place, we can trace 

 an identity of plan, a connection of system, from Saturn to 

 cur own globe ; and when arrived upon our globe, we can, 

 in the second place, pursue the connection through all the 

 organized, especially the animated bodies which it supports. 

 We can observe marks of a common relation, as well to one 

 another as to the elements of which their habitation is com- 

 posed. Therefore one mind has planned, or at least has 

 prescribed a general plan for all these productions. One 

 Being has been concerned in all. 



Under this stupendous Being we live. Our happiness, 

 our existence, is in his hand. All we expect must come 

 from him. Nor ought we to feel our situation insecure. In 

 every nature, and in every portion of nature which we can 

 descry, we find attention bestowed upon even the minutest 

 parts. The hinges in the wings of an carivig, and the joints 

 of Its antennae, are as highly wrought a? if the Creator had 



