360 RELIGIOUS VIEWS. 



tions, on the other hand, include something much 

 higher. They take in the establishment of the 

 laws of the elements, as well as the combination 

 of these laws and the determination of the dis- 

 tribution and quantity of the materials on which 

 they shall produce their effect. We must con- 

 ceive that the Supreme Power has ordained that 

 air shall be rarefied, and water turned into va- 

 pour, by heat ; no less than that he has com- 

 bined air and water so as to sprinkle the earth 

 with showers, and determined the quantity of 

 heat and air and water, so that the showers shall 

 be as beneficial as they are. 



We may and must, therefore, in our conceptions 

 of the Divine purpose and agency, go beyond the 

 analogy of human contrivances. We must con- 

 ceive the Deity, not only as constructing the 

 most refined and vast machinery, with which, as 

 we have already seen, the universe is filled ; but 

 we must also imagine him as establishing those 

 properties by which such machinery is possible : 

 as giving to the materials of his structure the 

 qualities by which the material is fitted to its use. 

 There is much to be found, in natural objects, of 

 the same kind of contrivance which is common 

 to these and to human inventions ; there are me- 

 chanical devices, operations of the atmospheric 

 elements, chemical processes ; many such have 

 been pointed out, many more exist. But besides 

 these cases of the combination of means, which 



