COSMIC PHILOSOPHY 



say to the architect who could not directly form 

 a museum out of bricks and mortar, but was 

 forced to begin as if going to build a mansion ; 

 and after proceeding some way in this direction 

 altered his plan into a palace and that again 

 into a museum ? Yet this is the sort of succes- 

 sion on which organisms are constructed." It 

 is out of this very uncomfortable corner that 

 metaphysical naturalists have sometimes at- 

 tempted to slip, by gravely asserting that Na- 

 ture is obliged to work tentatively ! Thus we 

 see that the habit of personifying Nature may 

 sometimes be made to serve an argumentative 

 purpose. When theologians are molested by 

 uncomfortable questions concerning the exist- 

 ence of phenomena which seem incompatible 

 with the perfect wisdom of an anthropomor- 

 phic Deity, they are wont to ascribe them to 

 the Devil. It must be acknowledged that met- 

 aphysical naturalists practise a more graceful, 

 though not a more candid, method of evasion 

 when they erect Nature (spelled with a capital) 

 into a person distinct from phenomena, and 

 coolly ascribe to her the shortcomings which 

 they dare not lay to the account of a personal 

 Deity. 



Viewed in the light of a scientific logic, this 



argument from embryology, like the argument 



from classification, seems powerful enough, 



when taken alone, to decide the case in favour 



402 



