:h. n.] ANTHROPOMOBTRIG THEISM. 383 



will never harbour the misgiving that her paths may lead to 

 Hades : he will fearlessly follow the guidance of Science, never 

 doubting that consolation must come of knowing the trdth. 

 In the present case we shall find reason to conclude that the 

 hypothesis of a quasi-human God is likely to aggravate 

 rather than to relieve the mental distress of scepticism. 



The doctrine of final causes we may first contemplate, for 

 a moment, under its logical aspect, and notice that, even if it 

 were true, it could never have the value which is claimed for 

 it as a means of investigation. Even admitting that all 

 things have been created with forethought, and that the 

 harmonious cooperation of phenomena is the fruit of con- 

 trivance, it is none the less undeniable that this forethought 

 cannot be perceived, the threads of this contrivance cannot 

 be unravelled by us, until the laws to which phenomena 

 conform have already been discovered. Previous to Newton, 

 for instance, all attempts to detect design in the structure ol 

 the solar system must have shared the fate of the quite 

 different guesses of Descartes and others as to its physical 

 conditions. Evidences of design, therefore, in order to be 

 trustworthy, must be deduced from known laws, and cannot 

 safely be employed as stepping-stones to the discovery of new 

 truths. However plausible they may seem as corollaries, 

 they can never be useful as lemmas or postulates. As M. 

 Scherer well observes, God is the cause of all things, but the 

 explanation of nothing.^ Accordingly unless we are so 

 arrogant as to lay claim to the possession of some direct 



^ " Dieu, comme on I'a trfes-hien dit, est la cause de tout, mais il n'est ex- 

 {Jication de rieii." Scherer. Noavelles Etudes sur la Liiterature Contempo- 

 nane, p. 408. See also Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, Anomalies de V Organisation, 

 torn. iii. p. 608. The only objection which can be made to M. Scherer's 

 statement is its disjunctive form. Obviously that which is the cause of 

 everything cannot be the explanation of anything. We cannot explain any 

 particular group of phenomena by a reference to divine action, because such 

 a reference is merely a reference to the source of all phenomena alike, and 

 hence cannot give us specific information foucerning any jiarticular group. 

 Laplace was therefore quite justified in saying " Je n'ai pas beboiu de cette 

 hypothfese." 



