NATURAL THEOLOGY. 15 



watch which we are examining, are seen contri- 

 vance, design ; an end, a purpose ; means for the 

 end, adaptation to the purpose. And the question 

 which irresistibly presses upon our thoughts, is, 

 Whence this contrivance and design ? The thing 

 required is the intending mind, the adapted hand, 

 the intelhgence by which that hand was directed^ 

 This question, this demand, is not shaken off, by 

 increasing a number or succession of substances 

 destitute of these properties; nor the more, by in- 

 creasing that number to infinity. If it be said 

 that, upon the supposition of one watch being pro- 

 duced from another in the course of that other's 

 movements, and by means of the mechanism 

 within it, we have a cause for the watch in my 

 hand, viz., the watch from which it proceeded, — 

 I deny, that for the design, the contrivance, the 

 suitableness of means to an end, the adaptation of 

 instruments to a use, (all of which we discover in 

 the watch,) we have any cause whatever. It is 

 in vain, therefore, to assign a series of such causes, 

 or to allege that a series may be carried back to 

 infinity; for I do not admit that we have yet any 

 cause at all for the phenomena, still less any series 

 of causes either finite or infinite. Here is contri- 

 vance, but no contriver; proofs of design, but no 

 designer. 



V. Our observer would further also reflect, that 

 the maker of the watch before him was, in truth 

 and reality, the maker of every watch produced 

 from it : there being no difference (except that the 



