74 NATURAL THEOLOGY. 



mal, it is fraught with still more evident absurdity. 

 Is it possible to believe that the eye was formed 

 without any regard to vision ; that it was the ani- 

 mal itself which found out that, though formed with 

 no such intention, it would serve to see with ; and 

 that the use of the eye as an organ of sight resulted 

 from this discovery, and the animal's application of 

 it ? The same question may be asked of the ear ; 

 the same of all the senses. None of the senses fun- 

 damentally depend upon the election of the ani- 

 mal ; consequently neither upon his sagacity nor 

 his experience. It is the impression which objects 

 make upon them that constitutes their use. Under 

 that impression he is passive. He may bring ob- 

 jects to the sense, or within its reach ; he may se- 

 lect these objects ; but over the impression itself 

 he has no power, or very little ; and that properly 

 is the sense. 



Secondly; there are many parts* of animal bodies 

 which seem to depend upon the will of the animal 

 in a greater degree than the senses do, and yet w4th 

 respect to which this solution is equally unsatisfac- 

 tory. If we apply the solution to the human body, 

 for instance, it forms itself into questions upon 

 which no reasonable mind can doubt ; such as, 

 whether the teeth w^ere made expressly for the 

 mastication of food, the feet for walking, the hands 

 for holding ? or whether, these things being as they 

 are, being in fact in the animal's possession, his own 

 ingenuity taught him that they were convertible to 



