84 NATURAL THEOLOGY. 



CHAPTER VII. 



OF THE MECHANICAL AND IMMECHANICAL PARTS AND 

 FUNCTIONS OF ANIMALS AND VEGETABLES. 



It is not that every part of an animal or vege- 

 table has not proceeded from a contriving mind ; 

 or that every part is not constructed with a view 

 to its proper end and purpose, accordmg to the 

 laws belonging to, and governing the substance or 

 the action made use of in that part ; or that each 

 part is not so constructed as to effectuate its pur- 

 pose whilst it operates according to these laws; 

 but it is because these laws themselves are not in 

 all cases equally understood — or, what amounts 

 to nearly the same thing, are not equally exempli- 

 fied in more simple processes, and more simple 

 machines, that we lay down the distinction, here 

 proposed, between the mechanical parts of ani- 

 mals and vegetables.^ 



^2 The observation here is most sensible. When we speak of 

 an organ as peculiarly suited to exhibit design, we mean merely 

 that we comprehend something of the object of the particular 

 structure. But there is no part of an animal, if we fully compre- 

 hended what was necessary to the performance of its functions, 

 that would not raise our admiration. Were we to take a portion 

 of the skin, and contemplate its exquisite sensibility, so finely ap- 

 propriated — could we penetrate, as it were, into the pores, and 



