457 



been attained such an arangement and modification of the seem- 

 ing ruin, as produced the regeneration of a world, stored, in its 

 deepest recesses, with substances calculated to promote the comfort 

 of man ; to tempt him to the exercise of his innate powers ; to fur- 

 nish him with the means of supporting his dominion over the ani- 

 mals around him; and even to urge him to a change from the 

 savage to a civilized state. Another world rises from the over- 



o 



whelming flood, composed of the fragments of the former, which 

 appear to be blended together, in an apparently disordered and 

 incongruous mass. But, after the lapse of a small period of time, 

 the constituent parts of the newly-formed world are discovered to be 

 arranged, according to those wise laws which the great Creator had 

 decreed from the beginning. The surface again teems with beings 

 possessed of the energies of animal and vegetable life ; and after 

 ages discover, that the atoms of which the new world is formed, 

 acting reciprocally on each other, with varying, but appropriate in- 

 fluence, regulated by the laws of attraction, and chemical affinity, 

 compose a variety of new combinations; and the newly-formed 

 world, enriched by the amelioration of its materials, obtains an in- 

 crease both of utility and beauty. 



This circumstance, which I consider as plainly pointing out the 

 wisdom and power of the Creator, may, however, I am perfectly 

 aware, afford occasion for hesitation to the sceptic, who may ima- 

 gine that the necessity of forming the world anew implies that its 

 first formation was deficient in design. But considering this planet 

 itself, as probably destined, with the other works of creation > to 

 undergo certain regular changes in its constitution, during the 



^wfe 



progress of its existence, such changes cannot furnish sufficient 

 grounds, for doubting of the wisdom or power of God : not even 

 were it discoverable, that this world had undergone several revo- 

 lutions and reformations ; and that, in common language, several; 

 VOL. i. 3 M 



