212 A SKETCH OF 



proceeds an incessant play of activity, the clearest and 

 grandest example of which is afforded by the fixed re- 

 gularity of the movements in our solar system. Even here 

 this play of force exhibits a determinate form, for the paths 

 of the planets do not all, in like manner, circle in one and 

 the same line drawn around the sun, but each in its own 

 way deviates from this line ; while the magnitudes of the 

 planets do not increase or decrease, &c., in a constant ratio, 

 from the sun. Here, at present, our knowledge is at a 

 stand, and we are unable to find a regular deduction for 

 these forms of the solar system. But the peculiar forms 

 become far more complex in the natural processes upon the 

 earth ; and here, where they at once present themselves 

 without our seeking and can readily be reviewed as a 

 whole, we call them " shapes." We might anticipate, in 

 regard to crystals, on account of their regular mathematical 

 forms, that they are subject to rigid laws of formation ; 

 but even here, it always appears to be purely accidental 

 that common salt and iron pyrites crystallize in true cubes, 

 and not in eight-sided bodies, like fluor-spar. Lastly, in 

 plants and animals, the forms become so varied and so 

 aberrant, that a mathematical basis is out of the question. 

 All here seems pure accident, or capricious sport of a 

 blindly-acting force of Nature. Yet there lies in Man an 

 irrecusable necessity, never, in his contemplations of the 

 world, to allow of accident, which would leave him com- 

 fortless and hopeless in the presence of the forces of 

 Nature, to which he is subject ; and, therefore, where the 

 understanding of the law is at present denied to him, he 

 makes the circumstances yield to a conformity according to 

 the standard of his own modes of action, the final cause of 

 which he seeks in a mighty and wise Creator and Sustainer 

 of the World. But how insufficient this is for the scientific 



