166 LIFE IN NATURE. 



And if, again (calling our moral nature to aid 

 and carry up our intellectual apprehension), we 

 look at this law to which we have traced the living 

 structure, and endeavour to realize its significance, 

 we feel that it is a spiritual fact with which we 

 are in relation. Interpreted into moral terms, is not 

 the law of least resistance this, Action determined 

 by want ; giving, called into operation by a need ? 

 Is not this " appearance," this disguise of a material 

 law, worthy to present to us a fact of which the 

 verity is love ? It is love that appears to us under 

 this seeming law of force ; love not less demon- 

 strated in its nature, than made manifest in its 

 fruits. 



Thus was first suggested to me a thought I have 

 elsewhere pursued at greater length,* that this 

 physical world, known to be an appearance (or 

 phenomenon,) is the appearance of that spiritual 

 world which we also know. It is not the pheno- 

 menon of a merely unknown existence therefore ; 

 but of that " spiritual " which has a moral nature, 



* See Man and his Dwelling-Place, book i. chap, ii., et seq. 



