60 



of Orchids, and his equally cliarming and acute monograpli on 

 the Lythrums^ and repeat, as I have repeated, many of the 

 experiments and observations therein detailed. The effect on 

 my mind was an irresistible impulse to uncover and bow my 

 head, as being in the too immediate presence of the wonderful 

 prescience and benevolent contrivance of the Universal 

 Father. And I think such, also, would be the result on the 

 convictions and the emotions of the vast majority of average 

 men. I think the verdict would be that no plainer marks of 

 contriving will exist in a steam-engine, or a printing-pi-ess, or 

 a telescope." 



Design in nature can be seen by every unprejudiced man 

 who observes nature, or who thoughtfully reads the recorded 

 observations of others. Every fresh discovery in physiology ; 

 every inquiry of the scientist into the mechanism of the 

 animal frame ; every inspection of the marvellous adaptation 

 of insect organisms to the complicated structure of flowers ; 

 in a word, every new achievement of the naturalist in explor- 

 ing the domain of nature, reveals more clearly, and establishes 

 more firmly, the presence everywhere, and in everything, of 

 an infinitely powerful and infinitely wise Designing Mind. 

 Unseen by human eye, undiscoverable by scientific research 

 in the mystery of its working, we yet discern the impress and 

 recognise the beneficent control of that Infinite Mind in earth, 

 and sea, and sky. 



IV. The Origin op Mind and its Conception of God. 



The origin and nature of mind constitute the highest problem 

 with which Science has ventured to grapple. Democritus, as I 

 have said, held that the mind consists of fine, smooth atoms, like 

 those of fire. Huxley seems to aflfirm that '' those manifesta- 

 tions of intellect, of feeling, and of will, which we rightly 

 name the higher faculties," are known only as transitory 

 changes in the relative positions of parts of the body.* 

 " Matter and spirit," he adds, " are but names for the imagi- 

 nary substrata of groups of natural phenomena." Tyndall 

 is a little more explicit when he thus writes : — " Not alone the 

 mechanism of the human body, but that of the human mind 

 itself, — emotion, intellect, will, and all their phenomena, — were 

 once latent in a fiery cloud. "f 



* Lay »S'{,'?'»«o»(s, pp. 122, 143. t Address. 



