142 PROFESSOR EDWARD HULL, LL.D., F.R.S. 
nature as bearing such clear evidence of the power of the 
Godhead that all mankind were without excuse whoever 
should ignore that evidence.* Even the more enlightened 
philosophers of pre-Christian times recognised the agency of 
the Creator in nature; though sometimes attributing to His 
direct action that which can only be properly considered as 
resulting from the operation of natural laws. This, perhaps, 
is the special distinction between the views of the ancient 
and modern theist. 
I propose on the present occasion to select out of many 
examples of creative power two, drawn from the organic 
part of nature, which have always seemed to me to stand 
out from amongst those which we regard as ordinary 
examples; namely, 1. The origin of life on the globe, 
and 2. The origin of man. Both these problems are of 
profound interest to ourselves; but I do not regard them as 
evincing any exceptional or unusual exercise of Divine 
energy, as all natural phenomena stand on the same level 
in this respect; for as Pope has well expressed it: “ All are 
but parts of one stupendous whole ;” we ourselves and our 
surroundings all testify to the same Divine power. 
1. The Origin of Life on the Globe—It has been admirably 
argued by Locke that organic vitalised beings cannot have 
been originated from inorganic inert matter by its own force 
alone. This result of a process of reasoning finds support 
amongst many naturalists of eminence at the present day ; 
and all attempts to originate life from lifeless matter, and to 
prove that life can be so originated, have so far failed. 
Whether there be living beings in the other planets of our 
system, as inferred on astronomical grounds by Sir David 
Brewster, does not much concern ourselves. What we know 
about our own world is, that it is mhabited by living, 
organised beings; and we possess the most incontrovertible 
evidence that there was a period when such beings did not 
exist upon its surface. If, as there is every reason to sup- 
pose, our world was in a molten condition from heat—lving 
beings could not have commenced to inhabit its surface till 
this had cooled down to a temperature below that at which 
albumen coagulates. Hence we have to account for the first 
appearance of living beings on our globe. 
Professor Ernst Haeckel, who ridicules the idea of a 
miraculous origin for living beings, still makes no attempt to 
explain their origin from natural causes. I presume that he 
* Romans i, 19, 20. 
