18 ON THE STUDY OP NATUI12. 



aloud, that " the merciful and gracious Lord hath 

 so done his marvellous works, that they ought to 

 be had in remembrance." The whole material sys- 

 tem throughout Heaven and Earth, presents a varied 

 scene rich in use and beauty^ in which nothing is 

 lost, and in which, according to our former obser- 

 vations, the meanest and minutest creatures have 

 their full designation and importance. — "Thus 

 saith the Lord, thy Redeemer, and he that formed 

 thee from the womb, I am the Lord, who maketh 

 all things, who stretcheth forth the Heavens along, 

 and spreadeth abroad the Earth by myself." 



Nothing of all these various existences was formed 

 in vain : and that which is, however it may appear 

 to our confined and imperfect comprehensions, is 

 formed with supreme wisdom. It does not become 

 us to pry too boldly into the designs of God. We, 

 whose lives are but those of day, are unable to judge 

 of the councils of that Providence, whose economy 

 regards, not the objects merely of our senses, but the 

 whole system of Nature. We cannot scrutinize 

 the performances of God, nor can we possibly, with 

 all our boasted wisdom and cunning, discover tlie 

 grand connexions between incidents that lie widely 

 separate in time, and which are only knowm to 

 power iiiiinitcly surpassing ours. The Creator 

 did not plan the order of Nature according to our 

 confined principles of economy. The stupendous 

 perfori! ance of the Deity is one throughout the 

 Un verse ; and if Providence does not always calcu- 

 late exactly according to our mode of reckoning, it 

 would but become our inferior stations and judg- 



