24 LETTER OF PROF. HENRY. 



this space ! How small the wisdom obtained by a single life in its 

 passage, and how small the known, when compared with the 

 unknown, by the accumulation of the millions of lives, through 

 the art of printing, in hundreds of years! How many questions 

 press themselves upon us in the contemplations whence come we, 

 whither are we going, what is our final destiny, the object of our 

 creation ? 



What mysteries of unfathomable depths environ us on every 

 side! But, after all our speculations, and an attempt to grapple 

 with the problem of the universe, the simplest conception which 

 explains and connects the phenomena is that of the existence of one 

 Spiritual Being — infinite in wisdom, in power, and all divine per- 

 fections, which exists always and everywhere — which has created 

 us with intellectual faculties sufficient, in some degree, to compre- 

 hend His operations as they are developed in Nature by what is 

 called "Science." 



This Being is untihangeable, and, therefore, His operations are 

 always in accordance with the same laws, the conditions being the 

 same. Events that happened a thousand years ago will haj)pen 

 again a thousand years to come, provided the condition of existence 

 is the same. Indeed, a universe not governed by law would be a 

 ■universe without the evidence of an intellectual director. 



In the scientific explanation of physical phenomena^ we assume 

 the existence of a principle having properties sufficient to produce 

 the effects which we observe; and when the principle so assumed 

 explains, by logical deductions from it, all the phenomena, we call 

 it a theory. Thus, we have the theory of light, the theory of elec- 

 tricity, &G. There is no proof, however, of the truth of these 

 theories, except the explanation of the phenomena which they are 

 invented to account for. 



This proof, however, is sufficient in any case in which every fact 

 is fully explained, and can be predicted when the conditions are 

 known. In accordance with this scientific view, on what evidence 

 does the existence of a creator rest? 



First. It is one of the truths best established by experience in 

 my own mind, that I have a thinking, willing principle within me, 

 capable of ijitellectual activity and of moral feeling. 



