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hammer is arrested by the anvil, and its force seems spent ; but, in truth, it 

 only changes shape, reappearing in the form of heat communicated to the anvil 

 and the hammer. In the steam engine we see the reverse operation — Heat, in 

 this instance, disappears in producing mechanical force. In like manner Heat 

 will produce thermo-electric currents, whilst Electricity, in its turn, generates 

 Heat. Electricity and Magnetism also, it is now known, are mutually con- 

 vertible. Temporary magnets are made by electric currents, and sparks are 

 elicited from magnets. Many other instances of like convertibility might be 

 given. It is likely, then, that our conception of natural forces will, sooner or 

 later, be reduced to some single type ; and this one force will be conceived of 

 as ever varying in its aspects ; now Heat, now Chemical force, and now 

 Mechanical ; yet never spent. Here, then, it will perhaps be said, we shall 

 have at last the material cause of which we are in search. I answer, No ] you 

 will have found matter in action ; nothing more. The question will remain 

 unanswered, "what makes it act 1 ?" 



The Theist may then leave Darwinians to fight it out with their opponents 

 on the scientific field ; secure that Natural Religion is nowise interested in the 

 issue of the controversy. But is human faith, in any shape, truly in peril 

 should it be established, as seems not unlikely, that Creation is no past event 

 but a process ever going on 1 Grant to the advocate of progressive Develop- 

 ment his "nucleated vesicle," " primordial cell," or whatever he likes to call it, 

 out of which he is to bring the whole Organic world. Only do you and he 

 remember, that the whole animal and vegetable kingdoms are in that cell, as 

 truly as the oak is in the acorn. The cell accounts, he says, for the whole 

 Organic world. Be it so : but the cell 1 what accounts for that 1 



And, as we further see, the ground of the religious opposition is a mis- 

 conception. The antithesis of miracle and natural law, as one divine, the other 

 undivine, is, here, a false one ; for the Power of God is no more at work in 

 miracle than in Nature. 



Observe, I speak of the operation of Divine power, not of tbe manifestation 

 of Divine purpose, which is not here in question. In almost every form of creed, 

 the Divine character is supposed to be more fully expressed in miracle than in 

 Nature. But of Divine power, surely, this amazing universe, filled and pul- 

 sating with self-renewing life in countless myriads of forms, is the greater 

 physical expression : so that it is absurd to compare with it, in this respect, 

 any recorded or imaginable deviation from established order. " Command that 

 these stones be made bread," was the word of the Tempter, as we read. The 

 miracle, though then withheld, is worked, (on how huge a scale!) in each 

 returning season, in our ripened crops. To fill a starving multitude from the 

 scanty store of a poor fisher, what indeed, as a work of power is that to Him, 



' ' Who men and angels daily feeds, 

 And stills the wailing sea-bird, on the hungry shore ?" 



Scattered miracles of healing are small things to the repairing power of 

 nature, or to that " stupendous alchemy " ever at work transmitting inorganic 

 matter into living tissues. Nay, as a physical wonder, what is resuscitation of 

 a single life, whilst in the birth of Human infants (to speak only of this 

 Planet) the new creation of living souls takes place by thousands every hour 1 



But to resume our former argument. Science can never touch the ground 

 of Theism ; for it knows nothing of efficient causes. The mind ranges in vain 

 through nature for any original source of power. We find, as Reid puts it, 

 wheel turned by wheel in endless succession, but never reach the origin of 

 motion. Eor Matter (whatever it may be) we must needs conceive of as inert; 

 that is its very definition ; and of Force, in its essence, science must remain 

 for ever ignorant. 



