THE REIGN OF LAW. 



majority of all new and marvellous phenomena, 

 this would be the true and reasonable conclu- 

 sion. It is not the conclusion of pride, but of 

 humility of mind. Seeing the boundless extent 

 of our ignorance of the natural laws which re- 

 gulate so many of the phenomena around us, 

 and still more of so many of the phenomena 

 within us, nothing can be more reasonable than 

 to conclude, when we see something which is to 

 us a wonder, that somehow, if we only knew how, 

 it is " all right " — all according to the constitu- 

 tion and course of Nature. But then, to justify 

 this conclusion, we must understand Nature in 

 the largest sense, — as including all that is 



" In the round ocean, and in the living air, 

 And the blue sky, and in the mind of man''' * 



We must understand it as including every agency 

 which we see entering, or can conceive from 

 analogy as capable of entering, into the causation 



* 



of the world. First and foremost among these 

 is the agency of our own Mind and Will. Yet, 

 strange to say, all reference to this agency is 

 often tacitly excluded when we speak of the laws 



* Tintern Abbey. — Wordsworth. 



