CREATION BY LAW. 267 
environ it, it flourishes; when imperfectly adapted it 
decays; when ill-adapted it becomes extinct. If all 
the conditions which determine an organism’s well- 
being are taken into consideration, this statement can 
hardly be disputed. 
This series of facts or laws, are mere statements of 
what is the condition of nature. They are facts or 
inferences which are generally known, generally ad- 
mitted—but in discussing the subject of the “ Origin 
of Species ”’—as generally forgotten. It is from these 
universally admitted facts, that the origin of all the 
varied forms of nature may be deduced by a logical 
chain of reasoning, which, however, is at every step 
verified and shown to be in strict accord with facts ; 
and, at the same time, many curious phenomena which 
can by no other means be understood, are explained 
and accounted for. It is probable, that these primary 
facts or laws are but results of the very nature of life, 
and of the essential properties of organized and un- 
organized matter. Mr. Herbert Spencer, in his “ First 
Principles” and his “‘ Biology” has, I think, made us 
able to understand how this may be; but at present 
we may accept these simple laws without going further 
back, and the question then is—whether the variety, the 
harmony, the contrivance, and the beauty we perceive 
in organic beings, can have been produced by the 
action of these laws alone, or whether we are required 
to believe in the incessant interference and direct action 
of the mind and will of the Creator. It is simply a 
