Religious Belief. 



185 



natural primitive relations of animal life ; those sys- 

 tems to which we have given the names of the great 

 leaders of our science who first proposed them, being 

 in truth but translations into human language of the 

 thoughts of the Creator. And if this is indeed so, 

 do we not find in this adaptability of the human 

 intellect to the facts of creation, by which we be- 

 come instinctively and, as I have said, uncon- 

 sciously the translators of the thoughts of God, the 

 most conclusive proof of our aflfinity with the Divine 

 mind? And is not this intellectual and spiritual 

 connection with the Almighty worthy of our deepest 

 consideration ? If there is any truth in the belief 

 that man is made in the image of God, it is surely 

 not amiss for the philosopher to endeavour by the 

 study of his own mental operations to comprehend 

 the workings of the Divine Reason, learning from 

 the nature of his own mind better to understand the 

 Infinite Intellect from which it is derived/* 



Agassiz was first of all a believer in a Divine 

 Ruler, in a Creator of all things. To him it was 

 this Divine Intelligence that governed life. He was 

 essentially religious ; the teaching of his devoted 

 and pious mother had taken so deep root that he 

 never wandered. It was this in part that undoubt- 

 edly made Agassiz the successful teacher that he 

 was. The simplest facts in nature gave him inspira- 

 tion. Every leaf, the smallest animals were but the 

 evidences of the Divine Creator whose existence 

 he acknowledged. In his essay on Classification 

 he says: ''AH the facts proclaim aloud the one 

 God, whom we know, adore, and love ; and Natural 



