366 



regular streets, in each of which a certain uniformity prevails ; 

 while the streets themselves are arranged according to that 

 particular order which the founder of the city had previously 

 anticipated and designed.^ 



The Philosophy of Lamarck and his Disciples. 



25. Wise and merciful forethought, which provides an adap- 

 tation of means to meet the wants of the creature, is a truth 

 pencilled with light through every department of the Divine 

 handiwork. 



This universal principle, so beautifully illustrative of the 

 ever-present superintendence of God over His works, produces 

 an ardency of expectation in His creatures which enables us 

 to believe everything not incredible, and to hope for every- 

 thing not impossible. Therefore intelligent believers in the 

 Divine authority of the Bible are of all men the most 

 Catholic in their recognition of scientific progress and the 

 least dogmatical upon the unsolved problems of creation. 

 For they know that there are difficulties as far above reason 

 as reason is above instinct, and also that He who in the 

 riches of transcendant wisdom arranged the Divine history of 

 the Bible has also arranged the constitution and the course 

 of Nature. We may therefore look calmly on the discoveries 

 of modern science, for it must be evident that truth can 

 never be opposed to truth. So that the facts of Natural 

 Philosophy, instead of being opposed to the truth of Scripture, 

 must of necessity be proofs and illustrations of each other, 

 and of the variegated goodness of God, and, in coming from 

 our minds, form kindred portions of one great whole. 



26. The only limit to our belief is the impossible. This 

 is that border-land where the war of words begins. Yet even 

 here we are not left to blind conjecture. Wanton fate does 

 not sport with the universe as the disciples of Lamarck would 

 lead us to suppose. From facts already known we can make 

 progress towards facts yet unknown, but as finite creatures we 

 are gently and mercifully reminded at almost every stage of 

 our inquiry that the infinite and unknowable is immoa- 

 surably above our reach, and lies in the boundless horizon 

 beyond us. For want of this modest deference to the will of 



Ogilvie on the Frinciphs of Organic Architeciure. 



