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Let us examine it. All that we see there is limited, all is form 
and movement, form determined, movement calculated ; all 
falls under the straightened empire of measure, even the 
distances which remain unknown to our instruments, but are 
by no means unknown to our conceptions. We feel the limit 
even when our eye does not perceive it ; it is enough for us to 
seize it at one point to determine it everywhere. The infinite 
is indivisible, and were but one single atom of the universe 
submitted to our feeble hands, we should know that nature is 
finite, and that its immensity is but the splendid veil of its 
poverty.”* 
3. If all phenomena are limited by law, then they cannot 
have been self-originated, nor are they self -governed. A 
beginning without a Creator is inconceivable, and equally so 
the existence of law without a Ruler. 
4. It makes no difference to this argument whether the 
limits of phenomena were fixed from the first, or vary through 
development under fixed laws ; both are indications of a 
Creator. More roads than one lead to this terminus. On 
inviting you to follow the one indicated by the title of this 
paper, I first offer a few reasons for the pursuit. 
5. There is a vague creed of material infinity pervading 
much of published scientific thought, a creed which is really 
quite at variance with the admissions and conclusions of the 
masters of science. Into this expanse of infinity it is stated 
that religion is entering, stripping itself free from the shackles 
of Scripture and of churches, and proceeding on a limitless 
career of human improvement. The assumption that nature, 
and the order of nature, are unbounded, constitutes the 
groundwork of these arguments. 
6. In opposition to this assumption, I desire to maintain 
and urge that a consideration of the phenomena leads us to 
exclaim with Dante, — 
“ All, as they circle in their orders, look 
Aloft ; and, downward with such sway prevail, 
That all, with mutual impulse, tend to God.” 
7. The sentiment in question has arisen out of two 
great unverified hypotheses, — that of Uniformitarianism, 
inaugurated by the late Sir Charles Lyell, and Evolution, 
promoted by Mr. Darwin. These have given to our 
literature, language and colour far beyond the bounds of 
science. The two announcements of modern philosophy came 
so apparently complete, so easy of application, so facile to the 
* Existence of God : Conferences, p. 1 7. 
