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heart, and it was for the cranes. For a long time afterwards, motionless, in 
the midst of the crowd which was moving around me. I kept observing the 
rapid movement of the swallows, and I was astonished to see them suspended 
in the air, just as if I had never seen that phenomenon. A feeling of pro- 
found admiration, unknown to me till then, lighted up my soul. I seemed 
to myself to be looking on Nature for the first time. I heard with surprise 
the buzzing of the flies, the song of the birds, and that mysterious and con- 
fused noise of the living creation which involuntarily celebrates its author. 
Ineffable concert, to which man alone has the sublime privilege of adding 
the accents of gratitude ! Who is the Author of this brilliant mechanism ? 
I exclaimed in the transport which animated me. Who is it that, opening 
his creative hand, let fly the first swallow into the air ? It is He who gave 
commandment to these trees to come forth from the grounds, and to lift 
their branches towards the sky.” 
De Maistre thus found out the difference between a God- 
created universe and a self- created mechanical world_j between 
existences and machines. 
Haeckel (Reynolds, p. 104) tells us : — Life is nothing but a 
connected chain of very complicated material phenomena of 
motion.'’^ 
Who does not see that if our amusing author had been 
endowed with skill and power to comijlete the chains he would 
still not have formed a bird, but only an automaton. However 
perfect such automata might be, they could not be conscious 
of their own happy existence, nor have such instinct to guide 
their flight as called forth his admiration. Doth the hawk fly 
by thij wisdom, and stretch her wings towards the south ? 
(Job xxxix. 26.) 
I am conscious of a hearty desire to know more on the 
subject, and And in Mr. Reynolds many passages of elaborate 
description of what is already known. Far from any wish to 
settle down in superstitious ignorance, I ask to know more ; 
for all will but declare more of the glory of God. Only let the 
knowledge be real. 
I am unable to lend myself to that facile acceptance of 
plausible inanities, which is so common, that even Professor 
Huxley (Reynolds, p. 15) says : — 
“ The army of liberal thought is, at present, in loose order, and many a 
spirited freethinker makes use of his freedom merely to vent nonsense. 
We should be the better for a vigorous and watchful enemy to hammer us 
into cohesion and discipline ; and I for one lament that the bench of bishops 
cannot show a man of the calibre of Butler of the Analogy^ who, if he were 
alive, would make short work of the current a 'priori infidelity.” 
This eminent Professor begins to see that the superstitious 
adherence of the followers of evolutionist theories to their 
chiefs, is a real hindrance to the progress of science. He 
has good sense enough to know (also) that our ignorance is 
greater than we willingly confess. 
