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discoveries of modem science, requires the rejection of any hypothesis 
which does not account for the whole range of known facts to which it 
relates. Now, I ask, is there no other hypothesis than that of the Dar- 
winian which win account for aU the observed phenomena of animal and 
vegetable life and structure ? I have shown that there is one : one, too, 
possessing this advantage, that while it includes all the facts urged in favour 
of the Darwinian theory, embraces aU those which cannot be deduced from 
that theory, and many which are directly in opposition to it. I say that 
there is such a hypothesis. I have already brought it before you. Why 
are we to abandon it? Upon what sound scientific or philosophical 
grounds ? Because it is too narrow to account for newly-observed facts or 
phenomena ? No. But because it is considered to have too theological an 
aspect ! Therefore, we must take another, less theological, deduced from a 
narrower range of facts, and leaving out others strictly included in the 
rejected one. But why should we be afraid of the theological aspect of a 
theory ? Why adopt another which drives the operations of the Deity a 
little farther from our ken ? Are there not great philosophical truths which 
man cannot possibly ignore, though they do lead him up to the more imme- 
diate contemplation of the work of his Creator ? If the visible things of the 
world have plainly imprinted on them the fact that they are creatures of an 
invisible Creator— a Creator almighty in power and infinite in wisdom— I say 
if that fact be written clearly and intelligibly on all that we call the works of 
nature, surely we have no right to exclude that grand, general, most patent 
fact, because in the present day it may be regarded by some as too theo- 
logical, or as introducing a theological bias into science. If science be another 
name for real knowledge— if science be the pursuit of sound wisdom— if 
science be the pursuit of truth itself— I say that man has no right to reject 
anything that is true, because it savours of God. Well, what is this 
hypothesis — older than that of Darwin— which does, and does alone, account 
for all the observed facts, or all which we can read, recorded in the book of 
nature ? It is, that God created all things very good— that he made every 
vegetable after its own kind— that he made every animal after its own kind 
—that he allowed certain laws of variation, but that he has ordained strict 
though invisible and invincible barriers which prevent that variation from 
running riot— and which include it within strict and well-defined limits. This 
is a hypothesis which will account for all that we have learnt from the works 
of nature. It admits an intelligent Being as the author of all the works of 
creation, animate as well as inanimate : it leaves no mysteries in the animate 
world unaccounted for. There is one thing which the animate as well as the 
inanimate world declares to man, one thing everywhere plainly recorded,, if 
we will only read it, and that is the impress of design— the design of Infinite 
Wisdom. Any theory which comes in with an attempt to ignore design as 
manifested in God’s creation, is a theory I say which attempts to dethrone 
God. This the theory of Darwin does endeavour to do. If asked how 
our old theory accounts for such uniformity of design in the. midst of such 
perplexing variety as we find in nature, we reply, that this can only be 
