206 
to suit tlie various muscles, and adapted to tlie requirements of the human 
body, is something marvellous. Yet we may not see the end and purpose of 
them all. There are said to be typical parts of the human body. I cannot 
understand such a thing as order as distinct from skill and design. Order 
must be the result of intelligence ; and we are positively incapable of believing 
that disorder comes of intelligence. If that is so, the existence of useless 
members does not by any means get rid of the evidence we actually have. 
That evidence is of immense amount, extending through the whole of ani- 
mated nature ; it shows adaptation, proves the presence of a designing mind, 
and upon that I rest the argument and the proof of the existence of a 
God. The moral proofs are even stronger. The idea of ought implies 
responsibility ; and those who would deny it would have to reconstruct 
the entire structure of human language. They are obliged, after all, to use 
the ordinary language of men ; and if you take any man who denies the 
independent existence of our moral perceptions, and says that morality can 
be resolved into simple expediency or self-love, the language he uses inva- 
riably contradicts his assertions. 
The Chairman. — With reference to the 13th paragraph, Mr. Row did not 
quite explain Mr. Holvoake’s error. I would have checked Mr. Holyoake 
myself had he not been quite so impatient. He simply left out an “ if,” and 
therefore his whole argument goes for nothing. The accusation that he 
brought against my paper is, that it avoids the question raised in the debate 
at which Mr. Holyoake presided. I think that is hardly so. .It was written 
upon that very question, and within a month of that discussion. . I invited 
those who were present at that debate to come to a free discussion upon it y 
and I suppose, as Mr. Holyoake has not said anything to the contrary, he was 
not present. 
Mr. Holyoake. — I did not hear it. 
The Chairman.— My paper will also be printed ; and if I had known earlier 
that Dr. M‘Cann’s had been so brief, I would have had mine circulated also. 
But Mr. Holyoake can yet have the opportunity of replying to it. 
Dr. M‘Cann, in reply.— I cannot accept Mr. Row’s assertion that he has 
demolished me 
Mr. Row. — I said I came with the intention of doing so. 
Dr. M‘Cann. — But you have spared me. You said you did not believe 
my argument capable of mathematical demonstration.. I affirm that it is , 
and have given my reasons. I believe the position is axiomatic, and in 
demonstrating mathematics we string axiom to axiom 
Mr. Row— I should have contended that your axioms were not axioms. 
Dr. M‘Cann.— That is what I wished to have discussed. Whether, my 
statements are entitled to the character of axioms or not, the propositions 
are asserted to be self-evident; and it does not require many words to 
explain them, and to show they are not only axiomatic but intuitive. If 
they are truly self-evident it suffices ; whether they are intuitive or not, is a 
different matter. I, however, agree in much that Mr. Row has said, especially 
about the word “ought”; also that the moral argument is the strongest, 
