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without hearing Dr. Deane, is to discuss this paper. We cannot have Mr 
Morshead’s paper read to us, because the Council found this paper was so 
meagre and so short that it might well be extended over more ground, so 
as to exhaust the subject more effectually. Under these circumstances, this 
night became an open night with no paper for discussion at all, and the 
Council have acted according to the best of their judgment in the matter. 
It has been no choice of mine that a paper read originally in 1852 should 
now be read here again. My paper was not prepared for this Society, but 
having been read I think it would be better that it should also be discussed. 
I am sorry that Mr. Bradlaugh and Mr. Holyoake are not here to-night. 
When the paper was discussed before, they scarcely put in an appearance 
against it. 
Rev. C. A. Row. — Let me state what part I have taken in this matter. 
When I read the other paper which was brought forward at the same 
meeting with this one — I mean the paper by Dr. M‘Cann : “A Demonstra- 
tion of the Existence of God,”— I was of opinion that it would not hold 
water. I saw Mr. Reddie on the evening previous to the meeting, and I 
advised the production of his paper without the least knowledge that any 
infidel would be in the room, because I thought the other paper was in- 
efficient, and I thought it desirable to get a better one to place upon our 
records. That was done without any knowledge on my part that Mr, 
Holyoake was coming. When I found that he was coming, I only felt the 
more anxious to raise a tangible issue instead of one which a man could 
most effectually demolish in a moment, because I came myself prepared 
to attack Dr. MUann’s paper even more severely than Mr. Holyoake did. 
The Chairman. — I need only remark that my own feelings sympathize 
with the action of the Council in. admitting this subject for discussion. 
When we consider the position of those who are connected with science, and 
when we know how infidelity and atheism are probably gaining ground 
among not the least intellectual order of the English people, I think we are 
right in attempting to meet such a state of things and in supporting our 
own belief. I think the Council is perfectly justified in introducing a 
paper and discussing an argument which have for their object the dislodg- 
ment of atheism and the establishing a belief in the Deity. I only regret 
that Dr. Deane did not receive notice of what was to be the course pursued 
this evening, and I think I shall be right in asking Mr. Reddie to go on 
with the discussion of this paper. 
Mr. Reddie. — My object in writing this paper was not to bring forward 
the argument from design, because I always felt that there was a difficulty 
in dealing with that among those who did not see design, whereas the 
moment a person sees design in nature the argument from design is no longer 
necessary. When once you enlighten a man and let him see that the cell of 
the bee or that the eye could not have been formed without design, you have 
done enough. The cell of the bee is of the most wonderful construction, 
exhibiting the greatest economy of space, and yet it is not produced by any 
intellectual process, but instinctively. We argue that it is produced by a 
