STATE OF THE ARGUMENT 
1 
ceive the limit to be attained: but where there is no such 
tendency, or approach, nothing is effected by lengthening 
the series. There is no difference, as to the point in ques¬ 
tion, (whatever there may be as to many points,) between 
one series and another; between a series which is finite, 
and a series which is infinite. A chain, composed of an 
infinite number of links, can no more support itself, than 
a chain composed of a finite number of links. And of this 
we are assured, (though we never can have tried the ex¬ 
periment,) because, by increasing the number of links, 
from ten, for instance, to a hundred, from a hundred to a 
thousand, &c. we make not the smallest approach, we ob¬ 
serve not the smallest tendency, towards self-support. 
There is no difference in this respect (yet there may be 
a great difference in several respects) between a chain of 
a greater or less length, between one chain and another, 
between one that is finite and one that is infinite. 
This very much resembles the case before us. The 
machine which we are inspecting demonstrates, by its 
construction, contrivance and design. Contrivance must 
have had a contriver; design, a designer; whether the 
machine immediately proceeded from another machine or 
not. That circumstance alters not the case. That other 
machine may, in like manner, have proceeded from a for¬ 
mer machine: nor does that alter the case; contrivance 
must have had a contriver. That former one from one 
preceding it: no alteration still; a contriver is still neces¬ 
sary. No tendency is perceived, no approach towards a 
diminution of this necessity. It is the same with any and 
every succession of these machines; a succession of ten, 
of a hundred, of a thousand; with one series as with an¬ 
other; a series which is finite, as with a series which is 
infinite. In whatever other respects they may differ, in 
this they do not. In all, equally, contrivance and design 
are unaccounted for. 
The question is not simply, How came the first watch 
into existence? which question, it may be pretended, is 
done away by supposing the series of watches thus pro¬ 
duced from one another to have been infinite, and conse¬ 
quently to have had no such first , for which it was neces¬ 
sary to provide a cause. This, perhaps, would have been 
nearly the state of the question, if nothing had been before 
us but an unorganized, unmechanized substance, without 
mark or indication of contrivance. It might be difficult to 
show that such substance could not have existed from eter¬ 
nity, either in succession (if it were possible, which I think 
