15. Fifthly, the inquirer is to be reminded of the very important fact that, on his own admission, the limitations of matter in space originate, not in the Cause, but in the very nature of the thing caused of the material medium which exhibits the effect. He himself predicates of matter that it is conditioned by limits; that its nature forbids it to be properly infinite in extension. The question arises, therefore, what series of effects, exhibited in a substance necessarily subject to special limits, he - as a being constituted to infer, from what he sees, more than he sees - would deem an adequate illustration of uncircumscribed power? We just now intimated that the absolute origination of a single atom might be, in the estimation of superior beings, but the sole prerogative and the adequate proof of Omnipotence. But here is a universe of matter! He has no line with which to measure it. Words, numbers, imagination, fail, in succession, to do justice to the interminable reality. We say, interminable; for the inquirer must bear in mind that our view of the Divine power relies especially on the phenomena of the material universe, regarded as successive and progressive. Now, could its unimaginable masses be caused to roll or rush before him, in succession; surely he would not require many ages of such a survey to elapse, before he would feel constrained to exclaim, "It is enough!" Here, too, is a universe of matter in motion. Let him be given to understand the numerical amount of the forces implied in all this activity; surely, after the calculation had lasted for ages without any prospect of termination, he could not forbear confessing, "Nothing is too hard for God!" Here is a universe perpetually changing in all its parts. The changes which our own planet has passed through imply periods of time beyond our computation. Let him conceive himself to have beheld the first change, and the next, and so on, in succession; surely he would have exclaimed, ages, and cycles of ages ago, "Power belongeth unto God!". -all-sufficient power. He cannot but feel that, in such an imaginary position, the mere reasoning which measures the cause by the effect would soon be out of place; that, having prepared the way for a loftier rule, it would confess its own inadequacy, and be silent. Other and higher faculties than it implies would be awakened, and would assert their claims. And when he remembered that the mighty system was, both in the constitution of every particle and the collocation of its unnumbered worlds, entirely dependent on the will of God, he would feel that even here "was the hiding of His power". that He could reduce or enlarge the universe at pleasure. When he saw the innumerable changes which the great system had already passed through; and that no trace was visible of a failure of power, but, on the contrary, that everything was apparently constructed and conducted to evince its presence and its plenitude, he could not but feel himself challenged to say whether anything more was wanting to convince him of the all-sufficiency of God, in this department, for all the future. And when he recollected, that "the arm of God was still bare," still evolving and working out the immeasurable scheme; that every new moment brought with it an incalculable amount of new evidence of the Divine Power to be added to all the accumulations of the past; and that of such increase there was no prospect of an end; he would feel himself in the presence of a God all-sufficient, and spontaneously adore. 16. For, in the consideration of this subject, it should never be forgotten, that, as we have before remarked, man is not merely an intellectual, but also a moral being; a being meant for virtue as well as for reasoning, and partly, as the result of his reasoning. In relation to every moral truth, therefore, which he may be required to believe, evidence, depending for its due effect on his own diligence, attention, and state of mind, is to be expected, to a certain amount, but not beyond that amount. If wanting in that amount, belief would be impossible; if it be in excess of that amount, it would, by compelling belief, make virtue impossible. Constituted as man is, if his belief is to be at once rational and virtuous, the evidence on which it is to be based must be supplied in "weight and measure." Such evidence, it is conceived, is supplied in this opening stage of the Divine procedure-evidence calculated to call forth the intelligent and adoring exclamation, "Lo! these are parts of His ways; but the thunder of His power who can understand!" And thus the method and the reason of the Divine Plan, as evinced in this primary display, find their ultimate end, in contributing to prove the all-sufficiency of the power of God. FOURTH PART. ORGANIC NATURE. The Second Stage of Divine Manifestation. POWER AND WISDOM. THE first stage of the Divine manifestation disclosed to us 66 enormous masses of matter rolling around the horizon of illimitable space," impelling us to the conclusion that the Creator of these must be a Being of all-sufficient power. Let it be supposed that, haunted and bewildered with the sublime spectacle, and with the laws to which we saw matter successively subjected, we had retired to muse on the omnipotence of the Being who had produced the whole, and on the probable design of its production; and suppose, that now again, after the lapse of an incalculable period, it were permitted us to revisit some part of the material universe, to behold the manifestation of another perfection of Deity; what may we conceive that perfection would be? 1. But here, again, let it be premised that we do not contemplate anything like sudden transition in the Divine Manifestation, any distinct line which appropriates all within it to one attribute to the exclusion of every other. The very progressiveness of the manifestation implies the contrary; implies that which we actually find, that even the earliest attribute supposes the coëxistence of all that appear after it, and is itself to be carried on through all the intermediate stages of the great process, to the last. 2. But if, for reasons already assigned, we are warranted in concluding that the manifestation will be gradual; and if, in harmony with this expectation, we have found that the first display was an exercise of power, and that even this display advanced from step to step, as if to point attention to something yet beyond; we are surely warranted in expecting that the period will come in the history of creation, when another attribute will characterize the manifestation as distinctly as power does already. What, we repeat, is that attribute likely to be? We have already answered the question, in effect, by supposing that the manifestation of that power has filled us with wonder as to what is the design of the universe of matter. Wisdom, then, is the next perfection for whose manifestation we look; for with God, design and wisdom mean the same thing. Wisdom is evinced in the adaptation and adjustment of means to ends. Having seen the means, (we might be supposed to say,) let us proceed to examine the ends. Power has produced the material; in what way, and to what purposes, will Wisdom employ it? Immeasurable ages have elapsed since the first fiat went forth, and the universe seemed filled, or filling, with a new substance; what changes may not have passed on it, besides those which we witnessed, during the immense interval! What if, since our last survey, another fiat should have gone forth; and, in consequence, another effect have been produced as wonderful as the first, and by means of it! Now what should we be willing to accept as such an effect? And here, if the mind would do anything like justice to those primary displays to which, in the order of the subject. we are now approaching, it should labor to divest itself, as much as possible, of all the impressions of the Divine Wisdom which it has received from the later and loftier stages of the manifestation. Placing ourselves, then, in the situation of beings to whom nothing of the kind has yet been disclosed, what, we repeat, should we be willing to consider as a display of wisdom - of wisdom so marked, as to constitute an era in the manifestation, so wonderful, that it should seem to unveil to us a new view of the Divine character, to bring us nearer than ever to the Divine presence, and to remove all bounds from our expectation as to the future? 3. We will suppose that the particular section of the universe visited is the solar system; and that, having marked the scientifically calculated intervals between the sun and the planets, and between the planets themselves, and especially the rigorous equality subsisting between the angular motions of rotation and revolution of each satellite, we have been brought to conclude, with Laplace, that the arrangement is a protest against chance. We will suppose that the particular part of the solar sy tem to which we direct our attention is the earth; that we mark the progressive changes which it exhibits as compared with that primitive fluidity in which we beheld it untold ages ago; trace over again its laws of motion, and chemistry, and crystallization; and fancy ourselves one while standing in the midst of a vast chemical laboratory, where the great agent heat was crystallizing all things; and another while, amidst the conflicting operations of its wellmatched antagonist, water, assailing, wearing, and reducing continents of crystal to atoms, and carrying them away to its own depths, but bearing them away only to lose them again by a subterranean force, which lifts them up from their submerged state to the light of day a lofty table-land. Still, we should feel that all this was only the play or conflict of inorganic matthat each form we beheld was lifeless, and each motion compelled, or impressed by a force from without, " ceasing when that ceased, and never proceeding beyond its compulsory impulse, either in direction or degree." ter; 4. What, then, if some form of organic vegetable life had now for the first time met our view! It matters not whether that form came into existence slowly or suddenly, alone,1 or in company with kindred tribes, and with millions of each tribe; the fact that the earth, after the existence of a "limited eternity," has become the owner of a new principle-a principle, be it remarked, hitherto unknown to the whole course of nature a principle hitherto peculiar to the Creator himself, the sacred and mysterious principle of LIFE; and that innumerable pre-existing phenomena were now for the first time employed as means, for the development of this new principle as an end; this would surely be hailed by us as an epoch in the progress of the Divine Manifestation. Wisdom. Here was a result of which the supreme and ultimate reason is in the Divine Nature. 5. We have not yet to speak of the extent of the wisdom to be inferred from this new form of existence. At present, we have only to regard it as evincing the existence of design in the Divine Creator. Hereafter, we shall have to treat of it as being also a new illustration of creative power, and of every attribute and relation of the Deity already dis 1 See Note D. |