the argument as to the non-eternal character of heat implies a knowledge of the universe as a whole, has not the slightest reason or relevancy. I have adopted none of the theories alluded to, as I should thereby have weakened my argument and represented theism as dependent on some particular speculation in physics, when in reality its evidence is greatly superior to what can be brought forward for the majority of scientific doctrines. I merely argued that, from any plausible theory of matter, it follows that matter is not to be regarded as selfexistent; and that the reasoning by which it has been attempted to prove that heat is non-eternal, requires to be refuted by those who assert or assume that the world is eternal.

He passes from that part of my work which he has failed to understand, in consequence of disregarding the theory of disjunctive syllogisms and the principles of physics, to my treatment of the design argument. This he admits to have been quite conclusive against all opponents until he himself appeared. “For this argument assumes, rightly enough, that the only alternative we have in choosing our hypothesis concerning the final explanation of things, is either to regard that explanation as Intelligence or as Fortuity. This, I say, was a legitimate argument a few months ago, because, up to that time, no one had shown that strictly natural causes, as distinguished from chances, could conceivably be able to produce a cosmos; and although the several previous writers to whom Professor Flint alludes-and he might have alluded to others in this connection-entertained a dim anticipation of the fact that natural causes might alone be sufficient to produce the observed universe, still these dim anticipations were worthless as arguments

so long as it remained impossible to suggest any natural principle whereby such a result could have been conceivably effected by such causes. But it is evident that Professor Flint's time-honoured argument is now completely overthrown, unless it can be proved that there is some radical error in the reasoning whereby I have endeavoured to show that natural causes not only may, but must, have produced existing order. The overthrow is complete, because the very groundwork of the argument in question is knocked away; a third possibility, of the nature of a necessity, is introduced, and therefore the alternative is no longer between Intelligence and Fortuity, but between Intelligence and Natural Causation." From words like these one would suppose that Physicus had discovered a quite new explanation of the order of the universe. But no; when we turn to Chapters iv. and vi.-those to which he so triumphantly points uswe find that he has merely to tell us, what materialists have constantly told us, from Leucippus and Democritus downwards-namely, that "all and every law follows as a necessary consequence from the persistence of force. and the primary qualities of matter," and that he presents to us a number of loose statements to this effect, singly as "illustrations," and collectively as a "demonstration," of it. If the design argument is not valid against the reasoning in these chapters it was never valid in any reference. Physicus produces no particle of evidence to show that force is a "self-existent substance" or "eternal substratum," and explains in no single case how without law it should produce law, or how it should produce order, unless so defined as to quantity, so distributed, and otherwise so conditioned, as to presuppose Intelligence. The root of a large amount of his con

fusion is to be traced to his entertaining mythical and anti-scientific notions about "force" and "the persistence of force," which a deliberate and candid perusal of the chapters on "the varieties of energy" and "the conservation of energy" in any good treatise on Physics might possibly dissipate.

The criticisms on the evidence for the moral attributes of God entirely ignore its character and weight as a whole, and need no other answer than that the sentences objected to should be restored to their original connection and interpreted in relation to their context.

It is impossible to read the following passages from the work of Physicus without deeply deploring that a blunder in physics should have caused so much confusion in an interesting intellect, and inflicted so much pain on an apparently noble nature :—

"If it had been my lot to have lived in the last generation, I should certainly have rested in these 'sublime conceptions' as an argument supreme and irrefutable. I should have felt that the progress of physical knowledge could never exert any other influence on theism than that of ever tending more and more to confirm that magnificent belief, by continuously expanding our human thoughts into progressively advancing conceptions, ever grander and yet more grand, of that tremendous Origin of Things-the Mind of God. Such would have been my hope-such would have been my prayer. But now, how changed! Never in the history of man has so terrific a calamity befallen the race as that which all who look may now behold advancing as a deluge, black with destruction, resistless in might, uprooting our most cherished hopes, engulfing our most precious creed, and burying our highest life in mindless desolation. Science,

6

whom erstwhile we thought a very Angel of God, pointing to that great barrier of Law, and proclaiming to the restless sea of changing doubt, Hitherto shalt thou come, but no further, and here shall thy proud waves be stayed,' even Science has now herself thrown down this trusted barrier; the flood-gates of infidelity are open, and atheism overwhelming is upon us."-Pp. 51, 52.

"So far as the ruination of individual happiness is concerned, no one can have a more lively perception than myself of the possibly disastrous tendency of my work. So far as I am individually concerned, the result of this analysis has been to show that, whether I regard the problem of theism on the lower plane of strictly relative probability, or on the higher plane of purely formal considerations, it equally becomes my obvious. duty to stifle all belief of the kind which I conceive to be the noblest, and to discipline my intellect with regard to this matter into an attitude of the purest scepticism. And forasmuch as I am far from being able to agree with those who affirm that the twilight doctrine of the 'new faith' is a desirable substitute for the waning splendour of the old,' I am not ashamed to confess that, with this virtual negation of God, the universe to me has lost its soul of loveliness; and although from henceforth the precept to work while it is day' will doubtless but gain an intensified force from the terribly intensified meaning of the words that 'the night cometh when no man can work,' yet when at times I think, as think at times I must, of the appalling contrast between the hallowed glory of that creed which once was mine, and the lonely mystery of existence as now I find it,—at such times I shall ever feel it impossible to avoid the sharpest pang of which my nature is susceptible. For

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Anti-Theistic Theories.

whether it be due to my intelligence not being sufficiently advanced to meet the requirements of the age, or whether it be due to the memory of those sacred associations which to me, at least, were the sweetest that life has given, I cannot but feel that for me, and for others who think as I do, there is a dreadful truth in those words of Hamilton,-Philosophy having become a meditation, not merely of death, but of annihilation, the precept know thyself has become transformed into the terrific oracle to Edipus-Mayest thou ne'er know the truth of what thou art.'

Be not Martyrs by Mistake.

NOTE IV., page 38.

HISTORY, CAUSES, AND CONSEQUENCES OF ATHEISM.

Few works were written expressly against atheism until the sixteenth century was considerably advanced. The 'Antiatheon' of Fr. Boria, published at Toulouse in 1561, the Atheomachie' of De Bourgeville, published at Paris in 1564, the Atheomachie' of Baruch Caneph, published at Geneva in 1581, and the Atheomastix' of G. Ab. Assonlevilla, published at Antwerp in 1598, were among the earliest specimens of the class.

Publications of this kind followed one another in rapid succession during the seventeenth century. Among those which appeared in English, the following may be specified: Martin Fotherby's Atheomastix' (1622); Walter Charleton's 'Darkness of Atheism expelled by the Light of Nature' (1652); Henry More's 'Antidote against Atheism' (1662); Sir Charles Wolseley's 'Un