rmonies of nature in respect of
color, of number, of form, and of time are forcibly exhibited in
"Typical Forms and Special Ends in Creation," by M'Cosh.]

Again, the world is assuredly _perfect_, as being the sensible image and
copy of the Divinity, the outward and multiple development of the
Eternal Unity. It must, therefore, when thoroughly known and properly
interpreted, answer to all which we can conceive as perfect; that is, it
must be regulated by laws, of which we have the highest principles in
those first and elementary properties of numbers which stand next to
_unity_. "The world is then, through all its departments, _a living
arithmetic in its development, a realized geometry in its repose_." It
is a kosmos (for the word is purely Pythagorean)--the expression of
_harmony_, the manifestation, to sense, of everlasting _order_.

Though Pythagoras found in geometry the fitting initiative for abstract
speculation, it is remarkable that he himself preferred to constitute
the science of Numbers as the true representative of the laws of the
universe. The reason appears to be this: that though geometry speaks
indeed of eternal truths, yet when the notion of symmetry and proportion
is introduced, it is often necessary to insist, in preference, upon the
properties of numbers. Hence, though the universe displays the geometry
of its Constructor or Animator, yet nature was eminently defined as the
mimesis ton arithmon--the imitation of numbers.

The key to all the Pythagorean dogmas, then, seems to be the general
formula of _unity in multiplicity_:--unity either evolving itself into
multiplicity, or unity discovered as pervading multiplicity. The
principle of all things, the same principle which in this philosophy, as
in others, was customarily called _Deity_, is the primitive unit from
which all proceeds in the accordant relations of the universal scheme.
Into the sensible world of multitude, the all-pervading Unity has
infused his own ineffable nature; he has impressed his own image upon
that world which is to represent him in the sphere of sense and man.
What, then, is that which is at once single and multiple, identical and
diversified--which we perceive as the combination of a thousand
elements, yet as the expression of a single spirit--which is a chaos to
the sense, a cosmos to the reason? What is it but
harmony--proportion--the one governing the many, the many lost in the
one? The world is therefore a _harmony_ in