hat belief in a Supreme
Being which it was the object of these authors to substantiate. If it
has demonstrated the futility of their proof, it has furnished nothing
in the way of disproof. It has shown, indeed, that their line of
argument was misjudged when they thus sought to separate organic nature
from inorganic as a theatre for the special or peculiar display of
supernatural design; but further than this it has not shown anything.
The change in question therefore, although greater in degree, is the
same in kind as all its predecessors: like all previous advances in
cosmological theory which have been wrought by the advance of science,
this latest and greatest advance has been that of revealing the
constitution of nature, or the method of causation, as everywhere the
same. But it is evident that this change, vast and to all appearance
final though it be, must end within the limits of natural causation
itself. The whole world of life and mind may now have been annexed to
that of matter and energy as together constituting one magnificent
dominion, which is everywhere subject to the same rule, or method of
government. But the ulterior and ultimate question touching the nature
of this government as mental or non-mental, personal or impersonal,
remains exactly where it was. Indeed, this is a question which cannot be
affected by _any_ advance of science, further than science has proved
herself able to dispose of erroneous arguments based upon ignorance of
nature. For while the sphere of science is necessarily restricted to
that of natural causation which it is her office to explore, the
question touching the _nature of this natural causation_ is one which as
necessarily lies without the whole sphere of such causation itself:
therefore it lies beyond any possible intrusion by science. And not only
so. But if the nature of natural causation be that of the highest order
of known existence, then, although we must evidently be incapable of
conceiving what such a Mind is, at least we seem capable of judging what
in many respects it is not. It cannot be more than one; it cannot be
limited either in space or time; it cannot be other than at least as
self-consistent as its manifestations in nature are invariable. Now,
from the latter deduction there arises a point of first-rate importance
in the present connexion. For if the so-called First Cause be
intelligent, and therefore all secondary causes but the expression of a
supreme Will