. Each force, if left to itself, would
be the destruction of the universe. Were it not for the force of
gravitation, the centrifugal forces which impel the planets would fling
them off into space. Were it not for these centrifugal forces, the force
of gravitation would dash them against the sun. The ultimate fact of
astronomical science, therefore, is not the law of gravitation, but the
_adjustment_ between this law and other laws, so as to produce and
maintain the existing order.[264] 2d. There is _Light_, flowing from
numberless luminaries; and _Heat_, radiating everywhere from the warmer
to the colder regions; and there are a number of adjustments needed in
order to the beneficial operation of these agents. Suppose we grant that
by merely mechanical causes the sun became the centre of our system, how
did it become also the _source of its vivifying influences_? "How was
the fire deposited on this hearth? How was the candle placed on this
candlestick?" 3d. There is an all-pervading _Ether_, through which light
is transmitted, which offers resistance to the movement of the planetary
and cometary bodies, and tends to a dissipation of mechanical energy,
and which needs to be counter-balanced by well-adjusted arrangements to
secure the stability of the solar system. All this balancing of opposite
properties and forces carries our minds upward towards Him who holds the
balances in his hands, and to a Supreme Intelligence on whose
adjustments and collocations the harmony and stability of the universe
depends.[265]

[Footnote 264: Duke of Argyll, "Reign of Law," pp. 91, 92.]

[Footnote 265: M'Cosh, "Typical Forms and Special Ends," ch. xiii.]

The recognition of all teleology of organs in vegetable and animal
physiology is also persistently repudiated by this school. When Cuvier
speaks of the combination of organs in such order as to adapt the animal
to the part which it has to play in nature, Geoffroy Saint Hilaire
replies, "I know nothing of animals which have to play a part in
nature." "I have read, concerning fishes, that, because they live in a
medium which resists more than air, their motive forces are calculated
so as to give them the power of progression under these circumstances.
By this mode of reasoning, you would say of a man who makes use of
crutches, that he was originally destined to the misfortune of having a
leg paralyzed or amputated.[266] "With a modesty which savors of
affectation, he says, "I ascribe no