g
to the theory, is only one-fourth the density of the earth. La Place
himself has demonstrated that these densities and arrangements are
indispensable to the stability of the system. But they are plainly
contradictory to his theory of its formation.[207]

The palpable difference of luminosity between the sun and the planets,
which, as they are all made of the very same materials, and by the same
process, according to this theory, ought to be equally self-luminous, is
in itself a self-evident refutation of the nebular hypothesis, or of any
other process of creation by mere mechanical law. "The same power,
whether natural or supernatural, which placed the sun in the center of
the six primary planets, placed Saturn in the center of the orb of his
five secondary planets; and Jupiter in the center of his four secondary
planets; and the earth in the center of the moon's orbit; and,
therefore, had this cause been a blind one, _without contrivance or
design_, the sun would have been a body of the same kind with Saturn,
Jupiter, and the Earth; that is, _without light or heat_. Why there is
one body in our system qualified to give light and heat to all the rest,
I know no reason, but because the Author of the system thought it
convenient." So says the immortal Newton.[208]

The great expounder of modern science--Humboldt--is equally explicit in
enumerating the decisive marks of choice and will in the construction of
the solar system, and in contemptuously dismissing the notion of
development and creation by natural law from the halls of science.

"Up to the present time, _we are ignorant, as I have already remarked,
of any internal necessity--any mechanical law of nature_--which (like
the beautiful law which connects the square of the periods of revolution
with the cube of the major axis) represents the above-named
elements--the absolute magnitude of the planets, their density,
flattening at the poles, velocity of rotation, and presence or absence
of moons--of the order of succession of the individual planetary bodies
of each group, in their dependence upon the distances. Although the
planet which is nearest the sun is densest--even six or eight times
denser than some of the exterior planets: Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and
Neptune--the order of succession in the case of Venus, the Earth, and
Mars, is very irregular. The absolute magnitudes do, generally, as
Kepler has already observed, increase with the distances; but this does