standing they might merely find their appropriate places. This
would increase the chances against a well-formed system to an amount
beyond all calculation or conception. In the case of the alphabet, the
chances for the letters to fall bottom up or aslant are not included. And
when we reflect that the blind goddess, or "unintelligent forces," would
have to contend against such fearful odds in the case of a single
individual, how long are we to suppose it would be, ere from old Chaos she
could shake this mighty universe, with all its myriads upon myriads of
existences, into the glorious order and beauty in which it now exists.

AN ATHEIST IS A FOOL.

He can't believe that two letters can be adjusted to each other without
design, and yet he can believe all the foregoing incredibilities.

I might swell the list to a vast extent. I might bring into view the
verdure of the earth as being the most agreeable of all colors to the eye;
the general diffusion of the indispensibles and necessaries of life, such
as air, light, water, food, clothing, fuel, while less necessary things,
such as spices, gold, silver, tin, lead, zinc, are less diffused; also,
the infinite variety in things--in men, for instance--by which we can
distinguish one from another. But I forbear. Is it reasonable to conclude
that, where there are possible appearances of design, still no design is
there? or even that it is probable there is none?

I have said that there is as much evidence of purpose in the works of
nature as in those of art. I now say that there is more, _infinitely_
more. Should the wheels of nature stop their revolutions, and her energies
be palsied, and life and motion cease, even then would she exhibit
incomparably greater evidence of design, in her mere construction and
adaptation, than do the works of art. Shall we then be told that when she
is in full operation, and daily producing millions upon millions of
useful, of intelligent, of marvelous effects, she still manifests no marks
of intelligence! In nature we not only see all the works of art infinitely
exceeded, but we see, as it were, those works self-moved and performing
their operations without external agency. To use a faint comparison, we
see a factory in motion without water, wind or steam, its cotton placing
itself within the reach of the picker, the cards, the spinning-frame and
the loom, and turning out in rolls or cloth. Such virtually, nay, far more
wonderful, is t