olizing its expression. As in the case of matter, the
first result of the divine activity was more matter, undiscriminated by
any further attribute; so here, we have, as the first organic creation,
a concrete expression of the highest possible generalization comprising
the fewest possible attributes--that is, forms of life involving the
fewest individual characteristics. To matter add the simplest organic
attribute--that is, the one lying nearest the genus--and we have mere
organized matter, the simple cell, the foundation of all life, no matter
how great its future complexity, equally the origin of animal and
vegetable growth, which are as yet entirely undiscriminated. This would
be the first appearance of life.[1] Differentiating again by the
addition of a new attribute, and organic being is subdivided into the
two species, vegetable and animal. Beginning with these typical forms,
adding single attributes in a continuous series, we at last reach the
highest types of animals and plants. Finally, add rationality to the
animal, and we reach man, the highest and therefore the most complex
type of life, and who, so far as we are concerned, must be the end of
creation. We cannot conceive of any higher creation, because we cannot
add an attribute to those we already possess, any more than we can
conceive of an additional sense by which to cognize such new attribute.

This process has been determined from the very outset by those
intellectual laws which we cannot disobey, and which we cannot conceive
disobeyed by an intelligent creator. If the law of intellectual action
require this process from the simple to the complex, the concrete
representation of the steps of this process must indicate the operation
of this law, and must also proceed from the simple and rudimentary to
the complex and highly developed. An intelligent Creator in revealing
his thought must follow the method which our minds must follow in
interpreting this revelation. When we know and seek to communicate our
knowledge, we proceed from the general to the specific.[2] The Creator
assumed to be infinite in knowledge would therefore follow this process
instead of the method peculiar to investigation. The law of intellectual
action determines this method, and the conditions of intellectual
communication determine the representation of this method in the
material expression of the ideas communicated. Considering the operation
of this law under these conditions, we