§ 2. The Facts of Nature Reveal God. Those who deny that natural theology teaches anything reliable concerning God, commonly understand by nature the external, material universe. They pronounce the ontological and teleologi- cal arguments derived from the existence of the world, and from the evidences of design which it contains, to be unsatisfactory. The fact that the world is, is a pi'oof that it always has been, in the ab- sence of all evidence to the contrary. And the argument from design, it is said, overlooks the difference between dead mechanism and a living organism, between manufacture and growth. That a locomotive cannot make itself, is no proof that a tree cannot grow. The one is formed ah extra by putting its dead parts together ; the other is developed by a living principle within. The one necessi- tates the assumption of a maker external and anterior to itself, the other excludes, as is said, such assumption. Besides, it is urged that religious truths do not admit of proof. They belong to the same category with aesthetic and moral truths. They are the ob- jects of intuition. To be perceived at all, they must be perceived in their own light. You cannot prove a thing to be beautiful or good to the man who does not perceive its beauty or excellence. Hence, it is further urged, that proof of religious truth is unneces- sary. The good do not need proof; the evil cannot appreciate it. All that can be done is to affirm the truth, and let it awaken, if possible, the dormant power of perception.
A. Answer to the above Arguments. All this is sophistical. For the arguments in support of the truths of natural religion are not drawn exclusively from the ex- ternal works of God. Those which are the most obvious and the most effective are derived from the constitution of our own nature. Man was made in the image of God, and he reveals his parentage as unmistakably as any class of inferior animals reveal the source fi-om which they sprung. If a horse is born of a horse, the im- mortal spirit of man, instinct with its moral and religious convictions. and aspirations, must be the offspring of the Father of Spirits. This is the argument which Paul on Mars' Hill addressed to the cavilling philosophers of Athens. That the sphere of natural the- ology is not merely the facts of the material universe is plain from the meaning of the word nature, which, as we have seen, has many