Page:Gods Glory in the Heavens.djvu/86

68 ground that she would give a much better light if her surface was all of a chalky whiteness, and not studded over, as it is, with dark spots. Now, granting that there might be a happier arrangement, if the use of the moon was to give light—granting that it would be better to have a wider orbit, and a more uniform disc, are we to conclude that a use cannot be proved, unless we can shew that it is the best possible contrivance for the use intended? Let us take the case of Paley's watch on the heath. Would the inference of design be legitimate only on the supposition that the watch had the most faultless scapement, and the most artistic finish? Would not some rude, old crown-and-verge movement, dropped by some boor as he crossed the common, quite as irresistibly lead to the inference of design? And in dealing with the mechanism of the heavens, the real question at issue, is not—Is the intelligent contriver perfect? but. Is there a contriver at all? No doubt, the ultimate aim of the theist is to prove a perfect intelligence, but the first is to prove that there is an intelligence—that the use necessarily implies a designing mind, lie knows that the atheist must be forced to surrender all, if he admits that mind, in any form, is necessary to account for material laws and arrangements. When it is therefore held that the design of the moon is to give light, or the eye to see, it is not necessary at all to prove that the moon is the best possible lamp, or the eye the best possible lens.