tenacity and hardness, without the intervention of human labor and skill. If there is no need of a bricklayer, we may discard also the brick-maker. Putting aside, therefore, this gratuitous addition to the theory, we come to examine the plausibility of the doctrine which assumes, that material atoms, constituted as they now are, are capable, without oversight or direction, of forming a universe like our own, and producing all the animated tribes which tenant it. In all the atheistic reasoning upon this subject, and especially in the work now before us, there is a constant confusion between _what may be_, for aught we know to the contrary, and _what is_, so far as we are able positively to determine it from our present means of observation and experiment; between the _possibility_ that is measured only by human ignorance, and the _probability_ that is fairly inferred by the legitimate exercise of the understanding. Effects have unquestionably been produced, such as the formation of a solar system, and the production of new and perfectly distinct orders of being, which we are wholly unable to account for by the _present and ordinary_ operation of what are called secondary causes. If a theorist chooses to assume, that these secondary causes, under certain conditions, which we never have seen, and never can see, realized, might produce very extraordinary results, might even fully account for the wonderful effects in question, we have a right to say, in reply, that he is dealing in pure speculation and hypothesis; that, having had no experience under the conditions or postulates of his theory, he is necessarily _speaking from_ ignorance and _appealing_ to ignorance; that, even if we could not point out a single difficulty, a single false assumption, in his whole scheme and argument, it would still remain a mere hypothesis, alike incapable of proof or disproof; and that, at the best, the arguments brought against it must be of nearly the same wiredrawn, speculative, and far-fetched character with those adduced in its support. On a mere sandbank, unsupplied either with arms or tools, the only edifice that can be built is one of sand, and sand affords the only means for its destruction. The fallacy to which such speculatists constantly have resort is, that the weakness or the entire absence of all considerations against their theory constitutes a positive argument in its support. No such thing; it affords only a fair presumption of the baseless character of the whole fabric.