SOPHEREUS. It is, and I will tell you why. Man is the one being on this earth in whom we find an intelligent will and constructive faculty united, to a degree which shows a power of variation and execution superior to that of all other beings of whose actions we have the direct evidence of our senses. We might select one or more of the inferior animals, and find in them a strong constructive faculty; but we do not find it accompanied by a power of variation and adaptation that is equal to that of man in degree, or that is probably the same in kind. I will not insist on the distinction between reason and instinct, but I presume you will admit that, when we compare the constructive faculty of man and that of the most ingenious and wonderfully endowed animal or insect, the latter acts always under an implanted impulse, which we have no good ground for regarding as of the same nature as man's reasoning power, however striking may be the products. When, therefore, we select the human power of construction or creation as the basis of reasoning upon the works of Nature, we resort to a being in whom that power is the highest of which we have direct evidence. In the works of man we have direct and palpable proof that the phenomena--the products of human skill and human force--are brought about by the faculties of an intelligent and reasoning being. If we dig into the earth and find there a statue, an implement, or a weapon, we do not hesitate to conclude that the spot was once inhabited by men, just as surely as we should conclude the same thing if we found there human bones. The world, above-ground and below-ground, is full of concrete objects that we know must have been fashioned by human skill, guided by human intelligence. This intelligence, this intellect, is not matter; it is a being; it is a person. It is not a force, acting without consciousness; it is a being wielding a force which is under the control of volition. The force and the volition are both limited, but within the limitations they constitute the power of man. Pass, then, to the works of Nature, or to what you call the power of Nature. As, in the case of man, you can not conclude that he created for himself his own faculties, that he prescribed for himself the limitations of his power over matter, or that he formed those limitations as mere matters of habit, or that it was from habit alone that he derived his great constructive powers, so, in studying the works of Nature, you must conclude that some intelligent being made the laws of matter and motion, prescribed the unvarying order and method of action, laid down the limitations, originated the properties, and, in so doing, acted by volition, choice, and design. The distinction, as I conceive, between man and Nature is, that there has been bestowed on man, in a very inferior degree, a part of the original power of creation. On Nature there has been bestowed none of this power. As we