while we attempt to think of the creation of things, we feel, that it is still only a sequence of events which we are considering,--though of events, the magnitude of which allows us no comparison, because it has nothing in common with those earthly changes which fall beneath our view. We do not see any third circumstance existing intermediately, and binding, as it were, the will of the Omnipotent Creator to the things which are to be; we conceive only the _divine will itself_, as if made visible to our imagination, and all nature at the very moment rising around. It is evident, that in the case of the divine agency, as well as in every other instance of causation, the introduction of any circumstance, as a bond of closer connexion, would only furnish a new phenomenon to be itself connected; but even though it were possible to conceive the closer connexion of such a third circumstance, as is supposed to constitute the inexplicable efficiency between the _will_ of the Creator and _the rise of the universe_, it would _diminish_, indeed, but it certainly cannot be supposed to elevate, the majesty of the person, and of the scene. Our feeling of his omnipotence is not rendered stronger by the elevation of the complicated process; it is, on the contrary, the immediate succession of the object to the desire, which impresses the force of the omnipotence on our mind; and it is to the divine agency, therefore, that the representation of _instant_ sequence seems peculiarly suited, as if it were more emphatically powerful. Such is the great charm of the celebrated passage of Genesis, descriptive of the creation of light. It is from stating nothing more than the antecedent and consequent, that the majestic simplicity of the description is derived. God _speaks_, and _it is done_. We imagine nothing intermediate. In our highest contemplation of His power, we believe only, that, when He _willed_ creation, a world arose; and that, in all future time, His will to create cannot exist, without being followed by the instant rise into being of whatever He may have willed; that His will to destroy any thing, will be, in like manner, followed by its non-existence; and His will to vary the course of things, by miraculous appearances. The will is the only necessary previous change; and that Being has almighty power, whose every will is immediately and invariably _followed_ by the existence of its object. FOOTNOTES: [27] Mart. Scrib. c. 7.--Pope's Works, _Ed._ 1757, v. vii. p. 58, 59. [28] Cicero de Officiis, lib. i. c. 4. [29] Recherche de la veritè, liv iv. c. ii.--Vol. II. p. 322. LECTURE VIII. ON HYPOTHESIS AND THEORY. The observations which I have already made on _power_, Gentlemen, have, I hope, shown you, both what it truly is, and the sources of that illusion, which leads us to regard it as something more mysterious.