Although, therefore, in Chapter V., I have been careful to
point out that the fact of existing order having been due to proximate or
natural causes does not actually _disprove_ the possible existence of an
ultimate and supernatural cause, still it must be carefully observed that
this _negative_ fact cannot possibly justify any _positive_ inference to
the existence of such a cause.
Thus, upon the whole, it may be said, without danger of reasonable dispute,
that as the argument from Order has hitherto derived its immense weight
entirely from the fact that Intelligence appeared to be the one and only
cause sufficient to produce the observed integration of the cosmos, this
immense weight has now been completely counterpoised by the demonstration
that other causes of a strictly physical kind must have been instrumental,
if not themselves alone sufficient, to produce this integration, So that,
just as in the case of Astronomy the demonstration of the one natural
principle of gravity was sufficient to classify under one physical
explanation several observed facts which many persons had previously
attributed to supernatural causes; and just as in the more complex science
of Geology the demonstration of the one principle of uniformitarianism was
sufficient to explain, without the aid of supernaturalism, a still greater
number of facts; and, lastly, just as in the case of the still more complex
science of Biology the demonstration of the one principle of natural
selection was sufficient to marshal under one scientific, or natural,
hypothesis an almost incalculable number of facts which were previously
explained by the metaphysical hypothesis of supernatural design; so in the
science which includes all other sciences, and which we may term the
science of Cosmology, I assert with confidence that in the one principle of
the persistence of force we have a demonstrably harmonising principle,
whereby all the facts within our experience admit of being collocated under
one natural explanation, without there being the smallest reason to
attribute these facts to any supernatural cause.
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