I may here observe, however, in
general terms, that I consider all his arguments to have been answered by
anticipation in the foregoing examination of Theism. I may also here
observe, that throughout the following essay I have used the word "design"
in the sense in which it is used by Professor Flint himself. This sense is
distinctly a different one from that which the word bears in the writings
of the Paley, Bell, and Chalmers school. For while in the latter writings,
as pointed out in Chapter III., the word bears its natural meaning of a
certain _process of thought_, in Professor Flint's work it is used rather
as expressive of a _product of intelligence_. In other words, "design," as
used by Professor Flint, is synonymous with _intention_, irrespective of
the particular psychological process by which the intention may have been
put into effect.
[46] Op. cit., pp. 255-257.
[47] Let it be observed that there is a distinction between what I may call
substantial and formal existence. Thus there is no doubt that flowers as
flowers perish, or become non-existent; but the substances of which they
were composed persist. And, in this connection, I may here point out that
if the universe is infinite in space and time, the universe as a whole
would present substantial existence as standing out of relation to space
and time, whereas innumerable portions of the universe present only formal
existences, because standing in relation both to space and time.
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