Sacred philosophy of the seasons : illustrating the perfections of God in the phenomena of the year ... Summer / [Henry Duncan].

  • Duncan, Henry, 1774-1846
Date:
1837
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Sacred philosophy of the seasons : illustrating the perfections of God in the phenomena of the year ... Summer / [Henry Duncan]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    ing the works of the Creator. With regard to the in- ferior animals, it is not so easy to speak with precision; but when it is remembered, that for all the varieties of the vegetable world, there are corresponding varieties among animals, we cannot withhold our conviction, that there are here contrivances and adaptations; and, on consider- ing the character of the Creator as reflected from the works whose objects we are enabled to trace, we feel war- ranted to add, that these contrivances and adaptations are wise and benevolent. It is to the animal world, then, that vre must direct our view, if we would rightly estimate the mighty plan of creation. Vegetation, considered in its primary in- tention, Is nothing more than a subservient contrivance, by which the animal frame shall be mechanically sus- tained, its organization developed, and its waste repair- ed. If with this be united varied enjoyment, arising from the exercise of the functions and senses, it is be- cause a paternal God was pleased, in the exuberance of his bounty, to cause these subordinate arrangements to be directly conducive to the ends of animal existence, as well as to its means. But so far as the human race is concerned, even the pleasures which they derive from their connexion with the vegetable world are but subor- dinate to a much higher object, and can only be consi- dered as faint and scattered emanations from the Great Source of light and happiness, the foretaste of enjoyments unalloyed and endless. Considered, then, as an end, the vegetable world vras called into existence, and endowed with all its proper- ties, exclusively with reference to the animal world; although the various relations and fitnesses, which sub- sist among the diversified orders of the former with re- gard to each other, may well form a subject of separate investigation. Vegetation exists for the use of living beings. Whatever properties it possesses are their in- heritance, made and maintained expressly for them. Whether a plant be succulent or dry, hard or soft,—