William Buckland

Book

The Brdigewater Treatises on the Power, Wisdom and Goodness of God as Manifested in the Creation

VI

Three important subjects of inquiry in Natural Theology come under consideration in the present Treatise. The first regards the inorganic Elements of the Mineral Kingdom, and the actual dispositions of the Materials of the Earth: many of these, although produced or modified by the agency of violent and distmbing forces, afibrd abundant proofs of Wise and provident Intention, in their adaptations to the uses of the Vegetable and Animal Kingdoms, and especially to the condition of Man. The second relates to the-Theories which have been enter- tained respecting the Origin of the World; and the deriva- tion of existing systems of organic Life, by an eternal suc- ceslion, from preceding individuals of the same species; or by gradual transmutation of one species into another. I have endeavoured to show, that to all these Theories the phenomena of Geology are decidedly opposed. The third extends into the Organic Remains of a former World the same kind of investigation, which Paley has pur- sued with so much success in his examination of the evi- deuce: of Design in the mechanical structure of the corporeal frame, of Man, and of the inferior Animals which are placed with him on the present surface of the Earth.

English