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Natural Theology. No. II.-The Eye.

his revelation of the fatherly character of the Supreme Being and his promises of boundless mercy. But, above all, death seemed to the eye of sense and natural reason as an all-subduing, eternally-victorious foe, Jesus Christ by his doctrine, and especially by his resurrection, shewed that the king of terrors was vanquished, and brought life and immortality to light. In the divine plans, death was the conse. quence of sin, and immortality was the consequence of Christ's righteous submission to death. Through sin, the human race lay under the sentence of mortality, but through the divine mercy, made known and administered by "the mediator of the better covenant," the sentence and curse were removed, a general acquittal was proclaimed and everlasting righteousness was brought in. "The wages of sin is death," but the gift of God is eternal life, through Jesus Christ, our Lord."

EPISCOPUS.

Natural Theology. No. III. On the eye.

THE

(Continued from p. 104.) He that formed the eye, shall he not see? HE ancient philosophers had very imperfect notions of the manner in which vision is effected. They simply knew, in general, that the eyes were the instruments of it. Imperfect, however, as were their ideas on the subject, the wisdom and foresight manifested in the operation, and in the structure of the organ, did not escape their observation. They admired the position of the eye, in the most elevated part of the head, whence, like a centinel, it could overlook a multitude of objects with a single glance. They admired its extreme mobility and the case with which it could be turned in every possible direction, and thus, as it were, multiply itself by the variety of its sensatious. They admired the suppleness of the lids, ready at all times to cover the eyes as with a veil, to protect them from the impression of too vivid light or the attack of exterior objects, or to aid the power of sleep over the whole frame. But these and other observations of the same kind, relate only to neighbouring circumstances; the intimate mechanism of vision they had not thought of penetrating. It is Now completely ascertained, as we

have seen, that every eye is a true op tical instrument, on the ground of which light delineates, or paints in miniature, the portrait of every object situated in the presence of the spectator. Of all the subjects of observation with which nature every where abounds, it may justly be said of this organ, that there is none which more forcibly exhibits in its structure the marks of infinite intelligence.

Having in our last given a description of the eye and of its several parts, we shall now endeavour to account for the manner in which vision is achieved. From all the points of any object that presents itself to the eye, there proceed rays that diverge in every direction, but of these rays those only that enter the eye through the pupil have any effect in producing vision. By means of these a complete image of the object is formed on the bottom of the eye; but the image made or painted on the retina is reversed, in consequence of the circumstauce that the rays proceeding from points situated on different sides of the middle point, cross one another on passing through the pupil. How this is effected may be seen by taking the eye of an ox recently killed, aud stripping it of its sclerotica behind. If in this state the eye be placed in a hole made in the window-shutter of a dark room, with the corner outwards, we shall see in the transparent membranes of the opposite part, distinct images of the exterior objects.

This truth admitted, viz. that the instant an object is before the eye, that object has its portrait on the bottom or back of the organ; it should seem that vision required no farther illustration, but that we may be led to suppose that our eyes are already trained, and that the mere presence of objects is sufficient for the impressions made on the retina and transmitted by the optic nerve to the brain, to enable the mind to represent those objects to itself precisely as they are, and in the places where they are. It will however, upon reflection, be quite evident that something more is necessary, considering that the image which is painted on the retina is a simple surface figured and coloured, without relief, and is moreover the result merely of the action which the extremities of the rays that touch it exert on the organ,

and has no connexion of itself with the opposite extremities, where the body which is the object of vision is situated. Philosophers have hence been led to suspect that there existed some intermediate agent, serving to connect the impressions produced by the rays which bodies send to the eye, with the modifications of those bodies themselves. They imagine that touch, or the sense of feeling is in some way or other instrumental in instructing the eye and enabling us to correct the errors into which we should be led by this organ when left to itself. This has been explained after the following manner, by M. Condillac, in his "Traité des Sensations."

Our first lessons are derived from the various motions which the hand makes that has its own image in the bottom of the eye. While in turns it approaches nearer to or withdraws farther from this organ, it teaches us to refer to a greater or less distance to one place than to another, the impression that is produced on the retina, from the knowledge we have of the position of the hand, and of the direction and extent of every movement which it makes. While one hand passes over the other, it conveys, in a manner, over its surface, the colour of which the impression is in the eye; it circumscribes this colour within its limits, and excites in the mind the representation of a body shaped in such a manner. Afterwards when we touch different objects the hand directs the eye over the several parts of each of them, and renders the arrangement and respective positions sensible to it. It acts incessantly with regard to the eye, by means of the rays of light, as if it held one extrem ity of a stick, of which the other end tonched the bottom of the eye, and guided this stick in succession over every part of the object. It seems even to inform the eye that the point it touches is the extremity of the ray which strikes that organ; and thus while it runs over the surface of the object, it seems to pronounce its true form. When once the eyes are instructed, the experience they have acquired enables them to do without the help of touch, and the presence alone of objects occasions the return of the same sensatious when the rays proceeding from those objects make similar impressions on the organ,

VOL. X.

At the same time that the sense of feeling instructs the eye with regard to the images of objects, it exercises it also in the art of estimating their position in space, their size, and their distance; and when this distance exreeds that to which the motion of the hand extends, we supply the defect by another exercise, which consists in approaching towards the object till we touch it, and then receding from it again; and by the extent of these contrary movements we ascertain its distance with a degree of accuracy quite sufficient for all common purposes. When the object exceeds the compass of our ordinary movements, the proportions we are accustomed to remark serve as rules by which to apply to more remote objects the im pressions that are made upon us; but as the distance increases, circumstances become less favourable to such applications, and beyond a certain limit objects present themselves more or less under a deceitful appearance, and we are led into that kind of errors called optical delusions.

Having given this brief account of the manner, or supposed manner of vision, we shall proceed to observe, that we cannot contemplate the structure and uses of this organ without admiration of the power, the wisdom, and the goodness of the Creator, especially when we consider the prodigious exactness, and exquisite skill employed in every part, administering to this noble and necessary organ, To pass over the arteries and veins, and other parts that are common to the rest of the body, let us reflect on its several muscles, which are placed, so as to be adapted not only to every possible motion of the eye, but cach is endowed with such an exact degree of strength, as to cause the most perfect equilibration, by which all contortions of the eye are prevented, and it can with the utmost readiness apply itself to every object. Again, the tu nics or coats are so admirably seated, and of so firm a texture, as to fit every place, to answer every occasion, and to be proof against all common inconveniences and annoyances, In the humours also, we find all the requisite clearness and transparency, for an casy admission of the rays of light, well placed for refracting them, and formed, by the nicest laws of opties, to collect the wandering rays into a

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Cheynell's "Rise, Growth and Danger of Socinianisme.”

point. To this may be added the structure of the darkened cell, in which these curious humours lie, aud into which the glories of the heavens and the earth are brought and exquisitely pictured, which cell is perfectly adapted, by means of its texture, aperture and colour to guard off from without, all useless and noxious rays, and within it is extremely well coated with a dark tegument, that it may not reflect, dissipate, or any way confuse or disturb the beneficial rays. According to Descartes, this blackness is intended to obscure the rays which are reflected from the bottom of the eye to its fore-part, and which would otherwise be thrown back again upon the bottom, and thus occasion a confused vision. Another reason has been assigned for this colour, viz. that the superfluous rays which proceed from lateral objects may be absorbed. Hence illuminated objects are best seen from a dark station, because the rays proceeding from them are not obliterated by circumambient light.

It has been observed by the honourable Mr. Boyle and by others who have discoursed on the wisdom and goodness of the Almighty from the structure of the human frame, that as we are under the necessity of using optic glasses, so nature, meaning by the term, the God of nature, has made a far more complete provision in the eyes of animals, to shut out too much, and to admit sufficient light, by the dilatation and contraction of the pupil; and it may be farther noted that these pupils are in different animals of different forms according to their peculiar occasions. In some, particularly in man, it is round, that being the most proper figure for the position of our eyes, and the uses we make of them on all occasions. In some animals it is oblong, and large, as in the cow, sheep, borse, &c. which is an admirable provision for such creatures to see the better laterally, and thereby avoid those things that might offend them. In other animals the figure of the pupil is erect, and also capable of opening wide and shutting up close. The latter of which serves to exclude the brighter light of day, and the former to take in the more faint rays thinly scattered about in the night, which is an admirable provision for those animals, as the cat, squirrel,

&c. that have occasion to watch and way-lay their prey both by day and night, and to look upwards and downwards in the act of climbing after their food or to avoid danger.

With respect to the means adapted to the protection of this curious organ we may quote the words of Cicero De naturâ Deorum. "The eyelids," says this philosopher, "which are the coverings of the eyes, are soft to the touch that they may not hurt the sight, and are fitted both for veiling and opening the pupils with the greatest celerity. They are defended by the eye-lashes, as by a palisade which prevents any thing from falling into them while the eyes are open; and closing together in sleep, the eye is at rest under their covering. They are likewise most admirably placed under shelter, and are guarded on all sides by more prominent parts. The upper eye-lids covered by the eyebrows are screened from the perspiration falling down from the forehead; the under eye-lids are defended by the cheek-bones which rise higher than their surface." It is remarkable also, that the hairs of the eye-lashes grow only to a certain length, and never stand in need of cutting like the hair on the head again, their points stand completely out of the way: those in the upper lid bend upwards, while those in the lower lid decline downwards. From these circumstances, we may learn how critically exact the great Author of Nature has been in even the least and most trivial conveniences belonging to every part of the animal frame. Did our plan admit of figures we would farther shew the curious structure and lodgment of the muscle which is used in opening the eye-lids, and of another, or circucular one, used in closing them, and we would gladly point out the nice apparatus of glands that keep the eye moist, and serve for tears, and other circumstances which anatomists have noticed with wonder and delight.

Some Account of Cheynell's "Rise, Growth and Danger of Socinianisme."

~ (Continued from p. 83.) Chapter 1. of this curious pamphlet is entitled, "Of the Rise of Socinianisme." Cheynell attributes this malignant heresy to "the spirit of an

and that "it every where agreed with itself as to articles of faith."

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This learned inquirer, had he been impartial, could not have failed to discover many instances of disagreement, even before the Jesuits and Jansenists convinced the world, in spite of Bossuet's eloquence and acuteness, that variations were not peculiar to Protestant churches. Nor ought he to have been ignorant or to have forgotten that predestination, in its most rigorous form, with its systematic ac companyments of original or birth-sin reprobation, satisfaction, &c. had been advocated in the Roman church long before the names of Protestant or Calvin had any existence. Yet in his eighteenth consideration he quotes, as opposed by the Protestant to the Papal church the following sentiments from Calvin and Luther. "Nec absurdum videri debet quod dico, Deum non modo primi hominis casum et in eo posteriorum ruinam, prævidisse; sed arbitrio quoque suo dispensasse.' Calvin Instit. 1. 3. cap. 23. n. 7. "Dicimus Deum in nobis operari bona et mala, nosque; merâ necessitate passivâ subjici Dei operanti.-Hic est fidei summus gradus, credere [Deum] justum, qui, suâ voluntate, nos necessario damnabiles facit." Luther de Serv. Arbit. V. ii. Fol. 429 and 454. On the contrary, my author maintains that "it were a repugnancy to God's Sovereign goodness, before he had foreseen a man's demerits, to destine and condemn him to everlasting fire and even to create him for that fatal end." P. 16. In another place he complains that "these religions (of Luther and Calvin) are so far from teaching us to decline evil by the observance of God's commandments, that, on the contrary, they declare it a thing impossible to observe them. And instead of exhorting us to welldoing, they teach us that good works

1 Nor ought what I say to appear extragant, that God not only foresaw the fall of the first man and in him the ruin of his posterity, but also determined it by his sovereign pleasure.

"We say that God works good and evil in us, and that we are subjected to this operation of God by a mere passive necessity. This is the highest attainment of faith, to believe that God is just who made us, by his own will, necessarily, in a state of damnation.

are no ways helpful towards the gaining of salvation, and what is yet worse they say that good works are downright sins." P. 25. These charges are sustained by the following sentiments from Luther. "Si bonum operarentur propter regnum obtinendum, nunquam obtinerent. Opus bonum optime factum, est veniale peccatum." V. ii. fol. 453 and 110.

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The writer of the following passages might have been supposed to rank among those whom the Protestant church calls heretics, rather than to be returning to the MotherChurch of the orthodox faith.

"The abettors of the pretended Reformation, among other errors, teach that all sins are equal—an idle word then, according to the doctrine of our innovators, must be of equal enormity with any other sin.-But our Saviour (Mat. v. 22,) has given us a very different information, touching the punishment and pardon of sins." P. 17. The author thus proceeds, in the sixteenth and seventeenth Considerations:

"According to the same Sectaries, all good works are sins, and all sins are equally grievous, so that in their principles every good work must have in itself the enormity of all sins whatsoever. Consequently to pray to God is a crime of as black a dye as blasphemy, to give an alms to a poor person is no better than robbing him of what he has, and to restore ill-gotten goods to the right owner, is as blamable as to keep them against his will. What a pretence is this!

"To press this argument a little farther, I would gladly know what any of their preachers would advise a man to do, that should ask him, whether or no he were obliged in the last case above-mentioned to restitution? If he answers in the affirmative, the unjust possessor may ask him again; whether it be a good work to restore another's goods? If he say, it is, the other may reply unto him, you hold that all good works are sins; and again, that all sins are equal in themselves, so that, whether I restore or retain my neighbour's goods, it is all one, as to

3 If a good work is performed, to obtain the kingdom, (of heaven) it shall never be obtained.-The most righteous action is a

venial sin.

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the guilt of sin; I will therefore keep for my own use and benefit, what I hold to the prejudice of my neighbour."

We know what Christians in our age and country have named themselves, exclusively, Evangelical. On that subject I will quote the third Consideration entire, as a valuable acknowledgment, from a well-informed adversary, that those Christians have always proved themselves the most zealous and consistent Scripturists, on whom Papists and Protestants have agreed to affix the frightful brand of heresy.

"I am as much at a loss to know upon what principle the Lutherans and Calvinists exclude the Arians and Anabaptists out of their Evangelical Communion. For these pretend an equal right to the name, and that their doctrine is agreeable to the truth of the gospel, nay, that they are more properly Evangelical than the Lutherans or Calvinists are, we dont read, say the Anabaptists, in any part of the gospel that infants ought to be baptized. Jesus Christ himself says in St. Mark, He that believes and is baptized, shall be saved. (Mark xvi. 16.) Therefore faith must go before baptism. Now faith is only to be found in the adult, therefore no one till then ought to be baptized. Consequently our doctrine is more agreeable to the gospel than that of the Lutherans or Calvinists, who admit the baptism of infants. And thus plead the Arians, our Saviour says expressly in St. John's gospel, my Father is greater than I. (John xiv. 28.) We follow then the gospel when we teach that, as to the divine nature, the Son is not equal to but inferior to his Father. We admit, not upon this text, the interpretation of the fathers, who will have it, that the Son is less than his Father, according to his human nature, but equal to him according to his divinity; for we think the Lutherans and Calvinists have no right to force upon us any such interpretation, since they reject the authority of fathers in the controversies that are on foot between them and Catholics. For we see no reason why their authority should be allowed in this point and not in others.

"But if the Lutherans and Calvinists insist upon their own authority or the interpretation of their private

No. XIX.

spirit, the Arians and Anabaptists wil require them to point out in express terms this their interpretation in the Scripture; because 'tis a principle with all of them, that nothing is to be believed as an article of faith, but what the Scripture teaches in express, intelligible and clear terms." Pp. 5, 6.

In a review of his reasons at the conclusion of his work, the author thus again refers to the same subject. "I have never been able to learn upon what account the Lutherans alone call themselves Evangelical, or why the Calvinists style themselves the reformed religion. Nor can it enter into my head why the Anabaptists, the new Arians, and the Unitarians may not with as good a grace assume to themselves the same appellation." P. 72.

The following story forming the thirty-first Consideration, will be peculiarly interesting to an English Reader.

"I remember that being once present in my youth at a dispute of school divinity which was held among the Calvinists; one of the audience more knowing than the rest, proposed before all the company, in the person of a Catholic, an argument which so gravelled the professor, that it quite silenced him for a time. Then to get clear of it as well as he could, he told us that being formerly in England he had proposed the same difficulty to one of their doctors, who had no other answer to give him, than that no pertinent resolution could be made to the argument; and by consequence, that in this point no direct answer was to be given to Catholics, but the only way was to avoid the force and dint of it by some logical evasion.-So that I judged the Sectaries took not much to heart the truth of matters concerning articles of faith." P. 37.

It cannot be read without regret, that this learned and pious prince unable to adjust the rival claims of "the Lutheran, the Calvinist, the Arian or the Anabaptist," could not at the age of seventy-five become an Eclectic, or rather return to the New Testament

the judge that ends the strife, Where wit and reason fail. On the contrary, he determines "to return to the pale of the Roman Catholic church," among forty-nine

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