BY THOMAS DICK, LLD., AUTHOR OF "THE CHRISTIAN PHILOSOPHER," "PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION," " PHILOSOPHY OF A FUTURE STATE, IMPROVEMENT OF 80- WITH AN INTRODUCTORY ESSAY, BY REV. C. S. HENRY. BROOKFIELD, MASS. PUBLISHED BY E. AND L. MERRIAM. 1 INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. MORAL VALUE OF THE STUDY OF THE WONDERS OF NATURE. BY THE REV. C. S. HENRY. THE object of these remarks is neither to analyze nor criticise the work to which they are prefixed-neither to anticipate its information nor to forestall its impression; but to offer a few reflections which-like a prelude to a concert-may perhaps serve to put the reader's mind in a better state of preparation for that which is to follow. We should be glad at least to indicate some points of view in which the WORKS and the WORD of God appear in a most impressive relation to each other. "In Wonder philosophy begins; in Astoundment it ends"—it is thus that Coleridge translates the saying of the old Greek philosopher; and the remark is as profoundly true as it is strikingly expressed. It may be added that all philosophy leads to God; and the "astoundment," which is its result, is just an overwhelming impression of the Divine perfections. It matters not where we begin ; nor with what interest; the meditative mind is led by every path of inquiry to the same central conclusion: in everything we see God. Every disclosure of science-every object of nature, and every change wrought by its lawsis a revelation of God; and disproportioned as every finite and limited revelation necessarily must be to the infinite and illimitable Being revealed, yet enough is at every glimpse unfolded to lead us to adopt the exclamation of A* |