The builder of an organ, it has been said, must be a wise man; and the non-mechanical part of the world will willingly concede the point. We wonder at a skill and forethought which can create from passive wood and metal an instrument so elaborately planned, so subtly tuned to harmony. It is a grand example of man's dominion over matter. So with any other mechanical triumph: we not only admire, but on man's behalf we are proud of, the chronometer, the steam-engine, the thousand contrivances for abridging labour with which our manufacturing districts abound. But suppose there were a man who could construct one or all of these under quite different conditions; who, without altering by his own exertion the operation of one of the natural laws, could bid a steam-engine arise, or a watch grow into shape ; who, while he called into existence wheel, or lever, or pipe, and fitted them into orderly connection to achieve his ends, could yet show us that the natural forces, the properties involved in the things themselves, accomplished all; and could demonstrate to us for each useful or beautiful result a chain of causation reaching to the heart of all things: were not that more wonderful—infinitely more?