Note av — Chapter V

Or else as some may prefer to state it, Mind is the intelligible law. In other words, Law is the manifestation and energizing of the Mind in Nature, and we recognize mind in the energy of Law. Canon Mozley spoke as follows in 1872. "There is a great deal said now about Mind in Nature, and scientific men talk enthusiastically about Mind; the old notion of chance is obsolete, and in spite of the strength of a materialist school, there is a tendency to a consensus of scientific men that there is Mind in the universe. Would any one in any public meeting of scientific men dare to stand up and deny that there was Mind in Nature? It would be thought monstrous. It would be set down as the revival of an old stupidity. It is the only form in which they find they can speak of nature which at all ennobles it or which satisfies their own idea of the sublimity of nature." The Principle of Causation considered in opposition to Atheistic Theories, p. 41.

The learned writer goes on to connect this admitted idea of Mind with the collateral idea of Design. And this is a most natural sequence of thought. But, for reasons already mentioned, the main argument of this chapter pursues another track. Mind in Nature being directly intuited, (to use an expressive Kantian phrase) we supplement the evidence thus given by a cross-examination of facts for the purpose of eliciting an account of what manner of Intelligence this Mind in Nature must be.