Excerpt from Plain Practical Sermons In passing through a dark forest which appears to defy our entering, were we to espy a house nicely laid out, surrounded by all the necessaries of life and happi ness, would we not immediately conclude that man must have made his home there; that though no one be visible about it yet some one must have built it, must even now dwell there, since it is in such good order. Would we ever think of ascribing the origin of that house to chance, or would we dare to assert that this lifeless mass of timber thrown into the shape and form of a house had always been, there? Why, we would be laughed at; we would be called insane; and yet, my friends, will you credit it, there have been men who, looking at this vast Universe, with all its variety of beauty and order, have said that it was the work of chance that it had no author - no intelligent author - though showing efiects which could be produced by no other than an intelligent cause. This theory had its supporters, though shocking to common sense and the reason of mankind. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.