Chapter 2
All the destructive Powers in Nature must not only yield in the Course of Time to the maintaining Powers, but must ultimately be subservient to the Consummation of the Whole
First example. As the substance of future worlds lay floating in infinite space, the creator of these worlds was pleased, to leave matter to form itself by means of the internal energies imparted to it. Toward the center of the whole, the Sun, whatever could find no course of its own, or was attracted by the superior power of this orb, bent its way. Whatever found another centre of attraction revolved in like manner around it, and either tended to its great focus in an elliptical orbit, or flew off in a parabola or hyperbola, and returned no more. Thus the ether purified itself: thus from a confused fluctuating chaos arose an harmonious system of worlds, according to which earths and comets have revolved for ages in regular orbits round their sun: an eternal proof, that order arose out of confusion by means of divine implanted powers. As long as this grand and simple law of all powers numbered and balanced against each other endures, the structure of the universe stands firm; for it is founded on a divine rule and quality.
Second example. In like manner as our Earth formed itself from a shapeless mass into a planet, its elements struggled and contended upon it, till each found its place; so that, after much wild confusion, all are now become subservient to the harmoniously regulated orb. Land and water, air and fire, seasons and climates, winds and currents, and all its atmospheric phenomena, obey one great law of its form and density, its motion and distance from the Sun, and are regulated in harmony with these. Those innumerable volcanoes that once flamed on the surface of our Earth flame on it no longer: the ocean no longer boils with those vitriolic effusions, and other matters, that once covered the surface of our land. Millions of creatures have perished, that were fated to perish: whatever could preserve itself abides, and still, after the lapse of thousands of years, remains in great harmonious order. Wild animals and tame, carnivorous and graminivorous insects, birds, fishes, and man, are adapted to each other; and among all these, male and female, birth and death, the term and stages of life, wants and enjoyments, necessities and gratifications. Not, however, at the will of a daily changing, inexplicable order; but according to evident laws of nature, inherent in the structure of the creatures themselves, that is, in the relation of all the organic powers, which have animated and maintained themselves on our planet. As long as the natural law of this structure and relation endures, its consequences will likewise endure; namely harmonious order between the animate and inanimate parts of our creation, which, as the interior of our Earth evinces, was producible only by the destruction of millions.
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