As we can know only
a small part of this world, and can still less compare it with all
possible worlds, we may indeed from its order, design, and
greatness, infer a wise, good, powerful, etc., Author of it, but not
that He is all-wise, all-good, all-powerful, etc. It may indeed very
well be granted that we should be justified in supplying this
inevitable defect by a legitimate and reasonable hypothesis; namely,
that when wisdom, goodness, etc, are displayed in all the parts that
offer themselves to our nearer knowledge, it is just the same in all
the rest, and that it would therefore be reasonable to ascribe all
possible perfections to the Author of the world, but these are not
strict logical inferences in which we can pride ourselves on our
insight, but only permitted conclusions in which we may be indulged
and which require further recommendation before we can make use of
them. On the path of empirical inquiry then (physics), the
conception of God remains always a conception of the perfection of the
First Being not accurately enough determined to be held adequate to
the conception of Deity.
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