The very first application of Lord Rosse's telescopes to the heavens overturned the hypothesis; and with such unequivocal facts as that instrument has brought to light, we regard it as a most unwarrantable assumption to suppose that there are in the heavenly spaces any masses of matter different from solid bodies, composing planetary systems."[34] And Professor Nichol, while he gracefully acknowledges that he has "somewhat altered the views which he formerly gave to the public, as the highest then known and generally entertained, regarding the structure of the heavens," states, as the result of more mature reflection, that "the supposed distribution of a self-luminous fluid, in separate patches, through the heavens, has, beyond all doubt, been proved fallacious by that most remarkable of telescopic achievements,--the resolution of the great nebula in Orion into a superb cluster of stars; and that this discovery necessitates important changes in previous speculations on Cosmogony."[35] In short, Lord Rosse's observations at Parsonstown have conclusively proved that what appeared to be a nebula was in reality a cluster of stars; and while they still leave many nebulae unresolved, they afford a strong warrant for believing that discoveries in the same direction might be indefinitely extended in proportion to the increase of telescopic power.
3.

But even were the Nebular Hypothesis admitted, and were the Theory of Development by Natural Laws conceived to afford a satisfactory explanation of the origin of the planetary systems, it would not follow, as a necessary consequence, that the peculiar evidence of Theism--that on which it mainly depends, and to which it makes its most confident appeal--would be thereby destroyed, or even diminished.

The only legitimate result of such a doctrine would seem to be, that we must distinguish aright between a work of _Mediate_, and a work of _Immediate_ Creation.

In the Bible each of these is distinctly recognized.

We have a specimen of the one in the creation of the first man by the direct agency of Divine power; we have a specimen of the other in the creation, less direct but equally real, of all his natural posterity, through the medium of ordinary generation.