supreme Intelligence so far as any data of inference upon this point are
supplied by our observation of Nature; and the other question is as to
the strictly formal cogency of any conclusions either with reference to
the existence or the character of such an intelligence[24]. I shall
consider these two points separately.

No sooner have we reached the conclusion that the only hypothesis
whereby the general order of Nature admits of being in any degree
accounted for is that it is due to a cause of a mental kind, than we
confront the fact that this cause must be widely different from anything
that we know of Mind in ourselves. And we soon discover that this
difference must be conceived as not merely of degree, however great, but
of kind. In other words, although we may conclude that the nearest
analogue of the _causa causarum_ given in experience is the human mind,
we are bound to acknowledge that in all fundamental points the analogy
is so remote that it becomes a question whether we are really very much
nearer the truth by entertaining it. Thus, for instance, as Mr. Spencer
has pointed out, our only conception of that which we know as Mind in
ourselves is the conception of a series of states of consciousness. But,
he continues, 'Put a series of states of consciousness as cause and the
evolving universe as effect, and then endeavour to see the last as
flowing from the first. I find it possible to imagine in some dim way a
series of states of consciousness serving as antecedent to any one of
the movements I see going on; for my own states of consciousness are
often indirectly the antecedents to such movements. But how if I attempt
to think of such a series as antecedent to _all_ actions throughout the
universe ...? If to account for this infinitude of physical changes
everywhere going on, "Mind must be conceived as there," "under the guise
of simple-dynamics," then the reply is, that, to be so conceived, Mind
must be divested of all attributes by which it is distinguished; and