The ethics of William Paley

Abstract

During the period when the eighteenth century was merging into the nineteenth, William Paley was regarded as the outstanding apologist of the Christian religion in England. So conclusive was his work considered to be that one reviewer could write the following:We regard Dr. Paley's writings on the "Evidences of Christianity" as of so signally decisive a character that we could be content to let them stand as the essence, and the close of the great argument, on the part of its believers; and should feel no despondency or chagrin, if we could be prophetically certain that such an efficient Christian reasoner would never henceforward arise.The above was written in the year 1809. Since then Paley has been largely forgotten. The average student knows about him only this: that he was called "Pigeon" Paley and that he used some sort of analogy about a watch. To the writer it appeared that a rediscovery of Paley might offer to the modern reader some values that were greatly admired in the eighteenth century.