Galapagos Regained by James Morrow Page A

and yanked the veil away, revealing a wire cage in which a ruffled hen sat atop a clutch of eggs. “A hen can never cause herself, but only her eggs. These eggs can never cause themselves, but only those creatures we call chickens.” The contestant seized the cage and paraded it before the judges. “Once again we find ourselves in the valley of the shadow of infinite regress.”
    â€œWhich came first, the chicken or the croquet ball?” said Holyoake.
    â€œTo circumvent that void,” Sethington persisted, his voice rising to a crescendo, “we must posit a First Cause—God—the nonphysical being from whom all physical things sprang! Quod erat demonstrandum !”
    As the petitioner sat down on the dais, Lady Isadora quaffed champagne and addressed the bench. “Our Christians will now render their verdicts.”
    â€œBravo, Mr. Sethington,” said Owen. “You have my vote.”
    â€œ Quod erat indeed,” said Symonds.
    â€œAlthough the Cosmological Proof has a venerable history,” said Malcolm, “I cannot believe Saint Thomas would wish to see it illustrated with either poultry or sporting implements, and so I shan’t endorse this presentation.”
    â€œMr. Sethington, you have favorably impressed two of our Anglican judges,” said Lady Isadora. “If two of our freethinkers are similarly moved, the prize is yours.”
    â€œThe Cosmological Proof is famously lucid but notoriously flawed,” said Miss Martineau. “Those who embrace this argument imagine that God Himself is somehow exempt from the infinite regress. But why should that be the case?”
    How lamentable, thought Malcolm, that this brilliant woman would ally herself with unbelievers. He wondered if their incompatible theological views would preclude future intellectual congress. Equine of face, stumpish of form, and hard of hearing, Miss Martineau was less than alluring, but never had a person of her sex so fascinated him.
    â€œI fail to follow your reasoning,” said Sethington.
    â€œI shall put it as simply as I can,” said Miss Martineau. “If God created the universe, then who created God?”
    â€œGod is by definition uncreated,” Sethington replied.
    â€œThen we might as well say the universe is by definition uncreated and subtract God from the equation,” noted Atkinson. “Aquinas possessed a keen intellect, but his proof proves precisely nothing.”
    â€œShall I tell you of another crack in your cosmological egg?” said Holyoake to Sethington. “Even if we decide that our infinite regress must terminate in a supernatural being, why assume we’re talking about the God of Christian revelation? The entity in question might be the Hindoo’s Brahma, the Northman’s Odin, the Grecian’s Apollo, or a mystic elephant who defecates planets instead of turds.”
    The flâneurs laughed appreciatively.
    â€œWe are sorry, Mr. Sethington,” said Lady Isadora, “but it appears you will leave our meeting no wealthier than you arrived.”
    The petitioner rose, packed up his Cosmological Proof, and, grasping the handle of the wagon, trundled wordlessly away.
    â€œWe shall now indulge in a short intermission,” declared Lord Woolfenden.
    Goblets were filled, cigars ignited, witticisms traded, trysts scheduled, and bodices fondled, after which the master of Alastor Hall clapped his hands and called for silence. Receiving his cue, the evening’s second petitioner—a popinjay in a flowered silk waistcoat—entered the library accompanied by a squat hireling bearing an ancient traveling-chest, the unwieldy burden riding on his back like Quasimodo’s hump.
    â€œVisiting us tonight on behalf of disbelief is Sir Basil Wanderly of Blackthorn Hall,” said Woolfenden, “who means to undermine the consensus concerning God’s goodness.”
    As the fop approached the judges, the