Ernest O'Neill delves into the profound question of the origin of the universe, challenging common cliches and theories like evolution and the big bang. He emphasizes the intricate order and design present in the universe, from the molecular level to the planetary orbits, pointing to the existence of a superior reasoning power behind it all. O'Neill highlights the complexity of our environment and our bodies, suggesting that the universe originated from an intelligence as developed as human minds, rather than mere chance or luck.

How did this whole world come to exist at all? Have you ever wondered about that? Most of us have been forced to think this kind of thought at some point in our lives. Perhaps our mother or friend dies or we suddenly face some crisis in our own lives: momentarily we find ourselves wondering "Why are we alive anyhow?" What's the point of it all--the eating and sleeping and struggling and working and dying--how did it all start in the first place? The usual cliches satisfy only those of us who don't really want an answer. You know them already-- "It all came by evolution." Evolution of what? What evolved from what? Evolution from simple to complex forms may or may not describe how this whole system developed, but it certainly doesn't explain how it started. What power originated the first single-cell amoeba? If it all started from scum on a pond, where did the pond come from? If it all came from one proton, where did the proton come from? In recent years we've tried through research in astronomy to suggest that it all started with a 'big bang' but even this attempt to explain an expanding universe begs the question "what exploded?" Somewhere, sometime, something or somebody had to make something out of nothing! Theories like the 'big bang' look at the present facts and suggest probable explanations for them: does that method suggest anything about the origin of the universe? Well, the facts about our universe suggest one very obvious thing about its origin: it was not by chance or good luck! Why is that so? Because of the order that we find right from the smallest molecular structure to the orbiting of the largest planet. If our earth were any closer to the sun, we would all burn up. If air pressure were any greater, we would explode. Our environment is so carefully adapted to our existence and we are able so to adapt to it that it's obvious this order was built in from the beginning. This order is what caused one of the greatest geniuses of our era, Einstein, to declare, "My religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable Superior Spirt who reveals Himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble minds. That deeply emotional conviction of the presence of a superior reasoning power, which is revealed in the incomprehensible universe, forms my idea of God." This order, which enables the blood to carry at least 64 substances thousands of miles a day through our bodies and is evident in the chart of the elements and the structure of the DNA molecule, suggests that very reasonable hypothesis that the universe originated from an intelligence at least as developed as yours and mine. In other words, the existence and persistence of the seasons, the intricate connection between your eye and the object it photographs, the mystery of what maintains the electrical charge that makes your heart beat--these facts and millions of others suggest to common-sense this order did not result from chance plus time but from the conscious design of an intelligent mind.