Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion

Through dialogue, three philosophers named Demea, Philo, and Cleanthes debate the nature of God's existence.

Whether or not these names reference specific philosophers, ancient or otherwise, remains a topic of scholarly dispute.

[2] In The Blind Watchmaker (1986), evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins discussed his choice to title his book after theologian William Paley's famous statement of the teleological argument, the watchmaker analogy, and noted that Hume's critique of the argument from design as an explanation of design in nature was the initial criticism that would ultimately be answered by Charles Darwin in On the Origin of Species (1859).

[3] In the second part of the Dialogues (1779), the character Philo observes that animal reproduction appears to be more responsible for the intricacies and order of animal bodies rather than intelligent design, stating: But were we ever so much assured, that a thought and reason, resembling the human, were to be found throughout the whole universe, and were its activity elsewhere vastly greater and more commanding than it appears in this globe; yet I cannot see, why the operations of a world constituted, arranged, adjusted, can with any propriety be extended to a world which is in its embryo state, and is advancing towards that constitution and arrangement.

Nature, we find, even from our limited experience, possesses an infinite number of springs and principles, which incessantly discover themselves on every change of her position and situation.