Front matter (continued 2)

Animal sounds are the echoes of blind instincts within, or of the phenomena of the outward world, uttered by suffering or satisfied animal nature, and in all cases resulting from mere passiveness.

By rational language, on the other hand, is signified, to quote Mr. Mivart:[113]

The external manifestation, whether by sound or gesture, of general conceptions:—not emotional expressions or the manifestations of sensible impressions, but enunciations of distinct judgments as to "the what," "the how," and "the why."

Consequently, as Bunsen declares:

The theories about the origin of language have followed those about the origin of thought, and have shared their fate. The materialists have never been able to show the possibility of the first step. They attempt to veil their inability by the easy but fruitless assumption of an infinite space of time, destined to explain the gradual development of animals into men; as if millions of years could supply the want of the agent necessary for the first movement, for the first step in the line of progress! No numbers can effect a logical impossibility. How indeed could reason spring out of a state which is destitute of reason? How can speech, the expression of thought, develop itself in a year or in millions of years, out of unarticulated sounds which express feelings of pleasure, pain, and appetite? The common-sense of mankind will always shrink from such theories.

Bunsen's words were echoed even more forcibly by professor Max Müller, speaking as President of the Anthropological Section of the British Association at Cardiff in 1889.

What [he asked] does Bunsen consider the real barrier between man and beast? It is language, which is unattainable, or at least unattained, by any animal except man.

You know [he continued] how for a time, and chiefly owing to Darwin's predominating influence, every conceivable effort was made to reduce the distance which language places between man and beast, and to treat language as a vanishing line in the mental evolution of animal and man. It required some courage at times to stand up against the authority of Darwin, but at present all serious thinkers agree, I believe, with Bunsen, that no animal has ever developed what we mean by rational language, as distinct from mere utterances of pleasure or pain, a subject lately treated with great fulness by Professor Romanes. Still, if all true science is based on facts, the fact remains that no animal has ever found what we mean by a language; and we are fully justified, therefore, in holding with Bunsen and Humboldt, as against Darwin and Romanes, that there is a specific difference between the human animal and all other animals, and that that difference consists in language as the outward manifestation of what the Greeks meant by Logos.

It is moreover evident that, far from speech having generated reason, as some have preposterously maintained, it is reason which generates speech, no less inevitably than sunlight produces the spectrum when it passes through a prism. The seeming paradox of Wilhelm von Humboldt is in fact a sober truth: "Man is man only through speech, but in order to invent it he must already be man." We have plain evidence that before means for the internal expression of it are found, the mental word (verbum mentale) is awaiting them, and that without this it would be as impossible for any sort of rational speech to be produced as for an apple to be grown without an apple-tree.

Evidence to this effect is furnished by recorded instances of persons who from early childhood, or even from birth, were deaf, dumb, and blind, and appeared to be cut off from all possibility of human converse, the "gates of Mansoul" being thus almost entirely closed. Such are the well-known cases of Laura Bridgman, Miss Keller, and Martha Obrecht, who had been thus afflicted since their earliest childhood, the two first named from the age of two, and the last from that of three years.[114] Also the more recent instance of Marie Heurtin, who was so born, and consequently could not have even the faintest glimmer of any knowledge these senses could convey.[115] Yet, by the exercise of ingenious and unwearied charity, a means of communication was elaborated through the sense of touch, and the souls which had seemingly been buried alive, shewed themselves responsive to such advances,—often astonishingly so,—and revealed their possession of faculties identical with those of their rescuers. We are told, for example, of Marie Heurtin that her intelligence proved to be quick, that she was even "unusually clever, evidently eager for knowledge, and, as sometimes happens, her faculties being prevented by her infirmity from wasting their powers on external objects, were all the more fresh and vigorous." Even more wonderful is the case of Miss Keller, who attained a degree of culture and accomplishment far beyond the common level of those possessing the use of all their senses.

Somewhat akin to such instances is that of the savages from Tierra del Fuego mentioned above by Mr. Darwin. In their case likewise, when they were brought into communication with people possessed of higher culture than their own degraded race, it was found that the corresponding faculties within them were not dead, or as yet non-existent, but only starved into lethargy; and, the opportunity being given, they speedily caused surprise by unmistakable proofs how closely they resemble ourselves.

Thus we find that in this branch of our enquiry there is one broad fact, which all must recognize and none can deny. No race of men has ever been known which could not speak, nor any race of animals which could, or which had made the first beginnings of intelligent language. Facts being the only groundwork of Science here is undoubtedly something whereon she may build an inference, and this inference will certainly not be that the faculties of men and animals are radically identical. And if we are told, as we constantly are, that it is more truly scientific to admit such identity, should there not be some other facts, still more significant and equally well established, to exhibit on the other side?

But of what character are the arguments actually adduced? It will be sufficient to quote a few which come with the highest authority.

We may start with the almost classical specimen contributed by Mr. Darwin himself.

It does not [he says][116] appear altogether incredible that some unusually wise ape-like animal should have thought of imitating the growl of a beast of prey, so as to indicate to his fellow monkeys the nature of the expected danger. And this would have been a first step in the formation of a language.

Similarly Professor Whitney writes of some supposed "pithecoid"[117] men:

There is no difficulty in supposing them to have possessed forms of speech, more rudimentary and imperfect than ours.[118]

And so again Professor Romanes:[119]

Let us try to imagine a community considerably more intelligent than the existing anthropoid apes, although still considerably below the intellectual level of existing savages. It is certain that in such a community natural signs of voice, gesture, and grimace would be in vogue to a greater or less extent. As their numbers increased ... such signs would require to become more and more conventional, or acquire more and more the character of sentence-words.

Of course, as Mr. Mivart replies,[120] there is no difficulty in supposing anything we choose, or in seeing animals in imagination performing feats which never yet have they been known to achieve in fact. But no amount of such suppositions or imaginations will furnish Science with the scantiest apology for a foothold, nor can the germs of language attributed to pithecoid communities or the sagest of their patriarchs, be considered as of any greater value than the speeches put into the mouths of the animals by Æsop or "Uncle Remus."

It is also to be noticed that in these accounts of the origin of language, the essential element of reason is always quietly smuggled in as a matter of course. Thus Mr. Darwin's wisest of the pithecoids was able to "think of" a device for the information of his fellows. There is not the smallest doubt that any creature which had got so far as that would find what he wanted. It is but the old case of the man who was sure he could have written Hamlet had he had a mind to do so. Like him, the ape might have made the invention, if he had a mind to make it;—only he had not got the mind. So too, Professor Romanes' missing links use tones and signs which acquire "more and more" the character of true speech: which could not be unless they contained some measure of that character already. But it is just the first step thus ignored which spans the gulf between man and brute.

There is another factor upon which, in conjunction with these suppositions, great stress is wont to be laid, namely that of time; it being apparently taken for granted that if only time enough be given anything whatever may come about. Thus Professor Romanes tells us[121] that his imaginary Homo alalus, or speechless man, must probably have lived for an "inconceivably long time," before getting far enough on the road towards speech to give him such an advantage as enabled him to crush out his less accomplished congeners; and that even after this point was reached, another "inconceivable lapse of time" must have been required to turn him into Homo sapiens, or man as he actually is. Immense intervals, he further tells us, must have been consumed in the passage through various grades of mental evolution; "The epoch during which sentence-words prevailed was probably immense"; "It was not until æons of ages had elapsed that any pronouns arose."

Meanwhile, there is no scrap of evidence that as a matter of fact any thing of all this ever happened at all, and as Bunsen has observed no millions of years, even were millions available at discretion, could ever supply the want of the faculty without which nothing in the way of language could ever be accomplished.

(c) Free-will.—Here is another human faculty which Du Bois-Reymond declares never to have been accounted for by natural causation, and he greatly doubts whether it should not be classed among the problems that must be for ever insoluble.

Professor Haeckel, as we have seen, gets rid of all difficulties on this score by laying it down that "the freedom of the will is not an object for critical scientific inquiry at all, for it is a pure dogma, based on an illusion, and has no real existence."

It is plain that for his purpose this is the only course possible. If the will be really free, there can be no question of finding a mechanical explanation of it. There is therefore no alternative but to cut the Gordian knot, and to declare that the liberty which the vast majority of men believe themselves to exercise every instant, is proved by Science to be no better than a pure dogma, that is to say, a mere figment.

When we seek for his indication of the line of argument whereby this position is made good, the information supplied is less full than might be desired. He begins[122] with a rather lengthy sketch of the history of controversy in this regard,—which contains the remarkable statement that "Some of the first teachers of the Christian Churches—such as St. Augustine and Calvin—rejected the freedom of the will as decidedly as the famous leaders of pure Materialism, Holbach in the eighteenth, and Büchner in the nineteenth century." Then he proceeds:

The great struggle between the determinist and the indeterminist, between the opponent and the sustainer of the freedom of the will, has ended to-day after more than 2,000 years, completely in favour of the determinist. The human will has no more freedom than that of the higher animals, from which it differs only in degree, not in kind. In the last [i.e. the eighteenth] century the doctrine of liberty was fought with general philosophic and cosmological arguments. The nineteenth century has given us very different weapons for its definitive destruction—the powerful weapons which we find in the arsenal of comparative physiology and evolution. We now know that each act of the will is as fatally determined by the organization of the individual, and as dependent on the momentary condition of his environment, as every other psychic activity. The character of the inclination was determined long ago by heredity from parents and ancestors; the determination to each particular act is an instance of adaptation to the circumstances of the moment wherein the strongest motive prevails, according to the laws which govern the statics of emotion. Ontogeny teaches us to understand the evolution of the will in the individual child. Phylogeny reveals to us the historical development of the will within the ranks of our vertebrate ancestors.[123]

That is all. It is needless to observe that jargon like this proves nothing. Of anything approaching to evidence there is here, manifestly, no vestige, and there is consequently nothing which can avail to win our assent as rational men.

It is likewise obvious that we have here a question as to which every human being has the means of judging equally with the most eminent man of Science, and modern improvement of the methods and instruments of research leaves us just where we always were. The final evidence on the subject every man has within himself, in the most vital facts of his own experience. Into the philosophy of the matter it is neither necessary nor advisable at present to go. In dealing with profound yet elementary questions, regarding which our means of knowledge are thus simple and direct, men are apt to bewilder themselves when they begin to philosophize, and to persuade themselves that they cannot be sure precisely of those things that are most certain. George Borrow is by no means the only one who has tormented himself with doubts as to his own existence.[124] A still larger number have professed to believe themselves mere machines compelled to go like clocks, and to do only what has been predetermined for them. But such beliefs are for the lecture-room or the study only, and in practical life every one behaves as if both he himself and others—especially others—were responsible for their conduct. So common-sense teaches, than which we shall not find a safer guide. "Sir," said the eminently common-sense Dr. Johnson, "we know our will is free; and there's an end on't. All theory is against the freedom of the will; all experience for it.... But, Sir, as to the doctrine of necessity, no man believes it. If a man should give me arguments that I cannot answer to prove that I cannot see; because I cannot answer his arguments, do I believe that I have no eyes?"

Thus we find once again that the doctrines which some would force upon us in the name of Science, on whatever they are founded, have no basis of fact, and cannot therefore rightly call themselves scientific.

XI

THE ORDER OF NATURE

THAT the world which we inhabit is a Cosmos, ruled by law and order, no one has ever attempted to deny. Only because laws are everywhere found awaiting discovery, is natural science a possibility. What such laws really are, we have already considered. They are, as Mr. Lewes puts it, the paths along which the forces of nature travel to their results; and it is only because these forces keep invariably each to its proper path, that we are able to follow them with our minds, either to learn anything concerning them, or to turn our knowledge to practical account. In something of the same manner, it is because we are assured that our railway trains will run on their appointed lines, that we can learn from Bradshaw how to get to Exeter or to Edinburgh;—but the forces of Nature are never derailed. It is, in fact, as we have heard, the first principle of Science, that "the reign of law is universal, the principle of continuity ubiquitous,"—and upon this the validity of all her methods and conclusions wholly depends. It is taken for granted, with absolute confidence, that what is once found to happen will be exactly repeated in like circumstances,—that the laws experimentally observed, regarding motion, heat, light, sound, chemical combination, electricity, magnetism, and the rest, will be faithfully obeyed, in every minutest particular, as certainly as suns will rise and set, or moons wax and wane. Were it not so, were the forces of Nature to act spasmodically and at random, and did not their common action so result as to establish or subserve other laws of bewildering complexity,—as in molecular dynamics, the mechanism of the heavens, and the processes of organic life,—we could learn no more from the study of nature than from a page of type which had been set up by an idiot, or an anthropoid ape.

Here is another factor in our problem, and one which has from the first attracted the attention of thinking men. No feature of nature impressed them more than this same reign of law and order, apparent everywhere; and on this account they called the world Cosmos, instead of Chaos. And, since it is self-evident that everything must have a reason for its being, that whatever is not self-existent must have a cause other than itself, they felt compelled to enquire what manner of cause would account for law and order. The like enquiry we have still to pursue, and by methods radically the same as ever; for amid all her discoveries Science has found nothing which does anything whatever to furnish an answer. All that has been done is enormously to multiply the aspects under which the problem presents itself.

It is now not merely in the larger and more obvious operations of Nature that we can trace this marvellous ubiquity of law, but in her most hidden processes and inmost constitution. At every point, we are forced to ask why things should be as they actually are, and how they came to be subject to conditions which they cannot be supposed to have created for themselves. Why, for example, should the ultimate elements of matter,—be they atoms, or electrons, or whatever else,—always and everywhere observe the same rules of the great game in which they serve as counters? Why, to take a concrete instance, should atoms of Hydrogen in Sirius, or in a star of the Milky Way, obey just the same laws as do those with which we make coal-gas or spirit of salt? These various atoms, as Lord Grimthorpe reminds us, have never been within billions of miles of one another. What is the mysterious influence which links them together across the depths of space? That they are so linked is obvious; for if we can ascertain the existence of such a substance in other spheres, it is only because the light it emits, exactly agrees when analyzed in the spectroscope with that of hydrogen flames in our own laboratories. How comes it, again, that the seventy different kinds of atoms, (to speak in round numbers)—are distributed—according to Mendeléeff's periodic law,—among some seven groups or families, the members of each group resembling one another in various particulars, wherein they differ from the rest? Or, to pass from atoms to molecules, (in which atoms of the same or of different kinds combine, to build up simple or compound substances respectively,)—how is it that molecules of the same kind are always constructed upon exactly the same model, resembling one another far more closely than sovereigns struck from the same die, or different copies of this morning's Times? It was in this uniformity of type, character and behaviour, repeated always and everywhere, in instances multiplied "beyond the power of imagination to conceive," that Sir John Herschel[125] saw a feature stamping atoms and molecules as "manufactured articles, and subordinate agents," which, no less than a line of spinning-jennies, or a regiment of soldiers clad in the same uniform, and going through the same evolutions, imply a controlling force directing things according to a definite system.

These and innumerable other particulars of detail has Science added to the problem: but of anything which can supply an answer, she knows no more than did the first man who ever mooted the question within his own soul.

And if in the inorganic world we find food for such considerations, with immensely greater instance are they forced upon us by a study of the organic. Here we enter a new realm of mystery, for the laws we encounter actively energizing at every point, are altogether different from those with which hitherto we have had to deal. The matter which enters into the constitution of living things,—animals or plants—is precisely the same as that of which the inorganic world is constituted. No single atom or molecule is found in the one which has not been drawn from the other;—nor when incorporated in a living structure do atoms or molecules suffer any alteration, or change their nature in any respect, for, says Clerk-Maxwell,[126] throughout all changes and catastrophes these remain "unbroken and unworn." Nevertheless, they fall at once under the spell of a force which introduces into their operations an order altogether new, for it somehow strikes across all the laws of dead matter, setting up a new code of its own, which endures just so long as life lasts, and is never met with apart from life. And these organic laws issue in marvellous results. Professor Haeckel himself, after endeavouring to show that from the inorganic world no arguments can be drawn to favour the supposition of design in Nature, thus continues:[127]

But the idea of design has a very great significance and application in the organic world. We do undeniably perceive a purpose in the structure and in the life of an organism. The plant and animal seem to be controlled by a definite design in the combination of their several parts, just as clearly as we see in the machines which man invents and constructs; as long as life continues, the functions of the several organs are directed to definite ends, just as is the operation of the various parts of a machine.

How Haeckel proceeds to argue that such appearance of purposive design is merely fallacious, we need not here stay to enquire; our present concern is to attempt to realize the evidence of law and order which the world everywhere exhibits. As we have just heard, the parts of an organism, like those of a motor-car, or a chronometer, combine their operations for the production of definite ends; the attainment of which depends in all instances upon the nicest correspondence of various details of their work. Thus, that there should be eyes capable of seeing, the laws of optics must be satisfied, reflection, refraction and the rest, just as exactly in the making of an eye as in that of a telescope. De facto they are satisfied. The eye, Mr. Darwin styles[128] "a living optical instrument as superior to one of glass as the works of the Creator[129] are to those of man." He speaks, moreover, of "all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic aberration."[130] Therefore, however we are to account for them, the laws which govern the production of eyes successfully solve a practical problem and satisfy laws which were in force before an animal with eyes appeared on earth.

In just the same way, the requirements of sound are met by the structure of the ear, which Sir Henry Holland, for example,[131] judged more wonderful than that of the eye itself.

So again as to wings. They are in the first place such marvellous pieces of workmanship that as Mr. Pettigrew writes concerning one of their forms.[132] "There are few things in nature more admirably constructed than the wing of a bird, and perhaps none where design can be more readily traced." But, moreover, wings entirely different in plan, as of birds, bats, and all the varieties of insects, alike satisfy the laws of aerostatics, and successfully solve in practice the problem of flight, a problem which we are unable to solve even theoretically. "It is evident," writes Lord Grimthorpe,[133] "that nobody yet thoroughly understands the whole theory of flying, though we are seeing it continually, and have unlimited opportunities of examining all sorts of wings. The explanation that appears plausible for one kind, not only will not do for another but seems refuted by it." Yet in a multitude of different ways, the forces of Nature succeed in effecting what with all our Science we cannot shew to be possible.

And concerning not merely one portion of a creature's structure, but the whole, Professor Huxley declares:[134]

The horse is in many ways a remarkable animal; not least so in the fact that it presents us with an example of one of the most perfect pieces of machinery in the living world. In truth, among the works of human ingenuity it cannot be said that there is any locomotive so perfectly adapted to its purposes, doing so much work with so small a quantity of fuel, as this machine of Nature's manufacture—the horse.

These are but a few out of countless similar examples. "We are constantly discovering," says Lord Grimthorpe, "new complications and processes, and what to all common sense appear contrivances, in the organs of all living things, and indeed we can find no limit to them." In all these cases an instrument is fashioned precisely adapted to the performance of a certain function, and it is therefore obvious on first principles that there must exist some power capable of producing such instruments.

It will probably be answered that there are forces enough in Nature to account for everything, and that these furnish the needful explanation. But, as Mr. Croll rightly insists,[135] Force by itself explains nothing. Its mere exercise has no tendency whatever to produce such effects. There must likewise be Determination of Force in the one definite direction required, and it is in the source of this Determination that the true cause must be sought to which the result is due. It is not simply because iron is hammered and filed that a railway-engine is produced; nor is it sufficient that a block of marble be chipped with mallet and chisel in order to obtain a statue of Apollo. Unless some influence comes in to direct the forces in such cases to their respective results, the results will never by any possibility be secured. And in the processes of Nature such direction or determination must be exercised in particulars inconceivably intricate, to which the works of man furnish no parallel. As Mr. Croll writes:

If a tree is to be formed, the lines of least resistance must all be determined and adjusted in relation to the objective idea of the tree; of the root; of the branches; of the leaves; of the bud; of the fruit; and of every part of the tree. But this is not all: the tree is built up molecule by molecule, each of which requires a special determination, and, beyond all this, we have the structureless protoplasm, which must be differentiated according to the objective idea of the whole. What produces this marvellous adjustment of means to ends?

And as he insists in another passage:

The determinations which take place in nature occur not at random, but according to a plan—an objective idea. Thus the question is not simply what causes a body to take some direction, but what causes it to take, among the infinite number of possible directions, the proper direction in relation to the idea. In the formation of, say, the leaf of a tree, no two molecules move in identically the same direction or take identically the same path. But each molecule must move in relation to the objective idea of the leaf, or no leaf would be formed. The grand question, therefore, is, What is it that selects from among the infinite number of possible directions the proper one in relation to this idea?

And this sort of thing is going on in every blossom and leaf and blade of grass, in every hair and every feather over the surface of the earth.

Truly does our author find here "The Grand Question," for in it we touch the very heart of our whole problem, and are forced to consider more closely than we have hitherto done of what character must be the ultimate Cause which alone can explain the world.

It is, as we have seen, a first principle of Science, that in enquiries such as this, we must proceed from experience to inference, from the known to the unknown. Arguing thus, we may legitimately gather from observed phenomena, that something exists, which even though it be not directly within the range of our senses, must certainly be capable of producing such phenomena: just as the perturbations of one planet have revealed the existence of another; and the lines in their spectra have taught us the chemical constitution of the sun and stars.

This principle being borrowed by Science from common-sense, has instinctively been ever adopted by those who set themselves to enquire of what kind must be that unseen Power at the back of Nature to which the fact of law and order may be ascribed. And as there is but one force or power within the range of our experience capable of producing such an effect, it is but natural that this should have been constantly assumed to represent, at least by analogy, the nature of the power required. That there is but one cause known to us experimentally, which can determine the operation of force towards the attainment of a preconditioned result, none will deny—namely the purposive action of an intelligent will, as known to us in ourselves and in our fellow-men;—and to Will accordingly, immensely more intelligent than ours, has been ascribed the establishment of those laws which the highest intellects of our race are able partially and dimly to apprehend.

It is thus that we are led to the fundamental doctrine of Theism, to belief in an intelligent First Cause, according to whose design the universe has been fashioned; a cause which must have all that is found in the universe or any part of it, including man, and more—for it has of itself what all else derives from it—whose purposes necessarily transcend our mental grasp—but whose modes of thought are reflected in our own, by which they can in some measure be followed through a study of their results.

If such a belief, so grounded, be unscientific, as is constantly assumed, there must be good arguments to the contrary. It should be demonstrable, either that Science has shown such a line of reasoning to be unsound, or that she has discovered within her own domain something which, at least conceivably, can do the work thus attributed to Intelligence—in which case the much-quoted dictum of Lord Kelvin will be in point,—that if a probable solution of any problem can be found which is consistent with the ordinary course of Nature, we must not go beyond Nature in search of one.

If, on the other hand, the above line of reasoning cannot be invalidated, and if scientific methods can discover nothing competent to effect what has undoubtedly been effected, it is not easy to see how it can be unscientific to proceed by inference to what is confessedly beyond the scope of observation and experiment.

That "Teleology," or the doctrine of Final Causality,[136] is unworthy of serious consideration, is without doubt a common assumption, and some writers seem to think that an argument is sufficiently discredited if it be styled "teleological." Yet this rather formidable term represents no more than the belief that the infinite adaptations of means to results observed in Nature are the effect of purpose, not of chance. And if we eliminate purpose, what is there left to furnish an explanation, beyond the indubitable fact that such adaptations have always been found in organic nature, and that we have learnt confidently to anticipate that they will appear generation after generation according to the "law of heredity"? But this obviously only tells us that they have been produced and are likewise transmitted, and throws no light whatever on the cause of the marvellous processes to which their production and their transmission are due. If we have any rational grounds for expecting that such processes will continue to occur, it cannot be merely that they have occurred before, but we instinctively infer that the cause to which they are ultimately due continues to operate. We are thus as far as ever from an answer to the question, What is that cause?

It may be urged [says Newman][137] if a thing happens once it must happen always; for what is to hinder it? Nay, on the contrary, why, because one particle of matter has a certain property, should all particles have the same? Why, because particles have instanced the property a thousand times, should the thousand and first instance it also? It is prima facie unaccountable that an accident should happen twice, not to speak of it happening always. If we expect a thing to happen twice, it is because we think it is not an accident, but has a cause. What has brought about a thing once, may bring it about twice. What is to hinder its happening? rather what is to make it happen? Here we are thrown back from the question of Order to that of Causation. A law is not a cause, but a fact; but when we come to the question of cause, then we have no experience of any cause but Will.

Here is the crucial point: "We have no experience of any cause but Will;" and it follows that if, as Science bids us, we base inference on experience alone, there can be no doubt about the conclusion to which we shall be led.

No different is the verdict of Sir John Herschel:

The presence of Mind [he writes][138] is what solves the whole difficulty: so far, at least, as it brings it within the sphere of our consciousness, and into conformity with our own experience of what action is.

That the introduction of intelligent purpose, as a factor, sufficiently meets the requirements of our reason cannot be denied. As Bishop Butler insists, it is even impossible for any man in his senses to say that the problem can be more easily solved without it. And witnesses not merely unfriendly, but positively and even bitterly hostile, are compelled to admit that on whatever other grounds they may reject Theism, it is not because this doctrine is inadequate as an explanation of the world we know.

It seems to me [says Professor Huxley][139] that "creation," in the ordinary sense of the word, is perfectly conceivable. I find no difficulty in imagining that, at some former period, this universe was not in existence; and that it made its appearance ... in consequence of the volition of some pre-existent Being. The so-called à priori arguments against Theism, and given a Deity, against the possibility of creative acts, appear to me to be devoid of reasonable foundation.

Similarly, that uncompromising foe of religious belief in any shape, Professor W. K. Clifford, replying to Dr. Martineau who based his argument on the existence of the moral law, as well as the evidence of design in Nature, wrote thus:[140]

I fully admit that the theistic hypothesis, so grounded, and considered apart from objections elsewhere arising, is a reasonable hypothesis and an explanation of the facts. The idea of an external conscious being is unavoidably suggested, as it seems to me, by the categorical imperative of the moral sense; and moreover in a way quite independent, by the aspect of nature, which seems to answer to our questionings with an intelligence akin to our own.

On the other hand, where is an alternative hypothesis to be found of which as much can be said,—which will justify itself to reason, by accounting for the facts? That no purely materialistic or mechanical theory will suffice is not only obvious to common-sense, but is acknowledged by those who would gladly find such a theory sufficient.

It would be a great delusion [writes Weismann][141] if any one were to believe that he had arrived at a comprehension of the universe by tracing the phenomena of Nature to mechanical principles. He would thereby forget that the assumption of eternal matter with its eternal laws by no means satisfies our intellectual need for causality.

Similarly, Professor Huxley admits that even his primeval cosmic nebula with the world potential in its womb, leaves something to desire.

The more purely a mechanist the speculator is [he writes][142] the more firmly does he assume a primordial molecular arrangement of which all the phenomena of the universe are the consequences, and the more completely is he thereby at the mercy of the teleologist, who can always defy him to disprove that this primordial molecular arrangement was not[143] intended to evolve the phenomena of the universe.

Accordingly, although he was clearly persuaded that Theism is a doctrine which we can never have sufficient grounds for accepting, Professor Huxley repudiated the notion that scientific discovery has done anything to disprove it. Thus he tells us,[144] that, in order to be a teleologist, and yet accept Evolution, it is only necessary

to suppose that the original plan was sketched out ... that the purpose was foreshadowed in the molecular arrangements out of which the animals have come.

And again,[145] he thus expressed himself regarding two objections commonly brought against Darwinism, namely that it introduces "chance" as a factor in nature, and that it is atheistic:

Both assertions are utter bosh. None but parsons believe in "chance"; and the philosophical difficulties of Theism now are neither greater nor less than they have been ever since Theism was invented.

Accordingly, as has already been urged, in regard of this question we are precisely where men have always been,—dependent upon arguments such as satisfied philosophers like Cicero, who declared that when we regard the starry heavens the existence of a Deity of surpassing intelligence must appear no less obvious than that of the sun in the sky.[146]

That scientific enlightenment is not incompatible with such reasoning, we have sufficient evidence in the fact that amongst those whose conclusions are wholly in accord with Cicero's, men are to be found standing in the very front rank of Science.

Like the Roman orator, Sir Isaac Newton declared that the existence of a Being endowed with intelligence and wisdom is a necessary inference from a study of celestial mechanics, and that to treat of God is therefore a part of Natural Philosophy.[147]

We assume, as absolutely self-evident [say Professors Stewart and Tait][148] the existence of a Deity, who is the Creator and Upholder of all things.

When we contemplate the phenomena of vision, [says Sir G. G. Stokes,][149] it seems difficult to understand how we can fail to be impressed with the evidence of design thus imparted to us. But design is altogether unmeaning without a designing mind. The study then of the phenomena of nature leads us to the contemplation of a Being from whom proceeded the orderly arrangement of natural things that we behold.

Lord Kelvin's recent declaration is even more vigorous.[150]

I cannot say that with regard to the origin of life Science neither affirms nor denies creative power. Science positively affirms creating and directive power, which she compels us to accept as an article of belief.

Thirty years earlier Clerk-Maxwell in concluding his famous lecture before the British Association[151] thus spoke concerning Molecules:

They continue this day as they were created, perfect in number and measure and weight, and from the ineffaceable characters impressed on them we may learn that those aspirations after accuracy in measurement, truth in statement, and justice in action, which we reckon among our noblest attributes as men, are ours because they are essential constituents of the image of Him who in the beginning created, not only the heaven and the earth, but the materials of which heaven and earth consist.

It is of course not to be denied that there are eminent men of science who altogether dissent from such opinions, and reject Theism as false, or at least as lacking any rational claim on our acceptance. That, however, is not the point. The above testimonies have not been adduced as if their authority could settle the question, which is one to be determined not by authority, but by argument. At the same time, it is abundantly evident that it is not argument but supposed authority which influences the great majority of those who style themselves rationalists. By what modes of reasoning their creed is supposed to be established they have usually little idea: but they firmly believe, as they are constantly assured, that no one who knows what Science is can pretend to credit an antiquated doctrine which she has entirely exploded. It is to show what degree of truth attaches to such statements, that our witnesses have been called—and for this purpose their testimony is undoubtedly sufficient. As Lord Rayleigh in his Presidential address told the British Association:[152]

It is true that among scientific men, as in other classes, crude views are to be met with as to the deeper things of Nature; but that the life-long beliefs of Newton, of Faraday, and of Maxwell, are inconsistent with the scientific habit of mind, is surely a proposition which I need not pause to refute.

And when from authority we turn to the line of argument adopted by those who would impugn that upon which Theists rely, and who reject the idea of an intelligent First Cause either as superfluous, or as incapable of verification, we find but two courses one or other of which they feel themselves compelled to adopt, although it is not very easy to understand the state of mind which can rest satisfied with either.

Some, on the one hand, frankly admit that Science has not by her own proper methods discovered any ultimate principle of things, and never will. But on that very account, they maintain, this ultimate principle, whatever it may be, must remain utterly unknown to us—for we can never know anything except by the methods of Science. Accordingly, although the theistic hypothesis would confessedly furnish such an explanation as is lacking, we must not adopt it because we cannot test it experimentally.

And yet in ordinary life we have no difficulty in arguing from effect to cause in just the same manner, and satisfying ourselves of the existence of what we can as little touch or see as the First Cause itself. Thus we are convinced of the genius of Shakespeare and Napoleon, and that there was a difference between the character of Robespierre and that of Howard the Philanthropist. But no man ever saw or touched either genius or character, which can be known only by their results. It is by inference far less legitimate that those proceed who, like Haeckel, seek in the forces of Nature themselves an explanation of phenomena which, as we know them, they are wholly incapable of producing. Instead of arguing that a cause must therefore exist which is beyond Nature, but whose character our own experience enables us in some measure, and analogically, to learn, these philosophers start with the assumption that no such cause is possible, and then proceed to draw the consequence that the condition of Nature must once have been totally different from what it actually is, enabling her forces to produce results which no experience of any sort indicates as possible.

Those who adopt such an attitude of nescience, and in the proper sense of the word are termed Agnostics, find themselves compelled accordingly to leave their system in the air, with no basis more solid than the elephant and tortoise on which Hindoo astronomers rested the world. They must ignore the fundamental principle of Causation, from which we started our present enquiry, and in consequence it is impossible that their systems should, as Professor Weismann says, satisfy our intellectual needs.

Others, on the other hand, declare that the Theistic hypothesis must be dismissed, because a better has been found, Science having discovered within her own sphere an effectual substitute for the supposed First Cause. When we enquire what this may be, we are told that it is the "Law of Substance," or "Evolution," or "Nature" herself, or an "Infinite Eternal Energy unknown and unknowable," but devoid of intellect and will—or "Monism," or some other similar abstraction which can represent no idea at all, unless—as often happens—it be clad in the robes of its rival, and credited with the very powers and attributes denied to the First Cause, so as to become practically the same thing under another and misleading name. Regarding this point there will be more to be said presently. Here, it will be sufficient to note that this is in truth the only meaning which can be attached to much of the language of so-called scientific writers.

Who [asks Mr. Wollaston][153] is this Nature ... who has such tremendous power, and to whose efficiency such marvellous performances are ascribed? What are her image and attributes when dragged from her wordy lurking-place? Is she aught but a pestilent abstraction, like dust cast in our eyes to obscure the workings of an intelligent First Cause?

So at the end of his life Clerk-Maxwell characteristically observed, that he had studied many queer religions and philosophies, but had found none of them that would work without God concealed somewhere.

Finally, a warning uttered by Lord Rayleigh in the address quoted above must not be forgotten. After acknowledging that "unfortunately" there are writers speaking in her name who have set themselves to foster the prevailing belief that Science necessarily tends towards materialism, he thus continued:

It would be easy, however, to lay too much stress upon the opinions of even such distinguished workers as these. Men who devote their lives to investigation cultivate a love of truth for its own sake, and endeavour instinctively to clear up, and not, as is too often the object in business and politics, to obscure, a difficult question. So far the opinion of a scientific worker may have a special value; but I do not think that he has a claim superior to that of other educated men, to assume the attitude of a prophet. In his heart he knows that underneath the theories that he constructs there lie contradictions which he cannot reconcile. The higher mysteries of being, if penetrable at all by the human intellect, require other weapons than those of calculation and experiment.

XII

PURPOSE AND CHANCE

AN objection is no doubt awaiting us which many consider absolutely fatal to the argument for purpose or design in nature, as above presented. That argument, it will be said, rests entirely upon the assumption that the sole alternative to Purpose is Chance, an assumption which, if not dishonest, betrays ignorance scarcely less discreditable: for men of science constantly warn us that there is no such thing as Chance,—that every occurrence in nature, one as much as another, testifies to the uniformity and regularity of natural causation,—and that if we speak of any phenomenon being due to Chance, this term is but a conventional symbol signifying that we do not know what caused it.

Amongst those who take up this position, which is well-nigh universal, no better representative need be sought than Professor Huxley, who treated the point formally, and was manifestly well satisfied with his performance. We have already heard him declare belief in Chance to be an absurdity of which none but parsons could be guilty, a class in which he clearly conceived the low-water-mark of intelligence to be reached. On another occasion,[154] he set himself expressly to the exposure of what he described as, "The most singular of the, perhaps immortal, fallacies, which live on, Tithonus-like, when sense and force have long deserted them."

Probably the best answer [he writes] to those who talk of Darwinism meaning the reign of "Chance," is to ask them what they themselves understand by "Chance." Do they believe that anything in this universe happens without reason or without a cause? Do they really conceive that any event has no cause, and could not have been predicted by any one who had a sufficient insight into the order of Nature? If they do, it is they who are the inheritors of antique superstition and ignorance, and whose minds have never been illumined by a ray of scientific thought.

As an object lesson for his enlightenment, the Professor bids one of these benighted folk betake himself to the sea-shore on which a heavy storm is breaking; and having painted a rather elaborate word-picture of the scene, he thus continues:

Surely here, if anywhere, he [the unenlightened one] will say that chance is supreme, and bend the knee as one who has entered the very penetralia of his divinity. But the man of science knows that here as everywhere, perfect order is manifested; that there is not a curve of the waves, not a note in the howling chorus, not a rainbow-glint on a bubble, which is other than a necessary consequence of the ascertained laws of nature; and that with a sufficient knowledge of the conditions, competent physico-mathematical skill could account for, and indeed predict, every one of these "chance" events.

This, however, is mere beating of the air, having no bearing whatever upon the question at issue; and we can only wonder that so able a man as Huxley could thus absolutely miss the whole point, while remaining serenely unconscious that he did so. No sane man ever entertained the foolish notion with which he credits his man of straw. On the contrary, it is precisely those whom he so heartily despises, that disbelieve in Chance, and deny it any share in the making of the world. They neither regard Chance as a possible cause of phenomena, nor make of it a kind of deity or fetish, as some appear inclined to do with Science. Their contention is that according to those who, with Huxley, reject the idea of intelligent purpose, Chance would needs be introduced as a ruling element in nature, which would be absurd. Nor in thus arguing do they introduce any notion so irrational as that of "absolute" Chance, of events happening without causes. But unquestionably there can be "relative" Chance. A cause fully sufficient for the production of a result, may have no tendency whatever to determine or direct this result to a particular end; and if in such circumstances this end be attained it is by Chance. In particular, should many independent results of purely mechanical forces combine to produce a result, as intelligence would combine them, its production can only be ascribed to Chance. "Chance" has therefore a very real meaning. It is not a Cause, but the absence of Cause: not of Cause altogether, but of the determining Cause requisite for the production of certain results. The argument based upon the impotence of Chance to obtain such results, is precisely that which the most exact of all the Sciences, Mathematics, accepts and applies in the Theory of Chances.

The answer to the question which Professor Huxley evidently deems unanswerable is plain enough. By "Chance" is meant the concurrence, unguided by Purpose, of independent forces to produce a definite effect. "Chance" denotes the absence of Purpose, as "Vacuum" denotes the absence of air; and when it is denied that certain results can come about by chance, or fortuitously, it is as when we deny that life can be sustained in vacuo. It is no positive feature or action of the vacuum that we have in mind, for its essence is negative; but just because of that negative character, experience has taught us, that it cannot fulfil certain functions. In the same manner the potency of "Chance" is denied, simply because it is not Purpose.

That there are phenomena for which "Chance" thus defined cannot account is, surely, obvious. If a man sits down at a piano and plays "God Save the King," no evidence in the world would persuade Professor Huxley or any one else, that the performer had never before seen a musical instrument, nor knew of the existence of such an air or any other, but just put his fingers on the keys as the spirit moved him. Such a story would be rightly felt to be absolutely incredible: and yet the notes he produced—equally with those of the howling chorus of winds and waves—were the necessary effects of physical causes; given that particular strings were struck, they could not but follow. The whole point is, however, that in this case the result is not a howling chorus, but a melody; not mere formless noise, but an orderly composition, constructed on definite principles which our mind can recognize. It is in regard of this particular feature of the result that Force of itself, as we have seen, explains nothing, and that, if there is to be any explanation at all, we must know something as to how Force received the needful Direction or Determination.

It is only in regard of human action that we can, as in the above instance, find an example of what may be called pure fortuity, for such action alone can be traced up to an initial cause, namely the exercise of Will. No one can have a right to call the action of natural forces fortuitous; on the contrary, we have seen arguments that in the inorganic world itself purpose must be recognized. But an action directed by purpose to one result may be quite fortuitous in regard of another. A man who digging a foundation for a house finds a buried treasure, discovers this by chance. Although his action was ruled by a most definite purpose, that purpose was not this. So again when, according to the old story, certain Phœnician mariners finding no stones on the sea-shore suitable for the purpose, used blocks of natron to support their cooking-pots, and so produced glass, they were led to the discovery by mere chance. And in like manner, however definitely the forces of matter may be determined each to its own proper end, there are results which if produced by them must be as purely fortuitous as such an invention made by men who thought only of preparing their dinner. The cable which was being laid to America having, in 1865, snapped and sunk in mid-Atlantic, it was determined in the following year to attempt its recovery. Meanwhile the shore-end at Valencia was still connected with the dial-plate, on which messages had been scored between ship and shore while the cable was intact. A telegraphist was constantly on duty, watching the needle which was never still, being deflected hither and thither by the earth-currents, working through the wires. On a sudden, however, the needle spelled out the letters "Got it," and it was known with absolute certainty that there was a man at the other end. It is no doubt perfectly true that each previous movement had been the necessary consequence of the force applied, just as truly as those which coincided with the conventions of the telegraphist's alphabet; but win any one say that such coincidence could conceivably be attributable to the forces of magnetism alone, however exact to the laws according to which they operate?

It must always be remembered that the question we have to discuss is, how far Science casts any light upon such questions as the one before us. And since "Science" is taken to mean knowledge acquired through the observation of phenomena alone, we have at present to enquire whether material forces, the only ones of which observation directly tells us anything, could have produced such effects as we have considered, otherwise than by mere "Chance"? If they could not, is it imaginable that they produced these effects at all? And it appears obvious that unless there be Purpose at the back of Nature, Chance must be acknowledged as the architect of the universe.

Professor Huxley tells us, it is true, that such an idea could be entertained by no one whose mind had ever been illumined by a ray of scientific thought. In face of this it is rather remarkable to find that the idea was undoubtedly entertained by Mr. Darwin, who took for granted that to deny Purpose is to affirm Chance.

I am conscious [he wrote to Asa Gray][155] that I am in an utterly hopeless muddle. I cannot think that the world, as we see it, is the result of chance; and yet I cannot look at each separate thing as the result of Design.

And again:[156]

I cannot any how be contented to view this wonderful universe, and especially the nature of man, and to conclude that everything is the result of brute force. I am inclined to look at everything as resulting from designed laws, with the details, whether good or bad, left to the working out of what we call chance. Not that this notion at all satisfies me.

Professor Haeckel too is by no means in accord on this point with his friend Professor Huxley. He writes:[157]

One group of philosophers affirms, in accordance with the teleological conception, that the whole cosmos is an orderly system, in which every phenomenon has its aim and purpose; there is no such thing as chance. The other group, holding a mechanical theory, expresses itself thus: The development of the universe is a monistic mechanical process, in which we discover no aim or purpose whatever; what we call design in the organic world is a special result of biological agencies; neither in the evolution of the heavenly bodies nor in that of the crust of our earth do we find any trace of a controlling purpose—all is the result of chance. Each party is right—according to its definition of chance. The general law of causality, taken in conjunction with the law of substance, teaches us that every phenomenon has a mechanical cause; in this sense there is no such thing as chance. Yet it is not only lawful, but necessary to retain the term for the purpose of expressing the simultaneous occurrence of two phenomena, which are not causally related to each other, but of which each has its own mechanical cause independent of the other. Everybody knows that chance, in this monistic sense, plays an important part in the life of man and in the universe at large. That, however, does not prevent us from recognizing in each "chance" event, as we do in the evolution of the entire cosmos, the universal sovereignty of nature's supreme law, the law of substance.

There is a good deal here which is less clear in the way of argument than could be wished. The famous Law of Substance, as we have seen, has two articles: The indestructibility of matter, and the conservation of energy. What light either of these principles may be supposed to shed on such questions as the adaptation of organs to their functions is by no means obvious. To say that there is no design in the organic world, because it is a special result of biological agencies,—is quite of a piece with the contention which has actually been made, that we can no longer argue to Design, with Paley, from the analogy of a watch, since "nearly every part of a watch is now made by inanimate machinery."[158] Thus much, however, is perfectly clear: the competence of Chance is recognized to originate a world like ours, and to enable Nature, as Professor Clifford says, seemingly to answer our questionings with an intelligence akin to our own.

It would thus appear that when Newton asks,—Was the eye fashioned without knowledge of the laws of light, or the ear, without knowledge of those of sound?—we are to answer in the affirmative, and to say that such organs are but special results of biological agencies, under the general management of the Law of Substance.

That such a reply cannot with any truth be termed scientific is plain—for it touches matters which by her own acknowledgment Science cannot reach;—nor does it seem probable that this kind of talk would convince anybody, were there nothing more. Undoubtedly those who persuade themselves that the Order of the Universe can be sufficiently explained without introducing the idea of purpose or design, are influenced by other considerations than these.

(1) With some it is the argument, which appears chiefly to have weighed with Mr. Darwin, who constantly speaks of it as the great obstacle to that belief in Design which the marvels of the universe would otherwise necessitate. This he based on certain features in Nature which appeared to him incompatible with the work of a beneficent Author, mainly the existence of suffering amongst animals in whose case it cannot be supposed to subserve any purpose of moral benefit. As he wrote to Asa Gray:[159]

I own that I cannot see as plainly as others do, and as I should wish to do, evidence of design and beneficence on all sides of us. There seems to me too much misery in the world. I cannot persuade myself that a beneficent and omnipotent God would have designedly created the Ichneumonidae with the express intention of their feeding within the living bodies of caterpillars, or that a cat should play with mice. Not believing this, I see no necessity in the belief that the eye was expressly designed.

Such a mode of meeting the arguments for Design, though only indirect, undoubtedly deserves serious consideration, touching as it does the darkest of all mysteries—the Origin of Evil. It is clear, however, that in Mr. Darwin's case, and probably in that of many others, its effect was due in no slight degree to imagination rather than to reason. He picks out one or two instances of seeming cruelty in Nature, as though they were something exceptional, and appears to imply that they create an obstacle to a belief which Nature as a whole almost forces upon him. In reality, the same sort of thing goes on everywhere. Animal life from beginning to end is a record of rapine and slaughter, as Tennyson declared in a verse too trite to bear quotation. The most petted of pet dogs has no more compunction than a tiger in worrying creatures weaker than itself, and a robin-redbreast takes far more lives daily than does a sparrow-hawk. But to draw from these facts such large conclusions—is quite another matter. Can we imagine that we are qualified by the fulness of our knowledge to pronounce judgment and declare that there can be no good end where we fail to perceive one? As Mr. Darwin admits in the very same passage: "I feel most deeply that the whole subject is too profound for the human intellect. A dog might as well speculate on the mind of Newton."

How much is there in the actions of persons much lowlier than Newton which to the most intelligent of animals, dogs, elephants, or monkeys, could they speculate at all, must seem wholly devoid of sense;—as for instance that men should spend such continual labour in digging and ploughing. So again, in his famous lecture on Coal, Professor Huxley depicts what might have been the reflections of a giant reptile of the Carboniferous Epoch, suggested by the seemingly senseless waste of nature's powers in the production of the primeval forests, that have furnished the coal measures, to which so much of our progress and civilization is directly due.

And, after all, given the universal law of death for all living things, it would hardly appear that we can assure ourselves that any attendant circumstance constitutes a greater evil—as Mr. Darwin's argument seems to assume; and yet, it does not appear ever to have been argued that there can be no purpose in Nature since no organic life endures for ever. Most probably, if we knew enough, we should plainly see that nothing could be more cruel than to have omitted the carnivora from creation, leaving herbivorous animals to multiply till they starved one another to death, or at least to perish of senile decay far more painfully than under the fangs of tigers and wolves. Instances might moreover be quoted which serve to remind us how impossible it is rightly to estimate the true character of suffering amongst creatures altogether different from ourselves. Thus when, as eye-witnesses report, young scorpions clinging to their mother devour her alive, scientifically avoiding as long as possible all vital parts and mortal wounds—we are inclined to consider them monsters of wickedness, and their parent as a model of motherly devotion, whose sufferings cannot be less horrible than those of a caterpillar similarly eaten by the ichneumon grub. But we cannot with any reason impute more moral blame to the young scorpions, than to the lambkins which draw sustenance from their dams in another fashion which we find touching and poetical; while as for the mother—who doubtless treated her own parent in just the same fashion—she exhibits no symptom to show that she resents her offsprings' advances, any more than does the ewe, but on the contrary has her sting ever ready for any one who would interfere with them.

(2) It is a still more common objection to the doctrine of purpose everywhere in Nature, that such an idea is negatived by the continuity and uniformity of natural laws, precluding the notion of constant interference by another, supernatural, Agent. But this objection is based upon an entire misconception. No one imagines such intervention, or that purpose guides nature as a pilot guides a ship by repeated orders to the man at the wheel. Undoubtedly the reign of law in nature is uninterrupted, but in that law purpose is interwoven as the controlling element; just as the mind of Homer governs the hand of every printer who sets up type for a new edition of the Iliad.

(3) Finally, there is the argument, already alluded to, that inasmuch as the most complex structures are daily transmitted under our eyes by generation, we have evidence that nature can produce them from her own resources, and by the operation of a merely natural law, such as no one doubts generation to be.

Such an argument, it is evident, merely begs the question at issue, offering as it does no explanation, or suggestion, as to how a power so marvellous was acquired. It would be equally philosophical to argue that there is nothing wonderful about the genius of a great poet because we confidently anticipate that it will be exhibited in the next piece he produces.

It is likewise clear that, here again, imagination rather than reason furnishes the argument. In the first place, were there nothing else, no explanation whatever would thus be afforded as to how the structures in question were first produced, before they could be transmitted. And, secondly, which is still more important, generation—far from furnishing an explanation of anything—introduces us to mysteries yet more inscrutable than any we have yet encountered, and to problems which seem to admit of no possible solution apart from, not only Purpose, but transcendent Power.

Doubtless the propagation of life is ruled by natural law, but how such law effects its object we understand immeasurably less than we understand the flight of birds or butterflies. As a recent writer reminds us,[160] what is transmitted from parents to offspring "is not a new form or structure, but only the potentiality of such a new form: which, in suitable circumstances, builds itself up out of surrounding inorganic and organic material." As Lord Grimthorpe expresses the same truth:[161]

If we suppose an apple-tree to have once grown somehow, and to have somehow got power to produce seeds, that would not produce any more apple-trees, unless the seeds, and all the adjacent atoms that are wanted, had the power and the will to combine and grow into another apple-tree. The first hen that laid an egg performed a wonderful feat enough, but it would have done no good unless the atoms of the egg also knew and resolved what to do to turn themselves into a chicken. Yet spontaneous evolutionists are in the habit of slurring over generation as a thing too "natural," and therefore too easy and simple to require explanation.

The continual operation of a law such as this, certainly does not remove mysteries, nor make it more easy to understand how the order and the marvels of the universe can rationally be attributed to Chance rather than to Design, according to "this new philosophy of effects without causes and laws without a lawgiver."[162] For "fortuitous" means, as Professor Case has well observed,[163] not the accidental, as opposed to the regular laws of nature, but the spontaneous necessity of nature, as opposed to the voluntary designs of intelligence. Nor is it only in the organic world that we find the need of such a factor to explain phenomena; for it is throughout more essential than any other force to account for Nature as we find her—in such a manner as to satisfy the logical demands of our mind. We learn as little from observation and experiment as to the fundamental laws of matter,—gravitation, for instance, which Faraday and Herschel termed "the mystery of mysteries," or chemical affinities, or the nature of Ether—as concerning anything in organic nature; though in the latter we undoubtedly mount to a higher plane of mysteriousness. And in either case we could learn nothing whatever,—that is to say, Science would be wholly impossible,—did we not find natural phenomena respond to our enquiries with what seems an intelligence akin to our own. And accordingly it appears but reasonable,—that is to say, truly scientific,—to exclaim as did even Diderot—"Quoi! le monde formé prouverait moins une intelligence que le monde expliqué!"

XIII

MONISM

ALL systems of philosophy that reject the idea of an intelligent First Cause, which alone is self-existent, and whose being is of a higher order than that of aught else,—base their denial on the assumption that no such distinction of nature either exists or is possible,—that there is but one reality, namely the substance whereof the sensible world consists,—that this has always existed with the same forces it has now, and that it is the source of all phenomena. This assumption of the unreality of whatever is beyond the scope of sense, which has ever been at the bottom of materialistic systems, is now elaborately formulated as a creed, declared by Professor Haeckel and his following to be the only creed which science can tolerate. This is termed Monism,—from the Greek Μὁνος, "single," and is opposed to Dualism, or the doctrine that there are two orders of being, or two distinct substances, material and spiritual.[164]

According to monistic teaching, therefore, there exists but one Thing, that which we usually call Matter, but might equally well call Mind,—for all phenomena whatever, whether mental or material, are but various shapes which it assumes, exhibiting diverse aspects of itself. Thus all the objects which appear to have a being of their own,—as the globe we inhabit, the furniture of earth and heaven, we ourselves,—are but the forms momentarily assumed by this protean entity in its ceaseless transfigurations, and have no more existence of their own than the ripples on a pool of water or the faces we see in the fire. It follows that when the particular phase of this basic substance is ended which brings us into being, (or rather which we are,) we like everything else, sink into blank nothing,—so that the mighty dead whom nations honour, or the loved ones whose memory we cherish, are blotted out of existence as utterly as the days and nights which made up the span of their lives. But amongst its permutations and combinations this solitary reality can produce the phenomena which we call thought, just as much as those which we call motion, and accordingly the Aeneid or Hamlet is its work, a mechanical product of evolution, no less than a seam of coal, or an eclipse of the moon.

Such, in outline, is the philosophical system which commends itself, as Professor Haeckel assures us,[165] to all men of science, who combine the necessary conditions, of scientific knowledge, mental acumen, moral courage, and intellectual independence. It may be rightly described as materialistic pantheism; for while, according to it, everything is equally divine, in the only sense in which anything can be so, everything is likewise equally material, as falling under the category of what we know as matter, and within the direct cognizance of physical science.

Accurately to sketch a doctrine such as this is a task of no slight difficulty. It undoubtedly contradicts the instinctive teaching of our consciousness, so that, as Professor Haeckel admits[166] in the primitive stages of both religion and philosophy Monism is unknown. Moreover, even those who most loudly profess it, have by no means as yet succeeded in realizing their own system, and after having from time to time formally enunciated its articles, proceed forthwith to ignore them, and in the staple of their discourse speak like other men in terms which have no meaning if the tenets of their creed have any. As a natural result their exposition of monistic doctrine is not very easy of apprehension, but it seems to be not unfairly reflected in the above summary.

Professor Haeckel himself thus expounds "that unifying conception of nature as a whole which we designate in a single word as Monism."[167]

By this we unambiguously express our conviction that there lives "one spirit in all things," and that the whole cognizable world is constituted, and has been developed, in accordance with one common fundamental law. We emphasize by it, in particular, the essential unity of inorganic and organic nature, the latter having been evolved from the former only at a comparatively late period. We cannot draw a sharp line of distinction between these two great divisions of nature, any more than we can recognize an absolute distinction between the animal and the vegetable kingdom, or between the lower animals and man. Similarly, we regard the whole of human knowledge as a structural unity; in this sphere we refuse to accept the distinction usually drawn between the natural and the spiritual. The latter is only a part of the former (or vice versâ); both are one. Our monistic view of the world belongs, therefore, to that group of philosophical systems which from other points of view have been designated also as mechanical or as pantheistic.

More concisely and clearly, Professor Romanes tells us:[168]

Mental phenomena and physical phenomena, although apparently diverse, are really identical.

And in a work recently issued for the express purpose of expounding and diffusing the new gospel, we read:[169]

Just as the same particles of matter may at one time form parts of a rose, and at another time parts of a mushroom, so the same force may at one time strike a church as lightning, and at another time may be the mother-love that rocks the cradle.

If such conceptions are not easy to grasp, there can be no doubt as to the practical conclusions to which they lead. We have already heard from Professor Haeckel that human freedom is an utter delusion. We have likewise seen that the only term in prospect is utter annihilation, which Professor Haeckel endeavours to persuade us is the consummation we ought to wish.

"The best we can desire," he says,[170] "after a courageous life, spent in doing good according to our light, is the eternal peace of the grave. 'Lord give them an eternal rest.'"

It is evident however that in order to secure such a reward it is not necessary to show any courage, or attempt any sort of good-work, for according to him it equally awaits the most selfish and abandoned voluptuary.

Finally,[171]

At our death there disappears only the individual form in which the nerve-substance was fashioned, and the personal "soul" which represented the work performed by this. The complicated chemical combinations of that nervous mass pass over into other combinations—by decomposition, and the kinetic energy produced by them is transformed into other forms of nature.

Imperial Cæsar, dead and turned to clay,

Might stop a hole to keep the wind away, etc.—

* * * * *

which lines others besides Haeckel are fond of quoting on this subject as if they had any possible connexion with it. It would be more to the point, and far more interesting, were some indication afforded of the chemical equivalent of the qualities which made Cæsar imperial, or those which distinguished the author of the above lines from the bards of our Music Halls. That, when a man is no more, his material part may serve various material purposes, is no more than was known to the first savage who made a drum with his enemy's skin, or used his skull for a drinking-cup.

As has been said, the Monistic philosophy claims to be above all things scientific, and upon this ground are we bidden to accept it. But what is the meaning of this claim? The one argument, apart from mere assertion, brought to show that spirit is not distinct from matter, is drawn from the part undoubtedly played by the brain in the process of thought, though we see far less in this, as in other connexions, than the assertions made by unscientific writers might lead us to imagine. But when all this is most fully acknowledged can it be said that the state of the question is changed from what it was? To listen to Monists, it might be supposed that the intimate connexion between soul and body is a new discovery, undreamt of in former ages,—and that we have now arrived at a demonstration that it is our material part that actually does our thinking. But, as a matter of fact, like other fundamental questions, this is exactly as it has ever been, and so far as Science is concerned, we are just as much in the dark respecting it as men ever were. Though the philosophers of former days were unaware of all the departmental details of brain activity, they understood as well as we do the essential point, that in our composite nature soul and body form one being, whose every operation is of mixed character like itself. The soul alone is the intelligent principle, yet all objects of knowledge must come to it through sense, and in the senses it can be reached only by the mechanical media of light, or sound, or touch. So firm was their grip of this principle that the Schoolmen styled the soul the "substantial form" of the body, and in their mouth this term expressed a union more essential and intimate than modern philosophers can perhaps imagine.

And, on the other hand, have all the results of modern research brought anything to light which tends to show that matter can by any possibility think? We are assured on the contrary, upon unimpeachable authority, that however we may succeed in tracing the mechanical processes of sensation to their furthest limit, it remains absolutely inconceivable to us how the gulf is crossed that lies between this and rational perception. So Professor Tyndall tells us:[172]

The passage from the physics of the brain to the corresponding facts of consciousness is unthinkable. Granted that a definite thought and a definite molecular action in the brain occur simultaneously, we do not possess the intellectual organ, nor apparently any rudiments of an organ, which would enable us to pass by a process of reasoning from one to the other. They appear together, but we do not know why. Were our minds and senses so expanded as to enable us to see and feel the very molecules of the brain, were we capable of following all their motions, all their groupings and electrical discharges, if such there be, and were we intimately acquainted with the corresponding states of thought and feeling, we should be as far as ever from the solution of the problem—"How are these physical processes connected with the facts of consciousness?" The chasm between the two classes remains still intellectually impassable.

With these views Professor Huxley[173] expresses his agreement, and although he contrives to confuse the issue very considerably, as is not unusual when he undertakes to philosophize, he lays down in the clearest possible terms that nothing whatever is known as to the connexion of mechanical processes with thought, whence it follows that on this point Science has nothing to tell us.

"I really know nothing whatever [he writes] and never hope to know anything, of the steps by which the passage from molecular movement to states of consciousness is effected."

It should be needless to repeat that if nothing is known regarding all this, it is mere charlatanism to pretend that Science tells us anything about it, and those who make such assertions use words to which no meaning can attach. Unfortunately such a practice is far from uncommon in connexion with these questions. What sense can there be conceivable in the well-known materialistic doctrine that the brain secretes thought, just as the proper organs secrete bile or saliva? Bile and saliva are material substances, with a definite chemical constitution, each adapted to one definite function. But, Thought! It would be as intelligible to talk of secreting the British Constitution, the Steam Engine, and the Differential Calculus.

So much for the sole basis of Monistic argument. When we turn to some other considerations it certainly becomes no easier to understand the claim of Monism to be scientific. In the first place, as we have seen, in order to furnish the system with any semblance of truth, it has been found necessary to attribute to the ultimate elements of matter qualities which all our experience denies them; for Professor Haeckel has told us that "the two fundamental forms of substance, ponderable matter and ether, are not dead, and only moved by extrinsic force, but they are endowed with sensation and will." Of such attributes, and that of self-mobility, it is unnecessary to add anything to what has been said already. Assuredly nothing can look less like the great ultimate reality, of whose ceaseless metamorphoses, we are but a flitting phase, than the material substances with which we can do what we like, investigating their laws, exploring their constitution, and setting them tasks which we know exactly how they will accomplish.

Another point in the same connexion is no less important. What is this one Thing, this Ultimate and Solitary Self-existent Reality, from which Monism takes its title? Professor Haeckel has told us of two fundamental forms of substance,—ponderable matter and ether. These he evidently supposes, as his creed requires, to be radically the same: but what right has he to take such a supposition for a fact? and unless this unity be a fact, what becomes of Monism? What has Science ever discovered that can justify any one in speaking of Ether and Matter as one and the same? How, then, can a theory that assumes their identity be termed "scientific?"

Or, leaving Ether alone, "that half-discovered entity," as Lord Salisbury styled it on a famous occasion, and restricting our attention to ponderable matter, concerning which we know a little more,—how can even this be spoken of as "One"? As we have seen already it is only by a figure of speech that the term "Matter" can be used at all. It stands not for a single thing, but for countless millions and billions of atoms, dispersed through space, some of one kind some of another, no one of which can be imagined to owe its existence or its properties to any other. To say that matter is self-existent is to say that every several atom is self-existent. If this be so, and if this be the ultimate Reality,—then there are as many first principles, or first causes, as there are atoms. Yet none of these could do anything to the purpose towards the evolution of anything, without the concurrence of a multitude of others, nor would such concurrence be possible but for the reign of law, which none of them can have instituted, but to which all alike are subject. Were matter the great reality, even matter composed of "animated atoms," the term Monism would be sadly out of keeping, and should yield its place to Myriadism. If, on the other hand, there is a unifying principle amid such diversity, this it must be which can control and direct all to one end.

It is undoubtedly hard to understand how the First Principle of all things can be supposed to consist of Atoms, but this is one of the perplexities in which monistic doctrines abound. That atoms are, so far as we know, the ultimate constituents of the Fundamental Reality, Professor Haeckel admits. It is true, he adds, that our knowledge of these ultimate elements is still far from satisfying, and he likewise anticipates that atoms will someday be discovered not really to be ultimate, but forms of something, more primal still.

Although [he says][174] Monism is on the one hand for us an indispensable and fundamental conception in science, and although, on the other hand, it strives to carry back all phenomena, without exception, to the mechanism of the atom, we must nevertheless still admit that as yet we are by no means in a position to form any satisfactory conception of the exact nature of these atoms, and their relation to the general space-filling, universal ether. Chemistry long ago succeeded in reducing all the various natural substances to combinations of a relatively small number of elements; and the most recent advances of that science have made it in the highest degree probable that these elements ... are themselves in turn only different combinations of a varying number of atoms of one single original element. But in all this we have not as yet obtained any further light as to the real nature of these original atoms or their primal energies.

From which it is clear, that, while the considerations above presented lose none of their force, the Monistic system, by the avowal of its chief apostle, is based on complete ignorance concerning all which could furnish it with a foundation.

But by far the most serious consideration yet remains. If, according to Monistic teaching men are but bubbles on the surface of reality, and are inevitably carried as it wills,—there is an end of all distinction between good and evil, right and wrong, merit and guilt. One man, or one line of conduct, is as good, or as bad, as another, being all equally the products of Evolution, and aspects of the great Monistic principle;—"Jack the Ripper," and Socrates, Messalina and Queen Victoria, Chief Justice Scroggs and Sir Thomas More, are none of them in any possible sense one whit better or worse than the others,—inasmuch as they all did but act as puppets actuated by one and the same original, playing its own part in them all.

And in like manner as regards Truth. It must follow that a man's beliefs, like his actions, are as much beyond his own control as his stature or the colour of his hair. If Professor Haeckel calls Monism supreme wisdom, and I call it nonsense, we are equally right, for each is the mouthpiece of the same one all-embracing first-principle. What each believes is the only thing possible for him to believe, and, so far as he is concerned, is the only truth.

But here comes in a perplexity. If such be the case, if there be no Free-will, and no possibility whatever of doing or believing anything but what is predetermined for us as a necessary part of our being,—where is the sense of all the strenuous efforts that are being made to convert the people to a belief which, according to its own principles, nothing in the world can make them accept, unless nothing in the world can prevent them from accepting it? What again is the meaning of organizations, such as we hear of, for giving ethical instruction to the young on a Monistic and determinist basis? What can be the possible sense of giving ethical lectures to young people, if it is really believed that the course of each is marked out for him more rigorously than the path of a city omnibus? "If" said Professor Paul Darnley in Mr. Mallock's clever satire,—"If we would be solemn, and high, and happy, and heroic, and saintly, we have but to strive and struggle to do what we cannot for an instant avoid doing,"—namely, conform to the laws of matter. If Monists were to limit their aspirations to this, their teaching would at least be intelligible. It ceases to be so, when they feel compelled to graft on their Monistic stock the Dualistic notions of Right and Wrong, Truth and Error. But, as Dr. Johnson said respecting Free-will, no one ever believes the arguments on the other side, however loudly he may profess to do so. And in the same way it is quite clear that no Monist can get himself really to accept Monism.[175]

XIV

ORGANIC EVOLUTION

WE have now considered the question of Evolution in the larger and more fundamental signification of the term to which, as we noted at starting, very different meanings are attached; and at this stage of our discussion it will be convenient to sum up the main conclusions at which we have arrived.

It is, in the first place, unwarrantable to pretend that the discoveries of modern Science, brilliant and marvellous as they undoubtedly are, have thrown any light upon the origin of the Material Universe, or of its forces, or of the laws according to which its operations proceed. Nor has Science anything to tell as to the origin of life, of sensation, or of reason. Nothing as yet discovered by her, or which she can discern any prospect of discovering, adds aught to our knowledge regarding such points as these.

Therefore, to say that the doctrine of Evolution as affirmed by Science, explains the existence of the world we know, is untrue and unscientific.

Moreover, we have seen that, as a factor without which the Order of Nature is unintelligible, the First Cause to which her existence is owing must be possessed of Intelligence, determining her processes according to its purposes. Hence it follows that no system of philosophy satisfies our reason which would find the ultimate explanation of all things in the forces of matter themselves which it is the province of Science to investigate.

On the other hand, in maintaining that Purpose must needs have acted, we do not assume to pronounce as to the manner of its action. To say that Purpose rules every detail in the making or development of the universe, does not by any means signify that it interferes at every step with the laws of Nature. Rather, these laws are the expression of Purpose,—its machinery to secure its designed result. Assuming, for instance, the primeval existence of Professor Huxley's cosmic nebula, so constituted that the actual world was bound naturally to issue from it, as does a chicken from an egg, or an oak from an acorn,—while we find it inconceivable that such a piece of mechanism should originate without an intelligence to design it,—we have no difficulty in supposing that intelligence to have exhibited itself once for all at the first beginning, and to have fashioned the actual world by shaping the causes or conditions by which it was to be produced, thus making everything, not directly and immediately but as St. Augustine held "causaliter et seminaliter."

There remains for consideration Evolution in its narrower sense, in which its operations are restricted to organic nature, such Evolution being commonly, but incorrectly, identified with "Darwinism." Understood thus, "Evolution" signifies no more than that the various species of animals and plants have descended genetically one from another, through a graduated series of intermediate forms which link them together. Darwinism is one particular mode of explaining how such transformations may be accounted for,—namely, by what is known as "Natural Selection." The theory of Evolution, as thus concerned with Organic life in particular, is compendiously described as "Transformism," under which head Darwinism is evidently included.

Transformism makes no pretence to account for the origin of life, whether animal or vegetable. Living things must exist before any question arises as to their transmutation. But, given the existence of life, Transformists undertake in the first place to show that Organic Evolution has, as a matter of fact, occurred, and is still in process of occurrence; and secondly, to exhibit the manner in which this process is actually worked out. As to the first point, all Transformists, whether Darwinians or others, are necessarily at one, for the fact of Evolution is equally essential for every explanation of its method. It is when they come to explain in what manner evolutionary transformations have been wrought that Transformists divide themselves into various schools, each of which relies upon some particular factor to furnish the required explanation. Thus besides Darwinians pure and simple, there are neo-Darwinians, Lamarckians, neo-Lamarckians, Weismannists, and others, ascribing the results to physiological selection, sexual-selection, or other forces, rather than natural selection. Of such systems, however, excepting only Darwinism, it will be unnecessary to speak in particular. The great fundamental question is whether genetic Evolution be really established as a fact,—which, as has been said, equally affects them all—and if it be advisable to treat more in detail of Darwinism, it is not because this does not hold good of it as of the rest—but because this particular system has obtained such a position, is so much in the mouths of men, and has been made the basis of so many and such far-reaching consequences, that it is impossible to pass it by.

Much the same may indeed be said even of the assumed fact of Organic Evolution underlying all Transformist theories. This does not affect the fundamental problems with which we are concerned, and leaving untouched, as it does, the question of the origin of Life it makes even less pretence than the cosmic-nebular hypothesis just spoken of to trace the operations of Nature to their ultimate source. It might therefore appear superfluous to devote to it so much attention as, if treated at all, it must needs demand.

But, whatever may thus appear from the point of view of strict logic, it is abundantly evident that in common estimation the assumed fact of Organic transformation is the foundation-stone of Evolutionary systems of every kind. And not unnaturally; for here at last we have something with which Science can deal, strictly according to her own methods. If she knows, and can know, nothing from actual observation concerning the first beginnings of matter, of the cosmic nebula, or of life, it is quite otherwise with the history of living things since they first appeared, and with the phenomena of life as it exists and is propagated. Here are questions which are strictly scientific, forming the subject-matter of Palæontology and Biology, and these Sciences supplemented by others, such as Geology, Physical Geography, and Astronomy, furnish a mass of evidence bearing upon the subject of Organic Evolution. When therefore the great majority of men of Science, declare that the fact of genetic Transformism is established beyond the possibility of doubt, Evolutionists find themselves supplied with a plausible foothold on which to stand and rest their fulcrum, while, like Archimedes, they proceed to move the world.