STUDIES IN ANIMAL LIFE. 37 



of human inquiry, especially by applying the test 

 of immediate utility. All truths are related ; and, 

 however remote from our daily needs some partic- 

 ular truth may seem, the time will surely come 

 when its value will be felt. To the majority of our 

 countrymen during the Eevolution, when the con- 

 duct of James seemed of incalculable importance, 

 there would have seemed something ludicrously ab- 

 surd in the assertion that the newly-discovered dif- 

 ferential calculus was infinitely more important to 

 England and to Europe than the fate of all the dy- 

 nasties; and few things could have seemed more 

 remote from any useful end than this product of 

 mathematical genius ; yet it is now clear to every 

 one that the conduct of James was supremely insig- 

 nificant in comparison with this discovery. I do 

 not say that men were unwise to throw themselves 

 body and soul into the Revolution ; I only say they 

 would have been unwise to condemn the researches 

 of mathematicians. 



Let all who have a longing to study Nature in 

 any of her manifold aspects do so without regard 

 to the sneers or objections of men whose tastes and 

 faculties are directed elsewhere. From the illumi- 

 nation of many minds on many points Truth must 

 finally emerge. Man is, in Bacon's noble phrase, 

 the minister and interpreter of Nature ; let him be 

 careful lest he suffer this ministry to sink into a 

 priesthood, and this interpretation to degenerate 

 into an immovable dogma. The suggestions of 



