352 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



and Descartes supposed that all their movements might be thus ac- 

 counted for — that they were, like the movements of sensitive plants, 

 absolutely detached from consciousness or sensation, and that, in fact, 

 animals were mere machines or automata, devoid not only of reason, but 

 of any kind of consciousness. 



It must be admitted that Descartes' arguments are not easy to dis- 

 prove, and no doubt certain cases of disease or injury — as, for instance, 

 that of the soldier described by Dr. Mesnet, who, as a result of a 

 wound in the head, fell from time to time into a condition of uncon- 

 sciousness, during which, however, he ate, drank, smoked, dressed and un- 

 dressed, and even wrote — have supplied additional evidence in support 

 of his views. Huxley, while fully admitting this, came, and I think 

 rightly, to the conclusion that the consciousness of which we feel cer- 

 tain in ourselves must have been evolved very gradually, and must 

 therefore exist, though probably in a less degree, in other animals. 



No one, indeed, I think, who has kept and studied pets, even if they 

 be only ants and bees, can bring himself to regard them as mere ma- 

 chines. 



The foundation of the Metaphysical Society led to the invention of 

 the term 'Agnostic/ 



"When I reached intellectual maturity," Huxley tells us, "and began 

 to ask myself whether I was an atheist, a theist or a pantheist, a mate- 

 rialist or an idealist, a Christian or a freethinker, I found that the more 

 I learned and reflected, the less ready was the answer; until, at last, I 

 came to the conclusion that I had neither art nor part with any of these 

 denominations except the last. The one thing in which most of these 

 good people were agreed was the one thing in which I differed from 

 them. They were quite sure they had attained a certain 'gnosis' — had, 

 more or less successfully, solved the problem of existence; while I was 

 quite sure I had not, and had a pretty strong conviction that the prob- 

 lem was insoluble. . . ." 



These considerations pressed forcibly on him when he joined the 

 Metaphysical Society. 



"Every variety," he says, "of philosophical and theological opinion 

 was represented there, and expressed itself with entire openness; most 

 of my colleagues were 'ists' of one sort or another; and, however kind 

 and friendly they might be, I, the man without a rag of a habit to cover 

 himself with, could not fail to have some of the uneasy feelings which 

 must have beset the historical fox when, after leaving the trap, in which 

 his tail remained, he presented himself to his normally elongated com- 

 panions. So I took thought, and invented what I conceived to be the 

 appropriate title of agnostic. It came into my head as suggestively 

 antithetic to the gnostic of Church history, who professed to know so 

 much about the very things of which I was ignorant; and I took the 



