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POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



of his resistless will he can make the 

 cells of the nervous system retrokaryo- 

 kinetate to the period when they opened 

 and shut a bivalve or sojourned upon 

 the planet Mars. This, then, is the dif- 

 ference between a telepath and a charla- 

 tan: the charlatan is a broker who 

 deals in futures; the telepath is a com- 

 mission merchant who deals in eggs. 

 Rebecca Shabpe. 

 P. S. — A.} I go over this to put in 

 missing commas and words, it seems to 

 me that it is made up crazy quilt patch- 

 work fashion, so I suppose it is hardly 

 a virtue to say that, though I first mixed 

 it all up and then wrote it out of my 

 own head, I got the woman facts from 

 old Mrs. Blackleg, who keeps the board- 

 ing-house where I lodge, and the socio- 

 logical facts from a poor fellow who is 

 madly in love with me and has proposed 

 ever so many times, though I have never 

 given him the slightest encouragement, 

 no, never; but he will, and he will, and 

 he will. Not that I am no scientist and 

 don't know original facts. That is not 

 true, for when I was studying up for 

 examination I noticed how the jelly- 

 fish Medusa could easily heal its 

 wounded nervous system, and the star- 

 fish, too, and so needed no protection, as 

 every part could go off on its own 

 hook; and then how Nature, in making 

 a more centralized nervous system, made 

 a limestone coat for the poor thing, and 

 so on, until I, trying to work out the 

 puzzle of mental fatigue, found that the 

 dear old lady made a clean jump to a 

 double nervous system for backbone ani- 

 mals, one set for vascular work and 

 the other for fighting purposes, and 

 brains made ribs of the entrenchment of 

 the clam and the cuirass of the turtle. 

 And without bothering you any more, I 

 only want to say that when man and 

 woman were somatically one, and 

 when, for purposes best known to a 

 wise and unscrupulous Providence, they 

 somatically became two, that woman 

 remained mankind and nearer to nature, 

 and man must be regarded as a mere 

 freak, which accounts for his ridiculous- 

 ness and his 'laws,' which are the dread 



enemies of the worship of Karyokinesis. 

 But I forget all this when riding home 

 in the cool evening air, and the electric 

 car goes bobbing up and down as it 

 tears down the hill, and I hug up close 

 to that broad-shouldered social wretch 

 who is fighting Mrs. Blackleg and her 

 telepaths for my happiness. 



CHRISTIAN SCIENCE. 

 To the Editor: It certainly has been 

 sufficiently obvioxis, by the communica- 

 tion of Mr. Smith in your February is- 

 sue, that the means of thought-com- 

 munication between 'material scien- 

 tists' and 'Christian Scientists' are by 

 no means easy or adequate. Not being 

 able to rise above 'human logic/ I am 

 placed along with many other worthies, 

 in whose company I take pride, amongst 

 the 'materialists,' and am accordingly 

 and very properly reminded that my 

 opinion on matters pertaining to reli- 

 gion and to Christianity are of little 

 consequence. Let it be also noted en 

 passant that I am not regarded as hav- 

 ing attacking 'Christian Science,' but 

 only credited with the belief that 1 

 thought I had. Consistently with their 

 own doctrines this really should 

 amount to the same thing. So it will 

 be well to disclaim any intention of at- 

 tacking, in the personal sense which 

 your correspondent gives to the discus- 

 sion, the upholders of this or any other 

 faith. It is always important to keep 

 in mind the admonition of Huxley that 

 in controversy one should not wander 

 from the really essential question of 

 what is right and what is wrong to the 

 entirely unimportant matter of who is 

 right and who is wrong. 



But my main purpose in sending this 

 note is to protest against the assump- 

 tion of my critic that the representa- 

 tives of Christianity are arrayed with 

 him and against me in the advocacy of 

 certain doctrines which I insist are not 

 characteristically religious ones, and 

 which, if they are distorted into a re- 

 ligious guise, can not by that shift es- 

 cape the candid comment of common- 

 sense science. It is an injustice to the 



