MODERN THOUGHT 133 



MODEKN THOUGHT 1 



By De. EDWARD F. WILLIAMS 



CHICAGO, ILL. 



WHILE purely metaphysical writings have not ceased to attract 

 attention, it must be admitted that public interest has been 

 drifting away from them and busying itself with inferences drawn from 

 the study of nature and with speculations based upon these inferences. 

 Yet here a philosophy has grown up, taking the form ordinarily of the 

 theories more or less striking which leaders in scientific studies have 

 held concerning the origin and laws of the universe. Some of these 

 theories express very clear and decided opinions concerning man, his 

 origin, capacity and destiny. But all agree that he stands in close rela- 

 tion to the visible, and that he alone of all living creatures can exercise 

 a real and an intelligent control over it. 



In a review of the thought of the last century, or century and a half, 

 one is compelled to begin with a recognition of a fact which the majority 

 of scientists, some of them unwillingly, accept, that back of all that 

 appears, ever has appeared, or ever will appear, is thought, the outcome 

 of mind, intelligent, directing, self-controlling mind. It is through the 

 exercise of mental power that the meaning of nature is discerned, that 

 significance is given to facts which penetration into her secrets has 

 revealed. Neither atoms nor their combinations are of the least impor- 

 tance unless there is mind to make use of this combination. When 

 we observe the changes which are constantly occurring in the natural 

 world we can not avoid the question, What has thought to do with them ? 

 What influence have these changes had upon thought, what part has 

 thought had in bringing them about? 



Passing over for the present scientific theories formed and held in 

 America, in southern or eastern Europe, and confining ourselves to 

 the three great centers of modern European thought, France, Germany 

 and Great Britain, we shall not be far out of the way if we assert that 

 the beginnings of modern scientific theories are found in England or 

 Scotland and have been made by individuals working in isolation with 

 little help and scant encouragement from government, or royal societies, 



1 See review and statement of various forms of scientific thought presented 

 and discussed with great ability by John Theodore Merz in his "History of 

 European Thought in the Nineteenth Century, ' ' two volumes, William Blackwood 

 and Sons, Edinburgh and London, 1905. This is one of the most valuable books 

 of the time. 



