438 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



come to meet them in considering the ascending development of 

 nature. 



The first difficulty is the existence of matter and force, and is in 

 itself transcendental. 



The second difficulty is the origin of motion. We see motion 

 arise and cease ; we can conceive matter at rest, and motion appears 

 to be something casual to it. It does not satisfy our demand for 

 a causal agency to think of matter evenly distributed in illimitable 

 space and at rest for endless time. Unless we admit a supernatural 

 impulse, a sufficient occasion for the first motion is lacking. Or, 

 if we imagine matter as in motion from eternity, we give up the 

 elucidation of the point. I regard the difficulty as transcendent. 



The third difficulty is the origin of life. As I have often said, I 

 see no ground for considering this difficulty transcendent. When 

 matter has once begun to move, worlds may originate ; under suitable 

 conditions, which we can as little imitate as we can those under which 

 a multitude of inorganic processes take place, the peculiar condition of 

 the dynamic balance of matter which we call life may also be pro- 

 duced. If we admit a supernatural act, one such act, creating the 

 animated matter, is enough. 



The fourth difficulty is offered by the apparently teleological ar- 

 rangement of nature. Organic laws of formation can not work adapt- 

 ively unless matter was created with adaptive purpose in the begin- 

 ning ; and they are inconsistent with the mechanical view of nature. 

 This difficulty is, however, not absolutely transcendent, for Mr. Dar- 

 win has pointed out in his doctrine of natural selection a possible way 

 of overcoming it, and of explaining the inner suitableness of organic 

 creation to its purposes and its adaptation to inorganic conditions 

 through a concatenation of circumstances operating by a kind of mech- 

 anism in connection with natural necessity. 



I have already, on a similar occasion to the present, considered in 

 this place the degree of probability that belongs to the theory of selec- 

 tion. " We might always," I said, " while we hold to this theory, 

 have the feeling of the otherwise helpless sinking man, who is cleav- 

 ing to a plank that just bears him up even with the surface of the wa- 

 ter. In the choice between the plank and destruction, the advantage 

 is decidedly on the side of the plank." The fact that I compared the 

 theory of selection to a plank on which a shipwrecked man seeks de- 

 liverance excited so much delight in the camp of the other side that 

 they, in the pleasure of repeating it, made a straw of the plank. There 

 is, however, a great difference between a plank and a straw. The man 

 who is dependent on a straw sinks ; a common plank has saved many 

 a man's life. Thus the fourth difficulty is no longer transcendent 

 when it is earnestly, thoughtfully met. 



The fifth difficulty is the origin of simple sensations, and is quite 

 transcendent. 



