3 o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



that matter is eternal and imperishable, for experience has never shown 

 us that even the smallest particle of matter has come into existence or 

 passed away. . . . Hence a naturalist can no more imagine the coming 

 into existence of matter than he can imagine its disappearance, and he 

 therefore looks upon the existing quantity of matter in the universe 

 as a given fact. If any person feels the necessity of conceiving the 

 coming into existence of this matter as the work of a supernatural 

 creative power, of the creative force of something outside of matter, 

 we have nothing to say against it. But we must remark that thereby 

 not even the smallest advantage is gained for the scientific knowledge 

 of nature. Such a conception of immaterial force, which at the first 

 creates matter, is an article of faith which has nothing whatever to do 

 with human science. Where faith commences science ends. Both 

 these arts of the human mind must be strictly kept apart from each 

 other. Faith has its origin in the poetic imagination ; knowledge, on 

 the other hand, originates in the reasoning intelligence of man. Sci- 

 ence has to pluck the blessed fruits from the tree of knowledge, 

 unconcerned whether these conquests trench upon the poetical imagin- 

 ings of faith or not." * 



With much which is contained in the preceding quotation I entirely 

 agree. Where faith commences, science ends / this is perfectly true ; 

 but I miss any recognition of the truth that the supernatural power 

 which most persons " feel the necessity of conceiving " is something 

 much beyond a " creative force outside of matter." It is difficult, I 

 think, for most of us to keep our minds clear of the conception of 

 such force outside of matter, though I quite agree with the author 

 that nothing is gained for the scientific knowledge of nature by adopt- 

 ing the conception. But what I think the mind feels chiefly the neces- 

 sity of conceiving is the existence of a Being who is the ground of 

 all the moral phenomena of the world ; and, if a writer on natural 

 history goes beyond his subject at all, he should recognize the fact 

 that the passing of the boundary carries the mind into a region of 

 moral philosophy and religion, and not merely into a speculation con- 

 cerning the possible origination of matter. 



That this criticism is not unfair and not unimportant may be, I 

 think, concluded from the results to which Ernst Haeckel is himself 

 led, and to which he wishes to lead his readers. He tells us that he 

 has no fault to find with the hypothesis, if we feel it to be necessary, 

 of an origin of matter ; but he tells us subsequently that there is no 

 purpose in nature, and no such thing as beneficence on the part of a 

 Creator. 



" Every one," he writes, " who makes a really close study of the 

 organization and mode of life of the various animals and plants, and 

 becomes familiar with the reciprocity or interaction of the phenomena 

 of life, and the so-called ' economy of nature,' must necessarily come 



* Vol. i., p. 8 (English translation). 



