THE DIFFERENCES OF THINGS. 



You could make out nothing, though you had as many eyes as the 

 " deviPs-darning-needle " of our boyhood, and each eye were " in fine 

 frenzy rolling." Call, now, that cellar the universe, and then see if 

 you can show cause why we may not consider the sense of sight as 

 practically gone, and all knowledge that comes through sight a scaled 

 book ; ay, more, that nothing would be left to give us a hint that such 

 knowledge could possibly exist. 



How is it that we receive knowledge through the ear ? By noting 

 the difference between sounds, and between sound and silence. But, 

 if there were no difference, there could be no hearino-. If ^ e had 

 always listened only to a single tone, varying neither in pitch nor 

 force, we should not be aware of the sense of hearing. "We should be 

 as one born deaf. It is the difference of sounds that gives us through 

 the ear knowledge and harmony. 



As with the senses named, so with smell, taste, and touch. Did 

 all substances affect these senses in exactly the same way, however 

 acute those senses, we should not be aware of their existence. Ask 

 any one what is the smell of pure air, and he will tell you, " No 

 smell." But how do we know that to be the case ? As it has always 

 been in contact with our smelling-nerves, we cannot judge of its odor. 

 A dweller in Jupiter coming to visit his mundane cousins might, when 

 he struck our atmosphere, expand his nostrils, as one sniffs the air 

 when he all at once smells something very nice, or he might turn up 

 his Jovian nose, as though he smelt something very bad. It is an 

 open question whether or not the atmosphere is odorless, or, as a lay- 

 man would put it, whether it smells the same as empty space. Could 

 an intelligent man be put under an exhausted receiver, get the smell 

 of a perfect vacuum, and survive to tell about it, he might throw some 

 light on the question. 



To sum up my reasoning, it comes to this: Were the universe one 

 of sameness, instead of the universe of differences that it is, we should 

 be unconscious of any external world, or of our own existence, no mat- 

 ter though we were the best-born specimens of the scientific stirpi- 

 culturist. In fact, we should be an army of negations. I am aware 

 there is something a little queer in the logic of this paragraph, but 

 yet there is a great deal of sound logic in it after putting aside the 

 "queer," which will, however, pass current with all except professional 

 detectives. 



2. Relation to Knowledge. What is knowledge ? Only a percep- 

 tion of differences. How is a knowledge of natural history, for in- 

 stance, obtained ? Simply by finding out differences. In this way 

 child and philosopher classify the horse and the ox. Progress in 

 knowledge is possible in proportion 1. To objective differences ; and, 

 2. To perceptive ability. Take botany. It is easy to classify those 

 plants which have obvious differences into genera; but, when we come 

 to the classification of sub-species, the w T ork is more difficult. A stu- 



