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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY.— SUPPLEMENT. 



both from time to time lodge a shot or two in the 

 battlements on which he stands, with some beat- 

 ing of that " drum scientific " which seems to me 

 to be in these days always as resonant, sometimes 

 with as much result of merely empty sound, as 

 "the drum ecclesiastic," against which Prof. Hux- 

 ley is so fond of warning us. Those whom Mr. 

 Harrison calls "theologians," and whom Prof. 

 Huxley less appropriately terms " priests " (for of 

 priesthood there is here no question), may indeed 

 think that, if the formidable character of an op- 

 ponent's position is to be measured by the scorn 

 and fury with which it is assailed, their ground 

 must be strong indeed ; and they will possibly 

 remember an old description of a basis less arti- 

 ficial than "pulpit-stairs," from which men may 

 look without much alarm, while " the floods come 

 and the winds blow." Gaining from this convic- 

 tion courage to look more closely, they will per- 

 ceive, as I have said, that each of the combatants 

 is far stronger on the destructive than on the 

 constructive side. 



Mr. Harrison's earnest and eloquent plea 

 against the materialism which virtually, if not 

 theoretically, makes all that we call spirit a mere 

 function of material organization (like the apjxovia 

 of the " Phoedo"), and against the exclusive "sci- 

 entism " which, because it cannot find certain en- 

 tities along its line of investigation, asserts loudly 

 that they are either non-existent or "unknow- 

 able," is strong, and {pace Prof. Huxley) needful ; 

 not, indeed, against him (for he knows better 

 than to despise the metaphysics in which he is 

 so great an adept), but against many adherents, 

 prominent rather than eminent, of the school in 

 which he is a master. Nor is its force destroyed 

 by exposing, however keenly and sarcastically, 

 some inconsistencies of argument, not inaptly 

 corresponding (as it seems to me) with similar 

 inconsistencies in the popular exposition of the 

 views which it attacks. If Prof. Huxley is right 

 (as surely he is) in pleading for perfect freedom 

 and boldness in the investigation of the phenom- 

 ena of humanity from the physical side, the 

 counter-plea is equally irresistible for the value 

 of an independent philosophy of mind, start- 

 ing from the metaphysical pole of thought, ami 

 reasoning positively on the phenomena which, 

 though they may have many connections with 

 physical laws, are utterly inexplicable by them. 

 We might, indeed, demur to his inference that 

 the discovery of "antecedence in the molecular 

 fact" necessarily leads to a "physical theory of 

 moral phenomena," and vice versa, as savoring a 

 little of the post hoc, ergo propter hoc. Insepa- 



rable connection it would imply ; but the ultimate 

 causation might lie in fcomething far deeper, un- 

 derlying both " the molecular " and " the spiritual 

 fact." But still, to establish such antecedence 

 would be an important scientific step, and the 

 attempt might be made from either side. 



On the other hand, Prof. Huxley's trenchant 

 attack on the unreality of the positivist assump- 

 tion of a right to take names which in the old 

 religion at least mean something firm and solid, 

 and to sublime them into the cloudy forms of 

 transcendental theory, and on the arbitrary ap- 

 plication of the word "selfishness," with all its 

 degrading associations, to the consciousness of 

 personality here and the hope of a nobler per- 

 sonality in the future, leaves nothing to be de- 

 sired. I fear that his friends the priests would 

 be accused of the crowning sin of " ecclesiasti- 

 cism " (whatever that may be) if they used de- 

 nunciations half so sharp. Except with a few 

 sarcasms which lie cannot resist the temptation 

 of flinging at them by the way, they will have 

 nothing with which to quarrel ; and possibly they 

 may even learn from him to consider these as 

 claps of "cheap thunder" from the "pulpit," in 

 that old sense of the word in which it designates 

 the professorial chair. 



The whole of Air. Harrison's two papers may 

 be resolved into an attack on the true individu- 

 ality of man, first on the speculative, then on the 

 moral side ; from the one point of view denounc- 

 ing the belief in it as a delusion, from the other 

 branding the desire of it as a moral degradation. 

 The connection of the two arguments is instruc- 

 tive and philosophical. For no argument mere- 

 ly speculative, ignoring all moral considerations, 

 will really be listened to. His view of the soul 

 as "a consensus of human faculties" reminds us 

 curiously of the Buddhist "groups;" his de- 

 scription of a " perpetuity of sensation as the 

 true hell " breathes the very spirit of the long- 

 ing for Nirvana. Both he and his Asiatic pred- 

 ecessors are certainly right in considering the 

 " delusion of individual existence " as the chief 

 delusion to be got rid of on the way to a perfect 

 Agnosticism, in respect of all that is not merely 

 phenomenal. It is true that he protests in terms 

 against a naked materialism, ignoring all spirit- 

 ual phenomena as having a distinctive character 

 of their own ; but yet, when he tells us that " to 

 talk about a bodiless being thinking and loving 

 is simply to talk of the thoughts and feelings of 

 Nothing," he certainly appears to assume sub- 

 stantially the position of the materialism he de- 

 nounces, which (as has been already said) holds 



