378 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



the amount of evidence so great, and special features are so numerous, 

 that the thorough discussion of the problem in all its bearings will 

 furnish employment for the most acute and comprehensive powers of 

 analysis for an indefinite period ; but there is no reason to believe that 

 the subject is beyond our grasp, or that it is not a perfectly proper 

 field for intellectual activity. 



We may fairly ask, though, whether, after all this is granted, it 

 pays to spend our time in speculation upon circumstantial evidence, 

 when all our conclusions may possibly be wrong, when they can not 

 possibly be true unless they are put into a general form, and when 

 the presumption in their favor is only a probability at best. Would it 

 not be wise for us to spend all our time in the observation of nature, 

 rather than to devote our energies to the discussion of general prob- 

 lems? 



In matters where we are called upon to act we must weigh the 

 probabilities, and form the best judgment we can according to our 

 evidence ; but this is necessary because we must act in any case, and 

 it is no reason for carrying scientific thought into similar fields. In 

 life it is often wise to act against the probabilities, as when an old 

 man denies himself to make provision for a prolonged life, which he 

 has very little chance of enjoying ; but it does not follow that it is 

 wise to form a scientific conclusion against the probabilities, and, if the 

 analogy of actual life will not justify this, how can it justify a scientific 

 conclusion which is based upon probabilities in the absence of demon- 

 strative evidence ? 



If science were a pure abstraction, standing by itself, this objection 

 might have weight ; but no part of the phenomenal world does stand 

 by itself, and nothing in nature is so independent of human interests 

 that broader knowledge does not conduce to wiser judgments and 

 actions : nor is the past history of life a remote subject, bearing so 

 slightly upon human interests that it may properly be left to occupy 

 the time and energy of future generations. 



It has the same importance to us as living things that the history 

 of the human race has to us as human beings. The future history of 

 our race will be a continuation of the one line as well as of the other, 

 or, rather, one is included by the other. The end of the study of history 

 is not the discovery of what has been in the past, but the discovery of 

 general laws and causes that shall enable us to foresee what is to 

 take place in the future ; but this sort of historical knowledge, the 

 wisdom of history, does not come from observation, but from reflection 

 upon the inner relations, the causes and effects of phenomena from a 

 weighing of the probabilities between one interpretation and another ; 

 and the wisdom which leads us to accept and act upon these probable 

 conclusions, as the best available basis for the guidance of conduct, 

 equally requires us to accept, in the same way, the results of the study 

 of our prehistoric life-history. Our conclusions may be wrong, but, 



