696 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



derf ulness, any of its perfection, but rather has disclosed new marvels 

 behind those which first struck man's attention. The widening of 

 the circle of the unknown has only served to confront us with deeper 

 and deeper mysteries. Science has ruled out miracle and magic from 

 the order of events, but it is to pick up the wizard's wand itself, bring 

 up before us daily stranger and grander phenomena, only the more 

 inexplicable and amazing because of the certainty we feel that some- 

 how there is no exception in them to our most ordinary experience. 



Science has expelled witch and elf, nymph and demon, and thus 

 depopulated the supernatural world ; but in the place of this uncanny 

 brood, the thought of whose capricious intervention paralyzed the 

 will and debauched the heart, the universe has been filled with the 

 presence of One, Eternal and Infinite, from whose perfect law we can 

 never escape. The more clearly we discern the path on which science 

 has led the world, the less fear shall we have that it is all a prepara- 

 tion for precipitating us into some godless abyss. Put the case 

 squarely before any one in its full significance, and there is no one, I 

 think, who would prefer to go back to the cosmic baby-house of the 

 middle ages. Who would vault in again the immensity of space ? 

 Who would cut down to six ordinary evenings and mornings the 

 activity of Him who inhabiteth eternity ? Who would relinquish the 

 confidence and hope inspired by the unswerving progress of that 

 single divine purpose that links the ages together ? 



Thus has science given to the cause of faith assistance which more 

 than countervails whatever injury it may have done. 



And so has Religion also, in reality, helped science helped, I be- 

 lieve, even more than she has hindered. 



It is to the understanding that the great achievements of physical 

 inquiry are commonly referred. Science is spoken of as a domain of 

 dry light and clear-cut facts, and religion is contrasted with it as the 

 realm of emotion. But how could the intellect have ever gained its great 

 victories without the aid of the heart ? how could the senses have ever 

 penetrated into Nature as they have done, had they not been carried 

 on the wings of the spirit ? What could science accomplish without 

 the emotions of enthusiasm and devotion, the instructive feeling of 

 truth and beauty, the love of Nature for its own dear sake ? " It is 

 in vain, I think," said Prof. Tyndall, at London, in 1869, " to separate 

 moral and emotional nature from intellectual nature. Let a man but 

 observe himself, and he will, if I mistake not, find that, in nine cases 

 out of ten, moral or immoral considerations, as the case may be, are 

 the motive force which push his intellect into action." The reading 

 of the works of three men, he proceeds to say Carlyle, Emerson, 

 and Fichte neither of them friendly to the scientific spirit, carried 

 him victoriously through mathematical studies and physical investi- 

 gations, and made him the man of science that he is. To the same 

 effect is the striking declaration of that other great leader of scien- 



