456 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



devil had horns, hoofs and a tail was a belief questioned by few : 

 yet I understand that quite different conceptions now prevail in 

 theological circles. The tendency here again is opposite to that 

 alleged by Sir Oliver: it is all in the direction of extreme 

 de-materialisation. Need I amplify by reference to the 

 materialism of modern beliefs among primitive races? — how they 

 leave holes in their graves for the dead man's soul to fly in and 

 out ; or build mounds over the graves to keep the soul in ; how 

 they will not let their shadow fall upon a river, lest a crocodile 

 should eat it ; how they refuse to tell you their name, lest you 

 should steal it ; how they treat diseases by thrashing the patient 

 and surrounding him with foul odours, in order that the " evil 

 spirit" may find its habitat uncomfortable and take itself off. 

 Surely Sir Oliver has been most unfortunate in having recourse 

 to historical evolution as evidence of the future materialisation 

 of spirits. He appears to have confused two totally different 

 meanings of materialism : crude materialism and scientific 

 materialism. Crude materialism is that which allows the 

 existence of ghosts and spirits but says they are made of matter : 

 it differs only from spiritualism in regard to the kind of substance 

 of which the ghost is made and its greater or less refinement ; 

 scientific materialism, on the other hand, is a very modern 

 growth and has no truck at all with any such creatures. The 

 progress of philosophy is from crude materialism via innumerable 

 shades of spiritualism to scientific materialism or monism. The 

 ghost, originally material, cannot face science, with its balances 

 and test-tubes. It becomes ever more shadowy and refined ; as 

 the light of science spreads, it recedes further into dimness and 

 attempts to safeguard itself by ever-increasing vagueness and 

 obscurity; and when its last lurking-holes are lit up, it fizzles 

 out altogether. In directing our attention to the historical 

 evolution of phantasms, Sir Oliver Lodge greatly injures the 

 cause of his proteges. To set against the innumerable ghosts of 

 the past which are extinct, can he mention one— one only — which 

 has become materialised and established its existence ? 



Other Views 



I need only mention shortly a few other works recently 

 published on the subject now before us. Eugenio Rignano 

 writes a book for the purpose of M explaining the inheritance of 



