:.] ADVISABLENESS OF mFROVING NATURAL KNOWLEDGE. 17 



Men have acquired the ideas of the practically infinite 

 extent of the universe and of its practical eternity ; 

 they arc familiar with the conception that our earth 

 is but an infinitesimal fragment of that part of the 

 universe which can he seen ; and that, nevertheless, its 

 duration is, as compared with our standards of time, 

 infinite. They have further acquired the idea that man 

 is but one of innumerable forms of life now existing in 

 the globe, and that the present existences are but the 

 last of an immeasurable series of predecessors. More- 

 over, every step they have made in natural knowledge 

 has tended to extend and rivet in their minds the con- 

 ception of a definite order of the universe — which is 

 embodied in what are called, by an unhappy metaphor, 

 the laws of Nature — and to narrow the rano;e and 

 loosen the force of mens belief in spontaneity, or in 

 changes other than such as arise out of that definite 

 order itself. 



Whether these ideas are w T ell or ill founded is not the 

 question. No one can deny that they exist, and have 

 been the inevitable outgrowth of the improvement of 

 natural knowledge. And if so, it cannot be doubted 

 that they are changing the form of men's most cherished 

 and most important convictions. 



And as regards the second point — the extent to which 

 the improvement of natural knowledge has remodelled 

 and altered what may be termed the intellectual ethics 

 of men, — what are among the moral convictions most 

 fondly held by barbarous and semi-barbarous people ? 



They are the convictions that authority is the soundest 

 basis of belief; that merit attaches to a readiness to 

 believe ; that the doubting disposition is a bad one, 

 and scepticism a sin ; that when good authority has 

 pronounced what is to be believed, and faith has ac- 



