68o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



high intelligence which lies latent in the brain of the infant. Thus it 

 happens that the European inhabits from twenty to thirty cubic inches 

 more of brain than the Papuan. Thus it happens that faculties, as of 

 music, which scarcely exist in some inferior races, become congenital 

 in superior ones. Thus it happens that out of savages unable to count 

 up to the number of their fingers, and speaking a language containing 

 only nouns and verbs, arise at length our Xewtons and Shakespeares." 



At the outset of this address it was stated that physical theories 

 which lie beyond experience are divided by a process of abstraction 

 from experience. It is instructive to note from this point of view the 

 successive introduction of new conceptions. The idea of the attrac- 

 tion of gravitation was preceded by the observation of the attraction 

 of iron by a magnet, and of light bodies by rubbed amber. The po- 

 larity of magnetism and electricity appealed to the senses ; and thus 

 became the substratum of the conception that atoms and molecules 

 are endowed with definite, attractive, and repellent poles, by the play 

 of which definite forms of crystalline architecture are produced. Thus 

 molecular force becomes structural. It required no great boldness of 

 thought to extend its play into organic Nature, and to recognize in 

 molecular force the agency by which both plants and animals are built 

 up. In this w^ay, out of experience arise conceptions which are wholly 

 ultra-experiential. 



The origination of life is a point lightly touched upon, if at all, by 

 Mr. Darwin and Mr. Spencer. Diminishing gradually the number of 

 progenitors, Mr. Darwin comes at length to one " primordial form ; " 

 but he does not say, as far as I remember, how he supposes this form 

 to have been introduced. He quotes with satisfaction the words of a 

 celebrated author and divine who had " gradually learned to see that 

 it is just as noble a conception of the Deity to believe He created a 

 few original forms, capable of self-development into other and needful 

 forms, as to believe that He required a fresh act of creation to supply 

 the voids caused by the action of his laws." What Mr. Darwin 

 thinks of this view of the introduction of life I do not know. Whether 

 he does or does not introduce his " primordial form " by a creative 

 act, I do not know. But the question will inevitably be asked, "How 

 came the form there ? " With regard to the diminution of the number 

 of created forms, one does not see that much advantage is gained by 

 it. The anthropomorphism, which it seemed the object of Mr. Dar- 

 win to set aside, is as firmly associated with the creation of a few 

 forms as with the creation of a multitude. We need clearness and 

 thoroughness here. Two courses, and two only, are possible. Either 

 let us open our doors freely to the conception of creative acts, or, 

 abandoning them, let us radically change our notions of matter. If 

 we look at matter as pictured by Democritus, and as defined for gen- . 

 erations in our scientific text-books, the absolute impossibility of any 

 form of life coming out of it would be sufficient to render any other 



