1 62 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



knowledge of it, and tbat the religious sentiment of man belongs to 

 this order of truths. This sentiment takes on various forms ; the 

 forms themselves are not true, but the sentiment is. To recur to my 

 former illustration of the constellations — however fantastic the figures 

 which the soul, has pictured upon the fathomless dome, the stars are 

 there ; the religious impulse remains. 



It is perhaps inevitable that systems should arise, that creeds 

 should be formed, and that the name of science should be invoked in 

 their behalf, but the wise man knows they are perishable, and that the 

 instinct that gave them birth alone endures. What is the value of 

 this instinct ? It w r ould be presumption for me to attempt to estimate 

 it, or to hope to disclose its full significance. Its history is written in 

 the various ethnic religions, often written in revolting forms and ob- 

 servances. But it tends more and more to purify itself, rises more 

 and more toward the conception of the fact that the kingdom of 

 heaven is within and not without ; and this purification has, in our 

 day, unquestionably been forwarded by what we call science. 



ZOOLOGICAL SUPERSTITIONS. 



By FELIX L. OSWALD, M. D. 



POPULAR sciences resemble the forest-plants that can flourish 

 without the aid of systematic culture, but that advantage is off- 

 set by their liability to excrescences in the form of popular supersti- 

 tions. During the middle ages thaumaturgy, or the study of the 

 supernatural, enjoyed for centuries an all but universal popularity, and 

 the luxuriance of its products almost suffocated all better germs of the 

 human mind. For, by a curious law of primogeniture, the vitality of 

 such spontaneous, sprouts far exceeds that of the most carefully grafted 

 scions. In natural history, for instance, many brilliant theories have 

 appeared and disappeared like meteors, while popular delusions flicker 

 with the persistency of a blazing tar-barrel. 



The authority of Scripture (1 Kings, x, 22) warrants the belief 

 that monkeys formed an article of commerce as much as twenty-eight 

 centuries ago, so that no lack of time can have prevented us from 

 studying the habits of our four-handed relatives ; yet it would hardly 

 be an overestimate to say that nine hundred and ninety-nine of a thou- 

 sand men persist in the belief that monkeys have a passion for imitat- 

 ing the actions of their two-handed kinsmen ; that, for instance, an ape, 

 seeing his master shave himself, would take the first opportunity to 

 get hold of a razor and scrape or cut his own throat. Now, how could 

 that idea ever survive this age of zoological gardens ? Marcus Au- 

 relius held that the sum of all ethics was the rule to "love truth and 

 justice, and live without anger, in the midst of lying and unjust men." 



