5 oo THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



grasp, not only than mine, but than that of Leibnitz or of Newton.* 

 To me the "chimoera, bombinans in vacuo quia cornedit secundas in- 

 tentiones " of the schoolmen, is a familiar and domestic creature com- 

 pared with such " forces." Besides, by the hypothesis, the forces are 

 not matter ; and thus all that is of any particular consequence in the 

 world turns out to be not matter on the materialist's own showing. 

 Let it not be supposed that I am easting a doubt upon the propriety 

 of the employment of the terms " atom " and " force," as they stand 

 among the working hypotheses of physical science. As formula? which 

 can be applied, with perfect precision and great convenience, in the 

 interpretation of Nature, their value is incalculable ; but, as real enti- 

 ties, having an objective existence, an indivisible particle which never- 

 theless occupies space, is surely inconceivable ; and with respect to 

 the operation of that atom, where it is not, by the aid of a " force " 

 resident in nothingness, I am as little able to imagine it as I fancy any 

 one else is. 



Unless and until anybody will resolve all these doubts and diffi- 

 culties for me, I think I have a right to hold aloof from materialism. 

 As to spiritualism, it lands me in even greater difficulties when I want 

 to get change for its notes-of-hand in the solid coin of reality. For 

 the assumed substantial entity, spirit, which is supposed to underlie 

 the phenomena of consciousness, as matter underlies those of physical 

 nature, leaves not even a geometrical ghost when these phenomena are 

 abstracted. And, even if we suppose the existence of such an entity 

 apart from qualities — that is to say a bare existence — for mind, how 

 does anybody know that it differs from that other entity, apart from 

 qualities, which is the supposed substratum of matter? Spiritualism is, 

 after all, little better than materialism turned upside down. And if I 

 try to think of the " spirit " which a man, by this hypothesis, carries 

 about under his hat, as something devoid of relation to space, and as 

 something indivisible even in thought, while it is, at the same time, 

 supposed to be in that place and to be possessed of half a dozen differ- 

 ent faculties, I confess I get quite lost. 



As I have said elsewhere, if I were forced to choose between mate- 

 rialism and idealism, I should elect for the latter ; and I certainly 

 would have nothing to do with the effete mythology of spiritualism. 

 But I am not aware that I am under any compulsion to choose either 

 the one or the other. I have always entertained a strong suspicion 

 that the sage who maintained that man is the measure of the universe 

 was sadly in the wrong, and age and experience have not weakened 

 that conviction. In following these lines of speculation I am rc- 



* See the famous "Collection of Tapers," published by Clarke in 171 1. Leibnitz 

 says, " 'Tis also a supernatural thing that bodies should attract one another at a distance 

 without any intermediate means." And Clarke, on behalf of Newton, caps this as fol- 

 lows : " That one body should attract another without any intermediate rncans is, indeed, 

 not a miracle, but a contradiction ; for, 'tis supposing something to act where it is not." 





