796 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



to imagine that a statement which is " general " but " admits excep- 

 tions," which is " popular " and " aims mainly at producing moral im- 

 pression," " summary " and therefore open to " criticism of detail," 

 amounts to a myth, or perhaps less than a myth. Put algebraically, 

 it comes to this, x^a-\-b-\-C', always remembering that there is 

 nothing to show the exact value of either a, or b, or c. It is true that 

 a is commonly supposed to equal 10, but there are exceptions, and 

 these may reduce it to 8, or 3, or ; h also popularly means 10, but, 

 being chiefly used by the algebraist as a " moral " value, you can not 

 do much with it in the addition or subtraction of mathematical values ; 

 c also is quite " summary," and, if you go into the details of which it 

 is made up, many of them may be wrong, and their sum total equal to 

 0, or even to a minus quantity. 



Mr. Gladstone appears to wish that I should (1) enter upon a sort 

 of essay competition with the author of the Pentateuchal cosmogony ; 

 (2) that I should make a further statement about some elementary 

 facts in the history of Indian and Greek philosophy ; and (3) that I 

 should show cause for my hesitation in accepting the assertion that 

 Genesis is supported, at any rate to the extent of the first two verses, 

 by the nebular hypothesis, 



A certain sense of humor prevents me from accepting the first in- 

 vitation. I would as soon attempt to put Hamlet's soliloquy into a 

 more scientific shape. But, if I suppose the " Mosaic writer " to be 

 inspired, as Mr. Gladstone does, it would not be consistent with my 

 notions of respect for the Supreme Being to imagine Him unable to 

 frame a form of words which should accurately, or at least not inaccu- 

 rately, express His own meaning. It is sometimes said that, had the 

 statements contained in the first chapter of Genesis been scientifically 

 true, they would have been unintelligible to ignorant people ; but how 

 is the matter mended if, being scientifically untrue, they must needs 

 be rejected by instructed people ? 



With respect to the second suggestion, it would be presumptuous 

 in me to pretend to instruct Mr. Gladstone in matters which lie as 

 much within the province of Literature and History as in that of Sci- 

 ence ; but, if anyone desirous of further knowledge will be so good as 

 to turn to that most excellent and by no means recondite source of in- 

 formation, the " Encyclopaedia Britannica," he will find, under the let- 

 ter E, the word "Evolution," and a long article on that subject. Now, 

 I do not recommend him to read the first half of the article ; but the 

 second half, by my friend Mr. Sully, is really very good. He will there 

 find it said that, in some of the philosophies of ancient India, the idea 

 of evolution is clearly expressed : " Brahma is conceived as the eternal 

 self-existent being, which, on its material side, unfolds itself to the 

 world by gradually condensing itself to material objects through the 

 gradations of ether, fire, water, earth, and other elements." And 

 again : " In the later system of emanation of Sankhya there is a more 



