17 



they observed, and the marvellous and beautiful struc- 

 tures they demonstrated, were really the consequence of 

 physical changes only, they have been advised to study 

 the general properties and forces of non-living matter, and 

 not to pay much attention to points of minute detail. And 

 the utmost energy has been displayed for the purpose of 

 impressing upon pupils the dogma of physical causation. 

 But in spite of all the manoeuvres the greatest ingenuity 

 could devise, in spite of the active help and cordial co-opera- 

 tion of some of the keenest intellects of our time, men do 

 doubt if many things taught in the name of science, and 

 most positively affirmed to be true, are true indeed. Some 

 have even given expression to the doubts they entertain ; 

 and it is even to be feared that not a few intelligent persons 

 having discovered that some scientific men had certainly 

 wandered, in spite of their asseverations to the contrary, 

 from the safe paths of observation and experiment, and had 

 certainly lost themselves in the mazes of conjecture, have 

 condemned scientific work generally as pretentious, boastful, 

 arrogant, and untrustworthy. People who venerated pure 

 intellect began to fancy that the days were fast approaching 

 when the old ideas, which had so impressed the greatest 

 minds in past centuries, would be set aside as myths, and 

 spoken of as fables ; when perhaps Christianity itself would 

 have to give place to positive knowledge— but alas it is beino* 

 found out that the jwsitire is not knowledge, and that the 

 knowledge we have is anything but positive. Had the pre- 

 tentious assertions that have been made and believed durino- 

 the last ten years been properly examined — had the facts so 

 loudly proclaimed to be true, been subjected to careful analysis, 

 one by one, and by persons properly trained to scientific in- 

 vestigation, how much higher might not science have risen 

 in the estimation of the thoughtful ? But any one who 

 ventured to ask for time for consideration, or to recommend 



