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the strongest seems to be always brandishing a sledge- 

 hammer, while some join in loud chorus every time the 

 anvil is struck, and others add to the commotion that is 

 made apparently for the purpose of leading people to think 

 that very hard work must be going on where so much noise 

 is produced. 



That there is another side to many of the arguments now 

 so forcibly advanced is well known ; but it is for the public 

 to determine whether they will hear the objections to popular 

 doctrines, or whether they will not. If people decide that 

 man is a physico-chemical mechanism, and that his physical 

 basis is a molecular albuminoid protoplasmic colloid sub- 

 stance, it must be so. The people have a right to take any 

 view they like upon any matter, artistic, political, philo- 

 sophical, literary, or scientific. The few who desire to 

 form a correct judgment are in the minority, and they 

 may be permitted to obtain the facts they want as best 

 they can. Their opinion is of no importance. There is, 

 one would suppose, a good deal to be said against the 

 doctrine that all causation is physical, but the dictum is 

 carried by acclamation ; so at least for a time it is held that 

 physical causation is of universal application. It is quite 

 certain that no one at this time can adequately explain by 

 physics even the growth of a blade of grass, or the move- 

 ments of the contents of the most minute cell, or the growth 

 of any living thing whatever. But that is no matter. The 

 cause must be physical because every cause is physical. 

 Peoj)le have determined to believe that everything is to be 

 explained by physical law. There is no harm in believing 

 this, only it is incorrect to conclude that the belief is in 

 accordance with reason, and that it is grounded upon facts of 

 observation and experiment. It is possible that some one 

 may be about to obtain new data for the belief, but in the 

 meantime the faithful should abstain from speaking con- 



