ELISHA MITCHELL SCIENTIFIC SOCIETY. 31 



THE LIMITS OF THE SENSES. 



F. P. VENABLE. 



It is surely a profitable field of research, in this age of the 

 credulity of science, to see what limits are set to the powers of 

 investigation themselves. The error of believing all things 

 within the grasp of natural science is, at least, as common as that 

 of setting too narrow bounds to this ever-progressing branch of 

 human knowledge. Of late several efforts have been made to 

 determine how far man is capable of laying hold upon the secrets 

 of the nature that environs him. To gather and sum up these 

 results, together with whatever additional facts experiments have 

 enabled us to learn, will lead to a clearer conception of our 

 powers and of the boundaries of man's field of work. 



We are broug-ht into communication with our environment bv 

 means of five or more senses. Bv means of these senses onlv 

 can we examine into the nature of that environment. In fact, 

 it is throu":h them onlv that we are aware of the existence of 

 such an environment. The settlement of the question as to how 

 far-reach iuii: these senses mav be is rendered difficult bv the two 

 facts: first, that they are highly susceptible of training, and 

 hence we meet with them in different degrees of perfection in 

 different individuals, and secondly, that by various appliances 

 man has found it possible greatly to extend and amplify some 

 of them, giving them wonderfully increased powers. It is not 

 possible, then, to state that the end has been reached; that the 

 particular organ of sense can never be trained to a higher degree 

 of perfection, or that no improvement upon such appliance and 

 instruments can ever be designed. AVe can at best but learn 

 the limits of present knowledge together with the probabilities 

 of further progress. Not only are the limits of the unaided 

 senses to be pointed out, l)ut as well those of the instruments 

 that aid or magnify them. 



