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and the Mathematicians to settle whether, really, it ■ will account for 

 everything already experimentally found. If it does so, and if it, in 

 addition, enables us to predict other phenomena, which, in their turn, 

 shall be found to be experimentally verified, it will have all the possible 

 claim on our belief that any physical theory can ever have." This will all 

 be readily granted, and I for one wish the theory all success ; but I 

 think I am not wrong in saying, that if it be found to be true, the 

 mystery of existence, — the ultimate question, what is this material universe] 

 — will be very much where it is now. 



All scientific achievement seems to lead to the same conclusion, 

 namely, that human investigation can move freely for a long distance, 

 we know not perhaps as yet how great the distance may be, but that there 

 are certain limits imposed by Him who made us which we cannot pass 

 — sunt certi denique fines. There is a charming little French book, which 

 I would recommend any intelligent person to read, entitled " L'histoire 

 d'une bouchee de pain." It has, I believe, been translated under the 

 literal title, "The History of a bit of Bread" — but I should recommend 

 the original, because the French language lends itself with peculiar 

 happiness to the style of exposition which the author has adopted. Let 

 me, however, tell you what the book is, and why I refer to it. It is in 

 reality a popular exposition of the process, by which food is assimilated 

 by the living body. The food is followed, through all its processes of 

 change, till it is formed into arterial blood, and till in this condition it 

 circulates through the body and supplies the waste and becomes itself 

 transmuted into the various substances of which the body is composed ; 

 skin is formed here, muscle there, hair in a third place, nail in a fourth, 

 and so on. But how this is done the ingenious author cannot tell us : 

 there is an absolute hiatus between the manufacture of the material, and 

 the appropriation of the material to its purpose. Here comes in 

 the mystery of life: and when we reach that mystery, we seem 

 to find ourselves in sight of a lofty barrier which can in no wise 

 be passed. The existence of this barrier is seen very conspicuously 

 in the " History of a bit of Bread," and that is why I have referred to 

 the book; it illustrates in one familiar department the law which 



