On Evil in Small Doses 



times, as we have tried to show, they have decidedly 

 helped and not hindered vegetation. 



Now that man has proceeded so far with the great 

 undertaking of subduing the earth and making the most 

 of every green herb and fruitful tree, his role is changing ; 

 once a mere vegetable Apollyon, he is now rather a 

 beneficentguardian angel, intelligently cherishing flowers, 

 grasses, and forests, and calling them into existence even 

 in places where vegetation by itself can make no progress. 



Surely then it is one of his first and most pleasant 

 privileges to take a kindly and intelligent interest in 

 every flower and weed and tree. To know its name 

 is not a difficult matter, but to understand how it lives 

 in one particular spot and its meaning in the scheme of 

 the particular association to which it belongs, those are 

 difficult problems as to which as yet there is but little 

 that is certainly known. 



There is only one other point which falls to be men- 

 tioned here. Not very long ago it was supposed that 

 protoplasm could be explained, by physics and chemistry, 

 as a mere machine, no doubt a complicated and intricate 

 mechanism, but still essentially a machine. This led 

 to a gross and blatant materialism which, happily, seems 

 to be in process of vanishing away. 



Now, many of our best and most honoured teachers 

 have accepted the fact that protoplasm is alive and 

 therefore differs altogether from machinery. Surely a 

 humble and reverent spirit always distinguishes the real 

 student of nature. 



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