Bibliographical Notices. 135 



In the ' Vestiges ' the premises may be false, but the reasoning is 

 clear and logical : in the ' Dynamical Theory ' premises, reasoning 

 and conclusions seem equally drawn from cloud-land. 



In the • Vestiges ' the whole spirit of the work is religious and 

 truth-seeking : in the ' Dynamical Theory ' it is imbued with a sui- 

 cidal theological prejudice. 



The author of the ' Vestiges ' trusts wholly in human reason, and 

 sometimes in human unreason, to discover the origin of things. 



Mr. Ritchie, on the other hand, would have us take our modem 

 understanding of the first chapter of Genesis (more especially as set 

 forth by the Very Rev. F. Scio de San Miguel) as the truth, the whole 

 truth, and nothing but the truth (p. 6. vol. i.) ; and tells us with a 

 degree of mediaeval moral courage (worthy of a better cause), that 

 where science and our interpretation of Scripture differ, the former 

 must at once yield (p. 81. vol. i.). 



But enough of such contrasts. It is more instructive to observe in 

 how strange a manner the two works are related — related by antago- 

 nism indeed, but as opposite phases of the same character of mind 

 and quality of mental accomplishment. 



This character of mind is acuteness without depth : this quality of 

 mental accomplishment is copious information as to results, without 

 the required severe critical check, of a practical knowledge as to how 

 these results are obtained. There is much reading and no research ; 

 and to grapple with the grand problem of science on such a basis as 

 this, is as if a man should attempt to play the fiddle on the strength 

 of having heard a great deal of music. 



Our fathers sought knowledge painfully, and with prayer and fast- 

 ing. They wrestled with nature for her secrets. We modems, in these 

 days of the " diffusion of useful knowledge," attend hour-long popular 

 lectures, see charming experiments, inspect particoloured geological 

 diagrams, and learn that the Plesiosaurus dolichodeirus might, had 

 he been so inclined, have devoiued the Clupea sprattiformis — and 

 then, thanking God for these times of illumination, go home and de- 

 vise a cosmology. Or perhaps, if some juster notion of the mode of 

 discovering truth enter the luckless speculator's head, he goes a step 

 further, lays violent hands upon scientific treatises of all sorts (as 

 may be imagined, however, chiefly of the popular description), reads 

 and makes extracts, and then builds up the infinite Universe as a 

 child puts together its puzzle : — if the fragments fit, then plainly, 

 the puzzle is rightly put together. 



In more than one sense, Mr. Ritchie's book is a Mosaic of this de- 

 scription. 



As for the ' Vestiges ' it has been judged elsewhere ; but who that 

 has had his reason stolen away by that delightful scientific romance 

 (and there be many who must plead guilty to such lese-majest^ 

 against truth) will not confess that his ultimate verdict upon the 

 book might be expressed in somewhat similar terms ? 



The ' Dynamical Theory ' and the ' Vestiges ' are as necessarily 

 connected to one another as reaction to action — as the tyranny of des- 



