214 ETHICAL ASPECTS OF EVOLUTION 



fields of prediction, whether absolute or hypothetical. In 

 the course of this history, innumerable events which were 

 at one time regarded as causal agencies have been removed 

 from that class, and transferred to the invariable series in 

 which the links are not properly distinguished as either 

 causes or effects. The stars and the winds, famine, disease, 

 and pestilence, to take only a few instances, had all been 

 worshipped as independent powers, and propitiated by 

 ceremonies and sacrifices which would be unmeaning if 

 addressed to beings devoid of personal volition. Some of 

 these have already been brought under scientific law, and 

 for all there is the strongest presumption that, being events 

 in the external world, they will sooner or later submit to 

 a similar reduction. 



Nothing of the kind can be said of the history of subjective 

 thought. Even now no single event can be predicted, 

 with the same degree of certainty, in the life either of the 

 race or of the individual. The impediment lies, not, as is 

 often supposed, in the greater complexity of the material, 

 but in the impossibility of reducing it to exact measurement, 

 an impediment which would be equally insurmountable 

 were the material simple instead of being complicated. 

 Nor is it for want of endeavour. The natural sciences 

 themselves have not engaged an attention more strenuous 

 and sustained, from the highest intellects in all ages, than 

 has the science of human conduct ; and, though our beliefs 

 on that subject have gained greatly both in depth and in 

 precision, it is no nearer reduction to a scientific form than 

 it was before the birth of Socrates. No single general law 

 like those of mechanics or chemistry, has been raised above 

 the level of discussion, and the last attempt, to establish 

 one on the basis of utility, is certainly not an exception. 

 So striking has been the want of success that it seems 

 improbable that the power of prediction should ever have 

 been claimed in the case of subjective phenomena, unless 

 the distinction between the two classes had been overlooked, 

 and the achievements of natural science been carried to the 

 credit of a common account. 



