70 BIOLOGY AND PHYSICAL SCIENCES 



There is no flaw in the reasoning of 

 Berkeley and Hume, absurd as may seem 

 the conclusions which they reached. The 

 flaw is in the premises, and particularly in 

 the assumption from which the reasoning 

 originally started, that the world is some 

 thing self-existent and outside us, as physical 

 science appears to teach. This assumption 

 simply destroys itself, leaving nothing but the 

 sceptical conclusions of Hume. 



How long will it be till the world, and 

 particularly the scientific world, begins to 

 take in the significance of David Hume's 

 reasoning ? His body has lain quiet at the 

 foot of the Calton Hill in Edinburgh for 

 nearly a hundred and forty years ; but the 

 old ideas which he finally showed to be un 

 tenable are still popularly accepted, just as if 

 he had never lived. To those who imagine 

 that the secrets of our existence are likely 

 to be revealed in, say, the latest discoveries 

 in colloid chemistry, I would commend a 

 careful perusal of Hume's Treatise of Human 

 Nature. 



Whether we take the ordinary popular 

 view, as taught by the theologians, that the 



