REV. MARTINEAU AND BELFAST ADDRESS 241 



and, on the other hand, such primordial, indefinable, un- 

 deniable, facts as these: I feel pain or pleasure; I expe- 

 rience a sweet taste, or smell a rose, or hear an organ, or 

 see something red. . . It is absolutely and forever incon- 

 ceivable that a number of carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, and 

 oxygen atoms should be otherwise than indifferent as to 

 their own position and motion, past, present, or future. 

 It is utterly inconceivable how consciousness should result 

 from their joint action. ' ' 



This language, which was spoken in 1872, Mr. Marti- 

 neau "freely" translates, and quotes against me. The act 

 is due to misapprehension. Evidence is at hand to prove 

 that I employed similar language twenty years ago. It 

 is to be found in the "Saturday Review" for 1860; but a 

 sufficient illustration of the agreement between my friend 

 Du Bois-Reymond and myself is furnished by the dis- 

 course on "Scientific Materialism," delivered in 1868, 

 then widely circulated, and reprinted here. The reader 

 who compares the two discourses will see that the same 

 line of thought is pursued in both, and that perfect agree- 

 ment reigns between my friend and me. In the very Ad- 

 dress he criticises, Mr. Martineau might have seen that 

 precisely the same position is maintained. A quotation 

 will prove this: "Thus far," I say, "our way is clear, but 

 now comes my difficulty. Your atoms are individually 

 without sensation, much more are they without intelli- 

 gence. May I ask you, then, to try your hand upon this 

 problem? Take your dead hydrogen atoms, your dead 

 oxygen atoms, your dead carbon atoms, your dead nitro- 

 gen atoms, your dead phosphorus atoms, and all the other 

 atoms, dead as grains of shot, of which the brain is 

 formed. Imagine them separate and sensationless ; ob- 



SCIEN CE YI 1 1 



