THE NOEWICH ADDRESS 119 



tific man a delusion, and to the religious man a snare, leading 

 too often to disordered intellects and to atheism. 



Thus only, with mutual recognition that, as Herbert Spencer 

 had put it, the ultimate power of the universe is inscrutable, 

 can religion and science proceed at peace on their common 

 but disparate search into the whence and whither of man's 

 existence, that passionate aspiration of the stanzas from 

 Francis Palgrave's poem, The Eeign of Law/ with which the 

 Address concluded. 



He wrote at once to Darwin : 



It is all well over, though I broke down in what I least 

 expected voice the place was atrocious to speak in, and 

 the desk so badly placed that I could with difficulty read so 

 about the middle I got husky, but recovered towards the 

 end and am said to have done the agony bits and the poetry 

 very well. I modified two or three things, left out the 

 allusion to Gray's being superseded, and something else. 



All is going off well. Huxley spoke nicely after it of our 

 sea-faring life, and Tyndall warmly of you and me being types 

 of ' unconscious merit ' ! ! ! ! 





To Charles Darwin 



August 30, 1868. 



A thousand thanks for your letter a regular sunbeam 

 it was. What a pother the papers kick up about my mild 

 theology ! An Aberdeen one calls me an Atheist and all 

 that is bad : to me, who do not intend to answer their abuse, 

 misquotations, garbled extracts and blunders, it is all really 

 very good fun. There were gentle disapproving allusions 

 at Kew church to-day I am told ! I am beginning to feel 

 quite a great man ! 



Tyndall most assuredly did couple our names most 

 prominently, unequivocally and unmistakeably, as the two 

 modestest men in science ! ! ! 



. . . The Cathedral service was glorious, the Anthem 

 was chosen for me, ' What though I know each herb and 

 flower,' and brought tears to my eyes, and Dr. Magee's dis- 

 course was the grandest ever heard by Tyndall, Berkeley, 

 Spottiswoode, Hirst and myself. 



