THE UNFATHOMED UNIVERSE 5 



The scientific order has grown like an organism. Ita 

 methods have become more penetrating; improvements in 

 instruments (such as telescope and microscope, spectroscope 

 and radioscope) have almost meant new senses. Its stand- 

 ard of accuracy has been raised, many residual phenomena 

 and minute discrepancies, previously neglected, have pointed 

 the way to discoveries, as in the case of Argon. Its con- 

 cepts have been periodically thrown into the crucible of 

 criticism, and come out clearer, or not at all. Thus force, 

 instead of being a power inherent in substances, became 

 a measure of the rate of transference of energy, and heat 

 became a mode of motion. Large bodies of facts which 

 used to be regarded as beyond science, the weather and 

 dreams for instance, have become amenable to scientific treat- 

 ment. 



The progress of science wrought inevitable changes in 

 man's outlook. The work of Copernicus and Galileo shat- 

 tered the geocentric theory, which made our Earth the centre 

 of the solar system, and subsequent discoveries showed what 

 a small corner of the universe our whole system occupies. 

 Not that we estimate man's kingdom in furlongs ! The 

 great discoverers in astronomy, physics, and chemistry re- 

 vealed more and more clearly the reign of law in the in- 

 organic world. No room was left for guidance or control 

 other than there is in the nature of things themselves; no 

 room was left for interventions or influxes; and the idea 

 that physical events were immediately ordered " by the hand 

 of God " in relation to human interests disappeared like a 

 dream. There came indeed to be an exaggeration of the 

 omnipotence of the Laws of Nature man's formulations 

 of observed uniformities of sequence, which, although they 

 evidently approximate to reality, cannot be invested with 



