36 THE WORLD MACHINE 



way to a generalisation more definite and more precise, and 

 less a poetical simile than a statement of fact. 



With biology lifted to the rank of a physical science, and, 

 in the phrase of Huxley, become a problem in molecular 

 mechanics, we shall turn, I think, from the analogy of the 

 flower and the tree to that of a world machine. 



A doctrine as old as philosophy itself, refurbished by 

 Descartes, and though he himself did not see it, inexpugnably 

 fortified by Newton and by his discoveries, the idea of the 

 universe as a mechanism is as yet very far from prevalence 

 among the minds of men. 



In the pages that follow I purpose to go back to the simplest 

 beginnings of things to the days when primitive man first 

 learned to count, to measure, to time, and to weigh, and to 

 mark out how his every step toward positive knowledge has 

 been an advance toward mechanical conceptions of phenomena 

 which must one day end in a mechanical conception of the whole. 

 In a word, since strict logic has been of no avail to convince, 

 I purpose to offer the induction of history, to endeavour to 

 construct, as it were, the curve of the development of our know- 

 ledge of this world, and by the logic of its continuity, bridge 

 certain obvious gaps which as yet remain to be filled in. 



There are types of minds to which the idea of Necessity 

 brings a vague shudder, as at the closing of iron gates. At each 

 great step in the development of our world conceptions these 

 emotional natures are stirred to revolt, or fright. But if the 

 larger knowledge seems to subtract alike from the individual 

 and the race something of their old importance, we need not 

 forget that this knowledge is ours, and has been dug out by the 

 race itself. Perhaps this is the true wonder. In any event, 

 let us not lose sight of the grandeur of the achievement ; for 

 in it the intellect of man has in some sense turned round upon 

 its antecedents and the universe of which it is corporeally 

 so infinitely slight a part. 



The theme is epic ; but the bards are voiceless, the tale 

 untold. We shall scarce lose ground if we consider for a 

 moment what manner of being it was that could unclasp and 

 read the book of the seven seals. 



