20 AN INTRODUCTION TO SCIENCE 



an unworthy conception of the Deity. An absolute monarch 

 is bound by no statutes. No laws stand between God and 

 the phenomena of His creation. 



Has science any quarrel with superstition ? The question 

 does not need an answer. Superstition is belief not founded 

 upon knowledge. It is the product of the imagination of the 

 individual, suggested and reinforced by the traditions of his 

 still more ignorant ancestors. The imagination does not 

 devise objects which are contrary to knowledge. Its pro- 

 ducts are within the bounds of possibility as they are under- 

 stood at the time. But as knowledge increases, it is inevitable 

 that some forms of superstition should be found to be con- 

 trary to this wider experience. 



The educated have ceased to believe in elves and gnomes 

 and hobgoblins, although there is a fringe of the population 

 living in out-of-the-way places, w r here nature is vast and 

 mysterious, who are still as firmly convinced of the existence 

 of their banshees as more civilised country folk are of their 

 ghosts. Few of us, indeed, are quite convinced that ghosts 

 are merely the products of the imagination. ' ' There are 

 more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt 

 of in your philosophy." It is a common and a reasonable 

 answer that while we trust our senses to tell us what is, it is 

 useless to appeal to them when we wish for an assurance that 

 certain things are not. Many a man, when asked whether he 

 believes in ghosts, is fain to answer in the words of the 

 cautious Scot, "Weel, I wun'na say that such things cud'na 

 be." No wise man would assert that ghosts cannot be. 

 But a man trained in science has great difficulty in believing 

 in the ghost as it is always described to him. 



Some years ago a much-haunted house in Buckingham- 

 shire was placed at the disposal of the Society for Psychical 

 Research. No house could have afforded a better oppor- 

 tunity for the patron of ghosts to meet one of his clients. 

 The ghost gave the best of references. Three clergymen 

 vouched for it, one in a long affidavit, These gentlemen also 



