354 



FOOT-NOTES TO EVOLUTION. 



The primal motive of science is to regulate the con- 

 duct of life. This is in a sense its ultimate end, for it 

 is the first and the last function of the 



Primal motive ggnses and the intellect. If science has 

 of science 



any message to man, it is expressed m 



these words of Huxley: "There can be no allevia- 

 tion of the sufferings of mankind except in absolute 

 veracity of thought and action and a 



Message of resolute facing of the world as it is." 



science. ,^ ... , ^. .1 



" Still men and nations reap as they 



have strewn." The history of human thought is filled 

 with the rise of philosophic doctrines, laws, and gen- 

 eralizations not drawn from human experience and not 

 sanctioned by science. The attempt to use these ideas 

 as a basis of human action has been one of the most 

 fruitful sources of human misery. 



And now we may turn for a moment to the positive 

 side of scientific belief. 



I was walking in the garden, not long ago, with a 



little girl, to whom I told James Whitcomb Riley's story 



of the " gobelins that get you if you 



Philosophic don't watch out " — a story supposed to 



doubt and ^^ peculiarly attractive to children, 



common sense. ^ ^ , , • 



"But there isn't any such thing as a 



goblin," said the practical little girl, " and there isn't 

 ever going to be any such thing." Mindful of the ar- 

 guments of Berkeley and Balfour, I said to her in the 

 spirit of philosophic doubt, " Maybe there isn't any such 

 thing as anything, Barbara ? " " Yes, there is," she said, 

 and she looked about her for unquestioned reality; 

 " there is such a thing as anything ; there is such a thing 

 as a squash ! " 



And in this conclusion of the little girl the reality 

 of the objective world, the integrity of science, and the 

 sanity of man are alike bound up. And for its evidence, 



