96 SCIENCE AND PSEUDO-SCIENCE m 



ordinary laws may be eloquent metaphor, but is 

 also nonsense. 



And now comes a further surprise. After 

 having given these superfluous stabs to the slain 

 body of the preacher's argument, my good ally 

 remarks, with magnificent calmness : " So far, 

 then, the preacher and the professor are at one." 

 " Let them smoke the calumet." By all means : 

 smoke would be the most appropriate symbol of 

 this wonderful attempt to cover a retreat. After 

 all, the Duke has come to bury the preacher, 

 not to praise him ; only he makes the funeral 

 obsequies look as much like a triumphal pro- 

 cession as possible. 



So far as the questions between the preacher 

 and myself are concerned, then, I may feel happy. 

 The authority of the Duke of Argyll is ranged on 

 my side. But the Duke has raised a number of 

 other questions, with respect to which I fear I 

 shall have to dispense with his support nay, 

 even be compelled to differ from him as much, or 

 more, than I have done about his Grace's new 

 rendering of the " benefit of clergy." 



In discussing catastrophes, the Duke indulges 

 in statements, partly scientific, partly anecdotic, 

 which appear to me to be somewhat misleading. 

 We are told, to begin with, that Sir Charles 

 Lyell's doctrine respecting the proper mode of 

 interpreting the facts of geology (which is com- 

 monly called uniformitarianism) "does not hold 



