76 PROFESSOR HUXLEY ON 



we may fairly enquire, how it comes to pass that physical 

 forces obey matter? Does every kind of matter, under 

 certain circumstances, guide forces, or only certain com- 

 binations of matter, or only special kinds of matter ? Is the 

 guiding influence a consequence of a mere command that 

 is mysteriously obeyed, or due to some repulsion or attrac- 

 tion, or if there be a subtle influence, what is the nature of 

 this, and whence did it come ? Here, as in many other 

 cases, Mr. Huxley makes an assertion which he expects his 

 pupils to receive. He does not tell them the grounds he 

 has for making it. No doubt he feels quite satisfied that 

 what he states is true, but a pupil might ask what ex- 

 perience Mr. Huxley has of jelly guiding forces, and whether 

 he had ever seen the operation himself and had succeeded 

 in demonstrating it to others. Mr. Huxley speaks so 

 authoritatively about fact and law ("fact I know and law I 

 know,") that one scarcely dares to venture to beg for an 

 explanation of a thing affirmed. But many are asking 

 about Mr. Huxley's " facts " and " laws," and are anxious to 

 learn something concerning the evidence upon which they 

 are supposed to rest. 



Now why should the idea of the jelly guiding forces be 

 a fact of such " profound significance," and the idea of 

 " vitality " acting upon the particles of this jelly, and guiding 

 them and their forces, be a fiction^ frivolous, absurd, 

 ridiculous, fanciful, &c. ? Again, we have been taught that 

 physical forces guide matter, but here we have the new 

 doctrine that matter guides physical forces. But is it not 

 more probable that neither matter nor force is capable of 

 guiding or directing force or matter ? Matter may be said 

 to rule and guide itself, but it can hardly be ruled and guided 



