386 CONTEMPT FOR RELIGION. 







taken for granted, and has been authoritatively declared to 

 be correct, no one can pretend that proof has been adduced 

 of its truth. Virchow has said that " life is only a special, 

 namely, most complicated kind of mechanics," and Strauss, 

 the critical unbeliever, has at once accepted, and without 

 the slightest misgiving or comment, this assertion, unproved 

 and unprovable as it obviously must be. Will mechanics 

 account for the movements of an amoeba ? Where is the 

 being that grows by mechanics, and where is the mechanical 

 apparatus that can be said to grow 1 } Has mechanics 

 taught us the difference between a living seed and the same 

 seed when it has ceased to live? The assertion that a 

 " part of the sum total of matter emerges from time to 

 time out of the usual course of its motions into special 

 chemico-organic combinations," is one ot many vague, 

 though eminently popular, assertions of the like tendency, 

 which teach absolutely nothing about life or living matter. 

 But this is an example of the sort of scientific knowledge 

 which Strauss boastfully affirms to be sufficient for his 

 cosmic conception to rest upon, and by aid of which he 

 maintains that miracle has been destroyed and belief in 

 Omnipotence rendered impossible. 



In conclusion, I shall venture to express my conviction 

 that, although some scientific men may regard with con- 

 tempt men who believe in divine truth, the teachings of 

 science have not been shown to be opposed to the teach- 

 ings of religion. I believe no opinion advanced in modern 

 times will prove to be more incorrect, less justified by facts, 

 or found to be farther removed from the truth, than that 

 adopted by Strauss : that scientific men who are frank, 



