194 FKAGMENTS OF SCIENCE. 



the manifestation of a Power absolutely inscrutable to 

 the intellect of man. As little in our day as in the days 

 of Job can man by searching find this Power out. Con- 

 sidered fundamentally, then, it is by the operation of 

 an insoluble mystery that life on earth is evolved, spe- 

 cies differentiated, and mind unfolded, from their pre- 

 potent elements in the immeasurable past. 



The strength of the doctrine of Evolution consists, 

 not in an experimental demonstration (for the subject 

 is hardly accessible to this mode of proof), but in its 

 general harmony with scientific thought. From con- 

 trast, moreover, it derives enormous relative cogency. 

 On the one side we have a theory (if it could with any 

 propriety be so called) derived, as were the theories 

 referred to at the beginning of this Address, not from 

 the study of nature, but from the observation of men 

 a theory which converts the Power whose garment is 

 seen in the visible universe into an Artificer, fashioned 

 after the human model, and acting by broken efforts as 

 man is seen to act. On the other side we have the 

 conception that all we see around us, and all we feel 

 within us the phenomena of physical nature as well 

 as those of the human mind have their unsearchable 

 roots in a cosmical life, if I dare apply the term, an 

 infinitesimal span of which is offered to the investiga- 

 tion of man. And even this span is only knowable in 



chick to pick up grains of corn without preliminary lessons. On 

 this point, he says, further experiments are needed. Such ex- 

 periments have been since made by Mr. Spalding, aided, I believe, 

 in some of his observations by the accomplished and deeply la- 

 mented Lady Amberly; and they seem to prove conclusively that 

 the chick does not need a single moment's tuition to enable it to 

 stand, run, govern the muscles of its eyes, and peck. Jlelmholtz, 

 however, is contending against the notion of pre-established har- 

 mony ; nnd I am not aware of his views as to the organisation of 

 experiences of race or breed. 



