REV. J. MARTTXEAU AND BELFAST ADDRESS. 237 



vapour with the earth's axial rotation, we track our 

 fugitive through the higher atmospheric regions, ob- 

 liquely across the Atlantic Ocean to Western Europe, 

 and on to our familiar Alps. Here another wonderful 

 metamorphosis occurs. Floating on the cold calm air, 

 and in presence of the cold firmament, the vapour 

 condenses, not only to particles of water, but to parti- 

 cles of crystalline water. These coalesce to stars of 

 snow, which fall upon the mountains in forms so ex- 

 quisite that, when first seen, they never fail to excite 

 rapture. As to beauty, indeed, they put the work of 

 the lapidary to shame, while as to accuracy they render 

 concrete the abstractions of the geometer. Are these 

 crystals 'matter'? Without presuming to dogmatise, 

 I answer for myself in the affirmative. 



Still a formative power has obviously here come 

 into play which did not manifest itself in either the 

 liquid or the vapour. The question now is, Was not 

 the power ' potential ' in both of them, requiring only 

 the proper conditions of temperature to bring it into 

 action? Again I answer for myself in the affirmative. 

 I am, however, quite willing to discuss with Mr. Mar- 

 tineau the alternative hypothesis, that an imponderable 

 formative soul unites itself with the substance after its 

 escape from the liquid state. If he should espouse 

 this hypothesis, then I should demand of him an imme- 

 diate exercise of that Vorstellung-fahigkeit, with 

 which, in my efforts to think clearly, I can never dis- 

 pense. I should ask, At what moment did the soul 

 come in? Did it enter at once or by degrees; perfect 

 from the first, or growing and perfecting itself con- 

 temporaneously with its own handiwork? I should 

 also ask whether it is localised or diffused? Does it 

 move about as a lonely builder, putting the bits of 

 solid water in their places as soon as the proper tern- 



