246 FRAGMENTS OF SCIENCE. 



inner force disappears, and the outward yoke of a usurp- 

 ing hierarchy takes its place. 



The problem before us is, at all events, capable of 

 definite statement. We have on the one hand strong 

 grounds for concluding that the earth was once a 

 molten mass. We now find it not only swathed by an 

 atmosphere, and covered by sea, but also crowded with 

 living things. The question is, How were they in- 

 troduced? Certainty may be as unattainable here as 

 Bishop Butler held it to be in matters of religion; but 

 in the contemplation of probabilities the thoughtful 

 mind is forced to take a side. The conclusion of 

 Science, which recognises unbroken causal connection 

 between the past and the present, would undoubtedly 

 be that the molten earth contained within it elements 

 of life, which grouped themselves into their present 

 forms as the planet cooled. The difficulty and reluc- 

 tance encountered by this conception, arise solely from 

 the fact that the theologic conception obtained a prior 

 footing in the human mind. Did the latter depend 

 upon reasoning alone, it could not hold its ground for 

 an hour against its rival. But it is warmed into life 

 and strength by associated hopes and fears and not 

 only by these, which are more or less mean, but by that 

 loftiness of thought and feeling which lifts its pos- 

 sessor above the atmosphere of self, and which the 

 theologic idea, in its nobler forms, has engendered in 

 noble minds. 



Were not man's origin implicated, we should ac- 

 cept without a murmur the derivation of animal and 

 vegetable life from what we call inorganic nature. The 

 conclusion of pure intellect points this way and no other. 

 But the purity is troubled by our interests in this life, 

 and by our hopes and fears regarding the life to come. 

 Reason is traversed by the emotions, anger rising in the 



