410 FRAGMENTS OF SCIENCE. 



CHAPTER XXIX. 



AN ADDRESS TO STUDENTS.* 



Self -reverence, self-knowledge, self-control, 

 These three alone lead life to sovereign power, 

 Yet not for power (power of herself 

 Would come uncalled for), but to live by law, 

 Acting the law we live by without fear; 

 And, because right is right, to follow right 

 Were wisdom in the scorn of consequence. 



TENNYSON. 



THERE is an idea regarding the nature of man which 

 modern philosophy has sought, and is still seeking, to raise 

 into clearness; the idea, namely, of secular growth. Man 

 is not a thing of yesterday; nor do I imagine that the 

 slightest controversial tinge is imparted into this address 

 when I say that he is not a thing of six thousand years 

 ago. Whether he came originally from stocks or stones, 

 from nebulous gas or solar fire, I know not; if he had any 

 such origin the process of his transformation is as inscru- 

 table to you and me as that of the grand old legend, accord- 

 ing to which " the Lord God formed man of the dust of 

 the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of 

 life; and man became a living soul." But however obscure 

 man's origin may be, his growth is not to be denied. Here 

 a little and there a little added through the ages have 

 slowly transformed him from what he was into what he is. 

 The doctrine has been held that the mind of the child is 

 like a sheet of white paper, on which by education we can 

 write what characters we please. This doctrine assuredly 

 needs qualification and correction. In physics, when an 

 external force is applied to a body with a view of affecting 

 its inner texture, if we wish to predict the result, we musi 

 know whether the external force conspires with or opposes 

 the internal forces of the body itself; and in bringing the 

 influence of education to bear upon the new-born man his 

 inner powers also must be taken into account. He comes 

 to us as a bundle of inherited capacities and tendencies, 

 labeled "from the indefinite past to the indefinite future;" 

 and he makes his transit from the one to the other 



* Delivered at University College, London, Session 1868-69. 



