120 GENERAL VIEW AND BASIS OF SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH. 



weaknesses of mankind, and are of a kind requiring either 

 extensive knowledge or deep thought, in order to detect 

 their fallacy, they have a most tenacious existence, and 

 are often dangerous to attack. An example of this kind 

 is the notion that the universe was entirely created for 

 the use and pleasure of man, and is ruled throughout 

 in accordance with what we consider ' beneficent design.' 

 Copernicus exploded the ignorant idea that the earth was 

 the centre of the solar system, and modern scientific know-- 

 ledge is dissipating the enormous conceit that man is the 

 primary object of the universe. 



Science, especially astronomy, cosmical physics, micro- 

 scopy, and an extensive knowledge of the variety of exist- 

 ences in nature, and their general relations to the universe, 

 clearly show that the idea of man's greatness in nature is 

 a false one, and therefore dangerous, because that which is 

 untrue is opposed to the real welfare of mankind. Such 

 an idea is also insidious, because it flatters the vanity of 

 mankind; and, by flattering their weakness, it induces 

 men to believe it, and to be willing to pay for its dissemi- 

 nation ; it flourishes best where ignorance most exists of 

 the great truths of creative power. An idea of magnitude 

 is always one of comparison ; a thing appears little only 

 when compared with that which is great, and it appears 

 smaller in proportion as that to which it is compared is 

 greater. 



' Our life is but a single drop in the ocean of eternity. 

 The reader may call to mind the duration of life of many 

 trees which is more than fifty times as long ; for example, 

 the dragon tree (Dracaena) and monkey bread-fruit trees, 

 (Adansonia), whose individual life exceeds a period of 

 five thousand years ; and, on the other hand, the shortness 

 of the individual life of many of the lower animals, for 

 example, the infusoria, where the individual, as such, lives 



