78 FRAGMENTS OF SCIENCE. 



ance of natural things. By science, in the physical 

 world, miracles are wrought, while philosophy is for- 

 saking its ancient metaphysical channels, and pursuing 

 others which have been opened, or indicated by, scien- 

 tific research. This must become more and more the 

 case as philosophical writers become more deeply 

 imbued with the methods of science, better acquainted 

 with the facts which scientific men have established, 

 and with the great theories which they have elabo- 

 rated. 



If you look at the face of a watch, you see the hour 

 and minute-hands, and possibly also a second-hand, 

 moving over the graduated dial. Why do these hands 

 move ? and why are their relative motions such as they 

 are observed to be? These questions cannot be an- 

 swered without opening the watch, mastering its various 

 parts, and ascertaining their relationship to each other. 

 When this is done, we find that the observed motion of 

 the hands follows of necessity from the inner mechanism 

 of the watch when acted upon by the force invested in 

 the spring. The motion of the hands may be called a 

 phenomenon of art, but the case is similar with the 

 phenomena of nature. These also have their inner me- 

 chanism and their store of force to set that mechanism 

 going. The ultimate problem of physical science is to 

 reveal this mechanism, to discern this store, and to show 

 that from the combined action of both, the phenomena 

 of which they constitute the basis, must, of necessity, 

 flow. 



I thought an attempt to give you even a brief and 

 sketchy illustration of the manner in which scientific 

 thinkers regard this problem, would not be uninterest- 

 ing to you on the present occasion ; more especially 

 as it will give me occasion to say a word or two on the 

 tendencies and limits of modern science ; to point out 



