THE BELFAST ADDEESS. 197 



mation. Science has already to some extent leavened 

 the world ; it will leaven it more and more. I 

 should look upon the mild light of science breaking in 

 upon the minds of the youth of Ireland, and strengthen- 

 ing gradually to the perfect day, as a surer check to 

 any intellectual or spiritual tyranny which may threaten 

 this island, than the laws of princes or the swords of 

 emperors. We fought and won our battle even in the 

 Middle Ages : should we doubt the issue of another 

 conflict with our broken foe ? 



The impregnable position of science may be de- 

 scribed in a few words. We claim, and we shall wrest 

 from theology, the entire domain of cosmological theory. 

 All schemes and systems which thus infringe upon the 

 domain of science must, in so far as they do this, 

 submit to its control, and relinquish all thought of con- 

 trolling it. Acting otherwise proved always disastrous in 

 the past, and it is simply fatuous to-day. Every system 

 which would escape the fate of an organism too rigid to 

 adjust itself to its environment, must be plastic to the 

 extent that the growth of knowledge demands. When 

 this truth has been thoroughly taken in, rigidity will be 

 relaxed, exclusiveness diminished, things now deemed 

 essential will be dropped, and elements now rejected 

 will be assimilated. The lifting of the life is the 

 essential point ; and as long as dogmatism, fanaticism, 

 and intolerance are kept out, various modes of leverage 

 may be employed to raise life to a higher level. 



Science itself not unfrequently derives motive power 

 from an ultra-scientific source. Some of its greatest 

 discoveries have been made under the stimulus of a 

 non-scientific ideal. This was the case among the 

 ancients, and it has been so amongst ourselves. Mayer, 

 Joule, and Colding, whose names are associated with 

 the greatest of modern generalisations, were thus 



