2 NATURAL HISTORY OP OUR SHORES 



practical use to you. But you have a curiosity to know 

 all about them because they are new and unknown. 



'' You accordingly make inquiries ; you feel a gratifica- 

 tion in getting answers to your questions that is, in receiv- 

 ing information and in knowing more ; you feel that you 

 are better informed than you were before. 



" When you see another instrument or animal in some 

 respects like it, but differing in other particulars, you find 

 it pleasing to compare them together, to note where they 

 agree and where they differ. 



" Now, all this kind of gratification is of a pure and dis- 

 interested nature, and has no reference to any of the common 

 purposes of life, yet it is a pleasure, an enjoyment. 



" You are nothing the richer for it, you do not gratify your 

 palate or any other bodily appetite, and yet it is so pleasing 

 that you would give something out of your pocket to obtain 

 it and forego some bodily enjoyment for its sake." l 



The truth of these words is well demonstrated by the 

 enthusiasm which marks each devotee to science whatever 

 his particular branch may be ; whether it is a profession or 

 a pastime it is with him a delight. 



But in all these vast realms it seems, to me at least, that 

 the branch which possesses the greatest charm is that 

 which deals with living forms. 



Here we see the physical forces chemistry, etc. 

 operating not only in modes that we are acquainted with, 

 but in such ways as to present to us the most stupendous of 

 problems Consciousness. 



We note the dawn of this in the simplest protoplasmic 

 speck this responding to stimulus. We note its advance 

 as complexity of structure advances, up to its culminating 

 point in ourselves. 



Then living forms present us with the interesting points 

 of structure in relation to environment. We note how 



1 " Circle of the Sciences." 



