B I M A N A. 



385 



teller fit only for Bedlam ; but when we find that, j 

 every day, steam ships and steam carriages convey : 

 both men and merchandise, \\ith at least seven times 

 the rapidity that they were carried at that time, and 

 also with much more certainty and comfort, we have 

 the demonstration before our eyes, as a matter of 

 daily observation, so common that \ve pass it over 

 without a marvel, and almost without a thought. 

 And it seems to be with the general progress of dis- 

 covery and application in nations, as it is with the 

 progress of knowledge in individual man : the more 

 that is acquired, the room and facility for further 

 acquisition become the greater. Nor is it difficult to : 

 see that such must be the case : for all true know- | 

 ledge is of a fertile nature ; and every portion of it 

 that we acquire [joints out, smooths, and shortens the 

 way to another portion. 



In this again we have an irresistible proof that 

 that which discovers, and knows, and points out how 

 the discovery and the knowledge are to be applied, 

 can have none of the properties of matter, and there- 

 fore cannot be material. The properties of matter 

 are constant. It requires the same effort of strength 

 to lift a pound weight, and the same degree of heat 

 to smelt iron out of its ore at the present day, as it 

 did when the inhabitant of Britain was a naked 

 savage in the woods ; and the men of the present 

 time, by whom wonders, compared with what could 

 then be accomplished, are performed with the greatest 

 ease as matters of common every-day employment, 

 are not a tittle stronger, and have not their senses 

 any more acute than these rude people ; but are 

 rather the reverse, inasmuch as they depend more on 

 the results of knowledge, and less on their individual 

 bodily powers. 



Now, if we consider this unchangeableness of the 

 properties of matter, whether as inorganic, or as in 

 the organised body, this conclusion forces itself upon 

 os that a material creature, how curiously soever it 

 may be organised, could not, in the nature of things, 

 improve one jot in one generation upon another. 

 External circumstances it might obey, and be by 

 them so far modilicd, as wt: find imuiy animals modi- 

 fied by situation and climate ; but of itself it could 

 neither improve nor deteriorate, but would neces- 

 sarily, under tlie same circumstances, remain, in all 

 its qualities and all its habits, specifically the same 

 creature from the beginning to the end of time. 

 And, when we look abroad, and survey all living 

 creatures, man excepted, in their present state, and 

 i:i all of their past history of which any thing is re- 

 corded, we find that, in respect of improvement, they 

 are as passive as the grass on the meadow or the 

 rocks in the mountain. If circumstances more favour- 

 able to their subsistence come round, they multiply 

 iii numbers, and are proportionally in better condi- 

 tion ; and if the circumstances are reversed, their 

 numbers decline, and the individuals fall off. But 

 those changes, whether in the one direction or in the 

 other, are in exact proportion to the changes of cir- 

 cumstances ; and therefore their causes must be 

 wholly in those circumstances, and in no wise and to 

 no extent in the creatures themselves. They bend 

 to the wind of occurrences in the general system of 

 material nature, just as the reed bends to the wind of 

 heaven ; but just as the reed, as long as it is a living 

 plant, continues rooted in the earth, so do they con- 

 tinue rooted to those characters which stamp upon 

 their, their specific natures ; and they can no more 

 NAT. HIST. VOL. 1. 



escape from or alter those circumstances than the 

 reed can betake itself to a more sheltered spot when 

 the hurricane threatens to tear it up by the roots. 

 To resist the common laws of matter by contrivance 

 to battle with the elements, as it were, and to over- 

 come to improve by its own energy, and even, the 

 converse, to deteriorate from the relaxation of that 

 energy, cannot be predicated of matter under any 

 imaginable circumstances ; for that would not only be 

 contrary to the whole tenor of what we know and 

 can observe respecting matter, but it would necessa- 

 rily lead to the conclusion that matter is self-existent ; 

 and this is the ultimate belief to which all scepticism 

 as to the existence and immortality of mind in man 

 directly tends ; and sceptics who stop short of this 

 have small merit in so doing, inasmuch as it is merely 

 on account of their being too ignorant or too indolent 

 for following out their own argument. 



That the classing of man with the other animals, 

 and treating only of the form, structure, and func- 

 tions of the body in natural history, has some ten- 

 dency to produce a leaning toward the doctrine of 

 materialism, at least on the part of those who have 

 merely a surface knowledge of the science, cannot be 

 denied. But still much of the raving in which those 

 who appear to exist, or, at all events, to write and 

 publish, for little other imaginable purpose, is the 

 result of mere prejudice, as ignorant as it is arrogant. 

 In matters of speculative opinion which, however 

 important they may be in themselves, do not involve 

 the gaining or the losing of worldly property, men 

 never seek to deceive others unless where they 

 themselves are deceived ; and wherever we find a 

 person calling himself a naturalist, and professing 

 sceptical or material doctrines, we need no further 

 evidence to convince us that, whatever he may know 

 of the mere details, he is not, in the more general, 

 useful, and better sense of the term, a naturalist at 

 all, but a mere impostor, though probably a self- 

 deceived one, and therefore deserving pity rather 

 than the exercise of any harsher or stronger feeling. 



But still, though when one has made so much pro- 

 gress in the study of nature as to see how perfect it 

 is in its design, how beautifully it works as a system, 

 how true each part is to the laws which have been 

 given it, and yet how readily all co-operate with each 

 other in the support and maintenance of the whole, it 

 is as absolutely impossible to be sceptical of the 

 existence of the author of nature, as it is for a perfect 

 eye to be open at bright noon-day, and not see : yet, in 

 the progress towards this equally beautiful and delight- 

 ful elevation, there are difficulties to be overcome, and 

 dangers to be avoided ; and against these it becomes 

 necessary to put those who are seeking the truth upon 

 their guard. This is more especially necessary in 

 that general knowledge of nature which should form a 

 part of the education of every individual who is so 

 educated as to enjoy the world while performing his 

 duties to society in it, and not to pass his days in dull 

 and unreflecting routine, like a mere tool, than it is 

 for those who study only one department of nature 

 as a trade or profession. The moral and social duties 

 of man depend so much upon the fundamental prin- 

 ciple of belief on the points under notice, that if the 

 study of natural history have no other use, as much of 

 it as should suffice to afford demonstration of their 

 truth, would still be among the most valuable subjects 

 on which instruction could be given. 



The danger of error lies u the impossibility of 



