IMPROVING NATURAL KNOWLEDGE 27 



Furthermore, the physiologist finds life to be as dependent 

 for its manifestation on particular molecular arrangements 

 as any physical or chemical phenomenon ; and, wherever he 

 extends his researches, fixed order and unchanging causation 

 reveal themselves, as plainly as in the rest of Nature, 5 



Such are a few of the new conceptions implanted in our 

 minds by the improvement of natural kno wedge. Men have 

 acquired the ideas of the practically infinite extent of the uni- 

 verse and of its practical eternity ; they are familiar with the 

 conception that our earth is but an infinitesimal fragment of 10 

 that part of the universe which can be seen ; and that, never- 

 theless, its duration is, as compared with our standards of 

 time, infinite. They have further acquired the idea that man 

 is but one of innumerable forms of life now existing in the 

 globe, and that the present existences are but the last of an 15 

 immeasurable series of predecessors. Moreover, every step 

 they have made in natural knowledge has tended to extend 

 and rivet in their minds the conception of a definite order of 

 the universe which is embodied in what are called, by an 

 unhappy metaphor, the laws of Nature and to narrow the 20 

 range and loosen the force of men's belief in spontaneity, 

 or in changes other than such as arise out of that definite 

 order itself. 



Whether these ideas are well or ill founded is not the ques- 

 tion. No one can deny that they exist, and have been the in- 25 

 evitable outgrowth of the improvement of natural knowledge. 

 And if so, it cannot be doubted that they are changing the form 

 of men's most cherished and most important convictions. 



Thus, without for a moment pretending to despise the prac- 

 tical results of the improvement of natural knowledge, and 30 

 its beneficial influence on material civilization, it must, I 

 think, be admitted, that the great ideas, some of which I have 

 indicated, constitute the real and permanent significance of 

 natural knowledge. 



