igo NATURE AND MAN. 



with skilful touch the varied response of the soul's finest chords, 

 heightening its joys, assuaging its griefs, and elevating its aspirations. 

 Whilst, then, the artist aims to picture what he sees in Nature, it 

 is the object of the poet to represent what '^.t feels in Nature ; and 

 to each true poet, Nature is ivhat he individually finds in her. 



The Philosopher's interpretation of Nature seems less individual 

 than that of the artist or the poet, because it is based on facts 

 which any one may verify, and is elaborated by reasoning pro- 

 cesses of which all admit the validity. He looks at the universe 

 as a vast book lying open before him, of which he has in the first 

 place to learn the characters, then to master the language, and 

 finally to apprehend the ideas which that language conveys. In 

 that book there are many chapters, treating of different subjects; and 

 as life is too short for any one man to grasp the whole, the scientific 

 interpretation of this book comes to be the work of many intel- 

 lects, differing, not merely in the range, but also in the character of 

 their powers. But whilst there are " diversities of gifts," there is 

 "the same spirit." While each takes his special direction, the 

 general method of study is the same for all. And it is a testimony 

 alike to the truth of that method and to the unity of Nature, that 

 there is an ever-increasing tendency towards agreement among 

 those who use it aright — temporary differences of interpretation 

 being removed, sometimes by a more complete mastery of her 

 language, sometimes by a better apprehension of her ideas — and 

 lines of pursuit which had seemed entirely distinct or even widely 

 divergent, being found to lead at last to one common goal. And 

 it is this agreement which gives rise to the general belief — in many, 

 to the confident assurance — that the scientific interpretation of 

 Nature represents her, not merely as she seems, but as she really is. 



But when we carefully examine the foundation of that assurance, 

 we find reason to distrust its security ; for it can be shown to be 

 no less true of the scientific conception of Nature, than it is of the 

 artistic or the poetic, that it is a representation framed by the mind 

 itself ovil of the materials supplied by the impressions which ex- 

 ternal objects make upon the senses ; so that to each man of 

 science. Nature is zvhat he individually believes her to be. And that 

 belief will rest on very diff'erent bases, and will have very unequal 

 values, in different departments of science. Thus in what are 



