92 FRAGMENTS OF SCIENCE. 



materialism — a word which, to many minds, expresses some- 

 thing very dreadful. But it ought to be known and avowed 

 that the physical philosopher, as such, must be a pure ma- 

 terialist. His inquiries deal with matter and force, and 

 with them alone. The action which he has to investigate 

 is necessary action ; not spontaneous action — the transfor- 

 mation, not the creation, of matter and force. And what- 

 ever be the forms which matter and force may assume, 

 whether in the organic world or in the inorganic, whether 

 in the coal-beds and forests of the earth, or in the brains 

 and muscles of men, the physical philosopher will make 

 good his right to investigate them. It is perfectly vain to 

 attempt to stop inquiry as to the actual and possible actions 

 of matter and force. Depend upon it, if a chemist by 

 bringing the proper materials together, in a retort or 

 crucible, could make a baby, he would do it. There is no 

 law, moral or physical, forbidding him to do it — his in- 

 quiries in this direction are limited solely by his own ca- 

 pacity and the laws of matter and force. At the present 

 moment there are, no doubt, persons experimenting on 

 the possibility of producing what we call life out of in- 

 organic materials. Let them pursue their studies in peace ; 

 it is only by such trials that they will learn the limits of 

 their powers. 



But while I thus make the largest demand for freedom 

 of investigation — while I as a man of science feel a natural 

 pride in scientific achievement, while I regard science as the 

 most powerful instrument of intellectual culture, as well as 

 the most powerful ministrant to the material wants of men ; 

 if you ask me whether science has solved, or is likely in our 

 day to solve, the problem of this universe, I must shake my 

 head in doubt. You remember the first Napoleon's ques- 

 tion, when the savans who accompanied him to Egypt dis- 

 cussed in his presence the origin of the universe, and solved 

 it to their own apparent satisfaction. He looked aloft to 



