io2 Scientific Sophisms. 



This "potency" of matter, then, when dis- 

 cerned at all, is discerned only " beyond the 

 pale of experience," "across the boundary of 

 experimental evidence." Scientifically, there- 

 fore, it is non-existent ; a mere " intellectual 

 figment," the product of an imaginary " intel- 

 lectual necessity " : an " unverified theoretic 

 conception," nothing more ; and this only when 

 it has been actually "discerned." But, as 

 simple matter of fact, it has never yet been 

 actually discerned. Professor Tyndall himself 

 has not thus discerned it. What he here calls 

 discernment he elsewhere calls the scientific use 

 of the Imagination. It is he himself who war- 

 rants the affirmation that this alleged " potency 

 of all terrestrial Life " has not been discerned 

 in Matter at all ; it has only been imagined. 

 " Conscious life " is a part, and the principal 

 part, of " all terrestrial life." Has the life of a 

 fern or an oak this potential " consciousness " ? 

 It is Dr. Tyndall who answers, " No man can 

 tell." l Does pig iron possess this potency of 

 conscious cogitation ? or does the loftiest granite 

 needle of the Alps cheer its eternal solitude 

 with the reflection, " Cogito, ergo sum " f There 



1 " Materialism and its Opponents," Fortnightly Re- 

 view, voL xviii. p. 595. " Fragments of Science," Intro- 

 duction. 



