12 TJie Scoj^e and Principles 



and coexistences we cannot penetrate. The very concep- 

 tion of relativity, however, carries with it the knowledge 

 of the Absolute as existing, and as involved in all phenom- 

 enal processes. As we cannot have a shadow without 

 light, so we cannot have the relative without the Absolute : 

 the existence of the one is proof positive of the existence 

 of the other. And since the relations which we know are 

 constant, since the law of cause and effect is universally 

 operative throughout the world of phenomena, our knowl- 

 edge, though relational, is real as real to us as would be 

 our knowledge of the thing in itself, were such knowledge 

 attainable. In knowing phenomena we do know the nou- 

 menon as it is related to us. 



The materialistic critic of the evolution-philosophy 

 comes to us, indeed, with the assumption that the universe 

 is just what we see it to be, and nothing else. As it is in 

 sense-perception, so it is in its essential nature. Mind 

 itself is material. "The brain secretes thought as the 

 liver secretes bile " thought itself is a material product. 

 We must assume something, he says : why not assume that 

 the testimony of our senses is iinal and conclusive ? It is 

 evident, however, that this position of the materialist is 

 reached not by a process of thought, but by the negation 

 of thought. lie is either incapable of duly considering 

 the problems involved in this discussion, or else he delib- 

 erately refuses to consider them, denouncing them as futile 

 and unprofitable speculations. The evolutionist, however, 

 assumes nothing, except the actual facts of experience; his 

 ultimate criterion of truth is the inability to conceive the 

 opposite of the proposition under discussion. The "fun- 

 damental assum})tion " of the materialist is neither logical 

 nor scientific it is essentially a metaphysical assumption, 

 and illustrates a very crude and primitive sort of meta- 

 physics at that. The evolutionist indulges in no assump- 

 tions, falls back on no " first princi])les," or " axiomatic 

 truths," the origin and history of which he cannot trace 

 in the experience of the race. Every conscious experience 

 constitutes a unit of knowledge, and science is simply the 

 orderly classification and interpretation of such experi- 

 ences. To science, therefore, the evoh;tionist appeals 

 not to metaphysics and by science is the position of the 

 materialist undermined and overthrown. 



Consider, for example, what science teaches us of the 



