60 77ie Evolution Hypothesis. 



mining the relations of the known and the unknow- 

 able. We must either claim a complete knowledge of 

 all the manifestations of the absolute ; in which case 

 we shall be able to affirm from observation that these 

 have not been either modified in kind or altered in 

 amount ; or we must assume an exact knowledge of 

 the law of the manifestation of the incomprehensible 

 actuality that is, we must. know the unknowable. 

 Either supposition is on the face of it absurd. 



The absurdity of a postulate which affirms the per- 

 sistence of the knowable as an unmodified revelation 

 of the unknowable, will be still more apparent, if we 

 fix our thought on the cosmos as effect and the 

 absolute as cause. 



The absolute reality is the First Cause, the cosmos 

 is its effect. Now the inscrutable power manifested 

 in. the cosmos is either exactly equal to the effect, so 

 that the whole cause passes into the effect, or it is 

 greater. Assuming the cause and effect to be equal 

 the effect is the measure of the cause, the cause is 

 fully manifested in the effect. To know the effect, 

 then, is to know the cause : if the effect, being exactly 

 equal to the cause, is completely known, the cause is 

 completely known ; there is nothing left to know. 

 Now the cosmos is known or knowable, and being 

 equal to its cause, the cause is alike known or know- 

 able. But this Mr. Spencer denies; for he affirms 

 the first cause to be " utterly inscrutable," " absolutely 

 incomprehensible." We must conclude, then, that the 



