Alfred Russel Wallace 



who read it was so impressed with its originality and treat- 

 ment that he persuaded Wallace to enlarge it into book 

 form; and it appeared in the autumn of 1903 as ''Man's 

 Place in the Universe." 



This fascinating treatise upon the position occupied 

 by the earth, and man, in the universe, had the same 

 effect as some of his former writings, of drawing forth un- 

 stinted commendation from many religious and secular 

 papers; whilst the severely scientific and materialistic re- 

 viewers doubted how far his imagination had superseded 

 unbiased reason. 



On one point, however, most outsiders were in agreement 

 — that he had invested an ancient subject with freshest in- 

 terest through approaching it by an entirely new way. The 

 plan followed was that of bringing together all the positive 

 conclusions of the astronomer, the geologist, the physicist, 

 and the biologist, and by weighing these carefully in the 

 balance he arrived at what appeared to him to be the only 

 reasonable conclusion. He therefore set out to solve the 

 problem whether or not the logical inferences to be drawn 

 from the various results of modern science lent support to 

 the view that our earth is the only inhabited planet, not 

 only in our own solar system, but in the whole stellar uni- 

 verse. In the course of his close and careful exposition 

 he takes the reader through the whole trend of modern 

 scientific research, concluding with a summing-up of his 

 deductions in the following six propositions, in the first 

 three of which he sets out the conclusions reached by 

 modern astronomers : 



(1) That the stellar universe forms one connected whole ; 

 and, though of enormous extent, is yet finite, and its extent 

 determinable. 



(2) That the solar system is situated in the plane of the 

 Milky Way, and not far removed from the centre of that 



170 



