4 f)4 Fit A OMENTS OF SCIENCE. 



certain that these views will undergo modification. Bat 

 the point is, that, whether right or wrong, we claim the 

 right to discuss them. For science, however, no ex- 

 clusive claim is here made; yon are not urged to erect it 

 into an idol. The inexorable advance of man's under- 

 standing in the path of knowledge, and those unquenchable 

 claims of his moral and emotional nature, which the 

 understanding can never satisfy, are here equally set forth. 

 The world embraces not only a Newton, but a Shakespeare 

 not only a Boyle, but a Raphael not only a Kant, but a 

 Beethoven not only a Darwin, but a Carlyle. Not in 

 each of these, but in all, is human nature whole. They 

 are not opposed, but supplementary not mutually ex- 

 clusive, but reconcilable. And if, unsatisfied with them 

 all, the human mind, with the yearning of a pilgrim for 

 his distant home, will still turn to the mystery from which 

 it has emerged, seeking so to fashion it as to give unity to 

 thought and "faith; so long as this is done, not only with- 

 out intolerance or bigotry of any kind, but- with the 

 enlightened recognition that ultimate fixity of conception 

 is here unattainable, and that each succeeding age must be 

 held free to fashion the mystery in accordance with its own 

 needs then, casting aside all the restrictions of materialism, 

 I would affirm this to be a field for the noblest exercise of 

 what, in contrast with the knowing faculties, may be 

 called the creative faculties of man. Here, however, I 

 touch a theme too great for me to handle, but which will 

 assuredly be handled by the loftiest minds, when you and 

 I, like streaks of morning cloud, shall have melted into 

 the infinite azure of the past. 



CHAPTER XXXII. 



APOLOGY FOR THE BELFAST ADDRESS. 1874. 



THE WORLD has been frequently informed of late that I 

 have raised up against myself a host of enemies; and con- 

 sidering, with few exceptions, the deliverances of the 

 Press, and more particularly of the religious Press, I am 

 forced to admit that the statement is only too true. I 

 derive some comfort, nevertheless, from the reflection of 

 Diogenes, transmitted to us by Plutarch, that "he who 



