4 EXPERIMENTAL EVOLUTION LECT. 



The philosopher of Geneva has said 1 that " the 

 condition of him who reflects is an anti-natural 

 condition, and that the man given to meditation 

 is a depraved animal." Some doubts may be 

 entertained concerning the second term of this 

 sentence, although the unhealthiness of meditation 

 is often obvitfus ; but it is certainly true that under 

 natural conditions, very little time is available for 

 meditative purposes. Even in our so-called civilized 

 life, how very small is the number of those who 

 do often really think and ponder on topics which 

 are neither food, nor dress, nor money. Most men 

 live, in fact, without troubling themselves with any 

 of the really great questions which force themselves 

 on the attention of the few who think, and they 

 leave those vexed questions of force, matter, move- 

 ment, space, life, consciousness, death, will, memory, 

 morality, right and wrong, to the physicist, bio- 

 logist, and moralist, with some disdain, pitying 

 them most thoroughly for devoting their time, life, 

 and energy to problems which apparently do not 

 admit of being solved. 



The thinkers are however not of the same mind as 

 the multitude ; they entertain the opinion absurd 

 in the eyes of many that human science has yet a 



1 J. J. Rousseau, Discours sur V Origin e et les Fondements de 

 rin'egalite parmi les Homines, 1754. 



