243 



SCIENTIFIC SIDE-LIGHTS 



Fact 



allure 



1187. FACTS OF SCIENCE NOT TO 

 BE FEARED All Real Knowledge Increases 



Reverence Gives Higher Conceptions of the 

 Creator's Power and Wisdom. It is cer- 

 tainly a legitimate exercise of the powers 

 given to man to follow out those paths, 

 whether well marked or as yet little trod- 

 den, which seem likely to lead to new knowl- 

 edge. We need not be troubled by doubts 

 as to the way in which such paths may lead 

 us, so that they really lead to the recogni- 

 tion of facts. We may learn many things 

 inconsistent, perchance, with our present 

 ideas as to the way in which it has pleased 

 the Almighty to provide for his worlds. 

 We may have to abandon some conceptions 

 which had appeared very accordant with 

 the might and wisdom of the Creator. But 

 we may be sure of this, that whatever new 

 ideas we may legitimately be led to will 

 prove not less worthy of him. Increase of 

 knowledge of his universe whether of its 

 various parts or of the various periods of 

 its history will enhance our conceptions 

 of his power and wisdom, though still leav- 

 ing those conceptions infinitely poor and 

 feeble compared with the reality. PROCTOR 

 Expanse of Heaven, p. 174. (L. G. & Co., 

 1897.) 



1188. FACULTIES UNUSED, BUT PER- 

 SISTENT Opossum on Treeless Plains. 

 It is indeed strange to find this animal 

 [the opossum] on the pampas. ... It 

 shuffles along slowly and awkwardly on the 

 ground, but is a great traveler nevertheless. 

 . . . In every way it is adapted to an 

 arboreal life, yet it is everywhere found 

 on the level country, far removed from the 

 conditions which one would imagine to be 

 necessary to its existence. For how many 

 thousands of years has this marsupial been 

 a dweller on the plain, all its best faculties 

 unexercised, its beautiful grasping hands 

 pressed to the ground, and its prehensile 

 tail dragged like an idle rope behind it! 

 Yet, if one is brought to a tree, it will take 

 to it as readily as a duck to water or an 

 armadillo to earth, climbing up the trunk 

 and about the branches with a monkey-like 

 agility. How reluctant Nature seems in 

 some cases to undo her own work! How 

 long she will allow a specialized organ, with 

 the correlated instinct, to rest without use, 

 yet ready to flash forth on the instant, 

 bright and keen-edged, as in the ancient 

 days of strife, ages past, before peace came 

 to dwell on earth! HUDSON Naturalist in 

 La Plata, ch. 1, p. 18. (C. & H., 1895.) 



1189. FAILURE ACCOMPANYING DE- 

 VELOPMENT Child's "Common Sense" De- 

 clining at Maturity. It may often be no- 

 ticed that children display a power of bring- 

 ing " common sense " to bear upon the or- 

 dinary affairs of life, which seems much 

 beyond that of their elders ; and yet a very 

 sensible child will often grow into a much 

 less sensible man. Now the reason of this 

 seems to be that the child perceives the ap- 



plication of " self-evident " considerations 

 to the case at issue, without being embar- 

 rassed by a number of other considerations 

 (perhaps of a trivial or conventional na- 

 ture) which distract the attention and un- 

 duly influence the judgment of the adult. 

 And the deliverances of a child's " common 

 sense " thus often resemble those of the old 

 " court fools " or " jesters," whose function 

 seems to have been to speak out " home 

 truths" which timid courtiers would not 

 venture to utter. Moreorer, as has been 

 well remarked, " it is quite possible for 

 minds of limited power to manage a small 

 range of experience much better than a 

 large, to get confused (as it were) with re- 

 sources on too great a scale, and therefore 

 to show far more common sense within the 

 comparatively limited field of childish ex- 

 perience than in the greater world of so- 

 ciety or public life. This is probably the 

 explanation of a thing often seen how 

 very sagacious people instinctively shrink 

 from a field which their tact tells them is 

 too large for them to manage, and keep to 

 one where they are really supreme." CAR- 

 PENTER Mental Physiology } bk. ii, ch. 11, 

 383, p. 477. (A., 1900.) 



1190. FAILURE OF MEMORY 



THROUGH INATTENTION Common Facts 

 Not Noted by Consciousness Names Help 

 Recollection. I was taking a walk with a 

 relation who was very much interested in 

 botany and anxious to know the names of 

 the different trees and plants. So I went 

 up an avenue (where nearly every second 

 tree was a plane-tree), and pointed out the 

 various trees and shrubs, mentioning their 

 names, but taking no notice of the plane- 

 trees. I then turned into a side avenue 

 of a similar character, and, having reached 

 the center of it, stopped in front of a plane- 

 tree, and asked, " Have you ever seen a simi- 

 lar tree to that before?" and received the 

 answer I expected : " No, I think that must 

 be a very rare tree. I don't remember ever 

 having seen one like it before." We were irf 

 sight of two or three dozen at the time, and 

 the great surprise expressed at finding every 

 other tree a plane was amusing. 



The reason I chose a plane-tree was that 

 very few people know a plane-tree, and so 

 that great combiner of impressions, a name, 

 was absent. ELDRIDGE-GREEN Memory and 

 Its Cultivation, pt. i, ch. 7, p. 147. (A., 

 1900.) 



1191. FAILURE OF PAST HYPOTH- 

 ESESA Warning for the Present Molecular 

 Physics The Atomic Theory. In reference 

 to atoms in molecular physics, Sir W. Thom- 

 son says, with much weight, that their as- 

 sumption can explain no property of the 

 body which has not previously been at- 

 tributed to the atoms. Whilst assenting to 

 this opinion, I would in no way express 

 myself against the existence of atoms, but 

 only against the endeavor to deduce the 

 principles of theoretical physics from purely 



