must be considered as prophecies of the methods which may, in coming 

 centuries, be used in the investigation of physical truth. 



Nature, says Emerson, never becomes a toy to a wise spirit. In the works 

 of God are hidden unfathomable depths of wisdom and knowledge. And it 

 was Peirce's faith, that whatever mathematical truth men reach by a priori 

 reasoning, by researches such as these wonderful ones of his, will, at some 

 future day, in this life, or in that higher life into which he has entered, be 

 found to have been foreknown and used by that Divine Architect who in- 

 spires the mathematician as he does the poet and the prophet. Peirce 

 believed, with all his heart, that in consecrating himself to science he was 

 consecrating himself to God. God's service was his highest aim. When in 

 my younger days he judged too favorably of his pupil's mathematical and 

 scientific ability, he wanted me to enter the field of astronomy. But " the 

 yoke of conscience masterful" drove me into the pulpit; and it was a great 

 happiness to me afterward to have him indorse my decision, and earnestly 

 wish me success in my calling. None of you can be more keenly and pain- 

 fully aware than I am myself of my defects and failures, both as a pastor and 

 preacher ; but none of you can know, as I know, how much of whatever 

 benefit or satisfaction you may have received from my ministrations has been 

 due, under the Divine Providence, to the cordial way in which Peirce rejoiced 

 over my entrance upon the field of his revered and beloved uncle's labors. 

 His sympathy and approval, his agreement with me in religious opinions, has 

 been strength and inspiration to me from the clay of my ordination, nearly 

 thirty-five years ago, to the present hour. Pardon me, therefore, that I thus 

 speak out of a full heart concerning a friend whom the Lord had gifted so 

 richly with knowledge, with understanding, and with religious wisdom. 

 He was not simply a mathematician : he was a man interested in almost 

 every thing of human interest; reading the literature of the past and of 

 the present with appreciative but discriminating eye. If perchance his 

 judgment differed from that of the public, it was nevertheless sustained 

 by good reasons. For example, among the classic work's of the English 

 writers Milton and Eunyan, he always preferred the " Paradise Regained" 

 to the "Paradise Lost," "The Holy War" to the "Pilgrim's Progress," 

 as having much more satisfactory unity in themselves, and thus being 

 more truly works of art ; and also, as being much more thoroughly imbued 

 with the genuine spirit and temper of the Master of the Christian Church. 

 This was what chiefly interested him and warmed his heart. He had no in- 

 terest in the technical discussions of theology; the minutiae of Scriptural 



54 



