78 THE BIOLOGY OF DAILY LIFE. 



One more comparison of the protoplasmic theory 

 with the phenomena of Nature and we have finished 

 this part of the process we have undertaken. 



How does this theory bear upon the question of 

 food, especially in regard to human aliment ? 



Again, in Prof. Huxley's own words, we have the 

 interpretation of the dark sayings of the protoplasmic 

 Sphinx. Whose fault is it that we are so startlingly 

 reminded of the old classical myth of Oidipous, who, 

 by interpreting the Sphinx's famous riddle about human 

 life, not only caused the welcome destruction of the 

 monster who propounded it, but also gained the 

 dreadful privilege of marrying, or rather outraging, his 

 own mother, and remorsefully putting out his own 

 eyes, was self-condemned to blindness.* 



There is indeed a sad proof of that blindness to even 

 the common facts of daily life, which comes on those 

 who habitually trifle with the sanctities of Mother 

 Nature, in these truly marvellous words ("Lay Ser- 

 mons" p. 133). 



matters of fact, is well illustrated by King Charles II.'s famous 

 inquiry of the Eoyal Society. 



" He asked the cause why a dead fish does not (though a live 

 fish does) add to the weight of a vessel of water. This im- 

 plies two questions, the first of which many of the philosophers 

 for a time overlooked viz., 1. Is it a fact ? 2. If it be a fact, 

 what can cause it?" (Whateley's " Logic," p. 120.) 



None but philosophers would have been taken in by the joke 

 of the Merry Monarch, a courtier would have joined in the joke, 

 a fishwife would have given a rough and ready answer. The 

 king is dead and gone, but the Eoyal Society is there still, and 

 has many philosophers, as of old. 



* See in contrast a charming little work called "Micliael 

 Faraday," by T. H. Gladstone, Ph.D., F.E.S. (p. 65;, on the 



