no POPULAR LECTURES AND ADDRESSES. 



energy : and the hypothesis which they suggest is 

 very inconsistent with our special knowledge of 

 the conduction and radiation of heat, of thermo- 

 electric currents, of chemical action, and of 

 physical astronomy. 



Kant's hypothesis of the restoration of a new 

 chaos, like the old one, with potential energy for 

 a repetition of cosmogony, described by Professor 

 Huxley, was not a more violent contravention of 

 thcrmodynamic law ; but the synthesis of its 

 fallaciousness is more obvious. 



27. Professor Huxley's own statement as to 

 catastrophism and uniformitarianism is open to the 

 objection of violating the principle of the conser- 

 vation of energy. " Catastrophism has insisted 

 " upon the existence of a practically unlimited 

 " bank of force, on which the theorist might draw ; 

 " and it has cherished the idea of the development 

 " of the earth from a state in which its form, and 

 "the forces which it exerted, were very different 

 " from those we now know." 



" Uniformitarianism, on the other hand, has, 

 " with equal justice, insisted upon a practically un- 



