IN MODERN SCIENCE. 



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for us to have any conception of an atom or of 

 the supposed ether, whether itself in some 

 sense atomic or not, including such atoms. 

 Our attempts to form rational conceptions of 

 atoms resolve themselves into complex conjec- 

 tures as to vortices of ethers and the like, of 

 which no one pretends to have any distinct 

 mental picture ; yet on this basis of the incom- 

 prehensible rests all our physical science, the 

 first truths in which are really matters of pure 

 faith in the existence of that which we cannot 

 understand. Yet all men would scoff at the 

 agnostic who on this account should express 

 unbelief in physical science. 



Let us observe here, further, that since the 

 mysterious and inscrutable "I" is surrounded 

 with an equally mysterious and inscrutable 

 universe, and since the ego and the external 

 world are linked together by indissoluble rela- 

 tions, we are introduced to certain alternatives 

 as to origins. Either the universe or "nature" 

 is a mere phantom conjured up by the ego, or 

 the ego is a product of the universe, or both 

 are the result of some equally mysterious pow- 

 er beyond us and the material world. Neither 

 of these suppositions is absurd or unthinkable ; 

 and, whichever of them we adopt, we are again 



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