278 REV. H. J. CLARKE 
5. A troublesome question, it is true, at once suggests itself, 
unless the law of gravitation may be ignored: How can it be 
admitted that such a balance is conceivable, except on the 
inadmissible supposition that the number of the atoms being 
absolutely infinite, the system is without a superficies, and 
therefore without a centre? A system, however, of atoms in 
equilibrium is what, it seems, we are to suppose. Indeed, 
what other relevant supposition is there that might commend 
itself to us as being at once more simple and more definite? 
Let the purely natural philosopher, putting out of view the 
embarrassing question I have just adverted to, suggest, if he 
can, another starting-point more suitable as such, and one 
which encumbers the theory with a smaller amount of arbi- 
trary assumption, for the process of evolution. ven if, 
overlooking that differentiation is thereby taken for granted 
already, he should think he sees reason to assume the 
existence of some permeable material medium whose property 
jt is to originate motion in the more substantial particles of 
matter, and, in so far as they agitate it, to react upon them, 
he will find, in the attempt to imagine what he has thus con- — 
ceived, that it too resolves itself into a mobile system of 
atoms, and that the commencement of a course of evolution 
still presupposes for the entire space-occupying aggregate a 
perfect reciprocity of neutralising tendencies. Upon this 
point, however, I need not dwell, provided no equivocal 
assumption be introduced unawares, and it be understood 
that the theory we have to consider is constructed on the 
hypothesis of an original homogeneous equilibrium of evolu- 
tional tendencies, wherein al] developments which were in due 
time to appear have what may be called their Logos, and are, 
to all scientific as well as practical intents and purposes, 
adequately accounted for. 
6. But an ideally unstable equilibrium being manifestly unat- 
tainable through the mere operation of conflicting tendencies, 
and as the result of movement thus generated, we cannot 
assume its existence without committing ourselves to one or 
the other of the two following suppositions:—Hither (1) it 
has been in existence from ail eternity, or (2) its constituent 
materials—let us call them homogeneous atoms—coming into 
existence at some time or other, find themselves in equili- 
brium. The latter supposition, if I am not mistaken, is far 
from likely to approve itself to persons who uphold the ordi- 
nary theory of evolution; and, indeed, in necessitating a view 
of origination which they repudiate, it partially nullifies itself 
by rendering gratuitous the hypothesis of an unstable equi- 
librium. As to the former, even if we should allow a status 
