253 
ORDINARY MEETING. 
Sir JosepH Fayrer, K.C.S.1., M.D., F.R.S., Vick-PRESIDENT, - 
IN THE CHAIR. 
The Minutes of the last Meeting having been read and confirmed. 
The CHarirman.—I have the pleasure of introducing the Rev. Mr. 
Wood, son of the naturalist whose name is so familiar to us all, who will 
now read a Paper on The Apparent Cruelty of Nature. Iam glad he has 
used the word “apparent,” and no doubt when he reads his Paper he 
will explain the meaning he attaches to that word. 
The following Paper was then read by the Author :—* 
THE APPARENT CRUELTY OF NATURE. 
By the Rev. THEODORE Woon, F.E.S. 
HIS question of the Apparent Cruelty of Nature has 
suggested itself to me as a suitable subject for a paper 
this evening, partly because of its very great intrinsic interest, 
quite apart from any bearing which it may have upon matters 
of revealed religion, and partly because of the frequency 
with which it is still brought forward by a certain class of 
infidels as an argument against the wisdom and beneficence 
of the Creator. The former of these—namely, the inherent 
interest of the subject—is self apparent, and requires no 
exposition ; to the latter, perhaps—the argument based upon 
it—a few prefatory words may be devoted. 
We are called upon, then, to notice that throughout the 
animal kingdom, not merely death but destruction 1s the law 
and condition of life ; that many animals appear to live only 
that they may be destroyed and devoured by others; that a 
vast proportion of these are doomed to suffer death in its 
most terrible and agonizing forms; and that cruelty, in 
varying degree, appears to be the great and prevailing 
characteristic of that which we call “ Nature.” It is further 
argued that this suffering is for the most part wholly 
* April 6th, 1891. 
TWENTY-SIXTH SESSION. T 
