lxii REPORT — 1859. 



means, has, as it naturally must, at all times occupied the Metaphysician. 

 He has answered the question in various ways, more or less satisfactorily to 

 himself or others. To me, Science, in its most general and comprehensive 

 acceptation, means the knowledge of what I know, the consciousness of 

 human knowledge. Hence, to know is the object of all Science ; and all 

 special knowledge, if brought to our consciousness in its separate distinctive- 

 ness from, and yet in its recognized relation to the totality of our knowledge, 

 is scientific knowledge. We require, then, for Science — that is to say, for 

 the acquisition of scientific knowledge — those two activities of our mind 

 which are necessary for the acquisition of any knowledge — analysis and syn- 

 thesis ; the first, to dissect and reduce into its component parts the object to 

 be investigated, and to render an accurate account to ourselves of the nature 

 and qualities of these parts by observation ; the second, to recompose the 

 observed and understood parts into a unity in our consciousness, exactly 

 answering to the object of our investigation. The labours of the man of 

 Science are therefore at once the most humble and the loftiest which man 

 can undertake. He only does what every little child does from its first 

 awakening into life, and must do every moment of its existence ; and yet he 

 aims at the gradual approximation to divine truth itself. If, then, there 

 exists no difference between the work of the man of Science and that of 

 the merest child, what constitutes the distinction ? Merely the conscious 

 self-determination. The child observes what accident brings before it, and 

 unconsciously forms its notion of it; the so-called practical man observes 

 what his special work forces upon him, and he forms his notions upon it with 

 reference to this particular work. The man of Science observes what he in- 

 tends to observe, and knows why he intends it. The value which the peculiar 

 object has in his eyes is not determined by accident, nor by an external 

 cause, such as the mere connexion with work to be performed, but by the 

 place which he knows this object to hold in the general universe of know- 

 ledge, by the relation which it bears to other parts of that general know- 

 ledge. 



To arrange and classify that universe of knowledge becomes therefore the 

 first, and perhaps the most important, object and duty of Science. It is only 

 when brought into a system, by separating the incongruous and combining 

 those elements in which we have been enabled to discover the internal con- 

 nexion which the Almighty has implanted in them, that we can hope to 

 grapple with the boundlessness of His creation, and with the laws which 

 govern both mind and matter. 



The operation of Science then has been, systematically to divide human 

 knowledge, and raise, as it were, the separate groups of subjects for scientific 

 consideration, into different and distinct sciences. The tendency to create 

 new sciences is peculiarly apparent in our present age, and is perhaps inse- 

 parable from so rapid a progress as we have seen in our days ; for the ac- 

 quaintance with and mastering of distinct branches of knowledge enables the 



