354 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. SXXVIII. No. 976 



pure mathematics is not the rival, even less 

 is it the handmaid, of other branches of 

 science. Properly pursued, it is the es- 

 sence and soul of them all. It is not for 

 them; they are for it; and its results are 

 for all time. No man who has felt its 

 fascination can be content to be ignorant 

 of any manifestation of regularity and law, 

 or can fail to be stirred by all the need of 

 adjustment of our actual world. 



And if life is short, if the gTeatest magi- 

 cian, joining with the practical man, re- 

 minds us that, like this vision, 



The clond-eapp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces. 

 The solemn temples, the great globe itself. 

 Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve 

 And . . . leave not a rack behind, 



we must still believe that it is best for us 

 to try to reach the brightest light. And 

 all here must believe it; for else — no fact 

 is more firmly established — we shall not 

 study science to any purpose. 



But that is not all I want to say, or at 

 least to indicate. I have dealt so far only 

 with proximate motives; to me it seems 

 demonstrable that a physical science that 

 is conscientious requires the cultivation of 

 pure mathematics; and the most mundane 

 of reasons seem to me to prompt the recog- 

 nition of the esthetic outlook as a practical 

 necessity, not merely a luxury, in a suc- 

 cessful society. Nor do I want to take a 

 transcendental ground. Every schoolboy, 

 I suppose, knows the story of the child 

 born so small, if I remember aright, that 

 he could be put into a quart pot, in a farm- 

 house ok the borders of Lincolnshire — it 

 was the merest everyday chance. By the 

 most incalculable of luck his brain-stuff 

 was so arranged, his parts so proportion- 

 ately tempered, that he became Newton, 

 and taught us the laws of the planets. It 

 was the blindest concurrence of physical 

 circumstances ; and so is all our life. Mat- 



ter in certain relations to itself, working 

 by laws we can examine in the chemical 

 laboratory, produces all these effects, pro- 

 duces even that state of brain which ac- 

 companies the desire to speak of the won- 

 der of it all. And the same laws will in- 

 evitably hurl all into confusion and dark- 

 ness again; and where will all our joys and 

 fears, and all our scientific satisfaction, be 

 then? 



As students of science, we have no right 

 to shrink from this point of view; we are 

 pledged to set aside prepossession and 

 dogma, and examine what seems possible, 

 wherever it may lead. Even life itself may 

 be mechanical, even the greatest of all 

 things, even personality, may some day be 

 resoluble into the properties of dead mat- 

 ter, whatever that is. We can all see that 

 its coherence rises and falls with illness 

 and health, with age and physical condi- 

 tions. Nor, as it seems to me, can any- 

 thing but confusion of thought arise from 

 attempts to people our material world with 

 those who have ceased to be material. 



An argument could perhaps be based on 

 the divergence, as the mathematician would 

 say, of our comprehension of the proper- 

 ties of matter. For though we seem able 

 to summarize our past experiences with 

 ever-increasing approximation by means of 

 fixed laws, our consciousness of ignorance 

 of the future is only increased thereby. 

 Do we feel more, or less, competent to 

 grasp the future possibilities of things, 

 when we can send a wireless message 4.000 

 miles, from Hanover to New Jersey? 



Our life is begirt with wonder, and with 

 terror. Reduce it by all means to ruthless 

 mechanism, if yott can; it will be a great 

 achievement. But it can make no sort of 

 difference to the fact that the things for 

 which we live are spiritual. The rose is no 

 less sweet because its sweetness is condi- 

 tioned by the food we suppl.y to its roots. 



