54 METHOD OF DISCOVERY. 



apart from the ordinary run of inquiry, and are, 

 by their very nature, placed out of our reach. They 

 say that all these phenomena originated miraculously, 

 or in some Avay totally different from the ordinary 

 course of nature, and that therefore they conceive it 

 to be futile, not to say presumptuous, to attempt to 

 inquire into them. 



To such sincere and earnest persons, I would only 

 say, that a question of this kind is not to be shelved 

 upon theoretical or speculative grounds. You may re- 

 member the story of the Sophist who demonstrated to 

 Diogenes in the most complete and satisfactory manner 

 that he could not walk; that, in fact, all motion was 

 an impossibility; and that Diogenes refuted him by 

 simply getting up and walking round his tub. So, in 

 the same way, the man of science replies to objections 

 of this kind, by simply getting up and walking onward, 

 and showing what science has done and is doing, — by 

 pointing to that immense mass of facts which have 

 been ascertained and systematized under the forms of 

 the great doctrines of Morphology, of Development, of 

 Distribution, and the like. He sees an enormous mass 

 of facts and laws relating to organic beings, which 

 stand on the same good sound foundation as every 

 other natural law ; and, therefore, with this mass of 

 facts and laws before us, seeing that, as far as organic 

 matters have hitherto been accessible and studied, they 

 have shown themselves capable of yielding to scientific 

 investigation, we may accept this as proof that order 

 and law reign there as well as in the rest of nature ; 

 and the man of science says nothing to objectors of 



