18 



the contact of the closely adjacent opaque body, sight in this 

 condition becomes a kind of ' anticipatory touch.' The adjust- 

 ment continues ; a slight bulging out of the epidermis over the 

 pigment granules supervenes. A lens is incipient, and through 

 the operation of infinite adjustments, at length reaches the 

 perfection that it displays in the hawk and eagle." (i) 

 There you have it accounted for in all stages of its development. 

 It is possibly true, but I ask, is there no mystery there? {k) You ask 

 for the grounds on which such an explanation is based, — whether 

 any of these developments have been traced in any one instance. 

 Well no ; never ; but then you see it is so likely to have been the 

 case. You may see the different stages in the eyes of different 

 classes of animals ; whence it is concluded that all eyes passed 

 through such stages (as in fact they are found to do in the embryo 

 of some creatures) until they reached the condition in which we 

 possess them. They are even now we are told very imperfect. 

 Professor Helmholtz speaking of the eye declares, " It is not too 

 much to say that if an optician wanted to sell me an instrument 

 which had all these defects, I should think myself justified in blam- 

 ing his carelessness in the strongest terms and giving him back the 

 instrument." And yet it was the Professor's imperfect eye with 

 which he discovered its own imperfections. 



THE ETHEE. 



I come now to what I fearlessly assert to be the crowning 

 mystery in science ; to some of the most astounding facts, if facts 

 they be, presented for our acceptance : — those connected with that 

 subtle, all pervading fluid, and "inter- stellar medium," known as the 

 Ether. It is what we may call the atmosphere of infinite space, a 

 fluid refined and rarified beyond all conception. Just as the air 

 fills every crevice, corner, and cranny on the surface, and in the 

 crust of our globe, and extends from it some two or three hundred 

 miles out into space, so does this hypothetical fluid occupy the sub- 

 stance of everything, gaseous, liquid, or solid ; extending between 

 planet and sun, system and system, nebula and comet, throughout 

 all creation. It stretches itself 



" From star to star 

 Prom World to luminous World as far 

 As the universe spreads its flaming wall." 



So refined, so subtle, that unlike atmospheric air it interpenetrates 

 all substances, even hard as the granite rocks filling up all the 



(i) Tyndall's Belfast Address, p. 48. 

 (fc) "Well let us suppose that this is so, as I, for my part have no diflBculty in 

 believing. And pray, how does it tell against the Divine induction ? * * * Surely 

 this is a more reasonable hypothesis than that which explains so marvellous a 

 development by chance or blind necessity," Lilly, 19th Century, August, 1888. 



