THE GREAT SILENCE 403 



drop of water, or human thought and consciousness. 

 There are no special and exceptional " incomprehen- 

 sibles " requiring us to assume that special " principles " 

 or " spirits " are concerned with them whilst the rest are 

 to be accounted for and explained in a more general way. 

 Wherever we push our inquiries we come equally and 

 inevitably, as did primaeval man, to that of which there is 

 no explanation — the perpetual miracle, the miracle of the 

 nature of things, of existence itself. The man of science 

 bows his head in the presence of this all-pervading mystery. 

 He is called arrogant by those who arrogate to themselves 

 the right to " explain " things and to deal in vital spirits 

 and metaphysical nostrums for that purpose. From time 

 to time they fill with their proclamations the great silence 

 which he has learnt to accept with reverence and humility. 

 As the years roll on their hollow phrases are less frequent, 

 and acquire the pathetic interest which belongs to all 

 such decaying remnants of the thought and effort of the 

 childhood of man. 



It seems still to be necessary to insist that it is not 

 reasonable to assume as an indisputable fact that man 

 can arrive at an " explanation " of existence and the 

 nature of things. This assumption has been made in the 

 past, and, by a well-known trick of advocacy, it has been 

 argued that since science fails to "explain" these things, 

 the old prehistoric fancies as to spirits — even though 

 they "explain" nothing and have themselves to be 

 " explained " — hold the field and must be accepted as true. 

 There is an alternative, and that is to admit our ignorance. 

 No man has ever seen or knows what is on the other side 

 of the moon, that which does not face our earth. There 

 are few amongst us who, in this admitted and complete 

 state of ignorance, would persist in declaring that we 

 must accept as true the suppositions of ancient races of 

 men as to the existence there of men-like creatures, or 



