46 



THE KEV. J. J. B. COLES_, ON THEOSOPHY. 



these residual particles would turn out to be nothing more than 

 superposed layers of positive and negative electricity. He refrained 

 from speculating as to what would happen to us if some clever 

 researcher of the future discovered a method of making these 

 alternate layers of plus and minus cancel each other out. 



" It must never be forgotten that theories were more than 

 mutable; they were only useful so long as they admitted of the 

 harmonious correlation of facts into a reasonable system. Directly 

 a fact refused to be pigeon-holed, and would not be explained on 

 theoretic grounds, the theory must go, or it must be revised to 

 admit the new fact. The nineteenth century saw the birth of new 

 views of atoms, electricity, and ether. Our twentieth century 

 views of the constitution of matter might appear satisfactory to us, 

 but how would it be at the close of the present century ? Were 

 we not incessantly learning the lesson that our researches had only 

 a provisional value 1 A hundred years hence should we acquiesce 

 in the resolution of the material universe into a swarm of rushing 

 electrons 1 He could not conclude better than by quoting some 

 words he wrote more than thirty years ago : ' We have actually 

 touched the borderland where matter and energy seem to merge 

 into one another — the shadowy realm between the known and the 

 unknown. I venture to think that the greatest scientific problems 

 of the future will find their solution in this borderland, and even 

 beyond. Here, it seems to me, lie ultimate realities, subtle, far- 

 reaching, wonderful.' " 



In view of this reference to the borderland of Science, and 

 taking it in connection with the extracts given above from 

 Occult Chemistry, the Christian student of Science holds fast 

 to the dignified opening words of Scripture: "In the beginning 

 God created the heaven and the earth." 



That God, who is both transcendent and immanent, w^as pleased 

 to work by gradual methods as well as by direct creative energy, 

 is, I take it for granted, what most of us here present believe. 



For my own part I have long held that Genesis i and ii 

 refer both to indirect and direct creative acts, and that there is 

 no authority for amalgamating these inspired records. 



To those who agree with me in this, there is no difficulty in 

 keeping the mind open upon the, as yet undetermined, questions 

 in the modern scientific world. 



Professor Alfred Eussell Wallace, in a recent reference 

 to the question as to how life originated in this planet, again 

 affirmed : — 



" That there was at some stage in the history of the earth, after 

 the cooling process, a definite act of creation. Something came from 



