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Dr. Irons. — I shall not detain you long in replying to what has been said, 

 but wUl endeavour, as far as I am able, to direct my remarks to the point. 

 Dr. Hill wished me to explain, how far the facts of prayer are practically 

 denied by Professor Tyndall ? Now, if he refers to my paper, he will find 

 that at section 26 I use the words, " "We have a right to complain of their 

 practically ignoring facts which they acknowledge to be co-extensive with 

 our existence," and I refer to p. 46 of Professor Tyndall's book, where he 

 actually admits all that I have said, although he practically ignores it in other 

 places. That must stand as my answer to the implied supposition that I unduly 

 charged him with inconsistency. It seems to me that out of deference, and 

 wishing to pay all respect, to a man of high eminence like Professor Tyndall, 

 I have rather under-stated than over-stated the case. Dr. Wainwright has 

 very truly observed the strength of our side. I have wished, if possible, to 

 be what people might consider ultra-fair. I might, I am aware, have made 

 the matter much more pungent, but not therefore more convincing to the 

 mind of Professor Tyndall, and I wished so to express his position, that if he 

 had been here he would have acknowledged that I had done him no injus- 

 tice in any of my statements. This leads me to the answer I have to make 

 to my friend Mr. Row, whose many duties have prevented his reading 

 Professor Tyndall's book, or carefully reading my paper. He seems to have 

 been under the impression that I was going to open a general discussion on 

 prayer, and that all the conceivable objections to prayer were to be answered 

 by me to-night. I was not aware that I had undertaken such a task. If 

 you refer to the title of my paper you will see that there is not a word in it 

 about prayer, nor should I have referred to prayer if Professor Tyndall had 

 not done so in several places. I have really dealt with nothing else than 

 Professor Tyndall's book. I am sorry Mr. Row is disappointed. I do not 

 know whether the Council would have wished me to write a paper on' the 

 subject of prayer, and to notice all the possible objections to it ; I doubt 

 whether they would have entertained such a proposal if I had put it before 

 them ; but I had no such object. I knew that Professor Tyndall's book 

 was doing a great deal of mischief, and I endeavoured to deal with its first 

 principle — the necessity of fixed law pervading Nature. I there explained 

 his inconsistency, and showed that he was obliged to make admissions 

 contrary to his very foundations ; and yet I am told that I have not answered 

 him ! Mr. Row must read Professor Tyndall's book. I am not content, 

 however, to lie under the imputation that I have not, in principle, discussed 

 prayer. I have indeed learnt a humbling lesson from every speaker who has 

 addressed us to-night ; for I have been made to feel tolerably certain that no 

 author, however earnest, would willingly write a page if he could only see the 

 shape his propositions would take in the minds of 99 out of every 100 men 

 who read them. In this book-making world one gets driven into writing 

 much which one might not, perhaps, be particularly anxious to do ; and your 

 honorary Secretary will bear me witness that I was by no means over-eager 

 to come before you with this paper. I have done so from a sense of duty, 

 and in deference to his expression of the wish of the Council. I hope at 



