THE MONTHLY 
JOURNAL OF SCIENCE, 
APRIL, 1879, 
I. IS NATURE PERFECT? 
J&Z E have often thought it might be useful to exhibit, 
in all their well-marked contrast with the results 
of modern Science, those views of Nature which 
still prevail even among the cultivated classes, and which 
are very slowly retiring from the fields of literature. For 
this purpose let us take a man, — such as may be found in 
abundance in the middle and upper ranks of society, — well- 
educated, heedful, thoughtful, and refined, but not trained 
as an observer, and having no special acquaintance with 
recent discoveries in natural history. Let us give him a 
holiday, and send him for a summer ramble in the New 
Forest, in “ merrie Sherwoode,” or among the ferny coombs 
of Devon, and let us try the while to read his musings. 
Even his very first expression of feeling, the sigh of relief 
on finding himself rid of city-bustle, worry, and noise, is 
mainly the outcome of an illusion. He fancies himself in 
a sphere where boundless resources are dispensed with a 
liberality equally boundless. The heavens are full of light 
and warmth, and the earth is clad in rich and varied hues. 
Perfume breathes from every spray. On all sides is life, 
animal and vegetable, unworn by toil and unshadowed by 
care and anxiety. To the butterfly hovering over the blos- 
soms, to the blackbird warbling on the spray, the world 
seems not as to man, the task-yard of a workhouse, but the 
banqueting-hall of a palace. The observer, even whilst he 
envies the insedts and the flowers, who “ toil not, neither do 
they spin,” feels soothed and refreshed by the mere reflection 
of their supposed felicity. 
Plenty requires peace as its natural complement, and our 
wanderer believes that he finds this boon also in the wood- 
vol. ix. (n.s.) t 
