34 
The Materialistic Origin of the Sexes . [January, 
apparent when we come to question its cause, for no natural 
law professes even to offer an hypothesis on the subject. 
It may here be asked, what is the doCtrine of Materialism ? 
As enunciated by the most advanced physicists, it is that 
“ Matter contains within itself the promise and potency of 
every form and quality of life.” This, it will be correctly 
said, is only a statement, not a cause , — an assumption that 
requires proof, not a proposition of faCt which may be de- 
monstrated with the facility of a problem in Euclid. 
Granted ; but it will be admitted that if we can show how 
the sexes originate from matter and its inherent properties, 
Materialism must be more than an assertion. This without 
further introduction we now propose to discuss. 
Taking matter and its properties as the only foundation 
we can build on with safety, we ask What is Matter ? 
After long years of experiment and failure we answer this 
question with a firm assurance in several things : — 
First. The Indestructibility of Matter. This involves both 
the eternity of matter and the eternity of the properties of 
matter. Nothing exists outside of matter. Nothing but 
matter and its properties exist. Nothing can be taken from 
matter, nothing can be added to it. Whatever properties 
matter may have had, matter must have now ; and, vice versa , 
whatever properties matter has now, matter has always had. 
Secondly. Matter is composed of elements of which sixty- 
four are known. Everything consists of those elements, 
their combinations, changes, and properties. Whatever 
form they take now, under similar circumstances they would 
either in the past or future also assume. 
This is the foundation of Materialism, and so far as it 
goes is perfectly clear and logical. Presuming that no force 
exists outside of matter, the properties of matter must account 
for every phenomenon in matter, and should they fail the 
premises fail also, and the faCt is made certain that a force 
exists outside of matter, and ergo that Materialism is dead. 
What, then, are the properties of Matter? 
Here there is confusion and disagreement. Gravitation, 
cohesion, and chemical attraction are the three forces which 
have been popularly supposed to control matter ; but when 
Huxley pertinently asked what these forces were, he found 
them not forces at all, but mere names or effects of a cause 
or causes unknown. Even Evolution, from which so much* 
was expected and preached, has fallen into disgrace, and 
proved to be no force or cause either, but merely an “orderly 
sequence of phenomena ” from some cause or causes un- 
known. How are we, then, to discover those unknown 
