4 8 
Correspondence . 
[January, 
BUTTERFLY MIGRATIONS. 
To the Editor of the Journal of Science. 
Sir, — In looking over the notices of butterfly migrations I find 
that, in many instances, a flight of these inseCts seems to have 
been the presage of a storm coming from the same quarter. Is 
this a mere coincidence, or is there a causal connection ? Per- 
haps your able contributor Mr. A. H. Swinton may be able to 
throw light upon this question. — I am, &c., 
Constant Reader. 
ANIMISM versus HYLOZOISM. 
To the Editor of the Journal of Science. 
Sir, — Courtesy, no less than what I regard as the cause of truth 
and sound philosophy, alike demand a few concluding words from 
me in reply to those who thought it right to criticise the Animistic 
view I put forth in your pages twelve months ago ; and who re- 
affirm their opposition (though I grant in a most fair and tem- 
perate manner) in the letter printed in your December number. 
Of the seventeen sentences of which that letter consists I seleCt 
some five or six as containing the gist of the controversy between 
us : — 
(i.) My motto, “ God is light,” is pronounced suicidal , being 
apparently taken as equivalent to saying that Light is God — a 
converse which is the reverse of the truth. But does C. N. 
really think that either St. John or myself intended to affirm that 
‘ God is light ’ in a literal sense ? It means one of two things, 
probably both : that God is the Source, Origin, and Cause of 
natural light ; or that this element — the purest, most wonderful, 
and most universal of all created things — is the most suitable 
emblem of Him who made it. Objectively, light is the aether in 
vibration. This motion is due to a force or power ever aCting in 
various modes and degrees : and I maintain that that power is 
the power of the Almighty — the Anima Mundi, as He has been 
called. 
(2.) Function , no doubt, means office, duty , or operation. 
Then, according to C. N., mind is an office, -duty, or operation 
of matter. But each of these terms implies a conscious agent 
who fulfils the duty, or performs the operation ; it implies, in 
