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Materialits, and the nature (at least), if not the details, of their 
defence. If Dr. Tyndall is not the Chief Prophet of the Sect, 
he is certainly the most prominent, as he is one of the most 
eloquent and fearless, and we may accept his utterances as truly 
ex cathedra. I make his Belfast address, therefore, in some 
sort, my text, and solicit your patience while I comment upon 
some of his teachings which affect the foundations of our 
religion, and at such length as the time I can reasonably occupy 
will allow. 
I shall not attempt to criticise the historical and descriptive 
portions of Dr. Tyndall’s address, although a closer examina- 
tion of them than I have given has enabled many to discover 
errors which its author ought not to have made. These ex- 
cepted, I am very grateful for it ; very glad to get it in a form 
so fresh and suggestive. As to the scientific results announced 
in it, I am bound to accept them as correct, until some other 
authority discovers them to be erroneous ; or, as is not at all 
impossible, seeing his candour and fearlessness. Dr. Tyndall 
himself shall say that he wishes to retract or to modify them. 
Taking up the subject with which the address first deals, I 
will speak of Creation, and human ideas about it. 
We are told that the same impulse which turned the thoughts 
of primeval man towards the sources of natural phenomena, is 
the spur of scientific action to-day. Determined by this 
impulse, we consult and test experience, and “ form physical 
theories which are beyond the pale of experience, but which 
satisfy the desire of the mind to see every natural occurrence 
resting upon a cause.’’* This fair statement helps to explain 
how, as Dr. Tyndall says, men began to form theories in 
harmony with their characters and dispositions. Some used 
only their knowledge and experience of man, i.e. of human 
nature. Others, whom Dr. Tyndall chooses to elevate into 
thinkers of “ exceptional power,” used their knowledge and 
experience of physical nature, — endeavouring to connect natural 
phenomena with their physical principles. The first were ethical 
and poetical men ; the second were rationalizing and logical 
men. The first attributed the universe to gods, — capricious 
beings having exaggerated human faculties and dispositions. 
The second, seeing that science repudiated caprice, and required 
absolute reliance upon law in nature, attributed the universe to 
self-evolution. I would here repair one omission of the address — 
the record of the growth in the world of a conception of creation 
different to both these : the conception found in the sacred 
*Dr. Tyndall’s Address, p. 1. 
