238 
cussion. Let every subject be ventilated to the greatest possible extent. I 
feel assured, as Mr. Lloyd has remarked, that there is a decided lack of 
courage, not only among scientific men, but also among the public at large ; 
and it is due to this fact that there is much less discussion on these questions 
than there ought to be. (Hear, hear.) If societies like this were to take up 
and discuss subjects of this kind more frequently, they would do great good, 
and their discussions would excite great interest. All that honest people, 
who are working at these questions can desire, is, that they should be 
thoroughly ventilated and examined from every point of view. I am 
extremely grateful for the way in which the few remarks I have made this 
evening have been received, and, as I have already stated, I am doubly 
thankful for the merciful manner in which my paper has been treated. 
(Applause.) 
The meeting was then adjourned. 
ON THE NEW MATERIALISM.* 
By Lionel S. Beale, F.R.S. 
I propose in as few words as possible to ask those present to consider 
certain views bearing on the first principles of religion and philosophy which 
have exercised during recent years and continue to exercise an extraordinary 
influence upon the opinions held by many persons of intelligence. Acqui- 
escence in the views in question, I think it will be found, involves the 
acceptance of ideas which are not consistent with one another, of doctrines 
Avhicli are contradictory, and principles which are incompatible or even 
mutually destructive. To give this fashionable confusion of doubt, denial, 
assertion, assumption, conjecture, prophecy, any name which has been 
already adopted by any philosophic or religious sect that has existed in the 
past, would be unjust, for the conflicting opinions now entertained cannot 
be formulated, and it is doubtful whether, among those who have consented 
to adopt them generally and vaguely, any two persons could be found who 
w'ould agree concerning the elementary propositions on which anything like 
a philosophy could be established. Neither of the terms Rationalism, 
Materialism, Agnosticism, is strictly applicable to this most recent and 
most fanciful of all the creeds ever offered for adoption. To call it Rational- 
* Being an Address delivered in July by the Author, and specially 
revised by him for the Victoria Institute. It is inserted here by reason 
of its importance. — Ed. 
