LIBRARY 
 
 UNIVERSITY OF 
 CALIFORNIA 
 SAN DIEGO
 
 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 CRITICALLY EXAMINED
 
 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 CRITICALLY EXAMINED 
 
 BY THE REV. PROFESSOR 
 
 GEORGE HENSLOW, M.A. F.L.S. F.G.S. 
 
 AUTHOR OF 
 
 Evolution and Religion; Christian Beliefs Reconsidered 
 in the Light of Modern Thought, etc. 
 
 LONDON 
 
 HODDER AND STOUGHTON 
 
 27 PATERNOSTER ROW 
 
 1904
 
 PREFACE 
 
 THE present work is an attempt to point out 
 and refute some of the fallacies of Present-day 
 Rationalism and Materialism. 1 
 
 Since the Rationalist Press Association was 
 established in 1899, and has for its object the 
 diffusion of cheap editions of Rationalistic and 
 Atheistic works, it is worth while trying to explain 
 to unscientific readers the erroneous assumptions 
 made in their reasonings. 
 
 Of course, many Secularistic and Rationalistic 
 writings are directed against Christian theo- 
 logical dogmas, especially, perhaps, those of the 
 late Mr. Bradlaugh's days in the "Seventies". 
 I do not enter upon this field of controversy, 
 beyond stating the bases of belief in God, Free 
 Will and Immortality. 
 
 I particularly emphasise Inductive Reasoning; 
 
 1 Haeckel in his Riddle of the Universe calls it " Monism," but he 
 means Materialistic Monism.
 
 vi PKEFACE 
 
 for some Rationalists insist upon "observation 
 and experiment" as the only acceptable kind of 
 proof of God a method of evidence obviously 
 out of the question and they moreover assert 
 that whatever cannot be brought within these two 
 things is not to be accepted as science or know- 
 ledge. 
 
 As Materialistic Monists, such as Haeckel and 
 Biichner, state categorically that " Darwinism " 
 forms the basis of their Atheistic views, it is 
 necessary to discuss the principles of Evolution 
 and its methods. It will be seen that certain distinct 
 assumptions were made by Darwin upon which 
 his special theory of The Origin of Species by 
 means of Natural Selection, known as " Dar- 
 winism," is founded but they have no foundation 
 in fact. 
 
 On the other hand, his alternative explanation 
 which he for the most part regarded as too rarely 
 occurring to be worthy of consideration at any 
 length, viz., by what he called the " Definite action 
 of the Environment " has been now proved to be 
 really the true and only method in the origin of 
 species. This I have called the " True Darwinism," 
 but it has already received in Botany the title of 
 "Ecology". 
 
 Then, as Dr. Weismann has asserted, contrary to 
 Darwin's opinion, as also of Haeckel's, that char- 
 acters acquired by the soma cannot be hereditary,
 
 PREFACE vii 
 
 it is necessary to prove by examples that this view 
 is fallacious. 1 
 
 After pointing out the absurdities in Haeckel's 
 theory of the origin of living protoplasm, Evolution 
 carries us direct to and inclusive of Man. There 
 does not seem to be any necessity of a "break" 
 in the continuity as some suppose, but Man alone 
 has acquired the power of making abstractions 
 objects of thought. This lies at the base of all 
 his superior "God-like" powers. It forms the 
 sharp line of demarcation between him and the 
 animal world. 2 
 
 Man is thus enabled (i) to be self-conscious ; (2) 
 to be conscious of other "selves," hence to be 
 altruistic ; (3) to realise the conception of God ; (4) 
 to be conscious of having the power to choose, i.e., 
 a Free Will or Volition ; (5) to acquire a belief 
 in Immortality. 
 
 As inductive evidence accumulates in favour of 
 the belief in God, so does it for a future existence, 
 while Faith in spiritual matters is shown to be 
 
 *I have been accused of insisting upon "Adaptation," i.e., Darwin's 
 alternative method, as if it were my own theory. I have never done 
 so. I would rather insist upon the reader as regarding it as Darwin's, for 
 it will be found clearly stated in his works. What I did was, in reading 
 Darwin's books, to collect all the facts I could read of or observe, 
 coupling them with experimental proofs. Then, after about fifteen years, 
 I published The Origin of Floral Structures in 1888, and The Origin 
 of Plant Structures in 1895, as well as papers in Natural Science. 
 
 "While writing this book I found both Locke and Schopenhauer, as 
 well as others, have held their view.
 
 viii PREFACE 
 
 based on inductive evidence, just as Conviction is 
 in the scientific world. 
 
 This line of argument running through the book 
 was embodied in a lecture delivered before the 
 University College Christian Association on ist 
 May, 1903. 
 
 Lord Kelvin, who kindly proposed a vote of 
 thanks, expressed himself as thoroughly in accord 
 with it, and strongly corroborated my contention 
 that modern Natural Theology or Theism is based 
 on strictly scientific methods of reasoning. His 
 observations will be found following my address 
 (the first of six) in the volume entitled Christian 
 Apologetics (J. Murray, 25. 6d.).
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 PART I 
 
 NATURE 
 
 \ 
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Old Secularism of the " Seventies " 3 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 The New Secularism of To-day n 
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 Rationalism and Materialistic Monism professedly based on 
 
 Darwinism - . 17 
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 Materialistic and Theistic Views of the Evolution of the Inorganic 
 
 World 28 
 
 CHAPTER V 
 Haeckel's Materialistic Theory of the Origin of Living Beings . 38 
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 Life and its Phenomena 49 
 
 b
 
 x CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Life and its Phenomena (continued) 60 
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 "Directivity" a Witness of Mind, in Evidence throughout the 
 
 Living World , 69 
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 The Principle of Least Action in the Evolution of Organic Struc- 
 
 tures 
 
 CHAPTER X 
 The Abandoned Argument of Design 
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 Pseudo-philosophic Views of Evolution ...... I0 7 
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 Final Causes ........... "4 
 
 APPENDIX TO PART I 
 
 DARWINISM 
 I. Darwinism based on Erroneous Assumptions .... 145 
 
 II. The True Darwinism or the Natural Law of Adaptation . . 161 
 
 III. Adaptation (continued) Z 74 
 
 IV. Heredity of Acquired Characters, a Fundamental Principle of 
 
 Evolution l8 3 
 
 V. Heredity of Acquired Characters (continued) . . . . 195
 
 CONTENTS xi 
 
 PART II 
 
 MAN 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Man's Origin by Evolution 207 
 
 CHAPTER II 
 Rationalistic Views of Science and Knowledge \ . . .221 
 
 CHAPTER III 
 Rationalistic Views of Psychology, Reason and Instinct . . . 232 
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 Metaphysical Conceptions of the Senses 251 
 
 CHAPTER V 
 Inductive Reasoning and the Faith of Theists 265 
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 Free Will and Automatism 273 
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 The Ethics of Rationalism and Christianity 294 
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 Religion and Rationalism . 3H 
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 The Origin of Moral Evil .317 
 
 CHAPTER X 
 Rationalistic Views of Physical Evils ; and the Law of " Inideality " 327
 
 xii CONTENTS 
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Ether as the Vehicle of Divine Power and the Human Soul . . 341 
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 Rationalistic Criticisms upon the Theological Aspect of God . . 350 
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 Inductive Evidence the Basis of Belief of the Theist in Human 
 
 Immortality 358
 
 PART I 
 
 NATURE
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 THE OLD SECULARISM OF THE "SEVENTIES" 
 
 SOME thirty years ago we heard a good deal of Secular- 
 ism, when Mr. Bradlaugh was a prominent figure before 
 the world and was promulgating his atheistic views. 1 
 
 Mr. G. W. Foote defined Secularism as " Naturalism 
 in Morals as distinguished from Supernaturalism ". 2 
 
 Speaking of Mr. Bradlaugh, Mr. Foote said : " Filled 
 with Republican and Atheistic Faith he stands upon the 
 cardinal assumptions of human greatness and power, and 
 the impossibility of supernatural knowledge ; and he 
 trusts in them as eternal and unassailable verities". 
 
 " Mr. G. J. Holyoake, although an Atheist, puts for- 
 ward a philosophic theory of human life and duties, 
 which he terms ' Secularism '. 3 From this, three pro- 
 positions are deducible Science is the only Provi- 
 dence, Reason the sole guide, Happiness the sole end." 
 " The invariability of Nature's methods of operation, 
 the inviolability of the law of universal causation be- 
 longs peculiarly to Secularism." ..." In the realm of mind, 
 as in the realm of matter, everything works in accordance 
 with definite laws. The science of psychology is win- 
 ning a definite place for itself." [Haeckel now merges 
 
 1 Such as A Plea for Atheism and Is there a God ? 
 
 2 Secularism Restated, 1874. 
 
 3 i.e., as concerning this world only. 
 
 (3)
 
 4 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 it in physiology.] ..." In Secularism Reason is the sole 
 guide." ..." Whatever in any of the supposed sacred 
 writings of the world is good, pure, elevating and in- 
 spiring, Secularism thankfully accepts and assimilates. 
 Whatever is evil, corrupt, ignoble and degrading it sternly 
 rejects." 
 
 With regard to Happiness as being the sole end of 
 action in Secularism, all sensual pleasures were regarded 
 as degrading, and rational pleasures were to be aimed 
 at. They are " by no means comparable to those of the 
 great-minded philosopher who penetrates into the pro- 
 foundest mysteries of Nature, or to those of the large - 
 souled philanthropist whose whole life is a loving 
 ministration to wants of suffering humanity ". 
 
 "To the utilitarian standard all actions must be 
 made to conform ; all other standards are the veriest 
 delusions, as inconsistent as they are misleading. Mo- 
 rality cannot be founded upon the will of God, for no 
 power can decree morality. If God has a claim upon 
 my gratitude, or reverence, or worship, it can only be 
 because he is himself gracious, adorable and worshipful, 
 and not because of his power to exact from me a 
 reluctant prostration. So it is not power but goodness 
 which entitles God to reverence, and therefore, at bottom, 
 goodness and not God is the object of adoration." 
 
 " Secularism is utilitarian, regarding happiness as the 
 aim of action ; happiness pursued through Duty, not 
 because Duty possesses a distinctive and inherent sacred- 
 ness, but because it is the necessary road to happiness. 
 Duty is imperative upon all because it implies the per- 
 formance of such actions as are absolutely necessary to 
 the preservation of society, and without which retrogres- 
 sion and anarchy would inevitably ensue." 
 
 " Secularism being concerned only with the region of
 
 THE OLD SECULARISM 5 
 
 morals it has no message respecting the great problems 
 of theology." 
 
 With regard to immortality, " The mere naked belief 
 in it may be entertained by a Secularist without any 
 detraction from essential Secularism ; but the very 
 moment it interferes with the principles of Secularism, 
 that very moment the doctrine of a future life becomes 
 pernicious ". 
 
 " Similarly with the belief in an intelligent controlling 
 Power in the universe, Atheism and Theism are alike 
 distinct things from Secularism. They have no relation- 
 ship whatever to the practical duties of life." 
 
 " In Secularism there is a mutual platform for Atheists, 
 Theists and Pantheists, for all, in fact, who have fully 
 recognised the Universality of Causation, the Supremacy 
 of Reason and the Independence of Ethics on theological 
 dogmas? 
 
 Such is an outline of the main contentions of the 
 older Secularists ; and the first question which naturally 
 arises in one's mind is : What is the motive power for 
 obedience to Duty spoken of? for such seems to be no 
 more than the laws of the land or the Decalogue enforced 
 by punishment if they be violated, such being social 
 laws. The answer Mr. Foote gives is : " To the charge 
 that Secularism is cold and dreary, devoid of feeling and 
 imagination, we reply, The history of humanity lies open 
 to us as a rich treasure-house of noble example and 
 generous inspiration. . . . From the history of every 
 heroic martyr to the cause of truth and human deliver- 
 ance we receive sustenance, inspiration and hope. Our 
 cheeks tingle and flush as we peruse the page which 
 records how noble sufferers have laid down their bodies 
 in the breach in order that others might use them as 
 stepping-stones to final victory over error and wrong.
 
 6 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 If men cannot be moved to passionate enthusiasm and 
 ardent hope and heroic daring by these things, they are 
 impervious to all pure and holy influences. . . . The 
 Heavenly Paradise has been dreamed of by imaginative 
 theologians and longed for by the votaries of supersti- 
 tion ; for Secularism it remains to realise the Earthly 
 Paradise for men, where the flower and fruit of happi- 
 ness shall bloom for the delight and sustenance of 
 all." 
 
 Two things are herein very apparent. First, what- 
 ever moral conduct is upheld by Secularists, it does not 
 differ from what is commonly accepted by Christians. 
 Secondly, the stories of noble heroes of the past have 
 never yet created an enthusiasm for practical goodness 
 in posterity ; with the exception of Jesus Christ, who for 
 nearly 2000 years has been a Power for Holiness in all 
 who will accept Him. 
 
 Mr. Holyoake averred that Secularism and Christi- 
 anity could not exist compatibly with one another ; but 
 true Christianity is solely the Christ-like Character, which 
 Secularism would seem inclined to imitate but cannot 
 improve. 
 
 The above quotations will show what Secularism was 
 in the seventies. All that is good in it is borrowed 
 from Christianity and not solely obtainable from Nature 
 or Reason. 
 
 We shall presently see its position after thirty years, 
 as described by writers of to-day ; but a few more obser- 
 vations by Secularists, in order to point out their illogical 
 character, may be advisable. 
 
 There was an expression used by Rationalists : " I can- 
 not believe in that which I cannot comprehend ". Such 
 were the words of Mr. Austin Holyoake on his deathbed 
 in 1874, on which the editor of the Christian Evidence
 
 THE OLD SECULARISM j 
 
 Journal^ remarks : " A vast amount of scepticism is based 
 upon this same idea, yet it is one of the most delusive 
 that can be entertained, and one upon which we do not 
 act in ordinary life nor in science and philosophy. We 
 all believe daily in what we cannot comprehend, and to 
 look for an exception in the domain of religion is a fatal 
 error." 
 
 What does the latest writer on Freethought say ? 
 Exactly the reverse of Mr. Austin Holyoake's assertion. 
 
 Mr. G. Forester in his book, The Faith of an Agnostic, 
 or First Essays in Rationalism, 1902, observes : " We are 
 compelled to believe in the reality of that which to us is 
 inconceivable". 2 
 
 " The Unknowable is not synonymous with the Non- 
 existent." 3 
 
 " In the regions of transcendental thought, far beyond 
 human ken, and for which human language is utterly 
 inadequate, there may be that explanation for which 
 religion and philosophy have ever sought, and ever 
 sought in vain." 4 
 
 It were easy to show that Mr. Austin Holyoake, and 
 I suppose he only represented many other Secularists in 
 his day, was utterly inconsistent. Did he, and do others 
 now, not believe in Electricity? Yet those who know 
 most about it cannot comprehend it. They can no more 
 answer the question, "What is Electricity?" than they 
 can tell you what the Ether is ; yet every physicist 
 believes in both. Electricity like Gravity is a power ; 
 that is all. So there is a Power behind all Nature, as 
 incomprehensible as Electricity ; yet all believe in it 
 whether they regard it as conscious or not. 
 
 1 Number for May, 1874, p. 80. 
 
 2 The Faith of an Agnostic, p. 177. 
 
 3 Ibid., p. 180. *Ibid., p. 182.
 
 8 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 This self-limitation on the part of the Secularist is a 
 perfectly gratuitous one. To summarise the old Secu- 
 larism we shall see that the sole reliance upon Science 
 and Reason is in agreement with the Rationalists and 
 Haeckelian Monists of to-day, and we shall also see how 
 far this, their prop and stay, is trustworthy. 
 
 The proposed means of securing happiness was ap- 
 parently much the same as now. It is also noticeable 
 that the want of enthusiasm in Secularism is also still 
 existing. 
 
 Why Secularism should claim the invariability of 
 Nature's laws as peculiarly its own is not very clear ; 
 since that invariability has existed ever since the world 
 began. 
 
 Secularism might be called simple morality based on 
 Utilitarian principles of social duties, for the sake of the 
 happiness which Duty brings. Our jails and police courts 
 have something to show in opposition to this. 
 
 Secularism differed from Materialism of to-day in that 
 it permitted belief in a God and immortality as harmless 
 ideas, unless " interfering with the principles of Secular- 
 ism". 
 
 On the other hand Monists like Haeckel ridicule both 
 as superstitions. 
 
 When the Secularist says, "Theism has no relation 
 whatever to the practical duties of life," the greatest 
 motive power for a good life is gone ; and the weakness 
 of Secularism lies in the want of any efficient motive. 
 This becomes at once apparent in the inefficiency of 
 Secularism to gather in the multitude ; as it was in the 
 seventies, so, as we shall see, is it now. 
 
 To hold up the ideals of goodness and virtue as 
 stimulating abstractions will never appeal to the masses 
 of mankind. Nor will reading the stories in Fox's Book
 
 THE OLD SECULARISM g 
 
 of Martyrs have any really moral effect, nor even has it 
 been able to kindle much, if any, enthusiasm ; even al- 
 lowing for what the actual witness of a martyr's death 
 might have had and undoubtedly did have upon others 
 during times of persecution. 
 
 It is interesting to read the expedients to which 
 writers are put for motives. Mr. Mallock thus writes : 
 "In all the annals of intellectual self-deception it would 
 be hard to find anything to outdo or even to approach 
 the fantastic absurdities of Mr. Spencer in search of a 
 religion. He invites each man to consider and to rever- 
 ence himself as one of the ' myriad causes through which 
 the Unknown Cause works '....' It is not for nothing that 
 the Unknowable has implanted in man certain impulses.' 
 Surely (says Mr. Mallock) here is anthropomorphism 
 with a vengeance ! . . . What idea could be more incon- 
 sistent with the whole teaching of Monism ? " l Huxley 
 said that " Obedience to the moral law is producible only 
 by the prevalence of the idea of Duty. . . . And the 
 motive is to be found," says Prof. Huxley, " in the beauty 
 of conduct which is ' to devote oneself to the service of 
 humanity,' ' to pity and help all men to the best of one's 
 ability, to be strong and patient, to be ethically pure and 
 noble,' and 'to push our devotion to others to the ex- 
 tremity of self-sacrifice '. Religion, in fact, is nothing 
 more than ' that reverence and love for the ethical ideal, 
 and the desire to realise that ideal in life, which every 
 man ought to feel'. 'That he ought to feel it is surely 
 indisputable ; and Agnosti6ism has no more to do with 
 the matter than it has with music or painting '." 2 
 
 But the " man in the street " will not be satisfied with 
 this. He wants a permanent, efficient motive power and 
 
 1 Religion as a Credible Doctrine, pp. 265, 266. 
 " Mallock, op. cit., p. 256.
 
 to PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 this can only be found in a Living Person? which no 
 one of the atheistic -isms can supply. 
 
 No wonder is it that Secularists complain that they 
 cannot " annex the masses," as we shall see in present- 
 day Secularism of 1903. 
 
 1 1 larnack in his What is Christianity ? in reply to Rationalists who 
 repeatedly ask " What is new in Christ's teaching ? " strongly emphasises 
 His " Personality," as the source of goodness in the Christian followers of 
 Jesus.
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 THE NEW SECULARISM OF TO-DAY 
 
 THIRTY years have nearly elapsed, and we now find Mr. 
 F. J. Gould writing on " The New Secularism " in the 
 Agnostic Annual (an ethical review, 1903). He dis- 
 tinguishes present-day Secularism from the old by " the 
 almost complete disappearance of the appetite for theo- 
 logical debate " ; and he asks the question : " By what 
 other methods shall Rationalism be propagated ? " 
 
 He wonders what it has been doing for the last 
 thirty years. 
 
 " We need an aim, an organic association, a moral 
 and intellectual solidarity which will supply the appeal, 
 the motive, and the force." 
 
 Secularism must be in a poor way if it have none of 
 these three things, all of which are to be found to the full 
 in Christianity. 
 
 "The age of analysis is passing and the age of 
 synthesis is demanded." 
 
 Mr. Gould proceeds to complain that "those who 
 have been bred in the old school are too content to live 
 as disparate units". 
 
 " The supreme test of Secularism is revealed in the 
 question : What will it do with religion ? that is, with all 
 the emotions, habits and ideals which are grouped to- 
 gether under that name in the Churches. . . . Orthodoxy 
 has been defeated in controversy, but it remains in 
 possession of the soul of the million." 
 
 (ii)
 
 12 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Now follows an astonishing remedial proposition : 
 " We ought to give the people a modified and rational- 
 ised Church, with all the apparatus of symbol, ceremony, 
 music and parochial institution ; and among the parochial 
 activities of the Church I should recognise a systematic 
 effort to encourage the ethical aspect of every political 
 and industrial movement. . . . Religion and the Bible 
 having been rejected on account of their irrational claims 
 to divine origin, must be re-inserted, so to speak, in the 
 secular development of mankind as moral and intellectual 
 factors of high importance." 
 
 Surely we have here the Christian spirit reasserting 
 itself in spite of Rationalism ! Apparently, then, the 
 masses are to be allowed to have the Bible, perhaps 
 after being carefully annotated whence all the myths, all 
 the miracles, all of Jesus Christ as a myth too, according 
 to Mr. J. M. Robertson, will be carefully excised ! 
 
 But the average man, working or not, is now often 
 quite as well able, and perhaps sometimes much better, 
 than the Secularists, to judge for himself. 
 
 Secularism, with its " coldness " and " want of rever- 
 ence," based on pure Reas6n and Science, will no more 
 raise the masses, much less the submerged tenth, in the 
 twentieth, than it did in any century B.C. 
 
 " A common complaint against the meetings of Free- 
 thought societies," continues Mr. Gould, " is that they are 
 cold and that they lack reverence." 
 
 Reverence for what or whom, one is inclined to ask ? 
 His reply is, Because they are losing sight of " the vital 
 principle of association " ; the very basis of Christianity 
 or the Brotherhood of Man. 
 
 He is beginning to fear for the masses just as Aristotle 
 did. He suggests " art, literature and education " where- 
 with to raise "the Human ideal to the same level of honour
 
 THE NEW SECULARISM 13 
 
 as the Divine once occupied, so that human passion, 
 labour, sorrow and beauty shall now be elevated by art 
 and literature to the supremacy formerly held by gods, 
 spirits and the fictions of a remote Beyond ". 
 
 It is all a vain delusion ! The call for " reverence " 
 comes from a deep-rooted instinct for Some One, greater 
 than himself, whom man can look up to and revere. 
 Art, science, politics, literature, etc., will never fill the 
 void of an aching heart which cannot find a Person to 
 love, pray to and obey. 
 
 Mr. Gould suggests as a stimulus, " We do need a 
 larger recognition of the call to municipal and national 
 service ". Why is it that we have not all felt this need 
 before ? Such is his substitute for religion ! But it will 
 never supersede the call of Jesus Christ to faith and 
 holiness, nor lead men to be religious, for faith is loyalty 
 to the Person. Jesus Christ, and He alone, has done 
 this for nearly 2000 years. 
 
 One seems to be able to read pretty plainly between 
 the lines of Mr. Gould's remarkable paper. He is evi- 
 dently beginning to realise the weakness of, and a decided 
 want in, Freethought. After thirty or more years what 
 has it done ? He complains of a want of coherence, a want 
 of motive, aim. His remedy is a desperate one : External, 
 sensuous paraphernalia, symbols, ceremonies, music, etc. 
 Does he think that these things help to make men really 
 and truly honest, pure and good ? 
 
 " Music and Morals " is a well-sounding alliteration, 
 but there they begin and there they end ! 
 
 It is a fatal error to try and make men moral, much 
 less religious, without an adequate motive. Let us hear 
 Aristotle's pathetic lament : " Is the end in practical 
 matters, not the contemplating and knowing all things, 
 but rather the practising them ? If so, it is not suf-
 
 i 4 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 ficient to know the theory of virtue, but we must endea- 
 vour to possess and employ it ; or pursue whatever other 
 means there may be of becoming good. Now, if mere 
 treatises were sufficient of themselves to make men good, 
 justly 'would they have received many and great re- 
 wards,' as Theognis says, and it would be our duty to 
 provide ourselves with them. But the truth is, that they 
 seem to have power to urge on and to excite young men 
 of liberal minds, and to make a character that is generous 
 and truly fond of the honourable, easily influenced by 
 virtue ; but that they have no power to persuade the 
 multitude to what is virtuous and honourable." 1 The 
 commentator observes : " The very fact of loving virtue 
 for virtue's sake presupposes a proficiency in morals far 
 beyond the general state of mankind. Some other motive 
 was then clearly necessary for men sunk in vice as the 
 heathen world, a powerful motive, which no heathen, no 
 human philosophy could supply." 
 
 Sir John Seeley called attention to the same fact after 
 our Lord came. He says : " Stoicism and Christianity 
 existed side by side at the end of the first century. Was 
 their view of the obligations resting upon them similar ? 
 It was totally different. The Stoic rules were without 
 sanctions. If they were violated what could be said to 
 the offender ? All that could be said was, ' Chrysippus 
 non dicet idem '. To which how easy to reply, ' I esteem 
 Chrysippus, but on this point I differ from him ! ' To 
 Christian lapsi it was said, 'You have renounced your 
 baptism ; you have denied your Master ; you are cut off 
 from the Church ; the Judge will condemn you '. Is this 
 distinction a verbal or a practical one ? " 2 
 
 1 The Nicomachean Ethics, bk. x., chap. 9. Translated and annotated 
 by R. W. Browne, 1853. 
 
 *Ecce Homo, Preface, p. xi.
 
 THE NEW SECULARISM 15 
 
 No wonder is there that the meetings of Secularists 
 are cold and lack reverence ! It is because they have 
 discarded the only Person who has been able to stimulate 
 mankind to revere Him. That is the secret of true 
 Christianity ; which the Secularists have thrown aside as 
 a myth, and now find they have thrown away the one and 
 only motive capable of kindling the hearts of men into 
 warmth and reverence ; which, too, could bind them into 
 one Brotherhood instead of their remaining, after thirty 
 years, disconnected units only. 
 
 Mr. Gould's paper is most significant, and if he could 
 only see that our evidences for the historical personality 
 of Jesus Christ are as sound and logical as he thinks they 
 are illogical, he may yet find it necessary not only to 
 come to us for ritual and music, but for the " Motive " for 
 goodness as well. 
 
 In Mr. Bussell's admirable account of Socrates, he 
 shows some curious parallels, with differences, to Modern 
 Secularism. 
 
 Like the Sophists (he says) Socrates was " as hostile 
 to indolent acquiescence in convention". So are the 
 Secularists to complacent believers in dogmatic theology. 
 " Yet, unlike the Sophists, a constructive, a positive process 
 of instruction succeeded to this preliminary purgative. 
 . . . He seems to postulate a power for the conscientious 
 student, the earnest thinker, of reaching, of having contact 
 with what was True and Good. This power he thought 
 was inherent in Soul as such." * 
 
 " He strives, as the chief task of education, to make 
 his pupil interested in himself. He appeals to the under- 
 lying sense, in each man, of duty, of a love for beauty and 
 goodness, which once fully realised (too sanguine op- 
 timist !) cannot but take effect in action." 2 
 
 1 The School of Plato, p. 84. 2 Op. cit., p. 88.
 
 16 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 " He felt sure that if any one could once be brought to 
 consider his own nature l ... he would never recur to 
 those perilous errors of convention, but would live stead- 
 fastly, a law to himself, happy (because self-respecting and 
 trustful) in this world and the next. These principles 
 never came from pure Reason ; but rather from an 
 instinct of sonship, a religious instinct, suggesting to the 
 soul as probable far more than it can prove by argu- 
 ment." 2 
 
 " Pure reason cannot tell him of this : its mission is 
 purgative not dietetic, negative, not constructive. A 
 scientific definition of a practical thing only removes 
 error ; it does not teach Truth." 3 
 
 Thus, as I have shown above, has it been and is it 
 still with Secularism. The instructive essay by Mr. F. 
 J. Gould on "The New Secularism" proves it ; in which 
 he speaks of the old Secularism of Mr. Bradlaugh's days 
 in the "seventies," as characterised by "destructive argu- 
 ments," not only against theology, but even among them- 
 selves. It was all " purgative," as Mr. Bussell says ; but 
 during the last thirty years it appears not to have offered 
 anything substantial in the constructive line. Hence 
 Mr. Gould suggests, as a beginning, to build Rationalistic 
 churches with organs and ceremonies and ritualism 
 complete ! 
 
 1 Apparently as Bradlaugh and Herbert Spencer did also. 
 3 Op. cit., p. 89. 3 Op. cit., pp. 91, 92.
 
 CHAPTER, III 
 
 RATIONALISM AND MATERIALISTIC MONISM PROFESSEDLY 
 BASED ON DARWINISM 
 
 THE Rationalist Press Association is largely responsible 
 for the present diffusion of Rationalism in England. 
 One of its objects is the issue of " Cheap Rationalistic 
 Reprints". 
 
 The "Memorandum of Association" of the R.P.A. 
 (Limited) states the objects for which the Association 
 was formed. They are nine in number. The three 
 most important are as follows : 
 
 (a) To stimulate freedom of thought and inquiry in 
 reference to ethics, theology, philosophy and kindred 
 subjects. 
 
 () To promote a secular system of education, the 
 main object of which shall be to cultivate in the young 
 moral and intellectual fitness for social life. 
 
 (d) To publish and distribute books, pamphlets and 
 periodicals designed to promote the above objects. 
 
 " Rationalism may be defined as the mental attitude 
 which unreservedly accepts the supremacy of Reason, 
 and aims at establishing a system of philosophy and 
 ethics verifiable by experience, and independent of all 
 arbitrary assumptions or authority." 
 
 The reader will not easily gather from the above 
 objects that atheism, denial of freedom in man, as well 
 as the complete annihilation of man's soul at death, form 
 2 (17)
 
 18 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 the creed of Rationalists ; while Christian Theism, the 
 divinity, miracles and resurrection of our Lord are 
 regarded as utterly vain superstitions. 
 
 That is the main position of the present-day Rational- 
 ism and the question is, Which is most probably right 
 Rationalism or Christianity ? 
 
 In considering this recrudescence of Rationalism, I 
 shall have to consider among others such important 
 matters as the basis of Rationalism and Monism, the 
 origin of the world and life on earth, the evolution of 
 living things, Darwinism and Adaptation, till we come 
 to the Origin of Man. Then follows the sharp line of 
 demarcation between man and animals, seen in his 
 capability alone to entertain abstract ideas ; animals 
 being limited to objects of sense and reasonings upon 
 them. This leads to human psychology including the 
 Will or Volition and Automatism. Lastly is the sur- 
 vival of Man after Death. 
 
 Throughout will appear, as occasion arises, inductive 
 evidence as to the existence of an Omnipotent, Conscious 
 Mind in Nature, or God. 
 
 " Rationalism " is also known under the phrase " Ma- 
 terialistic Monism," with which Biichner adds " Material- 
 ism " as a synonym. 1 
 
 In order to understand clearly what is meant by 
 Materialistic Monism, I will take Haeckel as the expon- 
 ent. He says: " All the different philosophical tendencies 
 may, from the point of view of modern science, be 
 ranged in two antagonistic groups ; they represent either 
 
 1 Monism as a philosophical term is used in three if not more senses. 
 One is the materialistic or that of Haeckel; the second is idealistic, 
 regarding all phenomena as spiritualistic, and the third is pantheistic, 
 neither mind nor matter being substantial, but both being referred to one 
 original substance.
 
 RATIONALISM BASED ON DARWINISM ig 
 
 a dualistic or a monistic interpretation of the Cosmos. 
 The former is usually bound up with teleological and 
 idealistic dogmas, the latter with mechanical and realistic 
 theories. Dualism in the widest sense, breaks up the 
 universe into two entirely distinct substances * the 
 material world and an immaterial God, who is repre- 
 sented to be its creator, sustainer and ruler. Monism, 
 on the contrary (likewise taken in its widest sense) 
 recognises one sole ' substance ' in the universe, which 
 is at once ' God and Nature ' ; body and spirit (or matter 
 and energy) it holds to be inseparable. The extra- 
 mundane God of Dualism leads necessarily to Theism ; 
 the intra-mundane God of the Monist leads to Pan- 
 theism." 2 
 
 Haeckel devotes a chapter 3 to a fuller explanation of 
 " the Law of Substance." " Under this name," he writes, 
 " we embrace two supreme laws of different origin and 
 age the older is the chemical law of the " conservation 
 of matter " and the younger is the physical law of the 
 " conservation of energy," that is to say, the sum of 
 matter and the sum of force are alike unchangeable : 
 so that " the whole marvellous panorama of life that 
 spreads over the surface of our globe is, in the best 
 analysis, transformed sunlight," and " no particle of living 
 energy is ever extinguished ; no particle is ever created 
 anew ". 
 
 All the different forces of Nature are reducible to one 
 common original force {prodynamis). " This fundamental 
 force is generally conceived as a vibratory motion of the 
 smallest particles of matter a vibration of atoms." 4 In 
 
 1 This word is used here partly in a metaphysical sense, not a con- 
 crete or material one, only. 
 
 8 The Riddle of the Universe, Eng. ed., p. 20. 
 
 3 Op. cit., xii., p. 214. *Op. cit., pp. 217, 221.
 
 20 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 further elucidation of his views Haeckel says : " The 
 two fundamental forms of substance, ponderable matter 
 and ether, are not dead, and only moved by extrinsic 
 force ; but they are endowed with sensation and will 
 (though, naturally, of the lowest grade) ; they experience 
 an inclination for condensation, a dislike of strain ; they 
 strive after the one and struggle against the other." l 
 
 With regard to the metaphorical expression of 
 chemical "affinities," which Haeckel regards as actual, 
 he says : " Every shade of inclination from complete 
 indifference to the fiercest passion is exemplified in the 
 chemical relation of the various elements towards each 
 other, just as we find in the psychology of man, and 
 especially in the life of the sexes. . . . The irresistible 
 passion that draws Paris to Helen, and leaps over all 
 bounds of reason and morality, is the same powerful 
 ' unconscious ' attractive force which impels the living 
 spermatozoon to force an entrance into the ovum in the 
 fertilisation of the egg of the animal or plant the same 
 impetuous movement which unites two atoms of hydro- 
 gen to one atom of oxygen for the formation of a mole- 
 cule of water. . . . Even the atom is not without a 
 rudimentary form of sensation and will. The same 
 must be said of the molecules which are composed of 
 two or more atoms." ' 2 Hence Haeckel deduces the 
 presence of a universal " soul," both in atoms, molecules 
 and their compounds ; and subsequently in living cells 
 up to man. 
 
 With regard to ether he says : " Ether is boundless 
 and immeasurable, like the space it occupies. It is in 
 eternal motion ; and this specific movement of Ether (it 
 is immaterial whether we conceive it as vibration, strain, 
 condensation, etc.) in reciprocal action with mass- 
 1 op. dt., p. 224. *Oj>. dt., pp. 228, 229.
 
 RATIONALISM BASED ON DARWINISM 21 
 
 movement (or gravitation) is the ultimate cause of all 
 phenomena." l 
 
 Haeckel concludes the chapter on " the Law of Sub- 
 stance " with the following words : " Our Monistic view, 
 that the great cosmic Law applies throughout the whole 
 of Nature, is of the highest moment. ... It marks the 
 highest intellectual progress, in that it definitely rules out 
 the three central dogmas of metaphysics God, freedom 
 and immortality. In assigning mechanical causes to 
 phenomena everywhere, the law of substance comes into 
 line with the universal law of causality." 
 
 Such is the fundamental position of Haeckel's monis- 
 tic theory, and the question to be answered is : Which is 
 the more probable, that the evolution of the universe is 
 worked out by self-acting, blind and unconscious forces, 
 or by an Omnipotent, Intelligent First Cause ? If there 
 be no consciousness in the energy at work ; whence came 
 consciousness in the product ? 
 
 Before proceeding further, it will be as well to make a 
 few comments upon this extraordinary theory of Materi- 
 alistic Monism. It at once gives one the impression 
 that, by starting with a disbelief in a Creator, Haeckel 
 is compelled to try and square the universe with his 
 atheism. He cannot ignore life, for it is in evidence in 
 his own person, therefore, to avoid its entrance into the 
 world in time, he relegates its existence to all matter 
 and ether as a kind of eternal living essence or substance. 
 
 A true scientist always looks for some kind of evidence 
 in support of his working hypothesis. He is bound to 
 base it on some facts, however slight they may necessarily 
 be, where he wishes to bring the " unknown " within the 
 region of the " known ". In this Materialism there are 
 none : everything is assumed. All scientists have always 
 1 op. dt., p. 233.
 
 22 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 sharply separated the organic world from the inorganic ; 
 because of the ample evidences of life in the one, and the 
 total absence of such in the other. This difference sup- 
 plies a stronger basis of such being true, than to assume 
 the inorganic world to be alive, in spite of the total 
 absence of all the familiar phenomena by which we 
 regard the presence of life to be indicated ; such as 
 absorption of food, digestion, growth, development, re- 
 production, etc., etc. With regard to prodynamis or 
 original vibrating force of atoms, one naturally asks 
 whence it arose. The only answer appears to be that, 
 like ether (from which matter is supposed to emerge), 
 it was eternal and that ether never began to vibrate ; but 
 always has done so. 
 
 In the next place, how did a uniformly vibrating 
 motion become changed into all the forms of energy 
 with which we are familiar ? What determined the first 
 changes of character in this primeval force, while acting 
 on a uniform ether ? l 
 
 " Atoms," he says, " experience an inclination for con- 
 densation and a dislike for strain." If this idea be based 
 on our experiences in physics ; then we find that 
 " inclination " varies with temperature ; for example, 
 water shows a decided " inclination " for condensation 
 at about 39 F. ; but at 212 the "inclination" is all the 
 other way ; for it goes off as steam by expansion. 
 
 How, too, came chemical forces into existence as 
 shown by their so-called " affinities " ? Here, again, we 
 have Haeckel's process of fitting the Cosmos on to his 
 atheism. Man loves, therefore love must have been an 
 eternal property of matter. Therefore, it is seen in all 
 chemical affinities and so on backwards till it is traceable 
 
 1 We shall see later what has to be said on " Vortex-rings".
 
 RATIONALISM BASED ON DARWINISM 23 
 
 into ether. He conveniently fits on traits of character 
 observable in man and animals to molecules and atoms. 
 But if he compares the love of Paris for Helen with the 
 " affinity" of one atom with another, how does he account 
 for the extreme rarity of one atom only of one kind of 
 element uniting with one atom only of another kind ? 
 By far the commoner process is for a molecule to be 
 composed of more than one, often many times more 
 than one atom. Thus with water, two atoms of hydrogen 
 are always in "love" with one atom of oxygen. While 
 in living albuminous protoplasm the number of element- 
 ary atoms in love with each other are represented by 
 the formula C 60 H 100 N 16 O 20 . Can absurdities gravely put 
 forth in the name of science go further ? 
 
 Then comes the question of the soul. Once more, 
 starting from his own (he only allows psychology to be 
 a branch of physiology), how did he get it ? As there is 
 only one substance in the universe, the soul, like every- 
 thing else, must be referred back, first to the primitive 
 living cell, thence back again to inorganic molecules of 
 some sort, then to atoms and finally to ether ; as being 
 " the ultimate cause of all phenomena ". 
 
 Any idea of the advisability, not to say necessity, of 
 looking for evidence, seems to be quite unnecessary to 
 Haeckel. Let us now compare this Monism with Secu- 
 larism. 
 
 We have seen that Mr. Bradlaugh, Mr. Foote, Mr. 
 Holyoake and others were at least Secularists, if they 
 repudiated the actual title of Atheists ; but Mr. Brad- 
 laugh said that Secularism was on the high road to 
 Atheism. They were what Huxley subsequently called 
 Agnostics ; for as Mr. Foote said, there might be a God, 
 but he knew nothing about Him, and therefore the 
 moral life is entirely bound up with this world and un-
 
 24 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 influenced by any belief in a God or a hereafter ; hence 
 the term " Secularism ". 
 
 If we ask why they assumed this attitude, it would 
 seem, as far as Mr. Bradlaugh was concerned, from his 
 treatises Is there a God? and A Plea for A theism , etc., 
 that it was the study of metaphysics which led him 
 astray. Thus, after a long discussion as to the nature 
 of God in whom he did not believe he emerges with 
 the following conclusions : that " God cannot be intelli- 
 gent," " can never perceive anything," " He cannot re- 
 collect or forget," " He cannot have the faculty of 
 judgment " and " He cannot think ". 
 
 It is generally considered to be impossible " to prove 
 a negative " ; but Mr. Bradlaugh did it to his own satis- 
 faction, although he professes not to know what one 
 means by the word " God ". 
 
 It seems that the absence of anything of the nature of 
 objective proof of the existence of God was the cause 
 of the atheistic view in the seventies ; and this is still 
 maintained to-day. Thus the anonymous author of Mr. 
 Balfour's Apologetics, to whom I shall refer again, says 
 nothing can come under the head of Knowledge which 
 does not fall within observation and experiment. 
 
 This demand is obviously unreasonable, nor is it fair ; 
 for no force or energy comes within " observation ". 
 Gravitation, heat, electricity, etc., are unknown in their 
 nature, but recognisable only by their effects. More- 
 over, one man's consciousness is only inferred by another, 
 by his acts. It is inductive not experimental evidence 
 upon which such " knowledge " is based. Consequently 
 in " proving " the existence of God from Nature's works 
 we have no other than inductive evidence or the ac- 
 cumulation of coincidences and probabilities ; so that 
 when they are fully grasped by the mind they form a
 
 RATIONALISM BASED ON DARWINISM 25 
 
 "moral conviction" which is equivalent to a demon- 
 stration. 
 
 The presence of Law and Order is obvious every- 
 where now in the universe ; yet this same universe, we 
 are told by scientists, was originally a homogeneous fiery 
 vapour. This " proves " to most minds the necessity of 
 a " Law-giver " and " Order-maker ". 
 
 But, strange as it may seem to those who knew 
 Darwin in the fifties, Materialistic Monists have seized 
 upon "Darwinism" as the very basis of their Monism. 
 "Darwin gave us the clue to the monistic explanation 
 of organisation . . . mechanism alone can give us a true 
 explanation of natural phenomena ; for it traces them to 
 their real efficient causes, viz., to blind and unconscious 
 agencies." 1 
 
 So, too, Biichner says in his Last Words on Material- 
 ism : " Darwinism is the chief support of Materialism or 
 Monism ". 2 
 
 It is, therefore, necessary to consider how it came 
 about that Darwin's theory which he himself thought 
 when he wrote it to be perfectly compatible with a belief 
 in the Creator came to furnish the very groundwork of 
 the most uncompromising Atheism ever known. 
 
 Some may think that I spend too much time over 
 Haeckel's " puerile argument for Atheism from Darwin- 
 ism," as it has been called ; but Haeckel is an eminent 
 biologist, and by no means stands alone in making this 
 deduction. 
 
 Darwinism has led many scientists to refer all phe- 
 nomena, both of the organic and the inorganic worlds, 
 to physico-chemical forces only. Such a conclusion has 
 landed them in Agnosticism if not Atheism ; because the 
 
 1 Haeckel's Riddle, etc., pp. 264, 265. 2 Ibid., p. 139.
 
 26 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 legitimate philosophical inference of a Conscious Power 
 in Nature is ignored as being outside the province of 
 science ; which Rationalists claim as the sole source of 
 knowledge. 
 
 Thus Prof. Karl Pearson says : " An explanation is 
 never given by science. The whole of science is descrip- 
 tion, mechanism explains nothing." 
 
 " The Grammar of Science confines the sphere of 
 knowledge to the world of perceptions and the concep- 
 tions drawn from it." 
 
 " The mind is absolutely confined within its nerve- 
 exchange ; beyond the walls of sense-impression it can 
 logically infer nothing. 1 . . . Briefly, Chaos is all that 
 science can logically assert of the supersensuous the 
 sphere outside knowledge, outside classification by 
 mental concepts." 2 
 
 " No human concept, such as order, reason or con- 
 sciousness can be logically projected into it." 8 
 
 But it is not merely an academical question whether 
 Haeckel and other biologists are right or wrong. His 
 books, especially the Riddle of the Universe, are eagerly 
 read by young men of the lower orders, who boldly pro- 
 claim atheism in the London Parks, etc., on the supposi- 
 tion that Haeckel is an infallible authority ! Haeckel's 
 theories may seem wild enough, it is true, to all who 
 know; but it is not so to those who only take their 
 " science " second-hand from him. 
 
 I feel, too, that it is unfortunate that I have to con- 
 test a purely scientific deduction from " Darwinism " in a 
 work, the purport of which is to contravene such abstract 
 conclusions as atheism, disbelief in man's free will and 
 immortality ; but the burden must rest on the shoulders 
 
 1 The Chances of Death and other Studies in Evolution, ii., pp. 381, 382. 
 8 The Grammar of Science, p. 108. 3 Ibid., p. 112.
 
 RATIONALISM BASED ON DARWINISM 27 
 
 of the Rationalists and Haeckel. It is they who go out 
 of their way to deny the existence of any scientific proof 
 of a God, of freedom and of immortality ; because these 
 things cannot be brought within the range of observation 
 and experiment. 
 
 Moreover, as Haeckel and others avowedly base their 
 Materialism on Darwinism, I cannot avoid discussing 
 this latter subject on the present occasion. 
 
 In order, however, to preserve more continuity in 
 what is intended to be apologetic, I propose relegating 
 my purely scientific discussion of Darwinism to an 
 appendix. 
 
 If the reader prefer to do so, he might read that 
 appendix at this point of the argument with advantage.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 MATERIALISTIC AND THEISTIC VIEWS OF THE EVOLUTION 
 OF THE INORGANIC WORLD 
 
 IN anticipation of what Haeckel has to say about the 
 evolution of animals and plants as well as the psycho- 
 logical phenomena of man's " soul," he is obliged to look 
 somewhere for a natural source of life in organisms. 
 But besides this he must also find a source of sensation 
 and will, and generally for a soul. 
 
 He starts with the fundamental ether filling all space 
 and permeating all bodies, being infinite and eternal. 
 He says : " The existence of ether as a real element is a 
 positive fact. . . . As we assure ourselves of the exist- 
 ence of ponderable matter by its mass and weight, by 
 chemical and mechanical experiments, so we prove that 
 of ether by the experiences and experiments of optics 
 and electricity." 1 
 
 The reader will observe that the nature of the proofs 
 is not identical. The former is experimental verification, 
 the latter induction, the ether being assumed to exist in 
 order to account for the transmission of light ; the pro- 
 babilities of its existence being of such a high order, that 
 its absence becomes unthinkable. 
 
 Let us now follow his assumptions and we shall then 
 be able to form some estimate of the probabilities of 
 their being true or otherwise. 
 
 1 Op. dt., pp. 230, 231. 
 
 (28)
 
 THE INORGANIC WORLD 29 
 
 Ether and force appear to constitute his primary 
 "Substance". 
 
 With regard to the origin of evolution in ether, 
 Haeckel thus describes the process : " This universal 
 movement of substance in space takes the form of an 
 eternal cycle or of a periodical process of evolution. 
 
 " The phases of this evolution consist in a periodic 
 change of consistency, of which the first outcome is the 
 primary division into mass [matter?] and ether the 
 ergonomy of ponderable and imponderable matter. 
 
 " This division is effected by a progressive condensa- 
 tion of matter as the formation of countless infinitesimal 
 ' centres of condensation/ in which the inherent primitive 
 properties of substance feeling and inclination are the 
 active causes." l Of course this theory of a homogeneous 
 ether forming local thickenings by some spontaneous 
 " feeling and inclination " at certain " centres of conden- 
 sation " is an hypothesis without a shadow of even a hint 
 of a proof, much less explanation how they came about. 
 When condensation is going on physicists call it gravity ; 
 but what sets up a centre of attraction, as in our sun, is 
 not known. And there we must leave these speculations 
 as involving at present insoluble problems. 
 
 Haeckel does not seem to have heard of vortex- 
 rings in ether as the origin of matter ; about which 
 something will be said below, as well as of the very latest 
 hypothesis of the present year (1903). Two great 
 questions, therefore, arise at once. How had the in- 
 organic universe, to which our earth belongs, a beginning 
 in time and space ; and how did Life appear upon this 
 earth ? 
 
 What has modern science got to say, first, as to the 
 
 1 Op. dt., p. 248.
 
 30 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 former question of the two ? We start with the hitherto 
 accepted belief in the universal existence of ether, im- 
 ponderable and immaterial, pervading all space and all 
 material objects. Prof. Dolbear says that from experi- 
 ments in a vacuum " one is led to infer that matter is not 
 the agent that transmits light". Hence the universal 
 ether is hypothecated to account for the transmission of 
 the waves of light, magnetism, electricity and gravitation. 
 
 " Ether is not atomic in structure, presents no friction 
 to bodies moving through it, and is not subject to the 
 law of gravitation, it does not seem proper to call it 
 'matter'. We might speak of it as a 'substance' if 
 we want another word than its specific name for it. As 
 for myself, I make a sharp distinction between the ether 
 and matter, and feel somewhat confused to hear any one 
 speak of the ether as matter. " l 
 
 Similarly, Tait says : " If we adopt Sir W. Thom- 
 son's [Lord Kelvin] supposition that the universe is filled 
 with something which we have no right to call ordinary 
 matter (though it must possess inertia) but which we may 
 call a perfect fluid ; then, if any portions of it have vortex- 
 motion communicated to them, they will remain for ever 
 stamped with that vortex-motion ; they cannot part with 
 it ; it will remain with them as a characteristic for ever, 
 or at least until the creative act which produced it shall 
 take it away again. Thus this property of rotation may 
 be the basis of all that to our senses appeals as matter" 2 
 
 It is thought that " atoms " of matter are made out of 
 ether. 
 
 The artificial manufacture of " vortex-rings " (such as 
 may be sometimes seen in smoke-rings from a tobacco- 
 
 1 Matter, Ether and Motion, p. 35. 
 
 2 Lectures on Some Recent Advances in Physical Science, by P. G. 
 Tait, 1876, p. 294.
 
 THE INORGANIC WORLD 31 
 
 pipe or in the vapour from the funnel of an engine, or 
 from the smoke in firing a cannon, etc.), shows how it is 
 conceivably possible that they can be formed in ether. 
 " If such a ring could be produced in a material not 
 subject to friction, none of the motion it possesses could 
 be dissipated, and we should have a permanent structure, 
 possessing several properties, such as definite dimensions, 
 volume, elasticity, attraction, and so on, all due to the 
 shape and motions involved." l 
 
 " Imagine, then, that vortex-rings were in some way 
 formed in the ether, constituted of ether. If the ether be, 
 as it is generally believed to be, frictionless, then such a 
 thing would persist indefinitely : it would have just that 
 quality of durability that atoms seem to possess." 
 
 " It may be asked how one vortex-ring can differ 
 from another, so that there could be so many as seventy 
 or more different kinds of atoms [elements]. To this it 
 may be said that such rings may differ from each other 
 not only in size but in their rates of rotation ; the ring may 
 be a thick one or a thin one, may rotate relatively fast or 
 slow, may contain a greater or less amount of the ether." 2 
 
 "Motion is the chief characteristic of matter. Chemists 
 have discovered that both the chemical and physical 
 properties of all kinds of matter are functions of their 
 mass or relative atomic weights, and that they may be 
 arranged in a harmonic series. Harmonic relations may 
 imply relations either of position or of motion. But the 
 fundamental properties of matter do not change by a 
 change of its position, and one is therefore led to the 
 conclusion that one must look to the various kinds of 
 motion involved among atoms for the explanation of all 
 their properties and all their phenomena." 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 39. * Op. cit., pp. 40, 41.
 
 32 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 " One, however, must not infer that this represents 
 knowledge of a demonstrated kind, for it does not." 
 Yet Prof. Dolbear finally observes : " It is either that 
 theory or nothing. There is no other that has any 
 degree of probability at all." l Though Prof. Dolbear here 
 writes somewhat decidedly, one must add that it is not all 
 physicists who accept the theory of atomic vortex-rings. 
 Writing to Lord Kelvin to ask him how far, if at all, the 
 discoveries about radium affected the theory, he has been 
 so good as to reply as follows : " In answer to your letter, 
 radium has nothing to do with vortex-rings. About 
 1886 I utterly abandoned the idea that atoms of matter 
 could be vortex-rings ; or that the theory of vortex-rings 
 (a beautiful and admirable result of mathematical work in 
 the dynamics of an ideal perfect liquid) could contribute 
 anything towards an explanation of the atoms of matter 
 and their mutual actions. I had occupied myself much 
 with that idea for about twenty years ; but I abandoned 
 it when I became convinced that there was no truth or 
 help towards truth in it." 
 
 Since the above was published, Prof. O. Reynolds, 
 F.R.S., has delivered the Rede lecture at Cambridge, 
 and broached a new theory in it, that ether consists of in- 
 conceivably small grains. Matter represents a deficiency 
 of these grains [how were they lost ?] causing a strain in 
 the medium and thus accounting for the law of gravita- 
 tion, etc. 
 
 Experts only can determine what degree of proba- 
 bility Prof. Reynolds's theory may have to support it ; 
 or how far it interferes with that of vortex-rings. At all 
 events, at a later date (ist May, 1903) Lord Kelvin 
 had occasion to say that he was " horrified to read in the 
 
 1 Matter, Ether and Motion (S. P. C. K., 1899).
 
 THE INORGANIC WORLD 33 
 
 press that he had spoken of ether-atoms. Ether was 
 absolutely non-atomic ; it was absolutely structureless 
 and homogeneous." 
 
 What physicists may finally determine as to the 
 nature of electrons and ions, must be left to their re- 
 searches. 
 
 These latest deductions of scientists seem to bring us 
 to the Origin of the Universe. 
 
 If we may assume the existence of an infinite and 
 eternal ether, perfectly homogeneous but replete with 
 motion, we thus arrive at the primary condition of 
 matter and motion, as being all that pure science can 
 imagine or detect. 
 
 If we think that an Omnipotent, Conscious, Intelli- 
 gent Power is present in the Universe as well as a limit- 
 less ether ; then if that Power be supposed to be infinite 
 in space, we might express this as regarding ether as 
 the " vehicle " of that Power. Science suggests, as we 
 have seen, that matter (represented by the seventy or 
 more "elements" known to physicists) was the first 
 result of some special kind of motion set up in ether, 
 which resulted in the production of vortex-rings ; these 
 vortex-rings being atoms of the known elements. 
 
 How vortex-rings are set going in ether is unknown. 
 All that Prof. Dolbear says is : " Imagine then, that 
 vortex-rings were in some way formed in the ether, con- 
 stituted of ether". They then appear to have all the 
 physical peculiarities claimed for atoms of matter as 
 ordinarily known to physicists. 
 
 Atoms once formed in this way, when suitable condi- 
 tions, as of heat, occur, enter into combination with one 
 another and produce molecules composed of two or more 
 different elements, and in various proportions. 
 
 As soon as this is the case the substances exhibit 
 
 3
 
 34 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 phenomena quite unknown in the individual atoms them- 
 selves. Thus nitrogen and oxygen mixed mechanically 
 constitute the atmosphere ; but if one atom of nitrogen 
 and one of hydrogen be chemically combined with three 
 of oxygen, we get the powerfully corroding substance 
 called "nitric acid". 
 
 How do these properties arise ? I am not aware that 
 any one knows. 
 
 We need not proceed further at present, for enough 
 questions begin to crowd upon one, but the fundamental 
 one is : How do vortex-rings arise in ether ? Did they 
 arise spontaneously? If not, what caused them, and 
 what was the antecedent cause, and so on ad infinitum ? 
 Dr. Charnock thus writes : " The proof of the beginning 
 of the world is affirmed with good reason". This is 
 abundantly corroborated by modern science. " If it had 
 a beginning, it had also some higher cause than itself; 
 every effect hath a cause." Similarly, " all motion hath 
 a beginning ". 1 
 
 The question, therefore, is, Was the origin of vortices, 
 as well as of subsequent phenomena attending atoms of 
 elements, which come under the sphere of chemical 
 investigations, from nebula to granite, as well as gravita- 
 tion, rotation, etc., etc., all purely mechanical under the 
 action of blind forces ; or are we justified in recognising 
 a Conscious, Omnipotent Power acting as the Originator of 
 special forms of force, or of the first impulse in making 
 vortex-rings, thence atoms, thence all the material sub- 
 stances in the universe with their respective properties ? 
 
 The answer depends upon two factors the amount 
 of probabilities, and the receptivity of evidence in the 
 human mind. 
 
 1 Complete Works, vol. i., pp. 144, 145. He was born in 1628,
 
 THE INORGANIC WORLD 35 
 
 The cumulative evidence of the existence of a Deity 
 seems ample to one mind ; whereas he who will not rise 
 beyond sensual perceptions of physical phenomena, of 
 course, closes his mind to all other evidence which is 
 based on a totally different and more abstract line of 
 reasoning. 
 
 To the one a large part of " proof" is inductive ; or 
 what is called " Faith ". To the other this is purposely 
 excluded as not evidential at all, and the man prefers to 
 be Agnostic in the sense that " he does not know," as the 
 evidence does not appeal to him as sufficient. 
 
 Dr. Charnock thus continues : " We must come to 
 something that is first in every kind, and this first 
 must have a cause not of the same kind, but infinite 
 and independent ; otherwise men run into inconceivable 
 labyrinths and contradictions. ... If the world were 
 uncreated, it were then immutable, but every creature 
 upon the earth is in a continual flux, always changing 
 [this has been corroborated and greatly intensified by 
 evolution]. If things be mutable, they were created ; if 
 created, they were made by some author ; whatsoever 
 hath a beginning must have a maker. If the world hath 
 a beginning, there was then a time when it was not ; it 
 must have some cause to produce it. That which makes 
 is before that which is made, and this is God. No 
 creature can make itself: the world could not make 
 itself. . . . Whatsoever began in time, was not ; and 
 when it was nothing 1 it had nothing and could do 
 nothing ; and therefore could never give to itself nor 
 to any other to be, or be able to do ; for then it gave 
 what it had not, and did what it could not." Dr. 
 Charnock here argues on the old hypothesis of the 
 
 1 For " nothing " may be substituted " ether ".
 
 36 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 creation of the world out of nothing ; but if we substitute 
 a homogeneous ether, it is difficult to realise how man's 
 mind could be potentially in it, if there be no Creative 
 Mind at all. " If it were," he proceeds, " as some fancy, 
 made by an assembly of atoms, there must be some 
 infinite intelligent Cause that made them, some cause 
 that separated them, some cause that mingled them 
 together for the fitting up so comely a structure as the 
 world. It is the most absurd thing to think they should 
 meet together by hazard, and rank themselves in that 
 order we see without a higher and a wise agent, so that 
 no creature could make the world. For supposing any 
 creature was formed before this visible world, and might 
 have a hand in disposing things, yet he must have a 
 cause of himself, and must act by the virtue and 
 strength of another, and this is God." l 
 
 So now, if atoms are vortex-rings, whence came the 
 initial power to make the rings in ether ? Those atom- 
 rings were made in time, and if a nebula consist of 
 millions of glowing hot vortex-rings of hydrogen, whence 
 the " Directivity " 2 which has produced the planetary 
 order out of them? Dr. Charnock then concludes his 
 argument : " To conclude this ; as when a man comes 
 into a palace, built according to the exactest rule of art, 
 and with an unexceptionable conveniency for the in- 
 
 1 Op. cit., vol. i., p. 150. 
 
 2 1 am indebted to Prof. A. H. Church, F.R.S., for this very useful 
 and expressive word. It seems a better one than Jas. Croll's " Determin- 
 ing Power" referred to below and employed in his paper What Determines 
 Molecular Motion, the Fundamental Problem of Nature ? Prof. Church 
 writes me, " I coined it many years ago to avoid the use of ' force,' 
 'energy,' etc., when describing in lectures on organic chemistry the 
 parallelism between the chemist directing in his laboratory physico- 
 chemical forces in the making of a true organic compound, and that 
 mysterious " something " which employs the same forces to make the 
 same compound in the plant or animal."
 
 THE INORGANIC WORLD 37 
 
 habitants, he would acknowledge both the being and 
 skill of the builder; so whosoever shall observe the 
 disposition of all the parts of the world, their connection, 
 comeliness, the variety of the seasons, the swarms of 
 different creatures, and the mutual offices they render to 
 one another cannot conclude less that it was contrived 
 by an infinite skill, effected by infinite power, and 
 governed by infinite wisdom." 1 
 
 Since this chapter was written, we have learnt a 
 great deal about Radium and radio-activities, which 
 seem likely to revolutionise previous conceptions of the 
 nature of atoms ; but the only question which arises in 
 connection with my present argument is : Are these 
 complicated phenomena more or less likely to favour 
 Rationalism or Dualism ? 
 
 One cannot say more than, that in proportion as 
 the complexity of an atom and its activities appear to 
 increase, so much the more difficult, if not incompre- 
 hensible is it, to believe that its structure and powers 
 should have arisen sud sponte, without some Directive 
 Agency. 
 
 1 op. dt., vol. i., p. 158.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 HAECKEL'S xMATERIALISTIC THEORY OF THE ORIGIN OF 
 LIVING BEINGS 
 
 THE following are a few passages from Haeckel's Riddle 
 of the Universe bearing on the origin of life. 
 
 " Max Verworn showed as a result of an ingenious 
 series of experimental researches that the 'theory of a 
 cell-soul ' is completely established by an accurate study 
 of the unicellular protozoa, and that ' the psychic phe- 
 nomena of the protistae ' form the bridge which unites the 
 chemical processes of inorganic nature with the mental 
 life of the highest animals." 1 
 
 " I restrict the idea of spontaneous generation also 
 called abiogenesis or archigony to the first development 
 of living protoplasm out of inorganic carbonates and 
 distinguish two phases in this ' beginning of biogenesis ' 
 (i) autogony or the rise of the simplest protoplasmic 
 substances in a formative fluid, and (2) plasmogony, the 
 differentiation of individual primitive organisms out of 
 these protoplasmic compounds in the form of tnonera" * 
 
 " Modern physiology teaches us that the first source 
 of organic life on the earth is the formation of protoplasm, 
 and that this synthesis of simple inorganic substances, 
 water, carbonic acid and ammonia, only takes place 
 under the influence of sunlight." 3 
 
 1 Riddle of the Universe, pp. 48, 49, 155. 
 
 8 Op. cit., p. 263. 3 Op. cit., p. 288. 
 
 (38)
 
 ORIGIN OF LIFE 39 
 
 It will be observed here that Haeckel does not say 
 where the sulphur and phosphorus are to come from 
 which protoplasm and its nucleus require. 
 
 In referring to the necessity of sunlight, such is only 
 necessary for plants provided with chlorophyll which can 
 live on the inorganic world. Colourless animals and plants, 
 like monera and bacteria, do not require it ; for they can 
 only live upon already prepared organised food. Where 
 this is to come from for his primitive beings Haeckel 
 neglects to tell us, for no such organisms can live upon 
 mineral food. 
 
 According to Haeckel, therefore, protoplasm, the only 
 known substance which can be alive, was originally 
 derived from the inorganic world ; and he does not 
 hesitate to explain from what mineral materials he 
 believes it to have been evolved. We know that it re- 
 quires carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen, oxygen and sulphur, 
 and we might add phosphorus for the nucleus. Haeckel 
 supplies us with carbonic acid, ammonia and water, but 
 here he forgets the sulphur (though he has previously 
 mentioned it), together with a hypothetical " formative 
 fluid ". What this is, of what it is composed and where 
 it occurred, we are not informed. 
 
 Haeckel then appears to combine these compounds 
 somehow ; for he calls the primitive inorganic substances 
 " nitrocarbonates ". 
 
 Surely it would be strange if carbonic acid and 
 ammonia did not form common " smelling salts " rather 
 than protoplasm ! 
 
 Searching among minerals for one containing the 
 same elements in its composition as protoplasm, we 
 seem to approach it in a comparatively rare one called 
 mascagnite, a product of volcanic action, being found at 
 Etna, Vesuvius and the Lipari Islands. It is described
 
 40 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 as a "hydrous ammonium sulphate," that is to say, it 
 contains water, ammonium and sulphur in its composi- 
 tion but not carbon. However, there is plenty of car- 
 bonic acid produced by volcanic action ; so with that 
 we have got all we practically want of the elements of 
 protoplasm. Thus we are better off than Haeckel ; but 
 the question is, How are we to get the right proportions 
 of these elements for building up protoplasm ? 
 
 Mascagnite contains in one molecule N 2 H 10 O 5 S. But 
 protoplasm requires them to be in much higher propor- 
 tions. The composition of albumen, which is a near 
 ally of protoplasm, is said to contain C 60 H 100 N 16 O 20 ; 
 while the nucleus is reported to have a still more com- 
 plicated composition. 
 
 " The result of an analysis of the plasmodium of a 
 Slime-mould (^thalium septzcum) showed 71-6 per cent, 
 water and 28'4 per cent, solid matter. The latter was 
 composed of 30 per cent, of nitrogeneous compounds : e.g., 
 plastine, vitelline, myosine, pepsine, lecithine, guanine, 
 sarcine, xanthine and ammonia carbonate; 41 per cent, 
 was composed of ternary compounds, including parachol- 
 sterine, resin and a yellow pigment, sugar (non-reductive), 
 various fatty acids and neutral fatty substances. The 
 remainder was composed of mineral substances, includ- 
 ing calcium combined with various acids, phosphates of 
 potassium and magnesium and chloride of sodium. . . . 
 This illustrates the extraordinary complexity of the proto- 
 plast, and the impossibility of obtaining more than an 
 approximation of its chemical composition." l 
 
 Protoplasm, therefore, does not seem to be quite so 
 simple a substance as Haeckel would like us to suppose ! 
 
 It may be added that " the Slime-fungi occupy quite 
 
 1 A University Text-book of Botany, by D. H. Campbell, Ph.D., 1902.
 
 ORIGIN OF LIFE 41 
 
 an isolated position in the vegetable kingdom. They 
 are, perhaps, the most nearly related to the group of 
 Rhizopods in the animal kingdom. They live in and on 
 organic remains, especially rotten wood and leaves, etc. 
 They are without chlorophyll, consisting of masses of 
 protoplasm without cell wall (blasmodid) ? l 
 
 Dr. Vines has lately investigated the physiology of 
 the yeast-plant, Saccharomyces Cerevisice ; and drew atten- 
 tion to the remarkable fact that though this plant consists 
 of but a single minute cell, it is known to produce a variety 
 of enzymes or ferments ; diastase, that converts starch 
 into sugar ; invertine, that splits cane-sugar into glucose 
 and fructose ; glucase, that converts maltose into glucose ; 
 zymase, that decomposes glucose into alcohol and carbon 
 dioxide ; as well as an undefined enzyme, protease, which 
 digests proteid matter. 
 
 There is nothing any more than with slime-fungi 
 or bacteria to enable it to live on mineral food alone ; 
 nor are any of these enzymes known in the inorganic 
 world. 
 
 Lankester (article " Protozoa ") says : " A conceivable 
 state of things is that a vast amount of albuminoids and 
 other such compounds had been brought into existence 
 by those processes which culminated in the development 
 of the first protoplasm ; and it seems, therefore, likely 
 enough that the first protoplasm fed upon these ante- 
 cedent steps in its own evolution just as animals feed on 
 organic compounds at the present day, more especially 
 as the large creeping plasmodia of some Mycetozoa feed 
 on vegetable refuse ". 
 
 It will be observed that the question of the origin of 
 life is not solved, but only pushed further back ; for 
 
 1 Systematic Botany (Warming and Potter), p. 5.
 
 42 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Lankester offers no explanation as to the origin of the 
 albuminoids. 
 
 To bring this question up to date " a new suggestion 
 as to the nature and origin of protoplasm has been made 
 by Herrara. 1 By triturating the acetate, carbonate, or 
 chloride of calcium with glacial phosphoric acid, and 
 then treating the resulting substance with salt solutions, 
 the author obtains a mass which behaves under the 
 microscope very much as does protoplasm. It shows 
 amoeboid motion, a vacuolar or granular structure, plas- 
 molyzes in certain cases when treated with plasmolyzing 
 solutions, can be stained with methyl green, has its 
 movements accelerated by sodium chloride, etc." 
 
 But, in reality, we are still no nearer to answering the 
 question : How was protoplasm^.?/ made in Nature ? In 
 all attempts at its artificial construction, Man replaces 
 Natural Directivity, and supplies the materials together, 
 which as far as we know, Nature does not ; certainly not 
 in all the compounds mentioned in this extract from the 
 Gardener's Chronicle, p. 459 (Dec. 20, 1902). 
 
 Haeckel also says that the element carbon is the 
 effective one in making protoplasm according to his 
 " carbon theory " ; but nitrogen is really the one which 
 allows of the " facility of decomposition ". 
 
 It is the presence of this element which accounts for 
 the explosiveness of gunpowder, gun-cotton, etc. It is 
 also nitrogen which facilitates rapid decomposition of 
 organic matters. If white of egg or albumen be treated 
 in the same way as to temperature, etc., with sugar, it is 
 the former (not the latter, which consists of water and 
 carbon only) which decomposes. 
 
 Neither Haeckel nor Lankester has brought us one 
 
 1 A. L. Herrara, " Le protoplasma de metaphosphate de chaux," 
 Mem. Rev. Soc., Set., " Antonio Alzate," Mexico, 17, 201-213, 1902.
 
 ORIGIN OF LIFE 43 
 
 whit nearer to the solution of the problem of the first 
 origin of protoplasm. 
 
 But besides protoplasm there is the ever-present 
 nucleus to be considered. Even if the primordial proto- 
 plasmic being contained no nucleus as the bacteria are 
 at present supposed by some to be without it 1 how did 
 it arise? Every living being, animal or plant above 
 those most degraded forms of fungi cannot be formed at 
 all without one. 
 
 The nucleus is now known to be a highly complicated 
 body, and passes through an elaborate series of evolu- 
 tions, when undergoing division for the making of new 
 cells. It is never known to arise spontaneously in 
 protoplasm, but always from pre-existing ones. Hence, 
 whenever the first protoplasm was formed, it must either 
 have had a nucleus within it, or very soon acquired one ; 
 otherwise Evolution, as we know it, could never have 
 proceeded at all. 
 
 It is in the behaviour of the nucleus that we first begin 
 to see marked directivity in the evolutions of its structure. 
 The spirem stage or chain with chromosomes divides 
 into a definite number, these arrange themselves in a 
 definite manner, in a certain place. They then undergo 
 certain changes, certain tracks are prepared like single rails 
 on a spindle, each travels along a line of the spindle, half 
 of them going one way, half the other, till the individual 
 parts of the two groups of bodies meet and fuse, forming 
 two fresh " daughter " nuclei one at one end, the other at 
 the other end or " pole ". After these daughter nuclei 
 are formed, the second act of the drama begins, and a 
 cell-plate is laid down between the two, which gradually 
 extends from one side to the other of the original cell. 
 
 1 They contain chromosomes, thought to be either the beginning of a 
 nucleus or degradations.
 
 44 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 According to observers various little difficulties are 
 surmounted by modifications in the method of laying 
 down the cell-plate ; just as an engineer will overcome 
 some local difficulty by skill and ingenuity. 
 
 " Directivity " is thus very apparent at the very be- 
 ginning of life-work. 
 
 Haeckel totally avoids touching upon the structure 
 and behaviour of the nucleus. He boldly assumes that 
 protoplasm arose by autogony, i.e., it was " self-begotten ". 
 
 Rationalists are fond of arguing that if there be a 
 God, there must be an antecedent Cause of God ; so we 
 might ask them in return, What is the cause of autogony ? 
 
 What were the first organisms supposed to be like ? 
 Haeckel boldly tells us they were " monera (for instance 
 Chromacea and Bacteria) which consist only of primitive 
 protoplasm and arose by spontaneous generation from 
 inorganic nitrocarbons ". 
 
 Unfortunately he gives us no proof, though he speaks 
 very categorically here. In the first place, he cannot 
 prove that these creatures are not degradations from 
 higher forms rather than primitive types. Knowing, 
 as we do, how degeneration has always accompanied 
 evolution, both in the animal and vegetable world, 
 and considering the millions of years we believe life to 
 have been on this world, it would seem that the pro- 
 bability is in favour of their being degenerations rather 
 than unchanged, original beings. But there is something 
 like proof that such is the case, for Haeckel has overlooked 
 the fact that these creatures cannot live on water, stones 
 and air, but must (as already observed) have organised 
 substances for their nourishment. Thus, some bacteria 
 cause diseases in trees, others, putrefactions, others, again, 
 are pathogenetic in man and animals, etc., but none of 
 them can live and thrive on purely inorganic matter.
 
 ORIGIN OF LIFE 45 
 
 Haeckel does not provide his first evolved beings with 
 anything which they can assimilate as food ; an essential 
 characteristic of all living beings. 
 
 As far as we know it is only chlorophyll-bearing 
 organisms which can decompose carbon dioxide ; and, 
 although nitrogenous compounds are in some mysterious 
 way made out of ammonia salts by the " nitrifying " 
 species of bacteria, these are not supposed to live solely 
 on inorganic matters. 
 
 Hence the first beings must have been green alga or 
 something of the sort, judging by our existing know- 
 ledge. 
 
 The group of plants known as Schizophyta, i.e., 
 plants multiplying by " fission " only (or else by spores), 
 are divided into two groups. 
 
 Schizopkyca, of the nature of algae with green chloro- 
 phyll, and Schizomycetes, colourless fungi. These may 
 be regarded, Strasburger observes, as derivative forms 
 of the former. 
 
 The Bacteria belong to this latter group. 
 
 Prof. Vines says of the Schizomycetes : " They multi- 
 ply by cell-division, the nucleus undergoing 'mitotic' 
 division in connection with this process." That is the 
 complicated process already referred to. 
 
 Strasburger says that the nuclei have not been 
 observed in many forms ; but were seen in certain species 
 examined by Hegler. 
 
 If it should be proved to be actually wanting, such 
 must be due to extreme degradation, and not a character- 
 istic of a primitive type. 
 
 The SchizophyccB, therefore, might be more probably 
 nearer to the original type. 
 
 Much has been written for and against the conception 
 of a " Vital Force " in organisms. Haeckel, of course,
 
 46 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 ridicules it ; but whatever name be proposed for it, there 
 is undoubtedly a " Directivity " in living beings of a kind 
 which is not observable in inorganic matter. It has also 
 been described as "Dominant". Each of these two 
 words expresses observable phenomena. 
 
 Thus when a new variety of a plant or animal 
 appears, it is due to alterations in the structure, so that 
 the external visible organs appear different in some 
 degree from the corresponding organs of the parent. 
 The internal anatomy may undergo parallel changes. 
 That is to say, the tissues within are different ; and as 
 these tissues are made up of cells, which again arise 
 by divisions of nuclei, we arrive at the fundamental 
 sources of the changes of form ; and the conclusion is 
 expressed by saying that the protoplasm and nucleus 
 respond to the direct action of the environment, and at 
 once build up cells and tissues so as to make the organs 
 suitable, or in harmony with, the new conditions of life 
 supplied by the environment. Here, then, we have in- 
 ternal " Directivity " constantly displayed. 
 
 The word " Dominant " might be used to represent 
 the " over-ruling " power of Life. 
 
 And here it may be added that this innate power of 
 adaptation is as perceptible in microscopic fungi, as it is 
 in trees and herbs ; for there is, for example, a parasitic 
 fungus, Erysiphe graminis, which attacks species of the 
 genus Bromus among grasses. The observer, Mr. E. S. 
 Salmon, F.L.S., remarks that specialisation has involved 
 the evolution of a considerable number of " biologic 
 forms " of the fungus, specially adapted to eight distinct 
 species of Bromus^ respectively. 
 
 Now supposing protoplasm were evolved from 
 minerals, there is much more to be accounted for and 
 explained than mere structure, such as all the enzymes
 
 ORIGIN OF LIFE 47 
 
 mentioned ; and in addition this inherent power of 
 adaptability to host plants in such as are parasitic. 
 
 Again, although chemical forces are active all over 
 the body, especially observable, perhaps, in the processes 
 of digestion and respiration, yet life is always more or 
 less dominant, for these chemical processes cannot go 
 on if life be withdrawn. As long as life is present, 
 those bacteria which cause putrefaction are powerless, 
 though they must invade all living beings by tens of 
 thousands. 
 
 Again many combinations of elements occur in living 
 bodies, forming substances which are never formed 
 naturally outside an organism. Life, therefore, is a 
 dominant power ordering as it were chemical combina- 
 tions to be made, which the unassisted inorganic forces 
 cannot accomplish. Materialistic Monists try to make 
 much of the fact that several vegetable products, as in- 
 digo, madder, etc., and the waste product urea of the 
 animal kingdom, can be made in the laboratory, and 
 they look forward with confidence to the time when 
 chemists will succeed in making albumen and then, at 
 last, protoplasm itself. When this is done, they say, all 
 the phenomena of life will appear ; since (they assert) 
 all vital phenomena are but the results of the molecular 
 composition of substances in the body. 
 
 But supposing protoplasm were made artificially, why 
 must it be instantly alive ? Protoplasm can be killed 
 readily enough. Dead protoplasm exists as well as living 
 protoplasm. 
 
 But there is a still more important fact which Ma- 
 terialistic Monists completely overlook : and that is that 
 the Chemist takes the place of the Directivity of the living 
 cell, in making vegetable products ; and if the former 
 were to make protoplasm artificially, whose place does
 
 48 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 he then take ? for such would be a very different thing 
 from protoplasm making itself de novo by autogony. 
 
 Let the chemist do for Nature a good turn in provid- 
 ing all the elements required, each being in as nearly the 
 exact proportion as is known to be in protoplasm, mix 
 them all together, then leave them to themselves, and see 
 if they will make protoplasm or even albumen. That 
 would at least be helping autogony if such exist, by 
 providing all the materials for life. 
 
 The assumption of Lankester of a quasi organic sub- 
 stance on the road to the formation of protoplasm is, of 
 course, a pure assumption to support the theory that 
 living protoplasm arose out of the inorganic world by 
 some natural process. 
 
 All I contend for is, that, at present, we are in total 
 darkness ; but people who know nothing of science are 
 only too ready to accept as truths whatever an eminent 
 man such as Lankester or Haeckel chooses to say. 
 
 Surely it is more philosophical to call oneself an 
 Agnostic where we " do not know," than to hazard base- 
 less hypotheses to be accepted by people who have no 
 knowledge to enable them to see their baselessness.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 LIFE AND ITS PHENOMENA 
 
 WE will now suppose the first living organism to have 
 appeared upon this earth somehow ; but as to the method 
 of procedure by which it came into existence, it seems 
 wiser to confess our entire ignorance than to frame im- 
 possible theories when we have no facts to go upon. 
 
 At this point Darwin enters upon the scene, as his 
 theory of the " Origin of Species by Means of Natural 
 Selection" was concerned with the evolution of animals 
 and plants since the commencement of life upon earth. 
 
 Comparing Evolution with the previous conception of 
 Creation by Design, he wrote as follows at the close of 
 his work : 
 
 "There is a grandeur in this view of life, with its 
 several powers having been originally breathed by the 
 Creator into a few forms or into one ; and that, whilst 
 this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed 
 law of gravity ; from so simple a beginning, endless 
 forms, most beautiful and most wonderful, have been 
 and are being evolved." 1 
 
 It will be here seen that Darwin believed in a Con- 
 scious, Omnipotent Creator, and evidently did not realise 
 when he wrote his books that his own theory in ex- 
 planation of Evolution would supply a basis for the 
 Atheistic Monism of to-day which ignores the existence 
 
 1 Origin of Species, 6th ed., 1878, p. 429. 
 4 (49)
 
 50 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 of a Conscious Creator altogether. His previous mental 
 training saved him at that time from the Agnosticism of 
 modern Rationalists, scientific or otherwise ; though their 
 conclusion, so far as his theory is concerned is a legiti- 
 mate one, had Darwinism any real foundation in fact. 
 
 It need hardly be added that the belief in a Creator 
 was and is held by astronomers, physicists, chemists and 
 others who are not biologists. Inductive evidence of the 
 existence of an Omnipotent Power is not confined to the 
 living world, but is based on the widest series of facts. 
 
 When, however, we tuni to Darwin's " Life," we read 
 a somewhat different story. He tells us that when 
 standing in a Brazilian forest he wrote in his diary : 
 " It is not possible to give an adequate idea of the higher 
 feelings of wonder, admiration and devotion which fill 
 and elevate the mind 'V 
 
 " But now," he continues, " the grandest scenes would 
 not cause any such convictions and feelings to rise in 
 my mind." I will not quote his description of his 
 mental atrophy for art, etc, nor more of his conversion 
 by his own theory of Natural Selection to Agnosticism. 
 It appears to me that this resulted from, as I shall show, 
 the total absence of Natural Law in Natural Selection, 
 as an element in the Origin of Species. For and I wish 
 to emphasise this fact as it is so important to bear it 
 in mind there is no relationship at all between the ac- 
 cidentally arising, favourable variations (out of imaginary 
 indefinite variations among a group of offspring) and the 
 requirements of the beings in adaptation to their new 
 conditions of life. 
 
 This is the fatal want in Darwinism ; and at once 
 stamps it with an atheistic character in the eyes of those 
 
 l Life, vol. i., p. 311.
 
 LIFE AND ITS PHENOMENA 51 
 
 who are predisposed to look upon all processes in Nature 
 as being the result of chemico-physical forces alone. 
 
 There are no facts known to occur in Nature in 
 support of Darwinism. 
 
 We can see, too, how the error of Darwinism misled 
 Romanes, who in referring to the well-known argument 
 of the watch with which Paley begins his work on 
 Natural Theology, says that he " will suppose the dis- 
 coverer of the watch to proceed to the sea-side and to 
 examine a bay. He would note the corresponding con- 
 figuration of the cliffs, the river with its suitable bed 
 entering the bay and many other details, etc. . . . Now I 
 think that our imaginary inquirer would be a dull man, 
 if he failed to conclude that the evidence of design 
 furnished by the marine bay was at least as cogent as 
 that which he had previously formed in his study of the 
 watch. . . . The teleologist would feel that he must 
 abandon the supposition of any special design in the 
 construction of that particular bay." Then in turning 
 from the phenomena of the inorganic world to those of 
 organisms, Romanes observes : " The mere fact that we 
 meet with more numerous and apparently more complete 
 instances of design in the one province than in the other 
 is, ex hypothesi, merely due to our ignorance of natural 
 causation in the more intricate province," by which he 
 means " Natural Selection ". 1 
 
 Romanes thus tries to bring the inorganic into line 
 with the organic by means of Natural Selection. But in 
 drawing a comparison between a sea-beach and a watch, 
 which is supposed to represent an organism, Romanes 
 strangely failed to see that the two things are not really 
 comparable ; for purely physical forces, provided with 
 
 1 Thoughts on Religion, pp. 57, 65.
 
 52 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 the same kind of materials to work upon, always pro- 
 duce precisely the same general results, and have done 
 so since the foundation of the world. Old sea-beaches 
 very similar to existing ones are in evidence, which were 
 probably laid down millions of years ago ; with the 
 impress of rain-drops and ripple-marks of the retreating 
 waves stamped indelibly upon them. Rivers flowed in 
 their beds to the sea then, just as they do now. So, too, 
 chemical combinations and crystallisations went on at 
 all ages, exactly as they do to-day, with as exactly the 
 same results. 
 
 But when we turn to living organisms, all is changed. 
 The great groups of animals and plants, it is true, have 
 existed in past ages ; but, nevertheless, they have changed 
 in detail again and again, through the epochs of the 
 world's history ; and it is only the very latest of the 
 earth's strata which contain organisms identically the 
 same as existing ones. 
 
 This profound difference between the results of 
 physical forces acting on inorganic bodies as distinct 
 from the effects of life, has to be accounted for. On 
 merely a priori assumptions, one would deem it probable 
 that some different or additional powers must have come 
 into play, where the results are so profoundly different. 1 
 
 Romanes thus went beyond Darwin in trying to 
 unite the physical world with the organic, as if both 
 alike depended upon Natural Selection, and as ejecting 
 " Design " from the world altogether. 
 
 If Darwin be right that all animals and plants in the 
 past, present and future are evolved from " few " or " one " 
 original being, that being might have been a simple 
 microscopic germ for all we know. Then, when we think 
 
 1 1 have here quoted from my little book entitled, The Argument of 
 Adaptation or Natural Theology Reconsidered (Williams and Norgate, is.).
 
 LIFE AND ITS PHENOMENA 53 
 
 of this, does it not excite our wonder to an astonishing 
 degree, on witnessing the practical omnipotence of proto- 
 plasm and its nucleus, and to imagine how it could have 
 acquired it ? Materialistic Monists and Rationalists, like 
 Romanes, try to bring life into the same category as all 
 physical forces ; but, as pointed out, we see a feature 
 altogether unknown in the inorganic world. All physical 
 forces act in precisely the same way now as ever before. 
 It is just because they do so that we can interpret the 
 past physical phenomena of the world by means of the 
 present. 
 
 It is not so with living beings. Evolution shows us 
 that so far as organisms go, though the same type is 
 produced by heredity, generation after generation, as 
 long as the conditions of life are constant ; yet change 
 is really the order of the day sooner or later. 
 
 Moreover, contrary to the behaviour of physical forces 
 which tend to dissipation, the commonest result being 
 heat, animals and plants have gone on getting more and 
 more complicated as the world grew older. The law 
 of adaptation has ever added new features as required, 
 though usually coupled with degeneracy whenever any 
 special structure is no longer useful. Thus have been 
 left the numerous rudimentary organs in animals and 
 plants still present, or, as in many cases, they have gone 
 altogether. 
 
 In whatever way we compare living beings with non- 
 living we see striking contrasts both in structures and 
 energies concerned with them, which have to be accounted 
 for, if it be thought that all the phenomena of life can be 
 relegated to purely physical procedures. 
 
 All the way from primitive protoplasmic beings to 
 man there is that Directivity which refuses to be ex- 
 cluded. It thrusts itself upon our notice, as I have said,
 
 54 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 even in the process of cell-division by the nucleus, in the 
 formation of suitable tissues and organic substances, and 
 also in the construction of entire organs, producing results 
 which Paley and the teleological school of old thought 
 must have been designed. 
 
 Whether created all at once by a fiat, as Milton but 
 too graphically describes it, or evolved by adaptation, 
 the result is precisely the same, forcing on every one 
 who is not blinded by the preconception of Atheism, a 
 Dominant or Directive Agent in every particle of living 
 matter. 
 
 It is sometimes desirable to supply concrete illustra- 
 tions, as many readers may not be scientific ; and so may 
 not see the significance of the above remarks. Let us 
 take, for example, an illustration of use and disuse and 
 their effects. The familiar increase of the size of the 
 muscles of the arm by exercise is a case in point. How 
 is it done ? The living protoplasm responds to the call 
 upon the activities of the muscle to meet them. It sets 
 to work and builds up fresh cells and muscular fibres, 
 and so strengthens the arm. The bones, if required to 
 do so, will as readily respond to efforts and increase in 
 size. Thus, in consequence of the great weight thrown 
 upon them they are enormous in the elephant as com- 
 pared with those of a horse or gazelle. The formation 
 of the foot corresponds with the habits of the animal 
 and nature of the ground it frequents. Thus, the so- 
 called " cloven hoof," really consists of two effective 
 toes which are spread out in animals living on soft soil, 
 while their tongue is correlated with the foot in adapta- 
 tion to the requirement of grasping long grass, as may 
 readily be observed in grazing oxen. On the other 
 hand, the horse has lost four toes from each foot and now 
 stands upon the middle toe only of the original five.
 
 LIFE AND ITS PHENOMENA 55 
 
 This is better adapted for a harder soil, while the 
 incisors can nibble short grass, as on downs ; and it does 
 not require the use of the tongue for " licking " up the 
 grass. 
 
 Huxley said somewhere that even if such Lamarckism 
 were true, it could only apply to half the living world ; 
 but he was not then aware that "use and disuse" are 
 equally applicable to the vegetable kingdom. 
 
 Thus, if weights be attached to young parts of plants, 
 as growing shoots or leaf-stalks, just insufficient to break 
 them, they soon acquire a much greater strength than 
 they would have done, had they been not so weighted. 
 Thus, e.g., the little stem of a seedling sunflower, 
 which would have broken under a weight of 160 grms., 
 bore a weight of 250 grms., after having been subjected 
 to a strain of a weight of 1 50 grms. for two days. The 
 weight was subsequently increased to 400 grms. without 
 injury. Leaf-stalks of the Christmas rose, which broke 
 with a weight of 400 grms., were able to resist one of 
 35 kils., after having been subjected to a strain for five 
 days. 1 
 
 Wood is formed more or less in most stems growing 
 in the air, to resist the strain of gravity. But in aquatic 
 plants, since the water supports the submerged parts as 
 well as air within them, the stem ceases to form wood 
 by " disuse," since it is no longer called upon to support 
 itself. 
 
 The bodies of animals and plants are thus living 
 automata. Their protoplasm spontaneously responds 
 in hundreds of ways to whatever stimulus comes from 
 without, and the response evinces itself, as if by an im- 
 material Directivity which meets the irritations, environ- 
 
 1 1 am here quoting from my book, The Origin of Plant Structures, 
 p. 204, where further illustrations will be found.
 
 56 PRESENT-DA Y RA TIONALISM 
 
 mental forces, or whatever we call them, in the most 
 admirable manner. Then if the stimulus be kept up 
 by the organism and its offspring continually living 
 under the same conditions of life, the changed organs 
 become fixed and hereditary, as is abundantly seen under 
 cultivation and domesticity. 
 
 Man has often found that he cannot do better than 
 imitate natural phenomena ; whenever he wants some 
 special contrivance as in engineering structures. If I 
 remember rightly, the iron " cells " on the top of the 
 Menai bridge were suggested by the structure of a bar- 
 nacle. Fox's iron-fluted stays of the umbrella are 
 precisely like hundreds of leaf-stalks ; in which the 
 edges are raised forming lateral flanges, thereby resisting 
 the downward tendency to snap through the weight of 
 the blade. Girders are found in some climbing stems 
 as the " monkey's ladder," buttresses are added to trunks 
 of trees, etc. 
 
 The structures of flowers possess adaptations to in- 
 sects, which furnished Darwin and others with admirable 
 illustrations of what one would have formerly said were 
 undoubtedly designed. 
 
 The Argument of Design was considered by Huxley 
 to have received its death-blow by Darwinism ; and so 
 undoubtedly it would have been slain, had Darwinism 
 been true ; but, as I have elsewhere shown, 1 it does not 
 exist at all. Nevertheless Design must give way to 
 Adaptation. 
 
 For if we accept Darwin's own alternative, namely, of 
 Definite Variations arising in response to the Direct 
 Action of the environment, we discover that if the 
 
 1 See address on Present Day Rationalism, with an Examination of 
 Darwinism, in " Christian Apologetics" (J. Murray), and in the Ap- 
 pendix, below, p. 145.
 
 LIFE AND ITS PHENOMENA 57 
 
 Argument of Design be not restored, that of Adaptation 
 under Directivity takes its place ; and Paley's argument, 
 readapted to Evolution, becomes as sound as before ; 
 and, indeed, far strengthened as being strictly in accord- 
 ance with facts. What then is the source of this Direc- 
 tivity which runs through the whole of the organic 
 world ? 
 
 Rationalists demand evidence of God, such as a 
 chemist might give for a new product, or "experimental 
 verification " ; but it is absurd to ask for it. They forget 
 that scientific truths are, as often as not, entirely based 
 on inductive evidence ; and such too is the only " proof" 
 of the existence of God from Nature. 
 
 Scientists, as Tyndall, H. Spencer, Huxley, etc., all 
 recognised a " Power " behind Nature ; and the real 
 question is Is that Power conscious or not ? 
 
 If man were not conscious himself, of course he could 
 not conceive of any other being as possessed with con- 
 sciousness. Moreover, it is impossible to think of 
 minerals being conscious, or of consciousness residing in 
 physical forces, as gravitation, or even in the vegetable 
 kingdom. 
 
 In our present state of knowledge, as we only know 
 of Life proceeding from Life, so too we can only con- 
 ceive of consciousness proceeding from some Conscious 
 Being who could impart it. 
 
 The answer to the above question, therefore, is that 
 as far as our existing knowledge will take us, the pro- 
 babilities of there being a " Conscious Power " whom we 
 call " God " are a hundred-fold greater than that every- 
 thing is due, as Haeckel says, to some " blind, unconscious 
 forces ". 
 
 We can only build on our own experience by a process 
 of analogy. We know that order can only come out of
 
 5 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 disorder in our temporal affairs by man's mind and 
 directivity. 
 
 Now, we have every reason to believe physical as- 
 tronomers who tell us that our own universe was origin- 
 ally a fiery vapour, or cosmic nebula. It has somehow 
 become arranged into a beautiful order of sun, planets 
 and satellites ; and, as far as the earth is concerned, 
 with many series of living beings terminated by Man. 
 
 Once given protoplasm we find all plants, animals 
 and man can have been evolved out of it. 
 
 If man wields limited powers as inventor and con- 
 structor to meet wants and requirements, that is, adapta- 
 tions to the needs of his environment ; he sees very 
 similar processes going on all around him in the past 
 and present. He, therefore, is justified in logically con- 
 cluding that there must be some conscious Directivity 
 akin to his own behind the infinite adaptations to needs 
 in all organic beings. 
 
 One notices that man himself never gets perfection 
 all at once. In music he began with, we will say, a tom- 
 tom, but he has now got to an orchestra. In drawing, 
 prehistoric man began by scratching the figure of a 
 mammoth on a flat bone. He now fills galleries with 
 beautiful compositions ; and so is it with the appliances 
 of forces, electricity, etc. 
 
 Just so is it with Nature. We notice that the adult 
 stages of her earliest efforts in the various groups of 
 animals represented the embryonic conditions of later 
 ones of the same kinds. 
 
 A progress from simple to compound has always 
 taken place, just as man progressed himself in his know- 
 ledge of the sciences and in the progress of the arts. 
 
 He at once recognises a Mind akin to his own in 
 such parallels in the working out the structure of pro-
 
 LIFE AND ITS PHENOMENA 59 
 
 gressive, organic beings, just as he did in working out 
 the problems of art. 
 
 In this way and illustrations may be multiplied in- 
 definitely does man gradually accumulate probabilities 
 arising from the number of evidences between the work- 
 ings of his own mind and what he sees in Nature, that 
 the power behind Nature is gradually forced upon him, 
 as a Being who is conscious as himself, and that it is God 
 who must be the source of the Directivity so apparent 
 in all beings that are alive. 
 
 On the other hand, the stronger this impression grows 
 upon him, the more incompatible does it become to 
 identify this Power with "blind forces" acting by fixed 
 laws unchangeable in their effects ; as is apparent in the 
 workings of all purely physical forces in the inorganic 
 world.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 LIFE AND ITS PHENOMENA (Continued) 
 
 LIVING beings were formerly supposed to possess a 
 " Vital Principle or Force," * as of a special kind " con- 
 ceived to exist apart from any material organisation as 
 a kind of entity. A difference between a living and a 
 dead animal was thought to be simply one of the presence 
 or absence of that entity called life." 2 
 
 Prof. Dolbear quotes the opinions of fifteen modern 
 scientific authors, who all agree in regarding the phe- 
 nomena of life as comparable or identical with the 
 physico-chemical processes well known in the mineral 
 kingdom. For example : 
 
 Haeckel says : " We can demonstrate . . . the physi- 
 cal and chemical properties of the albuminous bodies to 
 be the real cause of organic or vital phenomena ". 
 
 But since no albuminous bodies are ever formed 
 without a precedent life, how is it possible to demonstrate 
 as a cause that which depends upon the other ? 
 
 Hoffding says : " The aim of modern physiology is to 
 conceive all organic processes as physical or chemical ". 
 
 X A good account of Barthez' theory of the "Vital Principle" will 
 be found in E. T. Withington's Medical History from the Earliest Times, 
 sec. " Vitalism," p. 338. " He repeatedly protests that he does not mean 
 to explain anything by his ' vital principle,' which is simply a short way 
 of expressing his belief that life is not the result of either bodily or mental 
 action." This will equally apply to " Directivity " in plants and animals. 
 
 2 Dolbear, op. cit., p. 277. 
 
 (60)
 
 LIFE AND ITS PHENOMENA 61 
 
 It is difficult to conceive how alteration in structure- 
 building under new conditions of life can be accounted 
 for without Directivity. 
 
 B. Sanderson says : " In physiology the word Life is 
 understood to mean the chemical and physical activities 
 of the parts of which the organism consists ". 
 
 Lankester says : " Zoology, the science which seeks 
 to arrange and discuss the phenomena of animal life and 
 form [?] as the outcome of the operation of the laws of 
 physics and chemistry". 
 
 Lastly, Huxley says : " It must not be supposed that 
 the differences between living and not-living matter are 
 such as to justify the assumption that the forces at work 
 in the one are different from those to be met with in the 
 other". 
 
 All the fifteen authorities would reduce "vital phe- 
 nomena " to " chemical and physical forces ". 
 
 No one to-day can possibly deny the fact that an 
 organism cannot be kept alive, whatever that word 
 means, without food ; and that by means of chemico- 
 physical processes going on within the body it breathes 
 and digests that food, which is converted into other sub- 
 stances which build up the structures of the body till it 
 be adult and then repairs the daily waste as well as 
 supplies the whole organism with energy till it dies. 
 
 But there is one thing omitted, and that is Directivity ', 
 which is obvious in every organism and every part of it. 
 To take an illustration, Prof. Lankester inserts the word 
 " form ". He will admit that the form of a hawk is very 
 different from that of a cat ? What causes the difference ? 
 If a young kitten and a young hawk be fed on precisely 
 the same food until they are adults, it is obvious that the 
 same food has .built up two totally different "forms". 
 
 As the molecules of the food passed through several
 
 62 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 physico-chemical processes till it became flesh, bone, 
 skin, hair or feathers, etc., what kinds of physical or 
 chemical forces were they which brought about two so 
 different results as the " form " of a cat and that of a 
 hawk, one having hair and the other feathers, not to add 
 that these animals develop different habits and different 
 methods of propagation ? 
 
 From having been molecules of food such become 
 molecules in the blood, ready to be located in their proper 
 places in the animals' bodies. They then require some 
 directing to put them there ; so that every part, bone, 
 claw, feather, teeth or beak, etc., receives just what it 
 wants and no others ; as on repairing a house, stones, 
 bricks, wood, slates, etc., are placed by the builder wher- 
 ever a house may require any restorations. What purely 
 chemical or purely physical force (such as occurs in the 
 inorganic world) is capable of carrying out this selective 
 process and whence arises the very obvious Directivity ? 
 
 Now all this is greatly extended by Evolution. It is 
 not enough to explain how the same form is reproduced 
 by heredity as kittens or young hawks, but variation 
 occurs when the environment is changed. Adaptive 
 variations appear through the responsiveness of proto- 
 plasm to the direct action of the new conditions of life. 
 Here again Directivity asserts itself. The direct action 
 is upon the surface of the organism externally or in- 
 ternally as food ; but the response is deep-seated in the 
 nuclei of the merismatic cells, which divide and build up 
 tissues in adjustment to new requirements. It is the 
 nuclei which are the ultimate originators of cells ; but, 
 having made them, the cells during growth assume the 
 necessary forms to meet the new requirements. 
 
 Thus, as stated, if strains be put upon stem, petioles, 
 etc., beyond what are normally sustained by a plant,
 
 LIFE AND ITS PHENOMENA 63 
 
 more wood-fibres and other mechanical tissues are 
 developed to meet the strain ; just as bones and muscles 
 are formed wherever they may be required in animals. 
 A large series of experiments with plants has lately been 
 made by M. Ph. Eberhardt, 1 to show the adaptations in 
 the minute microscopical characters of the tissues of 
 plants subjected to drought and moisture. In every 
 case the artificially induced results were precisely the 
 same as observable in plants growing in arid and desert 
 regions on the one hand and in marshes and in water on 
 the other. In all cases the changes are just those most 
 suitable to the conditions under which the plants grow. 
 
 Can, therefore, alterations of structure in response to 
 external forces and in adaptation to them be accounted 
 for solely by means of the physico-chemical processes 
 involved in their manufacture ? There is no such Direc- 
 tivity ever observable, I repeat, in the mineral kingdom. 
 The nearest approach to it is seen in the angular 
 symmetry of crystals ; but this is constant. 
 
 Why are the molecules of living bodies being con- 
 stantly arranged differently ? No two peas in a pod are 
 precisely alike, showing a variability which becomes very 
 pronounced under cultivation. 
 
 On the other hand molecules of all inorganic sub- 
 stances assume constant forms when crystallised. A 
 crystal of salt made artificially is exactly like their 
 " casts " found in the Triassic strata. Every substance 
 that can be crystallised can be referred to its "system," 
 whether it be quartz from the silurian rocks or of any 
 later strata. 
 
 Evolution, on the other hand, shows constant change 
 in living organisms. Whence is this difference ? 
 
 1 Ann. des Set. Nat., xviii., p. 61, 1903.
 
 64 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 No one would deny that the execution of the work 
 or organism-building is carried out by means of chemico- 
 physical forces ; but there is abundant evidence of a 
 Directivity which is wanting in inorganic structures. 
 And the questions are, What is it ? Whence is it ? It is 
 perceptible, I repeat, even in cell-building. Though 
 the process of karyokinesis may go on regularly and 
 mostly in the same way, yet it has been shown that the 
 nucleus sometimes has to overcome difficulties. It is 
 not mathematically and accurately placed in the middle 
 of the cell. It is often at one side ; so that to make a 
 cell-plate across the cell, as it divides into two daughter- 
 nuclei, they can travel across laying down the cell-plate 
 between them, till they get to the other side. Or. as an 
 alternative, the " equator " of the spindle or barrel may 
 become so inordinately extended as actually to stretch 
 from one side of the cell to the other. Here, then, is 
 Directivity displayed in the very fundamental stage of 
 tissue-making, not to add the behaviour of the curved 
 V like chromosomes, which arrange themselves in an 
 orderly way, and travel up the lines, as if they thoroughly 
 understood what is expected of them to accomplish. 
 Can all this complicated process be brought under 
 chemico-physical forces of the inorganic world ? 
 
 One is inclined to wonder what these fifteen writers 
 would have to say about Directivity. May not the 
 suspicion be correct that their overlooking this special 
 peculiarity of living beings arises from Darwinism lying 
 behind their views ? Is it not this which thus causes 
 them to approximate Haeckel's and Buchner's ideas, 
 even if they do not go so far as to acknowledge them- 
 selves Atheists ? 
 
 I will now return to Prof. Dolbear. He says in 
 speaking of protoplasm : " It is entirely structureless,
 
 LIFE AND ITS PHENOMENA 65 
 
 homogeneous, and as undifferentiated as to parts, as is 
 a solution of starch or the albumen of an egg". 1 
 
 " The protoplasm organises itself into cells and tissues 
 in the same sense as atoms organise themselves into 
 molecules and molecules into crystals of various sorts 
 having different properties that depend upon the kind of 
 atoms, their number and arrangement in the molecule." 2 
 
 In an appendix he somewhat corrects this utterly 
 false statement, which, by the bye, agrees with Haeckel's, 
 who also ignores the phenomena of karyokinesis in the 
 nucleus, for on p. 369 Prof. Dolbear informs us : " Histo- 
 logists find that protoplasm consists of a kind of net- 
 work of less fluid material, the interstices being filled 
 with more fluid material . . . hence if there be so-called 
 'structureless' protoplasm, it is only apparently so, because 
 the meshes are too fine to be seen." 
 
 But this is nothing new, and it is a pity the author 
 had not made himself better acquainted with physiology 
 before he wrote the chapter on " Physical Life ". He 
 appears not to be aware of the phenomenon of "cell- 
 rotation " and other well-known peculiarities of proto- 
 plasm. 
 
 When he uses the word " organised " for inorganic 
 molecules, he is totally misusing the term. It is only in 
 living beings that " organisation " takes place. It im- 
 plies a locating of molecules as a definite means for an 
 "end". 
 
 In crystals, there is only an increase in size by super- 
 ficial accretions, with no "end" at all in view, and, of 
 course, no internal organisation. 
 
 Like Haeckel and others, Prof. Dolbear alludes to 
 the fact that chemists have succeeded in making many 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 280. 2 Op. cit., p. 281. 
 
 5
 
 66 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 substances in the laboratory, " which were not long ago 
 believed to be formed only by living things ; and there 
 is but little reason to doubt that, when [?] they shall be 
 able to form the substance protoplasm, it will possess all 
 the properties it is now known to have, including what is 
 called its life ; and one ought not to be surprised at its 
 announcement any day." 1 
 
 In another appendix he describes Prof. Quincke and 
 Biilschle's experiments with emulsions of soap, oils, 
 H 2 CO 2 etc., which show " amoeboid " motions and 
 "streaming" movements something like protoplasmic; 
 but no intelligent reader will be deceived by them as 
 being identical. For there is no nitrogen present, the 
 most important element, with carbon, of the constituents 
 of protoplasm. 
 
 He finally closes his book with the sapient remark : 
 " It is evident that in a chemically homogeneous mass 
 there can be no occasion for changes of any kind within 
 it ; and chemistry alone cannot give us any substance 
 which can give characteristic vital actions ". 
 
 One feels inclined, therefore, to ask what is the use of 
 his giving an illustration of the plume-like figures formed 
 by frost on a window pane ? under which he writes : 
 "The similarity it presents to vegetable forms is very 
 striking. . . . Such fantastic imitations of inorganic 
 things forcibly suggest vitality. They are too common 
 to be considered coincidences." 
 
 I reply there is no resemblance beyond a slight imita- 
 tion. It is a " chemically homogeneous " structure con- 
 sisting throughout of H 2 O and therefore "cannot give 
 characteristic vital actions ". We might compare it with 
 an ostrich feather, the inflorescence of the reed or a fern. 
 
 1 Op. dt. t p. 283.
 
 LIFE AND ITS PHENOMENA 67 
 
 It is as much like one as the other. To which of the 
 two organic kingdoms would Prof. Dolbear compare it ? 
 
 All modern biologists attack the question as to how 
 the processes of growth, etc., go on in the body. That 
 they grow by means of chemical processes is obvious ; 
 that the purely chemical process of oxidation of carbon 
 underlies respiration is perfectly clear. That electrical 
 phenomena are seen in the actions of muscles is well- 
 known ; that the phenomena of heat are patent to 
 every one in his own body, etc. No one now will dispute 
 all this. But it is all beside the question, What is Life ? 
 There is a something which sharply separates a mouse 
 from a lump of granite, or an organic molecule from a 
 crystal. 
 
 Why does biology form a study by itself independ- 
 ently of physical geology ? 
 
 The term " Vital Force " may be objectional or not ; 
 but some name is wanted to account for the Directivity 
 observable in every organ of every living being. 
 
 Prof. Dolbear quotes several definitions of life ; but 
 they only state what is obviously seen. Thus Bichot 
 says, " Life is the sum of the functions by which death is 
 resisted ". But the " functions " can only be carried on 
 as long as life is present, and " organs " wherewith they 
 can be done. What makes the organs? 
 
 Dreges calls life " the special activity of organised 
 beings " : but it is only organised beings which are alive 
 and exhibit activities. 
 
 H. Spencer's is " the continuous adjustment of in- 
 ternal relations to external relations ". That is true, and 
 the practical basis of Evolution ; but it is no definition of 
 Life ; only a description of what takes place as long as a 
 being is alive. 
 
 All definitions, however, show that Life is recognisable
 
 68 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 by its effects and that those effects never occur away from 
 any being which is alive. 
 
 It is easy to show that Prof. Dolbear is wrong when 
 he says : " All physiological phenomena whatever can be 
 accounted for without going beyond the bounds of 
 physical and chemical science ". l For Directivity, which 
 always co-ordinates means with ends, cannot be a purely 
 chemical or physical force ; though those " ends " be 
 brought about by chemical and physical agencies. 
 
 It is just those " ends," which Darwin called " pur- 
 poses," though he would insist upon the word being 
 metaphorically accepted, that sharply separate the organic 
 from the inorganic world. 
 
 The late James Croll published an article entitled 
 What Determines Molecular Motion ? the Fundamental 
 Problem of Nature. 
 
 I would add, What is the final cause or source of 
 Directivity in the organic world? 
 
 1 op. clt., p. 279.
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 "DIRECTIVITY" A WITNESS OF MIND, IN EVIDENCE 
 THROUGHOUT THE LIVING WORLD 
 
 As I regard Directivity as one of the most important 
 of the numerous lines of argument in proof of a conscious 
 Power behind Nature, I propose devoting a chapter to it, 
 in order to enable the reader to thoroughly grasp its 
 significance. 
 
 Of course, we learn nothing as to the nature of that 
 Power. All we can attempt to prove is its existence, by 
 the accumulation of probabilities ; which then amount 
 to a moral conviction, which, however, is equivalent to a 
 demonstration. 
 
 I would first emphasise the fact that " Life "per se must 
 be distinguished from purely physical forces. Whether 
 it will ever be proved to fall into line with the correla- 
 tion of physical forces, it is impossible to say ; but its 
 phenomena at present lead one to suspect such will not 
 be the case. 
 
 I will herein quote what the learned authors of the 
 Unseen Universe have to say upon the subject. 
 
 Starting with " the principle that life proceeds from 
 life, or to speak more accurately, that a conditioned living 
 thing proceeds only from a conditioned living thing . . . 
 if we assume the truth of this principle, it appears to 
 lead us directly to infer that life is not merely a species 
 of energy, or a phenomenon of matter. . . . Life, how- 
 
 (69)
 
 70 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 ever, can be produced from life only, and this law would 
 seem to give an indication that the solution of the mystery 
 is not to be found by considering life as merely a species 
 of energy. It is some time since we gave up the idea 
 that life could generate energy ; it now seems that we 
 must give up the idea that energy can generate life." : 
 
 Now in order to show how the various functions of the 
 body are procurable out of food which is " matter stored 
 with energy," Prof. Dolbear asks, " How is this trans- 
 formation of energy in the body effected ? " " Roughly," 
 he says, " there are five different kinds of motion to trace 
 the antecedents of, in the body of any of the higher 
 animals." (i) mechanical; (2) muscular; (3) tempera- 
 ture; (4) transpiration [osmosis ?]; (5) nervous. 
 
 As an example of (i) we will say a man walks, i.e., 
 his bones move by mechanical force. For this muscular 
 action (2) is brought into play. To do this nerve force 
 (5) is required. But what sets the nerves working? 
 The Professor does not answer that question. There are 
 two causes : either the automatic action of the brain, 
 when a man runs away from an angry bull ; the other is 
 volitional when, after careful deliberation, he chooses to 
 take one road rather than another. He is conscious of 
 the power to choose. 
 
 Prof. Dolbear refers to the senses as recipient of 
 waves, etherial for sight, aerial for hearing, but until 
 these waves reach the brain along the nerves there is 
 neither "light" nor "sound". 
 
 He says all organic phenomena are reducible to 
 physical processes. What physical process is able to 
 convert " waves " into " sensations," or into " conscious- 
 ness " of those sensations ? 
 
 1 The Unseen Universe, p. 228.
 
 "DIRECTIVITY" A WITNESS OF MIND 71 
 
 He says of nerves : " The activity of protoplasm in 
 the various cells transforms the various food stuffs into 
 the proper substances needed. 
 
 " The energy is already present ; it is only differently 
 distributed by protoplasm ; and nervous action deter- 
 mines what changes, if any, shall go on at a given place." l 
 
 He here recognises a sort of "Directivity" and places it 
 in the nerves, while protoplasm is charged with the power 
 of making assimilable molecules. 
 
 This may be true as far as the results come about. 
 But how can the same kind of protoplasm for no two 
 sorts are known 2 make a great variety of different sub- 
 stances, and what sets the nerves into action ? 
 
 There is " something " behind all these curious pro- 
 cesses which is not touched ! Nothing could better 
 display the powerlessness of the attempt to reduce all 
 vital phenomena to physics and chemistry than Prof. 
 Dolbear's description of the germination of a grain of 
 corn and the evolution of a chick from the egg. The 
 grain and the egg, he says, differ from the plantlet and 
 the chick in that the former may remain even years with- 
 out germinating, and " when growth has once really begun 
 it must keep on growing or die, arrest is impossible, 3 
 which seems to show that life is a process rather than 
 a condition, and the grain of corn is simply a combination 
 of materials where, under suitable conditions, life may 
 begin ". 4 
 
 The last three words beg the question. If life be only 
 a physical force it cannot begin. It could only appear 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 290. 
 
 'Haeckel invents terms such as " neuroplasm " for nerves. 
 
 3 Arrest in plant-growth often occurs when the temperature in spring 
 falls between 40 and 32 F. 
 
 4 Op. cit., p. 292.
 
 72 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 by its effects as transposed physical force. However, 
 no biologist will admit this supposition at all. More- 
 over, there is nothing resembling germination in the 
 inorganic world. Whence arises the profound difference 
 between them ? 
 
 Speaking of the reserve-food materials in the endos- 
 perm he says : " There are not only molecular groups of 
 many sorts, but they are segregated into families, so that 
 bodies of one constitution are all in one locality, and 
 bodies of other constitutions in other separate localities, 
 but definitely arranged so as to be available when the 
 life process begins ". l 
 
 There could hardly be a better illustration or better 
 description of Directivity than this passage ; while the 
 reader will also perceive that Prof. Dolbear shows the 
 " ends " secured by " means," all for the definite purpose 
 of nourishing the embryo when it begins to sprout. It 
 is not only the making of the starch, the oil, the nitro- 
 geneous aleurone grains, etc., which require chemical 
 processes for their manufacture, but the presence of 
 ferments or enzymes to render them assimilable, also 
 chemical products, but necessary as solvents before the 
 embryo can utilise the reserve food at all. 
 
 The mere physical and chemical processes will not 
 per se account for all this Directivity and Object. He 
 then asks : " What is the distinction between what is 
 called living and dead matter? One is able to transform 
 energy for its maintenance and the other seems to be 
 wholly inert; yet, if analysed, both may be reduced to pre- 
 cisely the same amount of elements ". 2 All this we knew 
 before ! Let us see if Huxley can enlighten us : " It must 
 not be supposed that the differences between living and 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 292. 2 Op. cit., p. 294.
 
 " DIRECTIVITY " A WITNESS OF MIND 73 
 
 not-living matter are such as to justify the assumption 
 that the forces at work in the one are different from 
 those to be met with in the other "- 1 Is that true ? An 
 obvious difference is that the forces in dead protoplasm 
 are excited by microbes which cause putrefaction. They 
 play no similar part in a living organism, though other 
 kinds of microbes can act pathologically. Again, the 
 forces of protoplasm bring about the formation of starch, 
 sugar, oil and hundreds of other substances in living 
 vegetable cells. The forces of dead protoplasm do no 
 such work, but destruction only. They may be, broadly 
 speaking, " chemical " or " physical " in both, but the 
 above statement of Huxley's requires demonstration in 
 details. Living protoplasm transforms energy from food 
 and utilises it in various ways. Whatever forces may 
 be at work in dead protoplasm nothing of the kind is 
 possible. 
 
 Prof. Dolbear commits himself still further by com- 
 paring an electrical machine with a living being. He 
 observes that all the parts are made separately and then 
 put together, yet no electricity appears ; but " if the 
 proper kind of energy is spent upon it, it at once be- 
 comes electrified, and electrical energy may now be got 
 from it in indefinite quantity, dependent wholly upon 
 the proper turning of the crank. . . . One might speak 
 of the whole machine as an organism, its wood and glass 
 and brass as its molecular composition, its function 
 depending upon each of these being in its appropriate 
 place, and nothing more. It can only exercise that 
 function when energy of the proper sort is turned into 
 it." 2 
 
 Precisely so, but what Prof. Dolbear does not see, is 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 359. *0p. cit., p. 295.
 
 74 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 that man has assumed, as Prof. Church points out, 
 the position of the Directivity in the living organism ; 
 or as we say, Life. If protoplasm once artificially made 
 could spring into life, and the electrical machine set up 
 electricity of itself, as soon as made, some analogy 
 might be drawn, but no more electricity can come out 
 of it than its equivalent to the muscular force derived 
 from the man's arm that turns the crank. 
 
 We come back to the unanswerable original question 
 What determines molecular motion which brings about 
 purposeful results in living organisms ; so that plants 
 and animals can not only reproduce themselves, but 
 evolve differently formed beings in adaptation to their 
 environments ? 
 
 There must be a something in the background which 
 causes it ; as there cannot be an "effect," viz., variation, 
 without a " cause " ; which, as far as we can see, resides 
 in protoplasm and its nucleus and nowhere else. 
 
 The above conclusions of physiologists seem to have 
 been arrived at from the belief in Darwinism. This was 
 said by Huxley to have given the death-blow to the 
 Argument of Design. 
 
 Now, if all adaptations seen in living beings arose by 
 means of Natural Selection, then it is easy to see that 
 Directivity has no place in the construction of animals 
 and plants ; consequently all the processes of growth 
 and development must be referable to physics and 
 chemistry. 
 
 Since, however, Natural Selection has no place in the 
 Origin of Species, but only in their Distribution in time 
 and space ; while all adaptations issue from the respon- 
 sive power of protoplasm to the definite action of the 
 environment, Directivity is reinstated as before ; Design 
 giving place to Adaptation.
 
 "DIRECTIVITY" A WITNESS OF MIND 75 
 
 I have alluded to an important paper by the late 
 Mr. James Croll in the Philosophical Magazine for July, 
 1872 ; and as this is not readily accessible to every one, 
 I propose making extracts from it ; as they convey 
 precisely what I could have wished said on the present 
 occasion. The title of the paper I have already given, 
 but will here repeat What Determines Molecular Motion ? 
 the Fundamental Problem of Nature (1872). 
 
 " Physical inquiry in every direction is converging 
 towards Molecular Physics, is resolving itself into ques- 
 tions regarding the dynamical action of the ultimate 
 particles of matter. 
 
 "To determine (i) the constitution of the ultimate 
 atoms and molecules of matter, what they really are, and 
 (2) the laws of their motions, are two great problems of 
 Molecular Physics. 
 
 " With regard to all physical change or motion . . . 
 there are at the very outset two fundamental questions : 
 (i) what produces the change causes motion? (2) what 
 determines or directs it? 
 
 " All agree that what produces change or causes 
 motion is Force. 
 
 "What determines or directs the motion, is not so 
 easily answered. 
 
 "In the production of all physical phenomena we 
 have two distinct elements, viz., force, and the way or 
 manner in which force acts ; in other words Force and 
 the Laws of Force ; or as Mr. Lewes expresses them 
 'the paths along which they travel to their particular 
 results '. What determines the paths along which force 
 acts? It is not what gives existence to the motion, but 
 what determines its direction, is the great question." 
 
 Mr. Croll thus arrives at the first most important dis- 
 tinction :
 
 76 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 (1) " The Production of Motion and the Determination 
 of Motion are absolutely and essentially different" 
 
 Applying this to living beings Mr. Croll rightly 
 observes : " In the production of organic forms from the 
 simplest up to the most special and complex in the 
 vegetable and animal kingdom two things require to be 
 accounted for, viz. : (i) the motion of the matter of 
 which they are composed, and (2) its disposition or 
 arrangement with reference to time and space. . . . 
 Not only must something produce the motion, but some- 
 thing must determine it also. . . . To assign a sufficient 
 cause for the one does not in the least degree satisfy the 
 mind as to the presence of the other. To account for 
 the motion of a ball does not account for why it moves, 
 say, east rather than west or in any other possible 
 direction. 
 
 " The grand and fundamental question then is, What 
 is it that determines or directs the action of the forces 
 concerned in the production of molecular change ? . . . 
 We must not only know the paths taken by the particles, 
 but must be able also to explain why the paths are 
 taken. . . What causes the molecules and particles of 
 living nature to arrange themselves into organic forms ? 
 Is it a Force ? " 
 
 These questions bring Mr. Croll to his second con- 
 clusion : 
 
 (2) The action of a Force cannot be Determined by 
 a Force nor can Motion be Determined by Motion : 
 
 " That the action of a force cannot be determined by 
 the action of a force is demonstrable thus. If the action 
 of a force is determined by an act, then this determining 
 act must itself have been determined by a preceding 
 act, and this preceding act by another, and so on in like 
 manner to infinity.
 
 "DIRECTIVITY" A WITNESS OF MIND 77 
 
 " Hence in any exhibition of force in action we have 
 to account (i) for its production, (2) for its determina- 
 tion. ... It must be evident that whatever this cause 
 may have been, it was not an exertion of force. . . . By 
 no possible means can we conceive [original ?] determina- 
 tion to be the result of an act, or exertion of force." 
 
 He proves this by supposing a number of bodies A, 
 B, C, etc., each acting in turn upon the other ; A being 
 the final recipient of the force. The direction of move- 
 ment of A in time and space is determined by that of 
 B, and so on backwards, till we come to the primary 
 director, so to say, or the original directivity, as some- 
 thing quite different from the actual force which sets the 
 series in movement with definite directions in time and 
 space. 
 
 " Motion cannot possibly take place without its being 
 in some particular direction. But this does not prove 
 that the two things are the same. It only proves that 
 they are inseparably connected. 
 
 " The mystery is not what are the forces which move 
 the particles but what is it that guides and directs the 
 action of the forces, so that they move each particle in 
 the particular manner and direction required. ... A 
 molecule may move without moving in the proper direc- 
 tion. . . . What is it that determines that the forces 
 shall act in the proper way ? Out of the infinite number 
 of different paths, what is it that directs the force to 
 select the right path ? It follows that there is something 
 else to be known than mere force before we can penetrate 
 the mystery of Nature. 
 
 " The simple truth is, in attempting to account for the 
 determination of motion by referring it to a force, we are 
 attempting an absolute impossibility. The production of 
 motion and the determination of motion are two things
 
 78 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 absolutely different in their essential nature. Force pro- 
 duces motion ; but it is as impossible that force can 
 determine motion as that two can be equal to three, or 
 that a thing can be and not be at the same time. The 
 necessity is as absolute in the one case as in the other." 
 
 In order to show that shape or form of any thing in 
 Nature could not be the sole product of a force, Mr. 
 Croll takes a crystal for illustration. He observes : " All 
 that force does is simply to move or draw the molecules 
 and hold them together in the crystalline state. The 
 crystalline form is therefore not due to the force, but to 
 that something, be it what it may, which is the cause 
 why the molecules have a [certain] shape, and why their 
 attraction is confined to the definite points on the sur- 
 faces of the molecules. 
 
 " What, then, is the cause of determination ? This 
 is the all-important question, whether as regards life- 
 theories, theism or evolution." 
 
 Mr. Croll is now led to his third proposition as 
 follows : 
 
 (3) "All the Energies and Forces of Nature are pro- 
 bably the same, and differ only in regard to their modes 
 of operation. 
 
 " This proposition follows as a consequence from the 
 principle of the Conservation of Energy. 
 
 " The only difference between chemical, electric, mag- 
 netic and heat energy is merely in the mode of operation. 
 The difference lies, therefore, not in the force or energy 
 itself, but in its determination, that is, not in the mere 
 exertion of force, but in the way or manner in which 
 force is exerted." 
 
 Mr. Croll then proceeds to consider the bearing which 
 these propositions have on theories regarding the so-called 
 " Vital Force " and the Mystery of Life.
 
 "DIRECTIVITY" A WITNESS OF MIND 79 
 
 " The various theories may be divided into two classes 
 the advocates of the one class maintaining that all the 
 phenomena of life-, all the changes which take place in 
 organic nature, are the result of purely chemical and 
 physical agencies ; while the other party maintain that 
 there must be something more than the ordinary chemical 
 and physical forces at work." 
 
 From what I have said above it will be gathered that 
 Materialistic Monists, like Haeckel and many physiolo- 
 gists of different countries, appear to repudiate everything 
 except chemical and physical forces ; taking no account 
 of this Determination which Mr. Croll insists upon, or 
 what I have called Directivity in the building up the 
 structures of animals and plants. 
 
 That life in any organisation is maintained by the 
 assimilation of food is obvious. Hence we might say 
 that " vital force " is chemical force transformed. The 
 same remark holds true of the mechanical and other 
 physical energies of the body. The energy by which the 
 arm is raised or by which the heart beats is derived from 
 the food. Animal heat is derived from chemical com- 
 bination, and so on. 
 
 " So far as all this is concerned the advocates of the 
 physical theory of life are evidently correct. But are 
 they warranted in affirming, as they do, that all the 
 energies of plants and animals are either chemical or 
 physical ? . . . Are the known forms of energy mani- 
 fested in the inorganic world sufficient to account for the 
 phenomena of life and organic nature ? 
 
 " Chemistry and physics are insufficient because they 
 do not account for the Objective Idea in Nature. 
 
 " Whatever may be one's opinions regarding the 
 doctrine of Final Causes and the evidence of Design in 
 Nature, all must admit the existence of the Objective Idea in
 
 8o PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Nature" We see everywhere not only exquisite order and 
 arrangement in the structure of plants and animals, but a 
 unity of plan pervading the whole. We see, in endless com- 
 plexity, beauty and simplicity, the most perfect adaptation 
 of means to ends. The advocates of the physical theory 
 are at least bound to show how it is probable that this 
 exquisite arrangement and unity of plan could have been 
 produced by means of chemical and physical agencies. 
 
 Mr. Croll here instances the formation of a leaf of a 
 tree, but as Prof. Dolbear referred to the reserve-food 
 material in the grain of corn, I will take that as an 
 illustration of Determination and Directivity. 
 
 The object of the grain is, of course, reproduction. 
 Having this, so to say, in view, Nature secures the im- 
 pregnation of the female germ-cell by the male sperm- 
 cell contained in a separate organ, the pollen grain. 
 
 There are two fertilising bodies in this latter, so that 
 when the origin of the new plant or embryo is thus 
 secured, the other "fertiliser" pays attention to another 
 body in the same chamber or embryo sac. This latter 
 having been, so to say, impregnated, undertakes to make 
 the reserve-food material for the embryo. Both proceed 
 to grow and develop independently of each other ; so that 
 when the grain is ripe the embryo lies freely at one end 
 of the grain with the " endosperm," as it is now called, at 
 the back of it. 
 
 The endosperm consists of a great number of chambers 
 called cells in which the food is stored up ; but how came 
 it there ? The main ingredient consists of starch grains. 
 This was made in the leaves, but being solid was changed 
 into soluble sugar, conveyed away by proper tubes, etc., 
 to the growing grain, where the sugar is re-formed into 
 starch in view of the resting period the grain goes through 
 before it germinates in the following year. Besides starch
 
 "DIRECTIVITY" A WITNESS OF MIND 81 
 
 (which contains no nitrogen) other granules are made 
 containing nitrogen and certain minerals which will be 
 required in due course. In some grains and seeds oil is 
 present instead of starch. 
 
 When the time comes for the seed to germinate, the 
 embryo can make no use of these permanent forms of 
 food until they have been changed into liquid states 
 capable of being assimilated. This is done by means of 
 ferments or enzymes, which convert the starch into sugar, 
 the " gluten " into " peptones," etc. The embryo now 
 absorbs them, and the starch ultimately goes to build up 
 the cell-walls and the nitrogenous gluten to increase the 
 quantity of living protoplasm. 
 
 The above is but a sketch : a number of other facts 
 might be mentioned, every one implying directivity or 
 determination of the paths along which molecules have 
 to travel to carry out the above and many more peculi- 
 arities of a grain of corn, all conspiring to secure the 
 most perfect adaptation of means to ends. 
 
 Generalising these observations over the structure of 
 many kinds of plants or animals, Mr. Croll says : " In 
 Nature we have a group of molecular movements corre- 
 sponding to the objective idea of each particular object 
 that is being formed. In objects of the same species the 
 groups of molecular movements have a specific resemblance 
 to one another, while in the formation of all objects of the 
 same genus there is a genuine resemblance between the 
 groups of molecular movements. In the formation of ob- 
 jects of the same family we have a still higher unity, com- 
 prehending a still greater number of groups of molecular 
 movements. We go on in like manner till we reach a 
 unity which comprehends under it all the groups of 
 molecular movements occurring in the vegetable or in 
 the animal kingdom. The unity which pervades the 
 
 6
 
 82 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 endless diversity of molecular movements must be as 
 perfect as the unity which we find to pervade the endless 
 diversity of organic forms. In fact, the two are insepar- 
 able, because the unity which exists amongst organic 
 forms is the effect of the unity which exists among 
 molecular movements. It is because these molecular 
 movements are determined according to a unity of plan 
 that their effects (viz., organic objects) have a unity of 
 form. It is the particular determinations of the move- 
 ments of the molecules that give the particular form to a 
 tree." 
 
 I will hereafter show 1 that "Darwinism," or "The 
 Origin of Species by means of Natural Selection," does 
 not exist in Nature, and that it represents no Natural Law 
 by which the accidental, favourable variations could be in 
 correlation with the requirements of the being, so as to 
 be in harmony with new surroundings. 
 
 Mr. Croll drew the same conclusion in 1872, for he 
 thus wrote : " Natural Selection never can explain the 
 objective idea in Nature unless we suppose the selection 
 to be made according to a design or plan. Mr. Darwin's 
 theory can never, from its very nature, explain the mystery 
 of the organic world. There must be a determining cause 
 in the background of all natural selection working out the 
 objective idea." 
 
 That is to say, Mr. Croll demands some Natural Law 
 governing the process by which new species arise : and 
 that we now know is expressed by saying the living proto- 
 plasm responds to the direct action of the new conditions of 
 life ; and molecular motion takes place in accordance 
 with Directivity towards adjustment. 
 
 " But there is not merely a unity of plan to be accounted 
 
 1 See Appendix, p. 145.
 
 "DIRECTIVITY" A WITNESS OF MIND 83 
 
 for, but also a unity of purpose. Things in Nature are 
 not only related to one another in form, but they stand 
 related as means to ends. And this relationship is as 
 all-pervading as that of form. There is not an object in 
 Nature that does not stand in the relationship of a means 
 to something as an end. And there exists a unity in the 
 ends as well as in the forms. All molecular motions 
 must consequently have this double relationship of plan 
 and purpose. How, then, is all this order and unity both 
 of plan and purpose in molecular motions to be accounted 
 for?" 
 
 Mr. Croll concludes his paper with the following 
 heading "'Molecular Motion in Relation to Unity of 
 Plan". 
 
 " The form assumed is due, not to the motion of the 
 molecules, but to the determination of that motion to 
 the way in which the motions are guided and adjusted in 
 relation to one another. It is not the energy which con- 
 veys the bricks that account for the form of the house, 
 but that which guides and directs the energy. So far as 
 the form of the house is concerned, it is a matter of in- 
 difference whether the bricks are conveyed on the backs 
 of labourers or transported by a steam crane. In like 
 manner, in accounting for organic forms, we must exhibit 
 not the mere energy which moves the molecules, but that 
 which directs and guides the energy." 
 
 Of the fifteen authors quoted by Prof. Dolbear, 
 Lankester is the only one who includes "form" as the 
 " outcome of the operation of the laws of physics and 
 chemistry " ; all the others omit this fundamental word, 
 upon which Evolution depends. 
 
 The question to be considered is, Can this marvellous 
 adjustment of molecular motions be explained by any- 
 thing which is found within the domains of chemistry and
 
 84 PRESENT-DA Y RA TIONALISM 
 
 physics ? The advocates of the physical theory must afford 
 us some explanation of the cause of the determination of 
 molecular motion derived from physics and chemistry, if 
 their theory in reality rests upon a true foundation. 
 
 " The chief argument in favour of this theory seems 
 to be that all the energies in Nature to which the term 
 ' vital ' can be applied evidently have a chemical or 
 physical origin. For example, the vital energies of our 
 bodies are derived from the food we eat, the water we 
 drink and the air we breathe ; they, therefore existed 
 first under the form of chemical affinities. The same is 
 the case in regard to plants ; all the energies in operation 
 in the plant are in like manner derived from the nutri- 
 ment received through its leaves and rootlets. But the 
 energy is no longer chemical or physical after it has 
 changed its mode of operation. If energies are to bear 
 names according to their mode of operation (which is the 
 practice in science), then energies differing from those 
 of chemistry and physics must have a name by which 
 they are to be distinguished. Why then, not call them 
 'vital energies'? 
 
 " The terms light, heat, electricity, magnetism, etc., 
 are different names which we apply to different modes of 
 molecular motion ; and it is true that at present little is 
 known regarding the nature of their modes of motion ; 
 but notwithstanding this we have reason to conclude that, 
 although we knew all that absolutely can be known re- 
 garding them, yet it would not afford us any explanation 
 of the cause of the determination of molecular motion in 
 organic nature. 
 
 "If one plant or animal differs from another, or the 
 parent from the child, it is because in the building-up 
 process the determinations of molecular motion were 
 different in the two cases ; and the true and fundamental
 
 "DIRECTIVITY" A WITNESS OF MIND 85 
 
 ground of the difference must be sought for in the cause 
 of the determination of molecular motion. 
 
 " Here in this region the doctrine of Natural Selection 
 and the struggle for existence can afford no more light on 
 the matter than the fortuitous concourse of atoms and the 
 atomical philosophy of the ancients." 
 
 Mr. Croll's imagery of a house recalls that of Darwin's 
 to which I shall refer, where I endeavour to show that if 
 naturally made fragments of rocks supposed to represent 
 casual, favourable variations in organisms were taken 
 with the purpose of building a "noble and commodious 
 edifice," such was impossible ; for no such house has ever 
 been built nor could be, with undressed stone. 
 
 Mr. Croll introduces another point. Supposing the 
 fragments were suitable, how are they to move from the 
 base of the cliff and find their proper places in the edifice 
 without a " director " who fits them in just where they 
 are to go? If the analogy between Darwin's noble and 
 commodious house and an organism be carried out, then 
 the bricks must be made for walls of the house, just as 
 molecules of cellulose must be made for cell-walls of 
 plants or of bone and enamel for teeth of animals. 
 
 Secondly, being made, the former have to be located 
 on the periphery of the protoplasm, and those required 
 for the teeth to be placed in those organs and nowhere 
 else. 
 
 There is first the preparation of the right chemical 
 molecules out of food to be gone through, and, secondly, 
 Directivity or Determination to locate them in the being. 
 
 A writer of an article on "The Atomic Theory of 
 Lucretius " observes : " It is a principle of mechanics that 
 a force acting at right angles to the direction in which a 
 body is moving does no work, although it may continu- 
 ally and continuously alter the direction in which the
 
 86 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 body moves. No power, no energy is required to deflect 
 a bullet from its path, provided the deflecting force acts 
 always at right angles to that path ". l 
 
 The author then applies this to man's free will : " The 
 will would add nothing sensible to nor take anything 
 sensible from the energy of the universe". 
 
 Similarly Directivity may be present everywhere in the 
 organic world, but neither exert nor neutralise any force. 
 
 1 North British Review, March, 1868.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 THE PRINCIPLE OF LEAST ACTION IN THE EVOLUTION 
 OF ORGANIC STRUCTURES 
 
 IN drawing attention to Directivity, so conspicuous 
 throughout the whole of the organic world, there is a 
 feature very observable in the structure of organs of all 
 kinds, which adds an additional value to the importance 
 of Directivity as one of the many coincident lines of 
 indubitable evidence which leads to the conclusion that 
 the Power behind Nature is not only conscious but 
 Omnipotent. It is, that in making organs for which 
 physical force has been employed, the responsive power 
 of protoplasm is seen in its forming the organ not only 
 to be admirably constructed for fulfilling its purpose but 
 in proportion to the need required. 
 
 It has not infrequently been found necessary in 
 engineering and other constructions to endeavour to dis- 
 cover methods of securing the greatest possible strength 
 with the least amount of substance and more especially 
 the least waste of force. This is called the " Principle of 
 Least Action ". 
 
 One of the most interesting discoveries in animal 
 mechanics is that the muscles and bones are invariably 
 constructed and placed on this principle, and often secure 
 ends far more effectively and perfectly than man has 
 succeeded in doing in architectural and engineering 
 works. 
 
 (87)
 
 88 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Rev. S. Haughton, D.C.L., F.R.S., a divine, mathe- 
 matician and medical man, investigated this subject, and 
 he found " that in every arrangement of bones, muscles, 
 joints and parts of animals the motion must be such as 
 it would be on the hypothesis that the muscle were a 
 living intelligent thing, trying to save itself trouble. 
 We can calculate with a certainty as perfect as we can 
 calculate the path of a planet the positions of bones and 
 sockets as we find them in Nature ".* 
 
 The law is familiar to every one on a little reflection. 
 Thus no one, not even a dog, would go round two sides 
 of a triangular field to get to another corner. Though 
 Euclid took the trouble to prove that any two sides of 
 a triangle are together longer than the third yet it is 
 practically axiomatic. With all people there exists the 
 universal habit of abbreviating words. We say, for 
 example, " won't " and " can't " for " will not " and " can- 
 not," and many other instances will occur to the reader. 
 
 The bee supplies a good instance in making its honey- 
 comb. The cells are constructed on strictly mathematical 
 principles. It has been ascertained by mathematical 
 calculations that no other form of cells in combination 
 could give the maximum capacity with the minimum of 
 material ; yet the bee is quite unconscious of the fact. 
 All that it does is to build cells on opposite sides of 
 a sheet of wax, only taking care that each cell stands 
 over the space between three cells on the other side. 
 The cells being then erected on both sides result in the 
 usual hexagonal form. 
 
 Similarly with regard to muscles, Dr. Haughton ob- 
 serves, "Nature aims at producing a given quantity of 
 
 1 The Principle of Least Action in Nature, illustrated by Animal 
 Mechanics ; being three lectures delivered at the Royal Institution of Great 
 Britain, 1871.
 
 PRINCIPLE OF LEAST ACTION 89 
 
 work with the least quantity of material, and their forms 
 are precisely those which the principle of least action 
 takes in muscular mechanics". 
 
 The first thing to do in investigating this subject was 
 to obtain the " coefficient " of muscular force, which 
 represents the number of Ibs. weight necessary to break 
 the muscle across, as if it were a rope. Dr. Haughton, 
 by an elaborate series of experiments, found that " 947 
 Ibs. per square inch is the weight that the arms of a 
 young man accustomed to athletic exercises are capable 
 of lifting. no'4is the corresponding coefficient for the 
 muscles of the legs of a similar class, and 107 for the 
 muscles covering the abdomen." 
 
 In concluding his first of three lectures Dr. Haughton 
 observes : " I have shown you that a planet moves in its 
 orbit as a lazy intelligent creature would, who was anxious 
 to perform an allotted task with the least trouble to itself ; 
 that the bee constructs its wonderful cell so as to produce 
 a given amount of storage for its honey with the least pos- 
 sible amount of trouble to itself. Similarly, I will show 
 you how the tendons of the legs and arms of animals are 
 constructed with a wonderful economy of the same kind 
 as that with which the bee constructs its cell. ... Is it 
 by the intelligence of the planet that it moves in its orbit ? 
 Who has weighed out and regulated the weight of the 
 tendons of our arms and hands ? By what force or by 
 what intelligence do the limbs of animals describe their 
 proper paths ? Who places the socket of each joint in 
 the exact position (which can be calculated with un- 
 erring certainty by mathematics) which enables the 
 muscle to perform its allotted task with the least amount 
 of trouble to itself?" 
 
 The answer which the Doctrine of Evolution by self- 
 adaptation gives is, that protoplasm at once responds to
 
 go PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 exercise. The effort made by the creature is at once 
 answered by that response, and whatever be the object 
 the creature wants, protoplasm automatically, instantly 
 sets to work to construct the muscle necessary and suffici- 
 ently strong and applicable for the purpose. The re- 
 sponse is always approximately proportionate to the 
 effort, so that no great excess of structure is made and 
 the principle of least action is acted upon. 
 
 But Directivity is here most plainly discernible in the 
 results ; which Paley selected as proving, from his point of 
 view, that they were " designed ". We shift the point of 
 sight and say they were evolved. 
 
 In his second lecture Dr. Haughton selected the 
 muscles and tendons of the feet of monkeys of the old 
 and new worlds, calling attention to a difference between 
 them correlated with their habits. Two tendons pass 
 into the palm and then branch into five for the digits. 
 In both classes the two main tendons are joined at the 
 base of the thumb (or No. i digit) and in both a tendon 
 crosses the palm from No. I into No. 5 ; the difference 
 lies in the fact that in the old world monkeys the tendon, 
 No. 2, coheres with the tendon in the thumb ; whereas it 
 is free from it in the foot of the new world monkeys. 
 
 " In the South American monkeys, best known by 
 those beautiful little capuchins, the natural action is to 
 place the first and fifth together or the first, second, third 
 and fourth. The monkey of Africa prefers to grasp with 
 the first, second and fifth toes." 
 
 Dr. Haughton then proceeds to classify muscles as : 
 "(i) prismatic, in which the muscular fibres run parallel 
 from bone to bone ; (2) penniform, where the fibres 
 radiate at equal angles from a common tendinous line 
 and are inserted, of course, at each extremity into the 
 bone ; (3) triangular, where the muscular fibres proceed
 
 PRINCIPLE OF LEAST ACTION 91 
 
 from a fixed line and converge to a very short one, 
 practically a point ; (4) quadrilateral is the same as the 
 triangular, but in which the short line is longer, so that 
 the whole makes a four-sided figure ; (5) sphincter and 
 ellipsoidal, which surround a circular or elliptical space". 
 
 The quadrilateral muscle is peculiar in that if the 
 bones be not in the same plane the fibres instead of 
 being parallel now take up the position forming a " skew 
 surface" precisely on the same principle as of a skew 
 bridge. Dr. Haughton observes : " I have succeeded in 
 discovering that the particular skew surface, of which 
 muscles are capable of assuming the shape, is the 
 beautiful surface known to geometers by the name of 
 the hyperboloid of one sheet. 
 
 " This is not a mere fiction of geometers. The adductor 
 magnus muscle in the leg of man, and the great pectoral 
 muscle in the wing of every bird, are living examples of 
 the reality of this curious fact, that Nature constructs 
 not merely plane muscular structures but that she is 
 capable of constructing muscular surfaces belonging to 
 the most beautiful and elegant forms that have been 
 studied and invented by abstract geometers. 
 
 " The prismatic muscle and the penniform muscle 
 possess the remarkable property, which can be demon- 
 strated mathematically, that in their contraction no loss 
 whatever takes place . . . whereas in the triangular, 
 quadrilateral and skew muscles we can demonstrate that 
 in the use of every such muscle there is a necessary loss 
 of force ; but these are only used under great necessity. 
 
 " The most wonderful triangular muscle in the world 
 is the biceps femoris or the flexor of the thigh of a tiger. 
 In the leg of a man it is like a rope of parallel fibres, 
 but a tiger's habit is to leap from the jungle at its prey. 
 The weight of muscle to give the tiger the spring is
 
 92 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 enormous, and if it took the form of a rope would 
 greatly impede it. 
 
 " The most remarkable example of the penniform 
 muscle in Nature is the muscle which lifts the wing of 
 the bird. The bird's wing is depressed by great and 
 powerful muscles but it is lifted by a small compact 
 muscle. . . . The nature of a bird's flight is this : The 
 depressor muscles of the wing must be made enormously 
 great, to strike the air with the utmost force ; the muscles 
 which lift the wing must be made as light and small as 
 possible. Therefore we find that Nature always employs 
 the penniform muscle to lift a bird's wing. Thus no 
 force is lost and the bird is enabled to repeat the down- 
 ward stroke much faster than if the prismatic form of 
 muscle had been retained." 
 
 Dr. Haughton concludes his lectures by describing 
 an " ellipsoid muscle that surrounds a cavity" a muscu- 
 lar bag. "In attempting the solution of the problem of 
 an ellipsoid muscle, I found myself brought into contact 
 with a problem in architecture which has baffled archi- 
 tects for many years. I mean the problem of the 
 equilibrium of an elliptical dome. Every portion of 
 a curved ellipsoidal muscle forms a portion of a small 
 flat dome ; and to determine the equilibrium of tensions 
 and strains among the muscular fibres of such an animal 
 structure, is the same thing as solving the problem in 
 architecture of what are the strains in various directions 
 in an elliptical dome. The difficulty of constructing 
 equilibrated domes may be illustrated by the fact that, 
 with the exception of the Pantheon in Paris, there is not 
 a truly equilibrated dome in existence. The dome of St. 
 Paul's is braced up with double chains of iron, and other 
 chains of timber and lead put on to cover the defects in 
 the original structure of the dome. No case exists, I
 
 PRINCIPLE OF LEAST ACTION 93 
 
 believe, of a self-supporting perfectly equilibrated spherical 
 dome but that of the Pantheon at Paris. 1 A perfect 
 ellipsoidal muscle is found in placental animals for 
 expulsion of the young in which there is a perfect 
 adaptation of force to resistance." 
 
 Dr. Haughton's three lectures on " Least Action " 
 would have furnished Paley with admirable materials ; 
 but the question is : How can chemico-physical forces 
 alone be made responsible for the Principle of Least 
 Action ? 
 
 It is paralleled in the vegetable kingdom. Every 
 tree puts on wood sufficient to support its own weight. 
 Lianes or woody climbers of tropical countries make 
 " cables " and " girders " to resist such strains as they 
 are subjected to ; while experiments of weighting stems, 
 leaf-stalks, etc., show that such strains as are produced, 
 instantly call out the responsive powers of the plants to 
 meet them. If a bough be bent and tied back in that 
 position, it will be found after a few years to be perma- 
 nently fixed, the strain having been met and completely 
 overcome. 
 
 From a simple experiment of tying a weight on to a 
 leaf-stalk to the formation of the skew, or ellipsoidal 
 muscle, the structures produced under strains, etc., are 
 all traceable to the responsive power of protoplasm to- 
 gether with its nucleus. 
 
 But there is Directivity throughout, as seen by the 
 Objective Results, in the development of the tissues of the 
 skew or muscle, out of molecules of matter derived from 
 food. 
 
 1 This was written in 1871. I am under the impression that the 
 large dome of the church at Musta in Malta, entirely built of stone, is 
 self-supporting.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 THE ABANDONED ARGUMENT OF DESIGN 
 
 WITH regard to this subject, the doctrine of Evolution 
 has quite altered our perspective. Nevertheless, Paley's 
 well-known argument of the watch only requires readjust- 
 ment to be as sound as ever. 
 
 Huxley said that the argument had received its death- 
 blow, on the appearance of Darwin's Origin of Species by 
 Means of Natural Selection. Possibly such might have 
 been the case, if Natural Selection had anything to do with 
 the Origin of Species. 
 
 A remarkable anticipation of Darwinism even in the 
 use of the word " indefinite " occurs in Paley's Natural 
 Theology (chap. v.). . 
 
 " The division of organised substances into animals and 
 vegetables, and the distribution and subdistribution of 
 each into genera and species, which distribution is not an 
 arbitrary act of the mind, but founded in the order which 
 prevails in external nature, appear to me to contradict 
 the supposition of the present world being the remains of 
 an indefinite variety of existence [here Darwin would say 
 'the survival of the fittest from "indefinite varieties,'"]; 
 of a variety which rejects all plan. The hypothesis 
 teaches that every possible variety of being hath, at one 
 time or another, found its way into existence (by what 
 cause or in what manner is not said), and that those which 
 were badly formed [Darwin's ' injurious variations '] 
 
 (94)
 
 ARGUMENT OF DESIGN 95 
 
 perished, but how or why those which survived [Darwin's 
 ' survival of the fittest '] should be cast, as we see that 
 plants and animals are cast, into regular classes, the 
 hypothesis does not explain, or rather the hypothesis is 
 inconsistent with this phenomenon." l 
 
 In another passage (chap, xvi.) he brings forward a 
 well-known objection to Darwinism. In speaking of the 
 elephant's trunk, he says : " The short unbending neck of 
 the elephant is compensated by the length and flexibility of 
 his proboscis. ... If it be suggested that this proboscis 
 may have been produced in a long course of generations, 
 by the constant endeavour of the elephant to thrust out 
 its nose (which is the general hypothesis by which it has 
 lately been attempted to account for the forms of animated 
 nature) I would ask, How was the animal to subsist in the 
 meantime during the process until this prolongation of its 
 nose were completed? What was to become of the 
 individual whilst the species was perfecting?" 
 
 This is a reasonable and, indeed, often suggested 
 question for Darwinism ; as there is no relationship be- 
 tween the accidental, favourable variation, which may 
 appear in one year, without any guarantee of its being 
 improved upon, even if it reappear in the next or any future 
 year; but with " definite " variations, the case is different, 
 the continued change in one direction, not of one, but of all 
 the individuals, year after year or generation after genera- 
 tion, is secured, provided the same inciting conditions of 
 life be constant. 
 
 Besides the presence of the " Object," as Croll says, 
 or Purpose in organic structures, there is their arrange- 
 ment and order to enable them to execute their functions 
 together for the well-being of the organism. Paley sup- 
 
 1 The italics in'this passage arc mine.
 
 g6 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 poses some opponent it might be a Monist of to-day 
 to argue that "there existed in things a principle of order, 
 which had disposed the parts of the watch into their 
 present form and situation ; " but as Paley observes, it is 
 inconceivable for a man at least to conceive of a principle 
 of order " distinct from the intelligence of the watch- 
 maker ". Darwinism, however, does not even admit such 
 an hypothesis of a " principle of order". The mechanism 
 of an animal, far more profoundly complex than a watch, 
 is supposed to have been evolved by "chance improve- 
 ments " occurring over immensely long periods ; but the 
 more the minutia of living beings are studied, the more 
 inconceivable is it that such a process could be effective. 
 As an example, I will here quote Paley's observations on 
 the structure of the eye and leave it to the reader's judg- 
 ment to decide which is the more probable hypothesis, 
 that all the adjustments have been developed together, 
 in response to the external stimulus, that being, in the 
 case of the eye, simply, light, to which the protoplasm 
 responds, and builds up the necessary tissues under that 
 mysterious Directivity already spoken of or, as accord- 
 ing to Darwin, each of the details appeared as a chance 
 favourable variety, to wait for improvement till another 
 chance favourable variety should appear, and so on and 
 so on till that most elaborate structure in its entirety 
 might be perfected. 
 
 Paley thus begins chapter vi. on "The Argument 
 Cumulative " : " Were there no example in the world, of 
 contrivance, except that of the eye, it would be alone 
 sufficient to support the conclusion which we draw from 
 it, as to the necessity of an intelligent Creator. It could 
 never be got rid of, because it could not be accounted for 
 by any other supposition, which did not contradict all the 
 principles we possess of knowledge ; the principles ac-
 
 ARGUMENT OF DESIGN 97 
 
 Cording to which things do, as often as they can be 
 'brought to the test of experience, turn out to be true or 
 * false. Its coats and humours, constructed, as the lenses 
 *<of a telescope are constructed, for the refraction of rays 
 of light to a point, which forms the proper action of the 
 organ ; the provision in its muscular tendons for turning 
 its pupil to the object, similar to that which is given to 
 the telescope by screws, and upon which power of direc- 
 tion in the eye the exercise of its office as an optical 
 instrument depends ; the farther provision for its defence, 
 for its constant lubricity and moisture, which we see in 
 its socket and its lids, in its gland for the secretion of the 
 matter of tears, its outlet or communication with the nose 
 tfor carrying off the liquid after the eye is washed with 
 iit ; these provisions compose altogether an apparatus, a 
 system of parts, a preparation of means, so manifest in 
 their design, so exquisite in their contrivance, so success- 
 ful in their use, as, in my opinion, to bear down all doubt 
 that can be raised upon the subject." 
 
 Had Paley lived now he could have added a great 
 deal more. He would probably have compared the eye 
 with a photographic camera, for it is a dark chamber 
 with the lens in front and a sensitive plate at the back : 
 upon which the external image is focussed as a minute 
 picture in a similarly inverted position. From this plate 
 (the retina) the optic nerve carries the vibrations to the 
 brain, where the picture is reversed, and the sense of 
 vision beholds, not the tiny image at the back of the 
 eye, but its source outside, as a house, in its proper 
 dimensions. 
 
 Can all this and much more be acquired by chance 
 variations, the few which are favourable occurring from 
 time to time ? Indeed, there is no guarantee that they 
 will occur at all in the succeeding generations ; when 
 
 7
 
 g8 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 perhaps, according to Darwin, injurious ones might come 
 in, and the being perish ; so that the beginning of im- 
 provements would be lost for ever. 
 
 Paley sums up the " cumulative argument " thus : 
 " The proof is not a conclusion which lies at the end of 
 a chain of reasoning, of which chain each instance of 
 contrivance is only a link, and of which, if one link fail, 
 the whole fails ; but it is an argument separately supplied 
 by every separate example. An error in stating an 
 example affects only that example. The argument is 
 cumulative in the fullest sense of that term. The eye 
 proves it without the ear ; the ear without the eye. The 
 proof in each example is complete ; for when the design 
 of the part, and the conduciveness of its structure to that 
 design is shown, the mind may set itself at rest ; no 
 future consideration can detract anything from the force 
 of the example." 
 
 This passage is, of course, equally applicable to the 
 evolutionary origin of the eye and ear by protoplasmic 
 adaptations instead of being designed. 
 
 Darwin in spite of the logical conclusion to which 
 Natural Selection might have brought him, as it did 
 Haeckel and Biichner could not refrain from exclaiming, 
 in comparing Evolution with Creation by fiat : " There 
 is a grandeur in this view of Life, with its several powers 
 having been originally breathed by the Creator into a 
 few forms or into one ; and that . . . from so simple 
 a beginning, endless forms most beautiful and most 
 wonderful have been and are being evolved." 1 
 
 Through all the illustrations which Paley gives, there 
 is in the background that Directivity or Determination 
 towards an object, which we have seen to be so obvious 
 
 1 Origin of Species, 6th ed., 1878, p. 429.
 
 ARGUMENT OF DESIGN 99 
 
 in the muscles as described by Dr. Haughton, and em- 
 phasised by Mr. James Croll. 
 
 Natural Selection in sweeping away Design was'sup- 
 posed to have swept away Determination with it ; so that 
 all animals and plants, including, of course, all their 
 internal anatomical structures, were supposed to have 
 arisen by the chance appearance of favourable variations, 
 accumulated through generations. 
 
 As, however, Natural Selection, so far as it was supposed 
 to be concerned with the Origin of Species, has not a 
 shadow of a foundation in Nature, the Law of Direct Ad- 
 aptation to the conditions of life is substituted ; and all 
 these wonderful structures which Paley thought to have 
 been designed, are now regarded as having arisen by 
 Evolution instead ; but there is everywhere present the 
 evidence of Determination or Directivity as patent as ever. 
 
 The human eye was undoubtedly evolved from a 
 pigment spot on the skin of some far distant creature at 
 the beginning of the series which led up to that of the 
 mammalia, which was sensitive to light ; such perhaps as 
 is found at the ends of the rays of a starfish ; so that 
 while there is hardly anything in these to be called 
 structure, in the human eye we attain to all the elements 
 of a self-acting photographic camera ! 
 
 Paley observes that if a man discovered the use of a 
 watch picked up on a heath, not knowing what it was, 
 it would raise his admiration still more if he found that 
 the watch could reproduce itself by young ones, as a living 
 organism does. 
 
 We may add here, that if he found that, by placing 
 young watches in various localities some would eventually 
 become "time-pieces," "eight-day clocks," "alarums," 
 "chronometers," etc., his admiration of the power of the 
 original watchmaker would be still more enhanced.
 
 too PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Now this is precisely what Evolution represents. 
 
 There may yet be added another feature. If a watch 
 gets out of order it has to be taken to a watchmaker to 
 be repaired ; but organisms have self-reparative powers, 
 so that a wound will heal up without external assistance. 
 
 However clever a human watchmaker may be, Nature 
 is incomparably the better of the two ; even though not 
 a single structure in the world may be regarded as ideally 
 perfect. 
 
 Darwin gives us his ideas of how he conceived a human 
 eye was evolved from a pigment spot by means of Natural 
 Selection, first observing : " I have felt the difficulty too 
 keenly to be surprised at others hesitating to extend the 
 principle of Natural Selection to so startling a length ". 
 
 " If we must compare the eye to an optical instrument, 
 we ought in imagination to take a thick layer of trans- 
 parent tissue [itself as well as the following having arisen 
 through Natural Selection] with spaces filled with fluid, 
 and with a nerve sensitive to light, beneath, and then 
 suppose every part of this layer to be continually changing 
 slowly into density, so as to separate into layers of dif- 
 ferent densities and thicknesses, placed at different distances 
 from each other, and with surfaces of each layer changing 
 inform. [We may ask where are all these things to be 
 got, and why do they arise in Nature ?] Further we must 
 suppose that there is a power, represented by Natural 
 Selection or the survival of the fittest, always intently 
 watching each slight alteration in the transparent layers ; 
 and carefully preserving each which, under varied cir- 
 cumstances in any way or in any degree, tends to produce a 
 distincter image. We must suppose each new state of the 
 instrument to be multiplied by the million [this is impos- 
 sible unless this sequence has occurred in a multitude of 
 individuals instead of one only] ; each to fee preserved
 
 ARGUMENT OF DESIGN lot 
 
 until a better one is produced, and then the old ones to be 
 all destroyed. In living bodies, variation will cause the 
 slight alterations, generation will multiply them almost 
 infinitely [why so, if they only appear in a few favoured 
 offspring ?], and Natural Selection will pick out with un- 
 erring skill each improvement. Let this process go on 
 for millions of years ; and during each year on millions of 
 individuals of many kinds ; and may we not believe 
 that a living optical instrument might thus be formed 
 as superior to one of glass as the works of the Creator 
 are to those of man ? " : 
 
 It did not seem to occur to Darwin, that if the eye 
 is a work of the Creator, as the reader infers such to be 
 Darwin's belief from the last sentence, why should He 
 proceed in this roundabout process of making innumer- 
 able variations in which some twenty suppositions are 
 included, and so necessitating a " power " to pick out the 
 best ones. Why cannot the Creator make only the best 
 quality at once ? Why not let all the individuals enjoy 
 the best variations, instead of a few only, without ruth- 
 lessly destroying millions of living beings unblessed with 
 favourable variations ? 2 
 
 1 Origin of Species, p. 146. I have indicated by italics seventeen 
 suppositions. The above paragraph is reproduced from my address in 
 Christian Apologetics (J. Murray). 
 
 2 When I first read the Origin of Species, etc., in 1860, I had 
 misgivings long before I came to this passage ; but this hypothetical 
 argument was sufficient to clinch the matter in my mind. I have never 
 accepted Darwinism at all. I was fortunate in gaining one of the two 
 " Actonian Prizes," for an essay on the subject " The Theory of Evolu- 
 tion of Living Things," offered by the Royal Institution in 1872. I chose 
 Palaeontology as the subject for illustrating Evolution ; but never referred 
 to Natural Selection at all as an instrument in the process. 
 
 The other successful essayist was Mr. B. T. Lowne (as there were 
 two prizes of a hundred guineas each given in that year). The authorities 
 showed their impartiality, for his essay was based entirely on Darwinism.
 
 102 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 In describing anatomical structures illustrating Di- 
 rectivity (I will not now say Design) Paley notices cases 
 where mechanical principles are brought into play ; thus 
 there is a pulley in the muscles of the eye, levers in the 
 feet and arms, etc. 
 
 We have seen how a skew bridge is imitated in a 
 bird's wing and a man's leg, and the thigh bone has, 
 internally, the structure of an arch. 
 
 In the vegetable kingdom we find the principle of 
 springs to be frequent in flowers and mechanical traps 
 in insectivorous plants, as the Venus' fly-trap, which 
 resembles a rat-trap ; while a lever is seen in the stamens 
 of Salvias. 
 
 Where engineers and architects construct machines or 
 erect buildings, arches, bridges, etc., they do so on precisely 
 similar principles. They do but imitate, consciously or 
 unconsciously, what Nature has done before them. 
 
 Man, therefore, is much more a revealer than an 
 original inventor; for his inventions are all based on 
 principles discovered to exist in Nature's works. In- 
 deed, the primary meaning of "Invention" is "Dis- 
 covery," ! and is a better description of man's work than 
 the ordinary meaning. 
 
 If a man "invents" the telescope, it is because he 
 has " discovered " the action of lenses in combination. 
 Similarly he may invent mathematical formulae, using 
 letters of alphabets, but they only represent illustrations 
 of the natural laws of Numbers, of Geometry, etc. They 
 were all there from the beginning, but no creature before 
 man arrived could reveal them. 
 
 When we turn to Astronomy we find the forms and 
 motions of the heavenly bodies to be strictly bound by 
 
 1 For example, " The Invention of the Cross " signified its discovery.
 
 ARGUMENT OF DESIGN 103 
 
 mathematical laws capable of being expressed in technical 
 terms. The question then arises : What was the primary 
 origin of " Natural " Mathematics and Geometry ; of the 
 natural laws of Physics and Chemistry? Are they all 
 self-existent and self-caused? 
 
 What is the difference between the amount of pro- 
 babilities of the pre-existence of an Intelligent Power, 
 and those of blind forces producing those laws of com- 
 binations of numbers in mathematics ; or of vibrations of 
 Sound-producing Air and of Light-producing Ether or of 
 Light itself in producing colours only appreciable by an 
 eye? 
 
 In chapter viii. Paley describes the mechanical action 
 of the human bones and alludes to that of the elbow. He 
 says : " In the fore-arm, for the perfect use of the limb, 
 two motions are wanted ; a motion at the elbow backward 
 and forward which is called a reciprocal motion, and a 
 rotatory motion, by which the palm of the hand, as occasion 
 requires, may be turned upward. How is this managed ? 
 The fore-arm consists of two bones, lying alongside each 
 other, but touching only towards the ends. One, and 
 only one, of these bones is joined to the cubit, or upper 
 part of the arm, at the elbow ; the other alone to the 
 hand at the wrist The first, by means at the elbow of 
 a hinge-joint (which allows only of motion in the same 
 plane) swings backward and forward, carrying along 
 with it the other bone, and the whole fore-arm. In the 
 meantime, as often as there is occasion to turn the palm 
 upward, that other bone to which the hand is attached 
 rolls upon the fiist, by the help of a groove or hollow near 
 each end of one bone, to which is fitted a corresponding 
 prominence in the other. If both bones had been joined 
 to the cubit or upper arm at the elbow, or both to the 
 hand at the wrist, the thing could not have been done.
 
 " 104 PRESENT-DA Y RA'fidfaiSR :A 
 
 The first was at liberty at' ob&tSnd, and the second a"t 
 the other; by which mean<^the two actions may be 
 performed together. The great bone which carries the 
 fore-arm may be swinging upon its hinge at the elbow, 
 at the very time that the lesser bone, which carries the 
 hand, may be turning round it in the grooves." 
 
 According to Paley all this would be supposed to have 
 ' been designed by the Creator antecedently to the creation 
 of man and in anticipation of his future requirements. 
 Evolution reverses this conception, in that no structure, 
 however much it may be exquisitely adapted to its use, 
 is ever originally begun in anticipation of its use. The 
 effort to effect some purpose calls out the responsive 
 power of protoplasm and the organ is then and there 
 originated. Then, by the effort being constantly renewed, 
 the organ is developed upon the "principle of least 
 action " ; that is to say, it somewhat exceeds rather than 
 just exactly meets the requirement ; since the use of any 
 organic structure is never absolutely the same on two 
 occasions, or the number of pounds weight represented 
 is not mathematically always the same to an ounce ; so 
 Nature takes care to supply rather more than is usually 
 required. 
 
 A remarkable instance of a relatively quick response 
 to use occurred to a patient at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, 
 London, a few years ago. A railway guard had his elbow 
 crushed. The bones at the joint were excised and he 
 subsequently returned to resume his former occupation. 
 This often necessitated his reaching his compartment 
 after the train had started. To do this he had to walk 
 along the footboard and swing himself, so to say, by 
 means of the rail on the carriage. This required a con- 
 stantly repeated bending at the elbow. Nature at once 
 responded to the action, and supplied him with a per-
 
 ARGUMENT OF DESIGN 105 
 
 Tectly efficient and flexible elbow, though pfoWbly not 
 at all like the bony structure that had been excised. 
 
 This case reminds one of the fact, a very common 
 feature in Nature, that the same result can be produced 
 by very different means. Thus flight is secured in very 
 different parts of the fore-limb in the extinct Pterodactyle, 
 the existing bat and the bird. 
 
 Similarly, in plants the tendril of a pea closely re- 
 sembles that of the vine ; but while the former is a 
 metamorphosed leaf the latter is homologous with a 
 flowering branch. In saying that Evolution never antici- 
 pates the use of a structure, I repeat, this only applies to 
 its origin. Once formed, heredity tends to preserve it, 
 and continual use to improve it ; we thus obtain organs in 
 every animal and plant now, which are built up during 
 the development in anticipation of their use later on as 
 the eye in the foetus in total darkness because the 
 Evolution of any individual being re-capitulates the de- 
 velopment of the race. 
 
 Hence Paley's fourteenth chapter on " Prospective 
 Contrivances," in which he alludes to the eye, must be 
 read in the light of Evolution to understand the real 
 significance of prospective structures. 
 
 Paley has an interesting chapter (xv.) on " Rela- 
 tions ". By these he means what are now called " Cor- 
 relations ". Thus he says : " The aptness of the jaws 
 and teeth to prepare the food for the stomach is, at least, 
 as manifest as that of the cider-mill to crush the apples 
 for the press. The concoction of the food in the stomach 
 is as necessary for its future use, as the fermentation of 
 the stum in the vat is to the perfection of the liquor, etc." 
 
 " Spallanzani has remarked a circumstantial resem- 
 blance between the stomachs of gallinaceous fowls and 
 the structure of corn-mills. Whilst the two sides of the
 
 io6 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 gizzard perform the office of the mill-stones, the craw or 
 crop supplies the place of the hopper. 
 
 "Nor does the gizzard belong to birds as such. A 
 gizzard is not found in birds of prey. Ttieir food re- 
 quires not to be ground down in a mill. The comparatory 
 contrivance goes no farther than the necessity." 
 
 In other words, it is an illustration of the Principle of 
 Least Action. 
 
 Degeneration, so commonly occurring in organs of 
 animals and plants, was a great stumbling block as long 
 as every kind of structure was supposed to be created as 
 it now is and " very good ". 
 
 Of course the interpretation by degeneracy under 
 Evolution is perfectly sufficient. It is one of the several 
 lines of evidence which together prove inductively that 
 man is descended from the animal world.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 PSEUDO-PHILOSOPHIC VIEWS OF EVOLUTION 
 
 HAVING surveyed the animal and vegetable kingdoms, 
 as coming into existence as soon as protoplasm with the 
 nucleus appeared upon this earth, by Evolution ; it is 
 necessary to pay some attention to what certain Ration- 
 alists and others have to say upon the subject. 
 
 Being profoundly impressed by the continuity which 
 pervades Nature, many eminent scientists, as Huxley, 
 Tyndall, Herbert Spencer as well as Haeckel and 
 Biichner, would see no " break " at the origin of life 
 in organisms ; which, to satisfy the law of continuity, 
 must, according to their views, have proceeded from the 
 inorganic world. 
 
 When, however, we read what those philosophers 
 have to say on the subject, we find nothing beyond 
 suggestions, or what they imagine, on a priori grounds, 
 as to what was the case. Not one can be accepted as a 
 scientific truth based on inductive evidence. 
 
 Dr. Tyndall, for example, wrote l as follows : he saw 
 in matter, "the promise and potency of all terrestrial 
 life " ; " Life under all its forms has arisen by an un- 
 broken evolution, and through the instrumentality of 
 what are called natural causes ". First there is " a 
 nebular haze," then this becomes a " molten mass," 
 wherein are all forms of life, man included, " potentially " 
 
 1 The following references are to his Fragments of Science. 
 (107)
 
 Io8 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 existent "the human mind itself emotion, intellect, 
 will and all their phenomena ... all our philosophy, all 
 our poetry, all our science, and all our art are potential 
 in the fires of the sun." 1 
 
 " Having determined the elements of their curve [in 
 allusion to the discoverable path of a comet] in a world 
 of observation and experiment, they [i.e., those who hold 
 the doctrine of evolution] prolong that curve into an 
 antecedent world, and accept as probable the unbroken 
 sequence of development from the nebula to the present 
 time." 2 
 
 The question arises, whether this is a legitimate " scien- 
 tific use of the imagination," or is it not rather an a priori 
 deduction without any efficient data whereon to rest the 
 theory? Let us see, then, what Tyndall could bring 
 forward in the way of concrete phenomena. He proceeds 
 to say : " The matter of the animal body is that of inor- 
 ganic nature. There is no substance in the animal tissues 
 that is not primarily derived from the rocks, the water 
 and the air. Are the forces of organic matter, then, 
 different in kind from those of inorganic matter ? The 
 philosophy of the present day negatives the question. 
 It is the compounding, in the organic world of forces 
 belonging equally to the inorganic, that constitutes the 
 mystery and the miracle of vitality. Every portion of 
 every animal body may be reduced to purely inorganic 
 matter. A perfect reversal of this process of reduction 
 would carry us from the inorganic to the organic ; and 
 such a reversal is at least conceivable " [?]. 3 
 
 In the present state of our knowledge I, for one, flatly 
 deny that a living organism can be conceived as arising 
 out of its inorganic constituents, without the aid of Life ; 
 
 1 Scientific use of the Imagination, p. 453. 
 
 3 Ibid., p. 456. 3 Vitality, p. 463.
 
 PSEUDO-PHILOSOPHY tog 
 
 or even of a dead body coming back to life again of any 
 of Nature's millions of plants and animals. 
 
 Finally, he says : " Not with the vagueness belonging 
 to the emotions but with the definiteness belonging to the 
 understanding, the scientific man has to put to himself 
 these questions regarding the introduction of life upon the 
 earth. ... As far as the eye of science has hitherto 
 ranged through Nature, no intrusion of purely creative 
 power into any series of phenomena has been observed." l 
 What did Tyndall understand by a "purely creative 
 power " ? Presumably, the " God of Design " ; but if the 
 making of one species out of another may be called 
 "creative," we find that protoplasm with its nucleus is 
 perfectly well able to do it. 
 
 If Tyndall meant some direct interference of an ex- 
 ternal, conscious Creator, working upon matter and force 
 from without physical nature ; then we have no direct 
 evidence of any such interference throughout the whole 
 period of the world's history ; since Evolution first began 
 to work out the life histories of plants and animals, includ- 
 ing man, from the first appearance of protoplasm on this 
 earth. 
 
 But when we turn from useless speculations of the 
 imagination, however scientific they may be thought to 
 be, to positive facts capable of investigation, we at once 
 come upon a phenomenon which is not discoverable in the 
 inorganic world, namely, that Directivity within proto- 
 plasm, to which I have abundantly alluded. 
 
 This Directivity is only associated with Life; 2 and 
 these two things have been in close operation through 
 all organisation. Both, like physical forces, are only 
 
 1 Apology for the Belfast Address, p. 547. 
 
 2 1 do not here include the arrangements of molecules to form crystals 
 in the mineral kingdom under the term ; though Croll would do so.
 
 no PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 recognisable by their effects ; and as Croll said are just 
 as worthy of the term " Vital Force " or " Vital Energy " 
 or any other like expression, as are Gravitation, Electricity 
 and Magnetism are of their special names. 
 
 Now let us see if Huxley can help us. He says : " A 
 sufficient intelligence could, from a knowledge of the 
 properties of the molecules of that [cosmic] vapour, have 
 predicted, say the fauna of Britain in 1869, with as much 
 certainty as one can say what will happen to the vapour 
 of the breath in a cold winter's day. 1 
 
 " Were it given to me to look beyond the abyss of 
 geologically recorded time to the still more remote 
 period when the earth was passing through physical and 
 chemical conditions, which it can no more see again than 
 a man can recall his infancy, I should expect to be a 
 witness of the Evolution of living protoplasm from non- 
 living matter." 2 
 
 The reader will here note that he derives nothing of 
 any scientific value from this utterance any more than 
 from Tyndall's. The "man in the street" asks for facts, 
 and they both supply him with imaginations. 
 
 It naturally occurs to one, Why is it necessary to go 
 back to so early a period for life ? We still have both 
 degrees of heat and cold beyond which no living being 
 can exist ; we know the external conditions of air, light, 
 moisture and food which are necessary for plant and 
 animal life ; why then cannot a living being arise now, or 
 'at any time along the evolutionary history of the world ? 
 
 A very obvious answer appears to be that once was 
 enough. Given the tiniest speck of living protoplasm 
 with its nucleus, and all the living world can have come 
 out of it. 
 
 1 Genealogy of Animals. 
 
 * Critiques and Addresses, p. 239,
 
 PSEUDO-PHILOSOPHY in 
 
 It is of no use saying with Tyndall " on tracing the 
 line of life backwards, we see it approaching more and 
 more to what we call the purely physical condition ". l It 
 really does nothing of the sort. An amoeba, a monera or 
 a bacterium is as much alive as a man. The protoplasm 
 of which it is made (as Huxley observes) is the same. 
 It shows no approximation whatever to the inorganic 
 world. Because it is small such is no proof that it ap- 
 proaches the composition of any mineral. This, surely, 
 is a most unscientific use of the imagination ! 
 
 Lastly Mr. Herbert Spencer observes: "That the 
 forces exhibited in vital actions, vegetable and animal, 
 are similarly derived, is so obvious a deduction from the 
 facts of organic chemistry, that it will meet with ready 
 acceptance from readers acquainted with the facts." 2 As 
 an illustration, we may take his description of the assimi- 
 lation of carbon dioxide by plants. " To overcome the 
 powerful affinities which hold their elements together, 
 it requires the expenditure of force, and this force is 
 supplied by the sun". He does not seem to consider 
 how it is done by means of living, green-coloured proto- 
 plasm only. Sunlight supplies the energy, but proto- 
 plasm is the manufacturer. 
 
 The preceding authors do not emphasise sufficiently 
 the significance of Natural Laws. Dr. Whewell in his 
 " Bridgewater Treatise " on " Astronomy and General 
 Physics " calls attention to the metaphorical use of the 
 term " law " in Nature. Contrasting it with Moral Law 
 he says : " The language of moral law is 'Man shall not 
 kill : the language of a Law of Nature is, a stone will fall 
 to the earth '." In other words, a moral law states what 
 a man always ought to be, a natural law, what always is. 
 
 1 Belfast Address, p. 524. 
 
 2 First Principles, p. 271,
 
 na PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 If men were perfect, then, their actions due to their 
 moral character would become a natural law. 
 
 Now, the Laws of Nature have always struck theolo- 
 gical thinkers as being, per se, a witness to Mind. Thus, 
 if it be true that the universe originated out of a homo- 
 geneous cosmic vapour, it is inconceivable (judging by our 
 own minds, and we know of no others for comparison) 
 how the laws, as of gravity, heat, light, electricity and of 
 evolution itself, could have originated, except from an 
 Omnipotent Mind or Will. 
 
 The whole universe is subject to laws ; as Dr. Whewell 
 observes : " The whole course of the visible universe is 
 but the collective result of such laws ; its movements are 
 only the aggregate of their working. . . . The number 
 and variety of the laws which we find established in the 
 universe is so great, that it would be idle to endeavour to 
 enumerate them. In their operation they are combined 
 and intermixed in incalculable and endless complexity, 
 influencing and modifying each other's effects in every 
 direction. . . . Yet, in so far as we consider the bearing 
 of one part upon another, we receive an impression of 
 adaptation, of mutual fitness, of conspiring means, of 
 preparation and completion, of purpose and provision. 
 This impression is suggested by the contemplation of 
 every part of Nature." l 
 
 All this will be equally true whether Evolution of 
 Animals and Plants or the instantaneous creation by a 
 Fiat were the method. The innumerable adaptations 
 and correlations are precisely the same. And it is the 
 wonderfully complete adjustments between the organic 
 and inorganic kingdoms, wrought out as we now know, 
 in large measure by the self-adapting powers of proto- 
 
 T Pp. 7,
 
 PSEUDO-PHILOSOPHY 113 
 
 plasm, that impress the mind with the necessity of an 
 over-ruling " Adapter ". 
 
 Let us follow out briefly the interdependence of the 
 three kingdoms. A man must live. He must breathe, 
 he must eat and drink. To do the first the air must 
 be so constituted as to supply him with the necessary 
 oxygen. Water is a necessity of life ; and if he eat 
 animal food, the sheep or ox had to live upon the vege- 
 table kingdom ; but grass or wheat, if man eat bread, 
 requires various mineral salts ; nitrates, phosphates, etc., 
 and potash, iron, etc., or it cannot grow. All green 
 plants require carbon dioxide from the air, or they could 
 not build up their tissues. To do this they require heat 
 and light from the sun, the energy of which is stored up 
 in plants ; these have been converted into coal. Man 
 extracts it, lights a fire and roasts his meat, thereby 
 liberating sun-light and sun-heat ; or he may utilise the 
 stored up solar energy in driving his motor car or any 
 kind of engine. 
 
 The question is, Which is more probable : that the 
 innumerable adaptations between the three kingdoms 
 was foreseen by a Master Mind before protoplasm ap- 
 peared on this earth, or whether the exquisite adjustments 
 between Matter, Force and Life came about by chance ; 
 i.e., without any natural laws in mutual correlation, just 
 as natural selection is supposed to have brought about 
 Evolution, without any connection between the appearance 
 of favourable variations and the environment. 
 
 I prefer to regard this interaction as one of the many 
 coincidences which supply inductive evidence in support 
 of the proof of a Creator, both seen in the Origin of Life, 
 and the Origin of Species.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 FINAL CAUSES 1 
 
 THE argument from design, which proved so fascinating 
 a subject to writers on teleology of the old School, has 
 been thought to have received its death-blow by Darwin- 
 ism. 2 This doctrine, as propounded by Mr. Darwin, is 
 now forty years of age. In the year 1878 appeared 
 probably the most elaborate work on Final Causes which 
 has ever issued from the Press. It contains two books. 
 The first treats of the Law of Finality, the second of the 
 First Cause of Finality. This term is defined as follows : 
 " It signifies the end (finis) for which one acts, or towards 
 which one tends, and which may consequently be con- 
 sidered as a cause of action or of motion". Hence it 
 would seem that a sharp distinction should be drawn be- 
 ween Finality and Causality; that while every pheno- 
 menon demands a cause of some sort, it is only a certain 
 number which have an end, this notion being " produced 
 
 1 Final Causes. By Paul Janet, Member of the Institute, Professor 
 at the Faculte des Lettres of Paris. Translated from the French by 
 William Affleck, B.D., with preface by Robert Flint, D.D., LL.D., 
 Professor of Divinity, University of Edinburgh. T. & T. Clark, Edinburgh, 
 1878. 
 
 This chapter recapitulates to a certain extent several observations made 
 throughout this book. I do not think this is any objection to its inser- 
 tion. It was written more than twenty years ago, but the arguments 
 are, I believe, as sound to-day as they were when it was written. 
 
 2 Lay Sermons. By T. H. Huxley, p. 330. 
 
 (H4)
 
 FINAL CAUSES 115 
 
 with an imperious and irresistible force ". Thus, for 
 example, that a peeble should be round and smooth is 
 a result of friction ; but we see no " end " in its round- 
 ness or smoothness. The eye-ball is also round and 
 smooth, and we rightly or wrongly do infer an end in its 
 spherical form ; for we recognise its use for rotation. 
 This " imperiousness," however, is not argument, and the 
 question may be asked, How is any supposed end to be 
 distinguished from a mere result ? 
 
 The reply is, that in every case where an end is 
 recognised there is a multiplicity of coincidences which 
 have by their mutual interaction brought about that end ; 
 while the probability of their occurring at haphazard, or 
 as uncorrelated coincidences, and yet collectively produc- 
 ing such a structure as the eye, is one to infinity that 
 such should be the case. It is on these grounds that the 
 order of the planetary system, as well as the organs of 
 animals and plants, imply ends ; but we cannot recognise 
 any end in the way a stream of lava pours down one side 
 of a volcano rather than the other. 
 
 We may, however, here ask what degree of complexity 
 is requisite to constitute or illustrate an end ? If there is 
 an indubitable end in the human eye, is there not a like 
 end in the pigment cell attached to a nerve ? or, if there 
 is an end in the limbs of a vertebrate, is there no end in 
 the shapeless pseudopodia of an amoeba ? 
 
 Now, the formation of pseudopodia may be claimed 
 by the Rationalists as illustrating the inherent properties 
 of protoplasm, and as such they are simply results and 
 not ends. 
 
 Even sex, so obviously an end, as Janet thinks, if 
 traced to elementary forms, is foreshadowed in the ac- 
 cidental fusion of two vegetative zoospores. Hence 
 although ends may seem very apparent in highly organ-
 
 n6 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 ised beings, the organs exhibiting these ends may be 
 traced back to states where those " ends," by a gradual 
 process of minimisation, seem to pass into accidental 
 " results," and so one cannot at last draw any sharp line 
 between them. 
 
 Mr. Herbert Spencer, in tracing conduct from such 
 random motions as are executed by pseudopodia, to the 
 actions of higher animals, which seem to show definite 
 ends, points out how the gradations are complete say, 
 from the swimming of an infusorium to the habits of a 
 cephalopod, or from those of an ascidian to an elephant. 
 It is just this which renders the attempts to limit finality 
 with any degree of precision so difficult a task. 
 
 This difficulty, if I mistake not, is scarcely brought 
 out with sufficient precision by M. Janet. It may, there- 
 fore, indicate a line of objection to finality, as it un- 
 doubtedly would be to the old views of teleology. 
 
 In his sixth chapter of the first book on " Objections 
 and Difficulties," M. Janet refers to M. Littre's view that 
 " the property of matter of accommodating itself to ends 
 of adjusting itself, as he says is one of the properties 
 of organised matter. It is of the essence of this matter 
 to adapt itself to ends as it is of its essence to contract 
 or expand, to move or to feel." x Our author takes M. 
 Littr to task for this expression. It is not Matter, but 
 Directivity, which guides matter to " ends ". Otherwise 
 the very existence of the animal and vegetable kingdoms 
 as they now are, cannot be accounted for. If Littr6 
 meant that the protoplasm, say, of some reptile, through 
 some inherent power of adaptation, developed wings 
 instead of forelegs, and so produced a bird, such a de- 
 scription may sound absurd. But every evidence yet 
 
 1 P. 221.
 
 FINAL CAUSES 117 
 
 discovered goes to prove it to be true, though the process 
 may have been a gradual one, and only perfected through 
 very many generations. 
 
 In fact, Evolution is based on the principle that 
 protoplasm has within it an infinite potentiality of adap- 
 tation ; and when our author objects to M. Littr^'s 
 expression about organised matter having the power of 
 adapting or adjusting itself, he does not refute it by say- 
 ing, " Let men but think of it, and they will own that 
 there does not exist a sort of entity called organised 
 matter, endowed, one knows not why or how, with the 
 property of attaining ends ; what really exists is a 
 totality of solids, liquids, tissues, canals, hard parts and 
 soft parts in a word, an incalculable totality of second 
 causes and blind agents, that all unite in a common 
 action, which is life". 1 Now, this, in a sense, is true ; but 
 it is not one whit the less true that it is, so to say, a 
 plastic whole ; for, although when a creature is once born 
 into the world, and has grown to maturity, it can rarely 
 change its form much after that, any more than "the 
 leopard its spots " ; 2 yet, by the power of inherent ad- 
 aptability, its offspring can during growth acquire a form 
 and structure different in some degree from the parent's ; 
 and so after several generations can produce a new species, 
 abounding in so-called "ends" which were not to be 
 found in the original ancestral form. 
 
 It is, in fact, just this plasticity of organised matter 
 (for want of a better expression), to which is due the 
 marvellous results which, per se, have all the appearance 
 
 1 P. 221. 
 
 2 This expression, as symbolical of fixity, is singularly inappropriate, 
 for the colour of the skin of even one and the same animal is extremely 
 variable, according to circumstances, as is the case with trout, frogs, and, 
 above all, the chameleon,
 
 n8 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 of ends. M. Janet finally asks : " Wherein is it more 
 absurd to admit in matter the property of healing itself 
 than the property of adjusting itself to ends?" Neither 
 one nor the other is absurd for both are equally true. 
 To the famous argument of the watch it might be added 
 that, if a watch could heal up an injury to its wheels, it 
 would imply a vastly increased skill in its artificer. But 
 this is just what the highest kinds of organised matter 
 can do, and are doing every day ! 
 
 Hence, if on the one hand, a large class of phenomena 
 do not instantly convey to our mind the idea of end, 
 whereas another large class imperatively force it upon us ; 
 we must bear in mind that the doctrine of Evolution, 
 without destroying that force as far as it acts per se, has 
 proved that, in all instances, we can actually or presumedly 
 pass from the highly complex organ, or organism, so to 
 say, crammed with ends, to seemingly a mere lump of jelly, 
 with, apparently, none at all ; and that by development, 
 whether studied historically in palaeontology or in embry- 
 ology, we pass by many gradations from what we call 
 a priori, " results," to what we a priori, call " ends ". It is 
 this discovery coupled with, or rather based upon Darwin- 
 ism, which has (it is supposed) given the death-blow to 
 teleology. For tracking them up from below, who can 
 say where " ends " begin ? And we may therefore, and 
 finally, ask Is it not somewhat arbitrary to assert such 
 or such a structure to be an end and not a result ? 
 
 Before attempting to reply to this, let us return to our 
 author. He gives, as another basis of finality, the correla- 
 tion of the end with the future, which implies the existence 
 of the future phenomenon as the efficient cause ; and he 
 adopts the old illustration of the eye being fully developed 
 in the womb, though the use of it is solely for the future. 
 
 It seems to me that a line of argument may be
 
 FINAL CAUSES iig 
 
 followed which will eliminate this dilemma. It is based 
 on the fact that function precedes structure, by which I 
 mean that functions now performed by well-differentiated 
 and specific organs, were undertaken by more generalised 
 structures before these organs existed ; just as, for ex- 
 ample, the membrane of a sea-anemone performs functions 
 of both digestion and respiration. 
 
 Again, when a new function is required by even a 
 highly organised being, that function is, so to say, under- 
 taken for a time by some existing organ (of totally 
 different function), until such modifications have occurred 
 in successive generations, as will ultimately enable the 
 organ (thus metamorphosed into a new form) to execute 
 its new functions exclusively. For example, the tendrils 
 of Naravelia are foreshadowed in the sensitive climbing 
 petioles of Clematis, and the seed-carrying expanded leaf 
 of Cycas is preliminary to the ordinary closed seed-vessel, 
 such as the pod of a pea. 
 
 Now, these principles of differentiation and meta- 
 morphosis which run through the organised world, imply 
 a universal potentiality of acquiring new functions, which, 
 at the same time, proceeds to modify structure, and so 
 gives rise to new organs. 
 
 May we not, then, legitimately pass from a considera- 
 tion of finality in the actual organ to a finality in this 
 very power and potency inherent in organised matter? 
 Whence it comes is unsearchable and past finding out. 
 All we can say is, that inorganic matter shows no sign of 
 it whatever, whereas organised matter, or its ultimate 
 elements, protoplasm with its nucleus, would appear to 
 have it to an infinite degree. 
 
 Grant finality in this marvellous power, and the whole 
 question would seem to at once meet with its ultimate 
 solution.
 
 120 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Further illustrations will not be unadvisable. 
 
 If one contemplates the eye as it is, without regard 
 to its evolutionary history, the idea of finality, if not 
 design, is very " imperious " ; but by tracing that history 
 from a mere pigment cell in contact with a nerve, and 
 then by imagining almost microscopic improvements, so 
 to say, to have taken place, the idea of finality seems 
 frittered away, while the notion of design vanishes alto- 
 gether. Such we have seen is the Darwinian view. 
 
 But it seems to return again under the aspect now 
 considered ; for granting the pigment cell and a nerve, 
 beyond which analysis is unable to proceed, and mere 
 sensation as a result, "we maintain that, what occurs 
 first as an effect takes thereupon the character of an end, 
 by reason of the number and the complexity of the com- 
 binations which have rendered it possible ; " * and we 
 may ask, Why should the more complex eye issue at 
 all out of the simpler condition ? Finality, as expressed 
 by the inherent potentiality of protoplasm, seems to be 
 the sole answer. 
 
 Again, our author lays stress upon the sexes, as 
 illustrating the most remarkable fact of co-ordination ; 
 for it is not merely a case of adaptation of one organ to 
 its function, but of one organ to another. Neither is one 
 the effect of the other. " Those two organs are two 
 distinct and independent effects, and yet they can only 
 be explained the one by the other, which is precisely 
 the relation of finality." 2 
 
 " It cannot be said," M. Janet observes, " that this 
 adaptation has been made in course of time ; for as the 
 species could not subsist without it, it would have perished 
 before it had been formed." 3 
 
 X P. 39. 2 P. 52. 3 ; P. 53.
 
 FINAL CAUSES 121 
 
 No doubt existing species could not exist without 
 their full amount of correlative structures ; but it is just 
 because the sexes have been, as it is believed, differenti- 
 ated in course of time, that the supposed finality becomes, 
 like that of the eye, attenuated by being prolonged back- 
 wards into history ; for by travelling historically backwards 
 we can theoretically, if not always practically, see species 
 getting simpler and simpler, and more and more general- 
 ised, till in every organism the sexual process would be 
 represented by a mere accidental fusion of two identically 
 similar protoplasmic masses ; while one stage further 
 brings us to an entire independence of such conjugations, 
 and the being propagates by fission of its vegetative 
 system only. 
 
 Instead, however, of thus eliminating by degrees every 
 trace of finality in sexuality till we merge into merely 
 mechanical results ; is it not just as logical to say that 
 the sexuality of mammalia and flowering plants was 
 potentially visible in the conjugation of monera and 
 plasmodia? and that the "sexual idea" has reigned 
 throughout, function ever dominating structure till the 
 latter had conformed to the more complete function by 
 becoming specialised more and more ; or, in the words 
 of M. Janet, " The agreement of several phenomena, 
 bound together with a future determinate phenomenon, 
 supposes a cause in which that future phenomenon is 
 ideally represented, and the probability of this presump- 
 tion increases with the complexity of the concordant 
 phenomena, and the number of the relations which unite 
 them to the final phenomenon." 1 
 
 M. Janet devotes the second chapter to an elaborate 
 investigation of the structure of the eye, ear, tooth, etc.,
 
 122 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 and sees finality in all, just as the older teleologists saw 
 design, in " that when a complex combination of hetero- 
 geneous phenomena is found to agree with the possibility 
 of a future act, which was not contained beforehand in 
 any of these phenomena in particular, this agreement 
 can only be comprehended by the human mind by a 
 kind of pre-existence in an ideal form of the future act 
 itself, which transforms it from a result into an end that 
 is to say, into a final cause." 1 
 
 If this be a correct account of finality, then the inter- 
 crossing of flowers would be a most pertinent illustration 
 of it. For the conclusion Darwin arrived at was that 
 plants, to be perpetuated, must be crossed at least 
 occasionally, that Nature " abhors perpetual self-fertilisa- 
 tion," that "self-fertilisation is injurious," etc., such being 
 expressions to be found in Darwin's writings. 2 We have 
 a " complex combination of phenomena" in the structure 
 of the flower of an orchis. This structure is correlated 
 to an insect which must convey the pollen-mass from one 
 flower to another, or the seed will not be set. Here, 
 then, is exactly what M. Janet defines as finality ; for 
 the structure is found to agree with the possibility nay, 
 necessity of a future act, that performed by the insect, 
 which was certainly not contained beforehand in the 
 structure itself. Such, then, is clearly finality in the 
 structure of many flowers as they now exist. How their 
 peculiar structures were obtained is another question, 
 which I will not discuss at present. 
 
 One of the most patent facts in Darwin's expositions 
 
 1 P. 85. 
 
 2 As, for example, repeatedly in his work " Cross and Self-Fertilisation 
 of Plants ". I have given reasons for dissenting strongly from these 
 expressions, in my book The Origin of Floral Structures and in " Self- 
 Fertilisation," Trans. Lin. Soc., 2nd Ser. Bot., voL i., p. 317, 1877.
 
 FINAL CAUSES 123 
 
 is that almost every detail of structure is presumed to 
 have a use, excepting, of course " rudimentary organs," 
 whose use is now gone, as it is superseded by that of 
 other organs, notably so in the structure of flowers ; and 
 he sets himself the task of discovering such use. This is 
 an a priori conclusion which he then proceeds to test by 
 trying to discover the use. 1 His language could be very 
 appropriately adopted by a teleologist ; but we know he 
 does not believe in direct design. All the minute details 
 of structure which seem so "imperiously" to force 
 finality, if not design, upon the mind, have been acquired, 
 according to Darwin, by the unintentional acts of natural 
 selection. All the characters by which a specific form is 
 known, he compares, as will be seen, 2 to chance frag- 
 ments of stone, broken from a mountain rock, but of 
 which natural selection has picked out and preserved 
 those most suited to render the creature the fittest to 
 survive ; just as a man may select stones of different 
 shapes wherewith to build his house, without having 
 previously shaped them himself. 
 
 The exquisite detail of structure of a flower of the 
 field, like to which Solomon in all his glory was not 
 arrayed, is much more comparable to a highly finished 
 and beautifully designed architectural pile, than to such 
 a rough building as that to which Darwin would have us 
 liken it. If it be necessary to prepare intentionally each 
 stone for its future position in the structure, so by ana- 
 logy it might be reasoned that Nature had intentionally 
 caused each detail to develop with the ultimate end of 
 forming a " complex heterogeneous whole ". No doubt 
 Darwin's simile is correctly apposite to his theory of 
 
 1 See, for example, his remarks on " Momordes Ignea " in Fertilisa- 
 tion of Orchids, p. 249, first edition. 
 
 2 See Appendix, p. 145,
 
 I2 4 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 indefinite variations, out of which natural selection takes 
 the best ; but, as already stated, naturalists are by no 
 means at one in adopting this view. The one I am 
 advocating in this book is Darwin's alternative to natural 
 selection, viz., that variations do not occur until external 
 conditions have incited them to appear ; and that when 
 they do, it is in response to, and they are then con- 
 sequently correlated with, the environment ; in other 
 words, the organism becomes more and more adapted 
 to the environment, so that natural selection has 
 nothing to do. 
 
 Darwin would seem to lay much more stress upon 
 the inherent, spontaneous powers of variation than upon 
 the environment as an inciting cause ; for he expresses 
 himself as inclined "to lay less weight on the direct 
 action of the surrounding conditions than on a tendency 
 to vary, due to causes of which we are ignorant." l We 
 shall see that he came to modify this view in 1876 in 
 favour of direct adaptation. 
 
 I have always adhered to the opposite view, and 
 regarded the environment as by far the most important 
 " cause " of variation, in that it influences the organism, 
 which, by its inherent but latent power to vary, responds 
 to the external stimulus, and then varies accordingly. 
 
 This view was very strongly insisted upon by Dr. 
 Aug. Weismann, who thus speaks : " A species is only 
 caused to change through the influence of changing 
 external conditions of life, this change being in a fixed 
 direction, which entirely depends on the physical nature 
 of the varying organism, and is different in different 
 species, or even in the two sexes of the same species. 
 According to my view, transmutation by purely internal 
 
 1 Origin of Species, p. 107. Sixth edition, 1878.
 
 FINAL CAUSES 125 
 
 causes is not to be entertained. If we could absolutely 
 suspend the changes of the external conditions of life, 
 existing species would remain stationary. The action of 
 external inciting causes in the widest sense of the word 
 is alone able to produce modifications." Dr. Alfred R. 
 Wallace, who quoted the preceding in his review of Dr. 
 Weismann's work, Studies in the Theory of Descent, said 
 that he had " arrived at almost exactly similar conclusions 
 to these ". l 
 
 Whichever theory be adopted, the outcome is, of 
 course, the same viz., structures which/^r se imperiously 
 suggest finality or design. But since the special creation 
 hypothesis is out of court, and Evolution only accepted, 
 design may be excluded, and the question stands, Does 
 finality remain ? If M. Janet's definition be accepted, 
 then as " ends " abound everywhere in organisms, finality 
 is also passim. We are not concerned, be it remembered, 
 at present with the investigation as to how the complex 
 correlated structures do arise in response to either an 
 external or internal stimulus. 
 
 Now, assuming finality to be recognised in Nature, it 
 must be either intentional or not. In the first book M. 
 Janet does not concern himself with intentionality. He 
 does not therein raise the question as to how the first 
 cause acts, but whether the second causes, as they are 
 given to us in experience, act for ends or not. Within 
 these limits, then, is the analogy between the industry of 
 man and that of Nature legitimate? 
 
 Taking as a starting point the consciousness of 
 personal finality in ourselves, we infer by analogy a 
 similar finality in other men ; " from finality in the in- 
 dustrious actions of other men, we pass to finality in the 
 
 1 Nature, vol. xxii., p. 141. Cf. p. 161.
 
 126 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 industrious actions of animals, whether these actions 
 present the appearance of some foresight and reflection, 
 or appear to us absolutely automatic. We have now to 
 pass from the external actions of the animal, which are 
 called its instincts, to its internal operations, which are 
 called its functions. This is the kernel of our whole 
 deduction." : 
 
 In tracking finality thus downwards, the reader will 
 at once perceive that the author considers finality as 
 equally characteristic of the voluntary and the automatic 
 acts of man, as well as the acts of all other animals 
 whether external and instinctive, or internal and func- 
 tional. 
 
 He notices a " profound difference between functional 
 industry and human namely, that artificial industry 
 constructs the machines it has need of to perform its 
 operations, while the animal functions are only the opera- 
 tions of machines already constructed. The man makes 
 pumps, but the animal has received from Nature a natural 
 pump, the heart. . . . Whatever be the cause that has 
 constructed it ... is of little consequence ; in any case, 
 this cause in constructing this machine has performed a 
 series of operations entirely resembling those of a work- 
 man constructing analogous machines." 2 
 
 The author then pertinently asks, " How could the 
 same machine be considered here as a collection of means 
 and ends, there as a simple coincidence of causes and 
 effects ? " Why is a spider's web a mere effect, but a 
 fishing net an end ? " Can we thus assign two absolutely 
 identical causes to two absolutely identical actions ?" And 
 M. Janet redefines finality under this comparison, observ- 
 ing that " in both cases there is a twofold common char- 
 
 'P-97. 'P.99-
 
 FINAL CAUSES 127 
 
 acter : (l) the relation of the parts to the whole ; (2) the 
 relation of the whole to the external medium. . . . There 
 is no part which has not its reason in the whole. . . . 
 Now, is not that the essential and distinctive character of 
 finality? It is not, then, the more or less of internal 
 activity or of spontaneity that is here in question ; it is 
 that pre-established harmony of the part and the whole, 
 which, common at once to the works of art and to the 
 works of Nature, confers upon them, on the one as on the 
 other, an incontestable character of finality." J 
 
 The two words I have italicised in this quotation may 
 possibly give rise to a misconception ; for whatever " pre- 
 established harmony" may be seemingly present in the 
 correlation of organic structures, Evolution will not per- 
 mit of any correlated structures having been made 
 primarily in anticipation of fulfilling a want. They may 
 be made so now in the development of existing species 
 say the eye in a foetus but when originally differentiated, 
 it was in accordance with immediate wants, or in response 
 to external stimuli e.g., light in this case. 2 But once 
 formed, it becomes hereditary, and then ever afterwards 
 will be formed in apparent anticipation. 
 
 Finality is certainly not destroyed, whether we believe 
 organs to have been developed by Evolution, or to have 
 been created in some analogous manner to the fabrication 
 of a steam-engine by man. For my own part, I still 
 hold to the theory that uses cause adaptations, on the 
 principle that function precedes structure. Thus as a 
 graminivorous animal has its food already (so to say) cut 
 
 'P. 101. 
 
 2 If total darkness causes eyes to atrophy, as in fishes, etc., in caves, 
 light is evidently essential to keep the structure of the eye in its normal 
 state. Hence it is legitimately to be inferred that light has "caused" 
 them. The eye of a blind man atrophies.
 
 128 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 up into slices in grass-blades, it does not require scissors 
 to reduce it to small pieces in order to make a convenient 
 mouthful. But a carnivorous animal has a large lump of 
 flesh in the shape of a carcase. It requires to cut it up. 
 The action of biting in order to do this, previous to its 
 consumption, has converted its teeth into scissors-like 
 carnassials, and as it can no longer masticate it bolts 
 the pieces whole. 
 
 So, too, man would never have thought of making 
 scissors unless he had had something that he wanted to 
 cut up. The object induced the manufacture, " Necessity 
 being the mother of invention". The parallel is com- 
 plete ; only, in the one case it is spontaneously effected 
 by the plasticity and adaptability of living matter ; in the 
 other it is artificially produced by the consciousness and 
 skill of man. 
 
 Not only, then, do we recognise finality in the func- 
 tions of the completed organs, but in the very formations 
 of the organs themselves. 
 
 But now, asks M. Janet, " Is this analogy between 
 human industry and the industry of Nature, though 
 justified by theory, also justified by science ? " Accord- 
 ing to the older methods of interpretation, the form of 
 the organs was supposed to imply their function. But at 
 the present day we have reason to believe the reverse, 
 or, as I have expressed it, that function precedes, structure. 
 In generalised animals different functions are often 
 executed by one and the same organ ; and it is not till 
 later i.e., higher in the scale of life that differentiation 
 of a common structure into special organs occurs, each 
 organ now taking on its special function, according to 
 the principle of the division of labour. 
 
 The present method of investigation does not limit 
 itself to organs, but presses on to the ultimate analysis,
 
 FINAL CAUSES 129 
 
 till it reaches the fundamental and physical basis of life, 
 or the protoplasmic cell ; and science declares that this 
 analysis leaves no room for ends, but can find nothing 
 but causes and effects. Hence once more do we ulti- 
 mately arrive at the potentiality of protoplasm, and all I 
 claim is, that, given certain, nay, almost any, combinations 
 of conditions of the environment, protoplasm will respond 
 and do such or such a work, the outcome of which is an 
 organ adapted to its environment, and finally an organism 
 which then "imperiously" asserts to us its finality. 
 
 We thus arrive at the last question, Whence comes 
 this potentiality of protoplasm ? or, How is it that 
 orderly differentiation comes out, and not perpetually 
 changing states of chaos ? As a fact, the more differ- 
 entiation has set in, the more wonderful are the structures 
 produced ; so that, casting the eye back through the 
 vista of past ages, from the most primitive creature to 
 man, we see as a rule nothing but ascending series in 
 every direction. 
 
 Science knows nothing of " must ". All that we can 
 say is, that such or such organs do grow in an embryo, 
 and that collectively they do make an organism, but 
 they may at any time make a monster instead. 
 
 Thus normally the tissue of a leaf-bud is formed in a 
 certain way ; but a cynips punctures it and deposits an 
 egg within. The tissues now grow abnormally and pro- 
 duce a gall. The inner layers of this contain nutritive 
 food suitable for the grub, and upon which it lives. If 
 the nourishment were not specially provided by the 
 tree, the grub could not live. This is a case which 
 shows how the gall is apparently nothing but an 
 effect or result of a mechanical injury caused by the 
 puncture. But looking at the gall per se, we find it 
 furnishes board and residence for the cynips. Here 
 
 9
 
 I 3 o PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 there are at least two " ends " in the structure ; and why 
 may we, then, not regard it as one of those " imperious " 
 cases of finality? Yet the whole structure was simply 
 an outgrowth in " response " to, or a " result " of, a 
 minute injury. 
 
 This case would seem to furnish a good illustrative 
 example of many others, of which the only interpretation 
 would seem to be that protoplasm is endowed with the 
 property of producing tissues in response to stimuli, and 
 that when the organ composed of those tissues is com- 
 pleted, it has all the appearance of having had an end 
 in view during its entire structure. And what is true of 
 single organs is true for their totality or a living being. 
 
 I have dwelt upon this potentiality of protoplasm, be- 
 cause, contrary to M. Janet's opinion, it seems to me that it 
 affords the only true resting-ground upon which to base 
 the doctrine of Finality. It is an objective fact which is 
 indisputable. Recognise it as such, and then all forms 
 of finality will flow from it. 
 
 Having pretty well exhausted the subject of finality as 
 apparent in organs, M. Janet observes that as animals and 
 plants cannot live without a suitable environment to furnish 
 them with adequate food, "we are thus brought to the 
 notion of external or relative finality ". " It is strange," 
 he adds, in speaking of external finality, " that it did not 
 strike Kant from this point of view, that internal finality 
 is in reality inseparable from external, and cannot be 
 understood without it. The organised being, in fact, is 
 not self-sufficient, and it only exists by means of the 
 medium in which it lives. Nature, then, would have 
 done an absurd thing if, in preparing an organism, it had 
 not, at the same time, prepared besides the means neces- 
 sary for that organism to subsist." * 
 
 >P. 157-
 
 FINAL CAUSES 131 
 
 But is he not here inverting the process? Nature 
 did not prepare grass for herbivorous cattle, nor did she 
 develop herbivorous cattle for the carnivora. Every 
 organism was, of course, independent of all others that 
 came into existence after it, as they entered the world in 
 an ever-ascending scale ; though each one is now depend- 
 ent upon some other or others if regarded in the reverse 
 order. Thus the lamb was not made for the wolf, but 
 the wolfs teeth have been secured to it as the best 
 adapted for tearing flesh of some kind. Teeth are an 
 internal finality, but the lamb cannot be regarded as 
 external finality for the teeth. 
 
 The oak-gall produced specially by and for the cynips 
 would seem to be a much better case of external finality ; 
 or again, the honey of flowers for insects. Organic 
 internal finality is the result of adaptation to the environ- 
 ment, but the environment cannot adapt itself to the 
 organism. 
 
 The eleventh chapter is devoted to the consideration 
 of various forms of objections which the author describes 
 with his usual acumen. He shows, for example, that 
 when Descartes objects because, as he says, we cannot 
 find out God's ends, he confounds absolute with relative 
 ends. The former, he observes, may well be beyond our 
 reach, but the latter are matters for investigation, and 
 come within the region of experience. 
 
 The objection of Maupertuis, quoted as follows by 
 M. Janet, is based upon the conditions of existence, and, 
 is singularly like Darwinism : " Might it not be said," he 
 writes, " that in the fortuitous combination of the produc- 
 tions of Nature, as it was only those in which certain 
 relations of convenience were found that could exist, it is 
 not wonderful that this convenience is found in all the 
 species that actually exist? Chance, it might be said,
 
 132 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 had produced an innumerable multitude of individuals ; 
 a small number were found constructed so that the parts 
 of the animal could satisfy their wants ; in an infinitely 
 greater number there was neither convenience nor order ; 
 all these last have perished. 
 
 " This hypothesis of a groping of Nature, and of a 
 period of disordered parturition, said to have preceded 
 rational productions such as we see them now, is con- 
 trary to all that we know of the processes of Nature. 
 No trace subsists of this period of chaos, and everything 
 leads to the belief that, if Nature had begun by chaos, it 
 would never have come out of it." l 
 
 His idea appears to have been general in ancient 
 cosmogonies, that as long as a chaotic state of things 
 existed, nothing but monstrous beings could be or were 
 produced. Hence, the strange beings described by 
 Berossos : " There was a time in which all was darkness 
 and water, and in these were generated monstrous 
 creatures having mixed forms. Men were born with 
 two and some with four wings, bulls were produced 
 having human heads, and dogs with four bodies having 
 fishes' tails . . . and horses with dogs' heads, and 
 other creatures having the shape of all sorts of beasts," 
 etc. 2 
 
 But this is only a concrete ideal representation of a 
 fundamental conception, that order is incompatible with 
 chaos or chance, i.e., the undesigned and undirected 
 clashing of Nature's forces. And although expressed in 
 so quaint a form, it undeniably involves a great truth, 
 which was early grasped by the mind of man. 
 
 1 Pp. 205, 206. 
 
 'Quoted from Max Miiller's Lectures on the Science of Religion, p. 
 50. See also Sayce's The Religions of Ancient Egypt and Babylonia, p. 
 377-
 
 FINAL CAUSES 133 
 
 Darwinism is essentially a similar theory, though in a 
 very different dress. The reader will detect a similar 
 ring in the following tones : " Of tens and hundreds of 
 thousands of intermediate forms we know nothing by 
 direct observation. They have perished as better fitted 
 forms ousted them in the never-ending conflict." l 
 
 The idea underlying these words is closely akin to 
 that of Berossos viz., "intermediate forms unfitted to 
 survive". 
 
 The Planetary system furnishes another illustration, 
 and seems ever to have been taken as indicating order. 
 The following is from the fifth tablet of the Cosmogony 
 discovered by Mr. G. Smith. In the sixth and seventh 
 lines we read 
 
 He marked the positions of the wandering stars to shine in their courses, 
 That they may not do injury and may not trouble any one. 
 
 Just as chaos and disorder, or their spiritual represent- 
 ative, the great dragon of the sea, are considered as the 
 source of evil, so where order reigns no harm follows. 
 Psalm cxxi. 6, 7, has a somewhat similar idea " The sun 
 shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night 
 The Lord shall preserve thee from evil ; He shall pre- 
 serve thy soul ". 
 
 It seems to me that the same problem is offered both 
 by chaos and by Darwinism namely, How can order 
 and admirable adjustment issue out of either chaos on 
 the one hand, or out of innumerable chance variations 
 on the other? If, however, we recognise in protoplasm 
 (as we must) a power of development in conformity or in 
 adaptation to a changeable environment, the change in 
 the right direction being set up by the environment, then 
 the difficulty of the " tens or hundreds of thousands of 
 
 ^Degeneration, by E. Ray Lankester, p. 17.
 
 134 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 intermediate forms " vanishes ; for they were but the 
 creation of the brain not of Nature. 
 
 And we may carry the problem further back, and 
 observe with M. Janet that, " It still remains to explain 
 how a conflict of forces can, at a given moment, have 
 brought about a result so complicated, and requiring so 
 appropriate a mechanism as life "- 1 " Everything leads to 
 the belief that if Nature had begun by chaos, it would 
 never have come out of it." 2 
 
 M. Janet does not seem to be a palaeontologist, or 
 probably he would not have misunderstood the expres- 
 sion that "fossils are embryos of actual species," or have 
 said of Aristotle's remark " the animal is an unfinished 
 man " " as a metaphorical and hyperbolical expression, 
 this is an admirable thought ; as an exact theory, it is 
 very disputable." 3 Every naturalist will recognise the 
 author's difficulty, which leads him into false inferences ; 
 for he says : " No doubt the inferior species have im- 
 perfect forms in relation to the superior. It is better to 
 have the wings of the bird than the flaps of reptiles ; the 
 brain of man than that of the oyster." Such is, how- 
 ever, not better if taken alone. With the conditions of 
 life required by the oyster or the reptile, brains and wings 
 respectively would be utterly useless and superfluous. He 
 is more accurate when he says : " Every being that lives, 
 being even thereby organised to live, be that life humble 
 or powerful, contains relations of finality and design [?] ; 
 between this being, however humble, and a purely for- 
 tuitous product, a freak of Nature, there is already an 
 abyss, and the latter can never have served as a transition 
 to the former. In the polyp I see finality as well as in 
 the vertebrates, and the tentacles by which it seizes its 
 
 1 P. 207. 2 P. 206. 3 P. 209.
 
 FINAL CAUSES 135 
 
 prey are as appropriate to their use as the claws of the 
 tiger or the hand of man." 1 
 
 M. Janet next considers Spinoza's objections. The 
 latter " explains the belief in final causes as he explains 
 the belief in liberty i.e., by ignorance of causes. When 
 we act without knowing what determines us to act, we 
 think ourselves the masters of our actions, and we say 
 that we act freely. So when we do not know how 
 Nature acts, we suppose that it acts voluntarily, and in 
 order to be useful to us." 2 
 
 No doubt an enormous percentage of our acts are 
 automatic, as I shall show in the second part of this work, 
 even though we should know if we thought about them 
 the cause, in many instances ; yet we do these acts spon- 
 taneously. But and this appears to me to lie at the 
 root of so-called free will we can make any motive an 
 object of thought ; and so far as we do so, we are not 
 ignorant of the cause, as in all cases of deliberate choice. 
 A selection between two acts may be purely automatic, and 
 we may call it unconscious natural selection, and we act 
 purely and simply in obedience to the strongest motive 
 and we are then automata. But we can bring motives to 
 bear upon the question by a determined reflection, and 
 not merely through automatic memory. We then make 
 the selection an object of deliberate thought. This is 
 volition, or free will. 
 
 Conscious of this, we can, by analogy, infer it in finality. 
 
 Spinoza's objection, moreover, would prove too much, 
 for, as M. Janet observes, " There are thousands of pheno- 
 mena whose causes are unknown, and which are by no 
 means, therefore, given as examples of finality, such as 
 showers of meteors, volcanoes, etc.". 
 
 1 P. 20Q. a P. 211.
 
 136 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 The author next notices M. Littre's objection to fin- 
 ality. " The property of accommodating itself to ends," l 
 to which I have already alluded. . . . " In another writing 
 M. Littr6 had opposed with eloquent vivacity the vis 
 medicatrix of the school of Hippocrates. Wherein is 
 it more absurd to admit in matter the property of 
 healing itself than the property of adjusting itself to 
 ends ? " 2 
 
 As long as we merely investigate the structure of 
 organised matter say, protoplasm, which certainly " does 
 exist," and record our observations upon what it can do, 
 apart from all considerations of finality, it is impossible to 
 escape from either the vis medicatrix, or some equivalent 
 expression or from M. Littre's "property of adjusting;" 
 for we find a seemingly homogeneous mass of jelly capable 
 of secreting the most beautifully symmetrical shells con- 
 ceivable, as in the case of the Radiolaria, Diatomacea, and 
 others ; and when we contemplate a complicated organ- 
 ism, such as one of the vertebrates, it is simply a highly 
 differentiated mass of protoplasm ; every atom of which 
 has furnished its individual quota towards the complex 
 structure of the whole. As the whole is an organism 
 adjusted to its environment in all its organs, so are its 
 organs, and so on till we have dissected out its ultimate 
 elements of cells and fibres, and come at last to the 
 physical basis of life itself. Nothing is more remarkable 
 in the analogy between Nature's organism and man's 
 works, than that whereas the latter cannot spontaneously 
 repair an injury, the former can ; hence the final question 
 of M. Janet seems singularly inappropriate ; for it is just 
 the property of healing itself residing in a living organism 
 at least in the animal kingdom that stands out as 
 
 X P. 221. 2 P. 222.
 
 FINAL CAUSES 137 
 
 so complete a contrast to the powerlessness of human 
 works of art to repair an injury. 
 
 Rudimentary organs, so abundant in Nature including 
 man himself, difficult as they are to reconcile with any 
 argument of direct design, are discussed by M. Janet 
 with ability, and are considered by him as affording no 
 objection to finality rather the reverse ; for they were 
 of use formerly, but have become rudimentary through 
 disuse, other uses having superseded them. " Nothing 
 conforms more to the theory of finality than the gradual 
 disappearance of useless complications." 
 
 Lastly, the production of monsters calls for some 
 attention as bearing upon finality. 
 
 The existence of monsters raises no great problem 
 when we consider the relatively perfect state in which 
 every organism finds its existence to be ; or what I have 
 called " Inideality" (see Part II, Chap. X). 
 
 Were every environment absolutely and perfectly 
 adapted to a being's welfare, and were every condition 
 for the development of a perfect being secured to the 
 parents, then monsters would be impossible. Since, 
 however, under existing circumstances, such a Utopian 
 idea cannot be realised, monsters and abnormal growths 
 of all kinds, as well as diseases, are simply the outcome 
 of the clash of accidentally conflicting forces. They are 
 "errors of Nature," caused, as M. Janet observes, "by 
 the predominance of the laws of Nature in general over 
 the interests of living Nature ". This was Plato's view, 
 and Aristotle explained evil in the same way. And if 
 men would but clearly distinguish between moral evil (i.e., 
 conscious abuse of Nature's laws) and physical evil (i.e., the 
 production of effects which man chiefly dislikes), there 
 would not have been so many attempts to prove a separate 
 author of "evil " from that of " good " in the world.
 
 138 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 In the second book the author addresses himself to 
 solve the question whether there is a First Cause of 
 finality. Finality being a law of Nature, what is the first 
 cause of that law? The reply has ever been, Intellig- 
 ence. Is this conclusion legitimate ? 
 
 The old teleological argument has ever been met by 
 the Epicurean view of chances. Atoms have an eternal 
 motion ; their fortuitous concourses must have already 
 exhausted infinite combinations, so that the one which 
 now exists is simply one of them. But this theory re- 
 quires infinite time for its accomplishment, and the most 
 modern views of the period spent in elaborating the 
 universe from nebulous matter still make it finite. But, 
 further, we are told that the existence of such combina- 
 tions of atoms fortuitously, as exist, is possible, because 
 it is. This is obviously to beg the whole question, for 
 the theory assumes that the universe is possible without 
 an intelligent cause. M. Janet justly remarks, "This 
 picture is possible, because it is ; it has, therefore, had 
 no painter," is just as logical. Logical possibility and 
 real possibility are confounded. 
 
 The whole argument is, however, antiquated, and so 
 may be dismissed. The modern form of the objection 
 is that raised by Kant and other metaphysicians, who 
 point out that the argument of analogy cannot do more 
 than suggest an A rchitect, but not a Creator. It cannot 
 rise beyond suggesting a relatively wise, skilful, or power- 
 ful cause, but not an absolute one. This, however, 
 implies, observes M. Janet, that only the form of things 
 is contingent, and that matter is not so. " If matter is 
 not contingent, that means that it is necessary, it exists 
 of itself, it has in itself the reason of its existence ; . . . 
 for the same reason we must suppose the cause that 
 gives the form to be necessary on the same ground as
 
 FINAL CAUSES 139 
 
 the matter itself, and that it is self-existent. How, in 
 short, can it be admitted that a non- necessary cause 
 would have the power to act on a necessary matter and 
 to give it orders ? . . . The processus in infinitum would 
 here avail nothing, for by hypothesis the matter supposed 
 necessary is also a last term ; therefore, on the other 
 hand, the cause must likewise be a last term." l 
 
 This argument strikes one as irrefragable, and the 
 conclusion is obvious, that the organising cause of the 
 world is a cause of itself or an Absolute Cause. 
 
 Kant's second objection falls with the first, namely, 
 that "from a contingent world we cannot rise to an 
 absolute cause". "But the first objection," says our 
 author, "by the hypothesis of a pre-existent that is, 
 necessary matter, furnishes the material of the absolute 
 idea of which I have need. If the first cause is absolute, 
 it will be so in all its attributes : being by hypothesis 
 intelligent, it will be omniscient ; being powerful, it will 
 be omnipotent ; being good, it will be perfectly good, 
 and so on." 2 
 
 These two objections of Kant, however, do not touch 
 the very essence of the argument, that Law and Order 
 imply Intelligence. 
 
 Three solutions have been offered to account for the 
 existence of finality : the hypothesis of subjective finality, 
 that of immanent, and that of unconscious finality. 
 
 The first is the doctrine of Kant, and M. Janet fully 
 admits " that there is something subjective in this doctrine, 
 namely, the part that is insusceptible of demonstration 
 and verification, and also the unknown part that goes on 
 always increasing in proportion as we approach the very 
 source of the creative activity. But then, again, the 
 
 J P. 335- 2 P- 336.
 
 I 4 o PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 same doctrine is objective where it represents facts ; it 
 is real on the same ground as all induction that rises 
 from what is seen to what is not seen ". l 
 
 That finality is internal or immanent is perfectly ad- 
 missible, " but this relative immanence of natural finality 
 does not imply an absolute immanence, and, on the contrary, 
 can only be comprehended by its relation to a transcendent 
 terminus. These two difficulties overcome, we are now 
 face to face with the true problem : Is the supreme 
 cause of finality^ an intelligent cause a Mind? This 
 will be the object of our last inquiries." 2 
 
 Hegel says that finality is not merely immanent, it 
 is unconscious. A striking illustration of unconscious 
 finality is seen in the instincts of animals ; which will be 
 sufficiently discussed hereafter. 
 
 An unconscious finality, says Frauenstadt, is no con- 
 tradiction of terms, just as " the Aristotelian opposition 
 between the efficient and final cause is in no way identical 
 with the opposition between the unconscious and the 
 intelligent cause. For the final cause itself may be 
 unconscious." 3 
 
 " To attribute to Nature an instinctive activity is to 
 say that Nature acts like bees and the ant in place of 
 acting like man ; it is zoomorphism substituted for anthro- 
 pomorphism. We see no advantage in it. 
 
 " In fact, the true difficulty, the profound difficulty, 
 in this question is that we can only explain the creative 
 activity of Nature by comparing it to something that is 
 in Nature itself that is to say, which is precisely one of 
 the effects of that activity. . . . The true difficulty evi- 
 dently applies to the hypothesis of a primitive instinct 
 quite as well as to that of a primitive intelligence." 4 
 
 1 PP- 352, 353- 2 P. 375- 3 P. 377- 4 P. 379-
 
 FINAL CAUSES 141 
 
 Still we have not reached the primary activity yet ; 
 the source, perhaps common, both of instinct in animals 
 and intelligence in man. M. Janet says that what is 
 called Inspiration perhaps comes nearest to our conception 
 of a creative intelligence, or the inventing at once both 
 the means and the end, by a single thought, in which 
 foresight may be regarded as identical with immediate 
 conception ; as, for example, the entire air dominates the 
 very first notes of a musical composition. M. Janet 
 considers the products of a genius as vastly superior to 
 the unconscious products of instinct. He says, " The 
 soul inspired by sentiment is not a blind activity. It is 
 conscious of itself ; it has a vivid and profound intuition 
 of its end ; it is quite full of it ; and it is precisely this 
 vivid sentiment of the end that evokes in it its own 
 realisation. Instinct, on the other hand, not only is 
 ignorant of the means, but of the end." l 
 
 Is not our author here adducing what is accidental to 
 man as grounds for regarding genius as essentially and 
 per se intelligent ? I cannot help thinking that M. 
 Janet does not attribute enough to the wonderful powers 
 of the automatic properties of the brain. " Calculating 
 boys " can give no rationale of the marvellous feats per- 
 formed by their own brains. A half-idiotic person may 
 be an extraordinary musical performer, like the negro, 
 " Blind Tom," who used to play in public some fifty 
 years ago. Remarkable powers of improvisation are 
 perfectly spontaneous and automatic, often enkindled by 
 artificial means, which specially excite the automatic 
 action of the brain. It would seem very difficult to 
 separate flights of genius from automatism, when we 
 put aside the consciousness of man and his powers, and 
 
 1 P-394-
 
 I 4 2 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 the knowledge that he can cultivate and improve those 
 powers. It was pure automatism that led Mozart, when 
 four years old, to compose a piece of music far too diffi- 
 cult to be played, but perfectly correct in harmony. 1 
 
 While, therefore, I should lay less stress on man's 
 genius than M. Janet does as implying great intelligence, I 
 would see in it the highest concrete manifestation of the 
 infinite genius of the Immanent Worker of Nature, so that 
 whereas different forms and varieties of genius are ex- 
 hibited in different men, I would regard them collectively 
 as the common characteristics of the Power which under- 
 lies Nature itself, and which thus shines through those 
 favoured human beings whom we call geniuses. 
 
 " Then, what of Intelligence ? This is not identical 
 with genius. Perhaps one definition of intelligence is the 
 power to distinguish means from ends, and thus to pre- 
 pare the means with the view of accomplishing the ends. 
 Thus, intelligence is distinct from tendencies. Hunger, 
 for instance, is a tendency. It is not the same thing as 
 the industry that finds food." 2 But both are really 
 equally automatic, and I do not see that our author clears 
 up the difficulty when he asks finally : " Is there not 
 something that represents what we should call foresight, 
 if the divine act were translated into human language ? 
 This is the question." 3 After discussing the nature of 
 human foresight trammelled by accident, M. Janet com- 
 pares it with God's " foresight," which means complete 
 vision of present and future at once, as "the act that 
 perceives the end, and the act that distinguishes the 
 means ". 
 
 " Thus, the doctrine of the Novs, or of intentional 
 finality, has for us no other meaning than this that intelli- 
 
 1 1 quote the story from memory, not remembering where I read it. 
 8 P. 408. 3 P. 410.
 
 FINAL CAUSES 143 
 
 gence is the highest and most approximate cause we can 
 conceive of a world of order." l 
 
 " The doctrine of final causes, however, cannot escape, 
 as it would seem, a final problem. If each of the things 
 of the universe, taken separately, has been produced for 
 another, for what, and to what end, have they, taken to- 
 gether, been made ? " 2 To be brief, the sole explanation 
 is in the doctrine of Divine Love. " It is by goodness 
 that Plato, as well as Christianity, explains the produc- 
 tion of things." 3 Knowledge is not the absolute end of 
 the universe; but, as Kant says, the end is found in 
 morality or a Moral 'Being i.e., Man. " The end of 
 Nature is, therefore, to realise in itself the absolute as far 
 as possible, or, if you will, it is to render possible the 
 realisation of the absolute in the world. This is brought 
 about by morality. . . . Morality is, therefore, at once 
 the accomplishment and the ultimate proof of the law of 
 finality." 4 Man is the only moral being upon earth. All 
 others are non-moral. 
 
 IP. 415. 2 P- 443- 'P.447- *P- 455-
 
 APPENDIX TO PART I 
 DARWINISM 
 
 I 
 
 DARWINISM BASED ON ERRONEOUS ASSUMPTIONS 
 
 THE first thing to do, now, appears to be to show that this 
 assumed basis of modern Rationalism, Materialism or Material- 
 istic Monism is a fictitious one. 
 
 " Darwinism " is the name given to Darwin's theory, ex- 
 pressed or defined by the title of his book, The Origin of 
 Species by means of Natural Selection. It must be carefully 
 distinguished from " Evolution," which is often spoken of as 
 " Darwin's Theory ". 
 
 Evolution is a thoroughly established fact, based on the 
 strongest inductive evidence, as well as proved by an abund- 
 ance of experimental verification. 
 
 Darwinism is a theory or hypothesis to account for it. It 
 is an imaginary process to account for Evolution. 
 
 When Darwin propounded his theory, he gave us an alter- 
 native ; but having his mind so concentrated upon " Natural 
 Selection," he did not then see that the evidence for his second 
 one was at all sufficient. 
 
 It is this alternative which I propose to call the " True 
 10 (145)
 
 146 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Darwinism," 1 and is rapidly gaining ground among observers, 
 especially, perhaps, in France and the United States. 
 
 Let us consider what really takes place in Nature. 
 
 As long as animals and plants live for generations under 
 the same conditions of life their forms are constant, allowing 
 for trivial individual differences, which supply no basis for 
 classification. But when they migrate and their offspring grow 
 up under a new set of conditions, markedly different from those 
 formerly surrounding the species, Darwin supposed that the 
 new conditions stimulated the latent variability (or innate 
 capacity for varying) and that as they grew up to the adult 
 stage, they varied " indefinitely," some variations being in- 
 different, others useless or even injurious ; while a few only, 
 perchance, varied in such a way as to be slightly beneficial. 
 These alone, he said, would survive, and all the others die 
 before reaching maturity. That imaginary process he called 
 " Natural Selection," with the " Survival of the Fittest ". Then 
 by the accumulation of favourable slight variations a new 
 " species " would be established after many generations ; but 
 it must be carefully observed that there is no Natural Law 
 connecting such chance favourable variations with the re- 
 quirements of the organism under the new conditions of 
 life. 
 
 No evidence has ever been forthcoming from Nature in sup- 
 port of this theory of "" the Origin of Species by means of Natural 
 Selection ". 
 
 The difficulty of accidental variations being sufficient has 
 been observed by many. Weismann asks how we can account 
 for " the occurrence of the right variations at the right place? " 
 How is it that "the useful variations were always present, or 
 that they always existed in a sufficiently large number of indi- 
 
 1 It has already acquired a name in botany, viz., " Ecology " (or 
 Oecology, as some prefer it), i.e., " the study of the homes " of plants, in- 
 cluding their adaptive structures to their environments, respectively. 
 The latest work is Dr. Schimper's Plant Geography on a Physiological 
 Basis.
 
 DARWINISM 147 
 
 viduals for the selective process?" . . . "Something is still 
 wanting to the selection of Darwin and Wallace." 1 
 
 Prof. Cope said " The survival of the fittest does not 
 explain the origin of species until we explain ' the origin of 
 the fittest ? ' " Asa Gray assumed that the variations must be 
 " led along certain beneficial lines ". 2 
 
 Dr. G. Fk. Wright observes : " The difficult question for 
 those who deny any purposive element at the bottom of 
 organic evolution is how to secure the complicated co-ordina- 
 tion of results involved in the development of any decidedly 
 advantageous anatomical variations". 3 
 
 Now the following is Darwin's alternative process : " By 
 the term ' Definite Action ' I mean that when many individuals 
 of the same variety are exposed to any change in their physical 
 conditions of life, all or nearly all the individuals are modified 
 in the same manner. A new sub-variety would thus be pro- 
 duced without the aid of Natural Selection." 4 
 
 Many observers soon discovered that the evidence of " de- 
 finite action " was abundant. It was ultimately seen that such 
 represented a Natural Law, viz., that the organism responded 
 directly to the environment, and so grew up in harmony with it, 
 all the offspring of any species thus varying alike in adaptation. 
 None died through want of it. 
 
 It may be added that it is perfectly true that " the struggle 
 for life," "natural selection" and the " survival of the fittest" 
 occur everywhere in Nature. These things, however, are con- 
 cerned with the Distribution of organisms. They account for 
 the presence or absence of species in any given area ; but they 
 have nothing to do with their origins, as these are based on 
 structure alone. 
 
 It is a common mistake to suppose that Natural Selection 
 is still required even if it be admitted that plants and animals 
 can grow in response to the environment; so that all the 
 
 1 Monist, 1896, pp. 261, 263, 264. *Darwiniana. 
 
 3 Scientific Aspects of Christian Evidences, p. 94. 
 
 * Animals and Plants under Domestication, ii., p. 271.
 
 148 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 individual offspring are in adaptation to the new conditions 
 of life, "without the aid of Natural Selection," as Darwin 
 says. 
 
 Thus Biichner writes : " There seems to be no fundamental 
 opposition between Darwinism and Neo-Lamarckism, and one 
 may rather be considered as the complement of the other "- 1 
 
 Dr. Vernon, who accepts hereditary variations which have 
 arisen from direct action on the soma i.e., the vegetative 
 system in plants and the bodies of animals, asks : " Are we to 
 agree with Henslow that the close adaptation of plants to their 
 environment is due entirely to the responsive power of proto- 
 plasm to the external environmental forces, and that it is 
 absolutely unnecessary to call in the aid of Natural Selection ? 
 By no means. Adaptive variation may be responsible for a 
 good deal of the adaptation observed in plants, and for a very 
 small part of that observed in animals, but probably [why ?] 
 in each case by far the larger portion must be ascribed to the 
 ever-present and ever-acting agency of Natural Selection." 2 
 
 This author does not perceive that when all the offspring 
 vary alike under the definite action of the environment there 
 are no variations for Natural Selection to select from. Hence 
 Darwin says, " a new sub-variety will be formed without 'the aid 
 of Natural Selection ". That is, so far as a new variety is con- 
 cerned. Still, out of, say, 100 seedlings, though they all vary 
 alike, 95 may perish from various causes, but they have nothing 
 to do with the production of the variation. The mistake is due 
 to the fact that he does not distinguish between Natural Selec- 
 tion as supposed to weed out all the imaginary individuals less 
 fitted in structure (i.e., Darwinism), and Natural Selection as 
 being concerned with those individuals which are unable to 
 withstand the struggle from various reasons, but altogether irre- 
 spective of structure. 
 
 Natural Selection is always present, wherever some die and 
 
 1 Last Words on Materialism, p. 194. 
 
 2 Variation in Animals and Plants (Int. Sci. Ser.), p 391.
 
 DARWINISM 149 
 
 others live, but has nothing to do with structure when it is 
 concerned with the origination of new varietal characters. This 
 was evidently perfectly clear to Darwin himself, for he more 
 than once insists upon the fact that " Definite Variations " 
 have nothing to do with Natural Selection or vice versa. 
 
 Having stated the case thus briefly with regard to the 
 present position of Darwinism, it will be as well to discuss the 
 question more fully in order to show how the materialistic 
 reasoning of Haeckel found a basis in Darwin's theory of 
 Natural Selection. 
 
 M. Leon A. Dumont published an interesting resume of 
 Haeckel 's Natural History of Creation in 1873, entitled Haeckel 
 et la Theorie de f Evolution en Allemagne, in which he observes 
 that of all countries Darwinism was best received in Germany ; 
 for it appealed more than any other to the pantheistic aspira- 
 tions of that country. Not only did it apply to natural science, 
 but one tried to extend it to most diverse facts languages, 
 formation of intellectual faculties, politics, morals, history and 
 the theory of progress. Indeed, Darwinism and its applications 
 gave birth to an entire literature. Thus, Schleicher, a dis- 
 tinguished professor of languages in the University of Jena, 
 who had already, before Darwin, taught the theory of Evolution, 
 explained by Natural Selection, as soon as it was known to him, 
 the development of languages. 
 
 A little reflection, however, will show that the " struggle for 
 existence" with "Natural Selection" has nothing to do with 
 the changes in words. Philologists invented the word " Brachy- 
 logy " (Short-speech) to express the cause of changes. For 
 whatever happens to be the easier to pronounce takes the place 
 of what is less easy. It is for this reason that the initial aspirate 
 h has vanished from most words in French which commence 
 with it. In England, however, though it is often dropped in 
 some places, as London, it is not yet recognised as correct not 
 to pronounce it. Spelling is much slower in following suit. 
 Ruthven is pronounced " Rivven," Cholmondeley, " Chumley," 
 etc., but there is nothing of the nature of a struggle for exist-
 
 150 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 ence about it. Similarly hour (aspirated) is easier to say than 
 ffbra, and 'our becomes easier still. So Dies Dominica has 
 been welded into Dimanche. Why some nations find it easier 
 to say b for /, d for /, and g for ch (hard) q or k, it is difficult to 
 say ; but such is the case. Thus what a Frenchman calls 
 boutique, a German pronounces apotheke, and a Spaniard bodega. 
 Each has found what is easiest for himself to pronounce ; but 
 there was no struggle for existence between these three words 
 in as many countries, not to add the English apothecary. 
 
 Letters get transposed if it be found easier to pronounce 
 the word with the vowels in a different order. Thus Curasao 
 and Cacao have become Cura9oa and Cocoa ; having changed 
 both in spelling and pronunciation. 
 
 Nor has Natural Selection got anything to do with the 
 origin of new words, idioms, etc. They arise automatically or 
 are invented as the want is felt. Once in a way an alternative 
 is proposed, and while one stays the other disappears. Thus 
 the words "telegram" and " telegrapheme " were both sug- 
 gested when the telegraph was first employed. The latter 
 may be more correct etymologically, but the shorter word was 
 quickly adopted. " Wireless telegram " of five syllables is 
 being subjected to the same process to-day, and will probably 
 yield to " Marconigram " of four. 
 
 A new meaning is often added to an old word. Thus 
 several Greek words acquired new meanings under Christianity. 
 'Ayd-mr) is the word in the LXX, in the Song of Solomon, as the 
 love of lovers for each other. In the Christian dispensation, 
 it became Brotherly Love and human reverence for God. 
 
 Evolution, per se, undoubtedly may be applicable to the 
 origin of languages; but Darwinism is not. New words, 
 changes of old ones, different pronunciations, etc., all arise 
 as " definite variations " in adaptation to new circumstances 
 when old ones become obsolete and disappear ; so that whole 
 languages, like whole families of animals and plants, become 
 extinct in the course of ages. Natural Selection may be called 
 the descriptive phrase of that process ; but it has nothing to do
 
 DARWINISM 151 
 
 with the origin of the changes, which give rise to new languages, 
 animals and plants, and does not act as " means " in the pro- 
 cess. 
 
 The conception of Evolution was impressed upon Darwin's 
 mind by his numerous observations made during his voyage 
 round the world ; but his theory of Natural Selection as afford- 
 ing the means, for the Origin of Species was suggested by 
 Malthus' Essay upon the Principle of Population (1798). " It 
 is the doctrine of Malthus applied with manifold force to the 
 whole animal and vegetable kingdoms." * Darwin, however, 
 introduced an element which Malthus had nothing to do with, 
 namely, variations in the structure of organisms. 
 
 According to Malthus, population tends to increase by 
 geometrical progression, while the quantity of the means of 
 subsistence is more or less in accordance with an arithmetical 
 one. It is not clear on what grounds this is based. Man 
 being an organism like other animals, he and they as well as 
 plants must follow the same laws ; and taking wheat as an 
 important food, it certainly increases by very high geometrical 
 ratios : they may be thirty- sixty- or a hundred-fold. His 
 theory might be true in a limited area, and when no foreign 
 supply of food is accessible. 
 
 Moreover, as populations increase, more of Nature's waste 
 lands can be brought under cultivation, as we are now doing 
 in Egypt, and doubtless shall do in South Africa by irrigation. 
 
 But the question of the Evolution of Species is not solely 
 concerned with the fact that more animals and plants are born 
 annually than the world can provide for, so that many must 
 die or the world would be overstocked. This would be the 
 sole matter for consideration, if offspring were always like 
 their parents ; but Malthus did not consider, and Darwin had 
 no grounds for inserting in his theory, anything to do with new 
 points of structure in the offspring of organisms. It is upon 
 these alone that varieties and species are based. 
 
 Hence, Darwin's theory of " the Origin of Species by 
 
 1 Origin of Species, 6th ed., p. 50.
 
 152 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 means of [indefinite variations of structure and] Natural Selec- 
 tion," is not "the doctrine of Malthus applied with manifold 
 force to the whole animal and vegetable kingdoms. As many 
 more individuals of each species are born than can possibly 
 survive ... it follows that any being, // it -vary however 
 slightly in any manner profitable to itself, under the complex 
 and sometimes varying conditions of life, will have a better 
 chance of surviving, and thus be naturally selected. From the 
 strong principle of inheritance any selected variety will tend to 
 propagate its new and modified form." * 
 
 I have italicised the unwarranted intercalation into Malthus' 
 theory. 
 
 The mistake Darwin here makes is to suppose that life and 
 death depend upon slight changes of Structure ; whereas they 
 are far more concerned with constitution, which has nothing to 
 do with the origination of changes of Form. 
 
 In the case of plants growing thickly together, the strongest 
 plants survive by crowding out the weaker. 
 
 Darwin very often alludes incidentally to " constitution," 
 as a factor in the struggle for life; but it has nothing to do 
 with the origin of new " variations of structure," upon which 
 alone new varieties are formed. I must repeat this, to make it 
 emphatic. 
 
 Of course, if it could be proved that new variations of 
 structure and form are in any way or always in correlation with 
 an enhanced vigorous constitution, there might be a shadow of 
 support to his theory ; but there is nothing to say for such 
 correlation as necessarily occurring. Hence, Darwin's applica- 
 tion of Malthus' theory to variations is an illegitimate one ; 
 for it will in no way account for them : nor when they arise 
 does it explain why they should survive. The transferring the 
 struggle for life from the constitution to variation is an 
 illegitimate procedure. 
 
 Now let us see what Darwin has to say about Natural 
 Selection. I have mentioned that as long as animals and 
 1 Origin of Species, p. 3.
 
 DARWINISM 153 
 
 plants live under precisely the same conditions of life, respec- 
 tively, they show no signs of changing. They only exhibit 
 trivial individual, mostly inconstant differences, of which no 
 systematist takes any notice. Though it was upon these that 
 Darwin laid stress. 
 
 He thus wrote : " No one supposes that all the individuals 
 of the same species are cast in the same actual mould. These 
 individual differences are of the highest importance for us, for 
 they are often inherited . . . and they afford materials for 
 Natural Selection to act on and accumulate." l 
 
 " Let it be borne in mind how infinitely complex and close- 
 fitting are the mutual relations of all organic beings to each 
 other and to their physical conditions of life ; and consequently 
 what infinitely varied diversities of structure might be of use 
 to each being under changing conditions of life. Can it, then, 
 be thought improbable, seeing that variations useful to man have 
 undoubtedly occurred, that other variations useful in some way 
 to each being in the great and complex battle of life, should 
 occur in the course of many successive generations? ^such 
 do occur can we doubt (remembering that many more individuals 
 are born than can possibly survive) that individuals having any 
 advantage, however slight, over others, would have the best 
 chance of surviving and of procreating their kind? On the 
 other hand, we may feel sure that any variation in the least 
 degree injurious would be rigidly destroyed. 
 
 " This preservation of favourable individual differences and 
 variations, and the destruction of those which are injurious, 
 I have called Natural Selection, or the Survival of the Fittest." 2 
 
 Besides differing from Darwin as to cultivation and domes- 
 tication affording any basis for comparison with wild plants 
 and animals, Dr. Wallace does not accept these " individual 
 differences " as means for originating species. He thus writes : 
 "In securing the development of new forms in adaptation to 
 
 1 Origin of Species, p. 34. I would refer the reader to my paper on 
 " Individual Variations," in Natural Science, vol. vi., p. 385. 
 
 2 Origin of Species, p. 623. The italics are mine.
 
 154 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 the new environment, Natural Selection is supreme. Hence 
 arises the real distinction, though we may not always be 
 able to distinguish them, between specific and non-specific 
 or developmental characters. The former are those definite 
 though slight modifications through which each new species 
 actually becomes adapted to its changed environment. They 
 are, therefore, in their very nature, useful. The latter [i.e., 
 individual differences] are due to the laws which determine the 
 growth and development of the organism, and, therefore, rarely 
 coincide exactly with the limits of a species." 1 
 
 Now, the first thing which strikes the reader is the ex- 
 tremely hypothetical style of the whole of this passage on 
 Natural Selection, as shown by the words I have italicised. 
 After having collected thousands of facts, published in the two 
 large volumes, Animals and Plants Under Domestication (upon 
 which the Origin of Species was based) it seems somewhat 
 curious that Darwin could not write more confidently than he 
 has here done. 
 
 Moreover, there is another fallacy lurking behind unseen. 
 At what period of life does the struggle for existence mostly 
 take place ? It is during the growth to maturity. If the off- 
 spring do grow to maturity, so as to be able to propagate, they 
 are ipso facto naturally selected. If they do not, but perish 
 prematurely, death takes place before any important variation 
 has arisen ; as, for example, in the flowers and fruits of plants ; 
 since specific characters are not looked for, nor based by 
 systematic botanists and zoologists on immature features, which 
 may change or be lost before the fixed adult stage is reached. 
 
 It is worth while considering this important point some- 
 what fully. 
 
 Specific and still more generic characters, I repeat, are, as 
 a rule, taken from \heflowers and fruits, much more than from 
 the vegetative organs. 
 
 The struggle for existence takes place mainly amongst 
 seedlings ; for if an annual can succeed in flowering, or a 
 1 Fortnightly Review, March, 1895, p. 444.
 
 DARWINISM 
 
 155 
 
 biennial and still more a perennial, which may not blossom 
 for several years, as trees, then such will obviously have 
 survived in the struggle for existence. 
 
 Darwinism asserts that specific characters (taken from the 
 flowers and fruit, for example) are secured by Natural Selection 
 weeding out less favourable varieties and intermediate forms. 
 The problem then is this : 
 
 How is it that characters which as yet do not exist [i.e., in 
 seedlings before they blossom] can be an important, if not the 
 main, agent in selecting the species ? 
 
 The struggle is amongst the young seedlings of the same 
 species competing with one another whenever a large number 
 are scattered within a limited area ; or they are struggling with 
 the seedlings or adults of other species or genera. In any case 
 the particular morphological characters on which the species is 
 founded, are not formed till long after the struggle has practi- 
 cally ceased to exist. For if a plant is able to produce its 
 flowers and seeds, as stated, it has proved itself fit to survive. 
 
 Hence, this survival has obviously nothing to do with the 
 morphological peculiarities of its flowers or fruit, upon which 
 its varietal, specific or generic characters depend. 
 
 It must be distinctly remembered that if a plant succeed in 
 producing its flowers and fruit, its " end " in life has thereby 
 been secured. If it die before it produces flowers and fruits, 
 then, it cannot be said that its death was due to any less 
 adapted or less complex character of its flowers or fruit, by 
 which its specific characters were known ; for they were not in 
 existence. 
 
 The conclusion from this logical analysis seems inevitable 
 that the Origin of Species cannot be aided by, much less due 
 to, Natural Selection. 
 
 However different their flowers and fruits may be, various 
 seedlings are often well-nigh indistinguishable in form. Even 
 as adults it is often impossible to tell one species or even genus 
 from another, as among grasses, without the flowers or fruit. 
 Hence it may be recognised as a truth, that when the struggle
 
 156 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 obtains, it is mainly during the early period of life and long 
 before the principal specific or generic characters are formed 
 at all. 
 
 We come then to the question, Why do some seedlings 
 survive and others do not when they struggle together? It 
 appears simply to be due to a more vigorous constitution. 
 Assuming an entire absence of all mechanical injuries or of 
 parasites, etc., and that a batch of seeds are all equally healthy, 
 there are seemingly but two causes for a relatively less vigorous 
 constitution. One, when the embryo has been accidentally less 
 provided with reserve food materials in the seed. The second 
 is, where there happens to be less external available nourish- 
 ment or something prejudicial in its environment superadded. 
 
 Here, then, we may recognise a true basis for Natural Selec- 
 tion ; and so limit it to its legitimate sphere of action. 
 
 But it has nothing to do with the origin of morphological 
 structures, upon which specific characters are based. 
 
 It has been said : " If we ask for the actual observations of 
 the process of Natural Selection on which the Darwinian theory 
 is based, we find what appear to be very slender foundations of 
 fact for a very large superstructure. There are the experiences 
 of the breeder, and very little more. The real data which 
 support the weight of the theory consist in the nature of the 
 actual products which the process is assumed to explain the 
 actual constitution of animal and vegetable species in their 
 higher and lower forms." 1 
 
 In other words, assume Darwinism to be true, then, every- 
 thing follows ; just as all a priori assumptions satisfy the 
 thinkers, that they have the exact clue, cause and interpreta- 
 tion of any problems in question. 
 
 I had not intended writing anything more on Darwin's 
 
 1 Stout's Manual of Psychology, p. 17. I would here refer the reader 
 to my reply to Dr. Wallace's criticisms, entitled, " The Origin of Species 
 without the Aid of Natural .Selection," Natural Science, vol. v., p. 257, 
 1894 ; and also to " Does Natural Selection play any part in the Origin of 
 Species of Plants ? " Natural Science, vol. xi., p. 166,
 
 DARWINISM 157 
 
 mistake in basing his theory upon " Individual Differences " ; 
 but Dr. Vernon's new book having just appeared, it becomes 
 necessary to show how he confirms, though it be quite uninten- 
 tionally, the statement that individual differences do not, as a 
 rule, help one to discover the origin of variations. 
 
 He commences his first chapter as follows : " If a number 
 of individuals of any species be compared, it will be found that 
 they all show differences from each other either in size, shape, 
 colour, etc., . . . in fact, no two of them are exactly alike. . . . 
 These differences constitute what is known as Variation, and it 
 is into the facts of this variation, and its importance as the 
 corner-stone of the whole fabric of Evolution, that we shall 
 briefly inquire in the following pages." 
 
 Dr. Vernon proceeds to give us illustrations of the many 
 results of observers who represent individual differences by 
 mathematical curves. 
 
 Similar curves can be made from shots at a target; since 
 no organ of a plant or animal ever grows absolutely like 
 another, no two leaves are alike, because there is always an 
 inequality in the forces of growth, the amount of food supply, 
 etc., etc. 
 
 Hence Wallace is right in saying that " they rarely come 
 within the limits of a species ". 
 
 These observers of numerical statistics seem to have in 
 some cases overlooked two fundamental conditions for varia- 
 tions in a true, classifactory sense of the word ; viz., changed 
 conditions of life or the nature of the environment, and 
 hereditary constancy. 
 
 There is no use in collecting hundreds or thousands of 
 animals, such as crabs, shrimps, etc., or heads of daisies, 
 marigolds, etc., all coming, respectively from the same locality. 
 
 No systematist takes any notice of individual differences ; 
 because they are too slight and too inconstant. 
 
 Variations which systematists can only recognise must have 
 more pronounced differences, and there must be hereditary 
 constancy.
 
 158 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Dr. Vernon quotes several instances of the mathematical 
 statistics of the parts of flowers giving maxima and minima. 
 But they are just what a botanist would anticipate. In fact, 
 I did so before studying the tables, because, knowing the 
 origin of the normal number of parts in floral whorls, the 
 maxima only mark off phyllotactical "cycles". Dr. Vernon 
 makes no mention of phyllotaxis ; I can only conclude, there- 
 fore, that he is not aware of the peculiarities of leaf-arrange- 
 ments. 
 
 Thus, we are informed that Ludwig counted the number of 
 pedicels or "rays" of the umbel of Torilis Anthriscus and 
 de Vries the ray florets of Chrysanthemum segetum. In the 
 former the maxima were 5, 8, 10 (= 2 x 5). In the latter, 13, 
 21, 26 (= 2 x 13), 34. In the case of the stigmatic rays of 
 poppies, 13 is the maximum. 
 
 Now, these numbers do nothing more than indicate the 
 prevailing phyllotactical cycles corresponding to the " angular 
 divergencies " of the series : 
 
 11236 8 / 
 S> T> F> \~5' ~Sl> elc ' 
 
 If the object of these investigations be a search for the 
 Origin of Varieties, they will not afford much help, and 
 generally none at all. 1 
 
 Since the above paragraph was written, a friend in Australia 
 has communicated to me an interesting fact, which bears out 
 the origin of variations by adaptation. He found the phyllo- 
 tactical cycles of the Mediterranean species of marigold 
 (Calendula) to be localised according to the nature of the 
 environment. He has observed that the large orange Calendula 
 has normally twenty-one ray florets ; but near the sea it is pre- 
 paring to develop a thirty-four-rayed form, many individuals 
 having reached twenty-six (i.e., 2 x 13). He adds that the point 
 he wishes to bring out is that the number of ray-florets in 
 different composites varies with their habitats. " Thus, the ox- 
 eye daisy has generally twenty-one ray-florets at the level of Lake 
 
 1 The reader is referred to Biometrika for other examples.
 
 DARWINISM 159 
 
 Como ; but at a height of 400-500 feet up the mountain side 
 above Cernobbio a form is developed during the height of the 
 flowering season with thirty-four rays, reverting at the end of it 
 to the twenty-one-rayed type. On the Mount Resegone above 
 Lecco, there is a still larger species, presumably with thirty-four 
 or more rays, which being called a species, is, I suppose, more 
 or less fixed, but I have not found it. At Taormina, where 
 the extensive observations on Calendula were made, I think, at 
 the end of them, if a batch of flowers gathered in one spot had 
 been given me, I could have inferred the habitat, at all events 
 approximately, by counting the rays." 
 
 This writer does not allude to the biometrical observations 
 going on in Europe, but has studied them, independently, from 
 the adaptive point of view ; i.e., upon which I have urged the 
 importance above. 
 
 The following, however, gives an illustration of an attempt 
 to combine locality with numerations. 
 
 In a paper on the Variation and Correlation in Lesser 
 Celandine, from Divers Localities, x the study of the table gave 
 the following conclusions : 
 
 " i. Local races in plants cannot be defined or distinguished 
 by the existence of differences many times the value of their 
 probable errors between the means, variations or correlations. 
 
 "2. The influences of environment and season are for 
 plants of supreme importance and very widely or indeed 
 entirely screen any differences due to local race." 
 
 As an example : While three sepals with eight petals were 
 common in Dorsetshire ; five sepals with ten petals prevailed 
 at Gais (Switzerland). 
 
 Again, selecting poppies from five different localities ; their 
 different standards of deviation became apparent from 1*455 
 to 1*898 upon which Prof. Karl Pearson observes : 
 
 " We have here illustration of how race, environment, selec- 
 tion, correspond to numerical differences in type and variability." 
 
 He also suggests that one should " count in some hundreds 
 1 Biometrika ii., p. 144.
 
 160 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 of individual cases the petals or florets of some simple wild 
 flower, and observe the differences which occur when the group 
 is taken from a field with one soil, aspect or altitude, and then 
 from a second wherein all these things are changed." l 
 
 He here introduces the precise cause of variation which 
 Darwin insists upon, or " changed conditions of life " with their 
 " definite action ". 
 
 However, many of the " calculators " do not seem to have 
 considered differences of locality at all or changes in the 
 environment as important or necessary. 
 
 When such are observed, then Natural Selection, of course, 
 is altogether a superfluity. 
 
 I will conclude this section with a summary of the false 
 data upon which Darwinism is based. 
 
 1. The intercalation of Structure or Form into Malthus' 
 Theory of Natural Selection in humanity. 
 
 2. Individual Differences are not a source of variations, as 
 a rule, the necessary " changed conditions of life " and 
 "hereditary constancy" being mostly neglected by present 
 mathematical observers. 
 
 3. The non-existence of Indefinite variations in Nature. 
 
 4. The assumption that death follows unfavourable varia- 
 tions in form. 
 
 5. The analogy between man's extermination of forms he 
 does not require, with a destruction in Nature through the 
 struggle for existence. For man takes care that a selected 
 being should have no struggle at all. 
 
 6. Any correlation between the subsequent appearances of 
 varietal characters (say of flowers and fruits) months or years 
 after the period when the struggle has taken place, i.e., during 
 infancy. 
 
 7. That " Natural Selection " can be regarded as an agent 
 or as possessing any power to effect anything : since it might 
 be called Nature's registrar of births, deaths and survivals ; but 
 is unconcerned with the cause of any one of them. 
 
 1 The Grammar of Science, p. 388.
 
 II 
 
 THE TRUE DARWINISM OR THE NATURAL LAW OF 
 ADAPTATION 
 
 BEFORE entering on this important matter I must beg the 
 reader to dissociate my name altogether from what I here call 
 the " True Darwinism ". I have been so often credited with 
 the theory of " Evolution by means of direct adaptation to the 
 environment," that I wish here to insist upon the fact that 
 it is not I but Darwin who is the original author of it. 
 
 In studying his books many years ago it seemed to me 
 that it was more probably the true interpretation of Evolution 
 than by means of Natural Selection. I therefore looked out for, 
 and collected, all the evidence I could find among published 
 writings, as well as made my own observations and experiments. 
 It soon became apparent that proofs of "direct action," as 
 Darwin calls it, were not only " plentiful," as he had discovered 
 by 1876, but universal. 
 
 It was not, however, till long afterwards that were published 
 my two volumes in the International Scientific Series, as well 
 as several papers in the Journal of the Linnean Society and in 
 Natural Science, etc. 
 
 No serious attempt has ever been made to refute this view, 
 excepting one by Dr. Wallace in Natural Science, but more 
 than one who did me the honour to read my " Reply " remarked 
 that it was " crushing "- 1 
 
 In 1876 Darwin came to regard his neglect of this alterna- 
 tive as his " greatest mistake ". Those significant words satisfy 
 1 e.g., Dr. St. G. Mivart,
 
 162 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 me that had he lived till to-day he would have seen that it 
 is universally true, and his habitual candour would have led 
 him to substitute Self-adaptation for Natural Selection. 
 
 It will be desirable now to enter more fully into this aspect 
 of the question, for it has been abundantly shown by observers, 
 especially in France and America, by following up the results 
 of the direct action of the environment, that Lamarck's theory 
 was fundamentally correct if a few aberrations be eliminated. 
 
 "The effects" [that is, of the conditions of life], writes 
 Darwin, "are either 'definite' or 'indefinite'. They may be 
 considered as definite when all or nearly all the offspring are 
 modified in the same manner. Indefinite variability is a much 
 more common result of changed conditions than definite vari- 
 bility "- 1 In speaking elsewhere of Definite variation he said : 
 " I will give in detail all the facts which I have been able 
 to collect rendering it probable that climate, food, etc., have 
 acted so definitely and powerfully on the organisation of our 
 domesticated productions that they have sufficed to form new 
 sub-varieties or races without the aid of selection by man or 
 of Natural Selection". 2 Darwin then gives about thirty in- 
 stances only, but many other cases occur incidentally in his 
 books. In 1876 he had become convinced that " definite varia- 
 tion " was far commoner than he had supposed, for he thus 
 wrote to Prof. Moritz Wagner, of Munich, in that year: "The 
 greatest mistake I made was, I now think, that I did not 
 attach sufficient weight to the direct influence of food, climate, 
 etc., quite independently of Natural Selection. When I wrote 
 my book \The Origin of Species, in 1859], and for some years 
 later, I could not find a good proof of the direct action of the 
 environment on the species. Such proofs are now plentiful." 3 
 
 1 Origin of Species, p. 34. This last statement is quite contrary to 
 what takes place in Nature. 
 
 2 Animals and Plants under Domestication, vol. ii., p. 272, 1868; cf. 
 Origin of Species, p. 107. 
 
 'Quoted by Buchner in Last Words on Materialism, p. 194. It is 
 also in his Life, vol. iii., p. 159.
 
 TRUE DARWINISM 163 
 
 Of course they have always been plentiful, but his attention 
 was not drawn to them ; yet, strange to say, it was due to the 
 " direct action of the environment " that all our domesticated 
 animals and cultivated varieties have arisen. As his mind ran 
 on " Selection " he overlooked " Adaptation ". 
 
 In discussing any question as to the origin of species the 
 first question to ask is, What is a Species ? Darwin himself 
 did not define it, but rather left his readers to infer or draw 
 their own conclusions as to what he meant by the term. The 
 following, however, will answer the question as systematists 
 regard it. A species is known by a collection of relatively 
 constant, morphological characters. In the case of plants these 
 may be taken from the forms of any or all of their organs, i.e., 
 roots, stems, leaves, flowers, fruits and seeds. 
 
 Whenever a plant is found to depart somewhat but con- 
 stantly from the typical description of the species, in any one or 
 more of its characters, such is called a "variety," and varieties, 
 according to Darwin, are " incipient a species ". 
 
 The second question to ask is, What causes organisms to 
 vary ? Most biologists appear to be agreed that the cause is, 
 primarily at least, due to the environment taken in its widest 
 sense. Thus, Dr. Weismann says : " We are driven to the 
 conclusion that the ultimate origin of hereditary individual 
 differences lies in the direct action of external influences upon 
 the organism ". 2 If the surroundings remain permanently the 
 same then there is little or no inducement for the organism to 
 change. Thus it has been noticed that the flowers found in 
 wreaths in the Egyptian tombs are exactly like those of to-day, 
 
 1 1 doubt the correctness of this word. The difference between a 
 " variety " and an allied " species " is one of degree, it is true, but the 
 origin of both is due to the relative amount of the "direct action" of 
 the environment together with the response to it. If this be comparatively 
 slight a variety results ; but as long as it remains, generation after genera- 
 tion, under the same conditions it will not advance to acquire a specific 
 form, but remains permanently a variety. Many such are recorded in 
 Floras. 
 
 2 Essays on Heredity, etc., Eng. trans., p. 279.
 
 164 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 because the climate of Egypt has never altered. If seeds, 
 however, be transferred to some quite new and different climatic 
 conditions they are often found to vary very much as they grow 
 to maturity. In agreement with this it has often been observed 
 that most varieties are found on the confines of the geographical 
 areas of any particular plants. 
 
 Hence is the discovery that organisms are mostly very 
 plastic and possess "variability," i.e., a capacity for varying 
 which is incited into action by the direct influence of the 
 environment. 
 
 Coupled with the power to vary from the characters of the 
 parents, offspring always have a tendency to reproduce the 
 parental form, so that they grow up under the two antagonistic 
 influences, viz., atavism or heredity, and variability. 
 
 In studying the variations of animals and plants under 
 domestication, Darwin noticed that offspring seemed to vary 
 "indefinitely," as he called it; that is to say, when a large 
 number, say, of seedlings, are raised in a border, though the 
 majority resemble the parent, several may differ more or less 
 obviously from the parental type. If the raiser see one which 
 he thinks will be of advantage to him, he will " select " this 
 individual, either by removing all others from its neighbour- 
 hood and letting it grow by itself; or he removes the plant to 
 a locality far away from the rest, so that no insects may cross 
 it with pollen from others of the same species, but unlike the 
 particular individual. This is called " artificial selection ". 
 
 Now, it is the peculiarity of the artificially prepared soil of 
 a garden with its variety of ingredients, to so stimulate the seed 
 of a wild plant sown in it (which may never vary at all in 
 Nature, as the cabbage), that its seedlings may grow up 
 into several and differently constructed plants. Thus, to give 
 two examples : M. Carriere * cultivated the wild radish, Raph- 
 anus Raphanistrum. In a few years he obtained the garden 
 or "ameliorated" forms of root, and he found that by sowing 
 
 1 Origine des Plantes Domestiques demontree par la Culture du Radis 
 Sauvage,
 
 TRUE DARWINISM 165 
 
 the seed in a light soil the long form prevailed, while in a stiff 
 soil the turnip-rooted was predominant. Moreover, in five 
 years he obtained a great variety : in the light soil only white 
 and rose-coloured roots appeared ; but elsewhere, besides 
 violet and very dark or almost black, there were others, as he 
 says, " de toutes les couleurs et de toutes les formes possibles ". 
 
 The late Mr. Jas. Buckman, 1 Professor of Natural History 
 at the Royal College of Agriculture, Cirencester, carried out 
 similar experiments with cabbages, carrots and parsnips, com- 
 mencing in the year 1847. In 1850 he had succeeded in 
 raising three distinct types of parsnip from the seed of wild 
 plants. He describes them as follows : (i) The round-topped, 
 long-rooted form, resembling the Guernsey parsnip (Panais 
 long of the French). (2) The hollow-crowned long-root; 
 " Hollow-headed " of gardeners (Panais Lisbonais type). (3) 
 The short, thick, turnip-shaped root, or " turnip-rooted " of 
 gardeners (Panais rond form). He finally continued his ex- 
 periments with the second only, which he called, " The 
 Student ". Messrs. Sutton & Sons on receiving seed from 
 Prof. Buckman still further " improved " it, and it is now con- 
 sidered, after fifty years of cultivation, the best in the trade. 
 
 The differences presented by garden races are not strictly 
 "varietal" as a rule, /.<?., in the sense which a systematic 
 botanist would apply the term ; but " individual differences," 
 only slightly exaggerated, as compared with the fluctuating 
 individual differences of wild plants. 
 
 Sir J. D. Hooker, for instance, in alluding to cabbages 
 under Brassica oleracea in his Student's Flora calls them 
 " Forms ". 
 
 Mr. W. B. Scott, in a paper on "Variations and Mutations," 2 
 observes: " Bateson's entire argument is founded upon the 
 assumption that individual variations form the material out of 
 which species are constructed, an assumption which has almost 
 passed into an axiom ". 
 
 *jfourn. Roy. Agric. Soc. of England, vol. xv., pt. i, p. 125, 1854. 
 *Amer. Journ. Set., 3rd ser., xlviii., 1894, p. 355.
 
 166 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Mr. Bateson's words are : "It is upon the fact of the 
 existence of this phenomenon of variation that all inductive 
 theories of Evolution have been based ". l 
 
 I have already quoted Wallace's opinion as opposed to this 
 view of Bateson and Darwin. True varietal and specific 
 differences are due to more pronounced variations in Nature 
 than " individual differences " give rise to ; and are induced 
 to appear by changed conditions of life. 
 
 The exaggerated individual differences of cultivation do 
 not occur in the wild state. The wild species of cabbage, 
 parsnip, carrot, radish have no varieties ; and if a systematic 
 botanist found them wild, they would be still regarded as one 
 species, respectively. 
 
 Beyond exaggerating the differences in such plants under 
 cultivation, or evolving more pronounced differences in pigeons, 
 Nature is not pursuing a new course totally different from her 
 methods in the wild state. If instead of man interfering and 
 selecting any he wants, suppose he left them to grow as they 
 pleased, none of Buckman's forms of parsnip would have died 
 and only one or two survive. They were all equally adapted 
 to the changed conditions of life. 
 
 It is a false analogy to compare man's selection with 
 Natural Selection ; because he takes care there shall be no 
 struggle, while Nature makes a struggle ; the conditions are thus 
 precisely the reverse, according to the theory ; yet Nature 
 knows no two methods of evolving new forms. 
 
 According to Darwinism, then, a number of seedlings of 
 parsnip, carrot, radish, etc., ought to die, a few only surviving, 
 but they refuse to do so. Every one of the forms would tend 
 to form a race. Human selection has nothing to do with the 
 origin of the forms, any one of which might have been chosen 
 instead of another. 
 
 On the other hand, certain wild species of plants have 
 developed several varieties in different places, as Blackberry, 
 Rose, Hawkweed, Willow, Knotgrass, etc. 
 
 1 Materials for the Study of Variation, p. 3.
 
 TRUE DARWINISM 167 
 
 But here lies a difference. In garden plants the seeds 
 taken from one individual parent-plant may grow up into 
 several different forms in the same garden. Thus an eminent 
 agriculturist speaking of the great variability of wheat, said 
 that one could almost raise a new variety from every grain in 
 an ear ! In Nature nothing of this has ever been observed ; 
 but the many varieties of the above-named plants, as recorded 
 in our " Floras," are found scattered over the country, and are 
 often known as "local varieties". Thus, Sir J. D. Hooker 
 observes * of the innumerable forms of Hawkweed (Hieraciuni) 
 " variable as the genus is, the sequence of its forms is so 
 natural as to have been recognised by all botanists. This 
 sequence represents to a considerable extent the spread of the 
 forms in altitude and area in the British Isles." 
 
 I will take another instance from Sir J. D. Hooker's Student's 
 Flora, viz., the Knotgrass (Polygonum Aviculare). Speaking 
 of its varieties he refers them to their localities as follows : 
 P. Aviculare, proper; Var. P. littorale, littoral, the passage to 
 P. maritimum; Var. agrestinum, field form ; arenastrum, sand- 
 loving form ; microspermum, small-fruited ; rurivagum, a way- 
 side one, sub-sp. P. ROBERTI ; Var. P. RAII, sandy shores. 
 
 The simple interpretation of all these "forms" or "varie- 
 ties," is that they have been evolved under and through the 
 conditions of the particular localities in which they are found 
 respectively. 
 
 While some genera would, therefore, seem to be endowed 
 with a very active variability, quickly incited into action by 
 local circumstances; others, like the daisy, bluebell, heath, 
 plantains and grasses remain the same wherever they grow. 
 
 We do not know why some plants vary so greatly under 
 cultivation and others do not ; nor why some species have no 
 varieties, while others have many in Nature. Such, however, 
 are observed and well-known facts. 
 
 I would now emphasise more particularly the marked 
 differences noticeable between variations under cultivation and 
 
 1 Student's Flora, 3rd. ed., p. 232.
 
 i68 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 variations in Nature. There is no evidence to show that all 
 the seeds of any individual plant, say of one season, when 
 sown in a new, but all in the same, environment ever grow up 
 with appearances markedly different from one another, as they 
 often do when they are sown in a rich and artificially prepared 
 soil of a garden. All experiments prove that if the seedlings 
 vary at all, they all vary alike in the same locality ; or as 
 Darwin says, in the passage quoted, they vary, "definitely," 
 i.e., in direct adaptation to the conditions of their new sur- 
 roundings. 
 
 Now when we turn to Nature, bearing this in mind, we 
 seem to see a distinct cause and effect in the following facts. 
 Not only do we find plants of one and the same kind to be all 
 alike when growing under the same conditions; but a vast 
 number of totally different kinds have strong points of re- 
 semblance in many ways, as long as they are all growing in 
 the same environment ; i.e., their vegetative system assumes 
 the same fades. Thus, if we turn to hot sub-tropical deserts 
 we are at once struck with the general spinescence prevailing ; 
 and the dense clothing of hair giving a blue-grey appearance 
 to nearly all the plants. Again, many plants growing by the 
 sea-side or in salt marshes are fleshy, like the samphire. 
 
 Hence, it has long been noticed that plants growing in 
 variously composed environments are correlated with a peculiar 
 fades, respectively. 
 
 On observing the universality of these correlations between 
 climate and form ; or the environment and the structure of plants, 
 one is led to infer by inductive evidence based on numerous 
 coincidences that there must be some common cause to bring 
 about these similar " adaptations " in so many different kinds 
 of plants, but all of which are growing under the same condi- 
 tions. I say " adaptations," because all those features which 
 collectively conspire to make up the fades of the floras, are so 
 many peculiarities of structure which enable the plants to live 
 under the special conditions in which they find themselves. 
 Thus a submerged leaf living naturally under water perishes
 
 DARWINISM 169 
 
 if brought above the surface; similarly a leaf ordinarily fitted 
 for living in air, soon perishes if kept under water; but if 
 either plant be allowed to develop its leaves from the leaf-bud 
 stage in the medium, opposite in kind to its usual one, it may 
 grow and adapt itself during its development to that medium till 
 it is fully developed, as often occurs with the water-crowfoot. 
 
 In order to ascertain, therefore, whether the peculiarities 
 of any plant are really due to the environment, as the efficient 
 cause to incite the variability of the plants, many experiments 
 have been made, and in each case the results invariably showed 
 that when a plant is grown out of its usual surroundings and 
 in another of a very different kind ; it either fails to grow, or, 
 if it succeed, it does so by putting on just those structures 
 characteristic of the plants normally growing in the environment 
 in question. 
 
 Thus, with regard to each of the groups above mentioned, 
 it is found, e.g., that if spiny plants of a dry soil or climate be 
 grown in a moist atmosphere and soil, the development of 
 spines is at once checked; the plants become less and less 
 spinescent until the spiny processes cease to be formed al- 
 together. If very hairy plants, characteristic of a dry locality, 
 be grown in water or in a constantly moist situation, they lose 
 their hair to a greater or less degree and so resemble water 
 plants which are normally hairless. If a plant usually developing 
 a tall flowering stem in lowlands be planted on high altitudes, 
 as of the Alps, it cannot develop it ; but becomes a dwarf, like 
 ordinary Alpine plants, the anatomy changing correspondingly. 
 If garden or wild plants like cress be watered with a solution 
 of salt, the leaves develop themselves thick and fleshy like 
 those of an ordinary maritime plant subject to the salt spray 
 of the sea. Conversely the samphire has borne flat and thin 
 leaves when cultivated in a garden far from the sea-side. 
 These are but a very few samples of an abundance of illustra- 
 tions furnished by experiments, which fully justify the belief 
 that the normal characteristics of plants are in every case due 
 to the environment, as Dr. Weismann maintains ; but contrary
 
 170 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 to the belief of that eminent Darwinian, who would say that 
 plants vary " indefinitely," so that Natural Selection might 
 select about i per cent, as " best fitting to survive ". The en- 
 vironment really so acts upon plants, that they all respond to 
 its influence, in a strictly definite and adaptive manner ; so that 
 they develop just those structures which supply them with the 
 best possible conditions for flourishing under the circumstances. 
 
 Having thus proved by experiments how certain character- 
 istic features, which we find in plants growing in the same 
 surroundings, can be produced or withheld at will, we are 
 justified in concluding that thefaaes of desert, aquatic, mari- 
 time, alpine plants, etc., have been produced by the direct 
 action of the environment upon all the wild plants normally 
 growing in those different regions, respectively ; and that by 
 a long continuance, they have acquired relatively, but not 
 absolutely fixed, hereditary characters varietal or specific. 
 
 Further, when we examine the minute anatomy of the 
 tissues, the invariable law is soon discovered that their peculi- 
 arities are always precisely those which are best fitted for the 
 circumstances under which the plants live. 
 
 The fact is that Darwin made an unfortunate mistake. He 
 thought that plants varied "indefinitely" in Nature, deducing 
 his conclusion from the numerous instances of what I prefer to 
 call "exaggerated" individual differences, called "Forms" by 
 Sir J. D. Hooker, in cultivation. He purposely limited his 
 observations to cultivated plants and domesticated animals so 
 that he was not prepared to receive the overwhelming amount 
 of evidence to the contrary from Nature ; and although Dr. 
 Wallace is our greatest champion of Darwinism, for he said, 
 and I suppose would still say " Natural Selection is supreme," 1 
 he was undoubtedly right when he opposed Darwin on this 
 point in his original paper published conjointly with Darwin's 
 in 1858.2 
 
 1 Fortnightly Review, March 1895, p. 444. 
 
 2 "On the Tendency of Varieties to Depart from the Original Type," 
 Journ. Lin. Soc., 1858, p. 53.
 
 TRUE DARWINISM 171 
 
 I repeat his words: "We see, then, that no inferences as 
 to varieties in a state of Nature can be deduced from the ob- 
 servation of those occurring among domestic animals ". He 
 does not say so, but I presume that this is supposed to apply 
 to plants as well as domestic animals. 
 
 To account for variations he said : "We believe we have 
 shown that there is a tendency in Nature to the continued pro- 
 gression of certain classes of varieties further and further from 
 the original type". Darwin, on the other hand, would not 
 admit of this " tendency" to vary. He says : " Some authors 
 . . . look at variability [he would seem to mean " variations "] 
 as a necessary contingent on reproduction, and as much an 
 aboriginal law as growth or inheritance . . . but falsely, as I 
 believe ''- 1 Variability ', is an inherent property, but variations 
 will not arise, unless the environment calls the former into 
 action. 
 
 I would repeat as the fact completely nullifies Darwin's 
 theory of the Origin of Species by means of Natural Selection 
 that there is no evidence to show that where the seeds of 
 any plant are sown in a natural environment, they grow up 
 " indefinitely," that is, with many variations; but, on the con- 
 trary, if they vary, the offspring all vary alike ; and to use 
 Darwin's words : " A new sub-variety would be formed without 
 the aid of Natural Selection ". 2 
 
 1 Animals and Plants under Domestication, ii., pp. 250, 253. 
 
 2 The reader will find abundance of illustrations with both inductive 
 and experimental proofs of The Origin of Species by Self -adaptation to 
 the Environment in my books entitled The Origin of Floral Structures 
 and The Origin of Plant Structures (International Scientific Series, vols. 
 Ixiv., 1888 ; and Ixxvii., 1895. References to other writers are given, es- 
 pecially to M. J. Costantin's works Les Vegetaux et les Milieux Cosmiques, 
 etc., and Dr. Warming's Lagoa Santa. 
 
 Since the preceding note was written (1903) a magnificent work has 
 appeared by Dr. Schimper full of photogravures, etc., in thorough corrobor- 
 ation of the contention in the text. It is called Botanical Geography 
 upon a Physiological Basis (Oxford : Clarendon Press, 1904). 
 
 M. Eberhardt has also published an article in Ann. des Set. Nat., 
 xviii., p. 61 (1903), upon experiments made upon numerous plants grown
 
 172 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 In proving that Natural Selection has nothing to do with 
 " Selecting " the best fitted to survive out of an imaginary 
 series of "indefinite" variations, I would emphasise the fact 
 that it must not be thought that this phrase " Natural Selec- 
 tion " stands for nothing at all. The datum which both 
 Darwin and Wallace start with is perfectly true, viz., that more 
 plants and animals are produced annually than can possibly 
 live to maturity. 
 
 Even if they were all to vary " definitely," and be therefore 
 in complete adaptation to the environment, still the majority 
 must die, and that is what Natural Selection represents. 
 
 Then, again, it plays a large part among adult animals and 
 plants which are not concerned with the process of evolving 
 themselves into new varieties. It is their offspring whose 
 business it is to do that. 
 
 There was a great plague of voles in Scotland a few years 
 ago, as also of ladybirds in South England in 1868. But any 
 great excess occasionally occurring is soon checked and Nature 
 returns to the normal supply. Natural Selection, but of course 
 only metaphorically, may be said to have rearranged these 
 matters. 
 
 Similarly among ourselves an epidemic takes place ; one or 
 two victims are carried off from several families ; while the rest 
 are " selected " and survive. 
 
 A few years ago, I had two sorts of strawberries, there being 
 three rows of each kind. When in fruit the mycelium of a 
 fungus formed itself over all the berries of one sort, but not at 
 all on the other kind. 
 
 One more illustration : Many European weeds have found 
 their way into our colonies ; and it is notorious how vigorous 
 
 artificially in a very dry and a very. moist air. The structures, morpho- 
 logical and anatomical, especially developed under these conditions, 
 were precisely those characteristics of desert and marsh plants respec- 
 tively, so that this experimental verification thoroughly corroborates the 
 inductive evidence drawn from the study of plants growing naturally in 
 dry and moist places.
 
 TRUE DARWINISM 
 
 173 
 
 they have become, often completely ousting some of the native 
 plants ; such are watercress and Dutch clover in New Zealand. 
 
 In various ways, therefore, the "struggle for existence" 
 takes place, with " the survival of the strongest or fittest " as 
 the case may be. 
 
 But in no case has it anything to do with any supposed 
 " selection " out of many indefinite variations of structure, as 
 Darwinians say, with the end of establishing a new variety or 
 species. 
 
 As an illustration of the misuse of the term, I will quote 
 the following passage : 
 
 " The general effect of natural selection, at least as regards 
 higher animals, is to produce in the individual organism the 
 power of varying proportionately . . . in response to stimulation, 
 etc" 1 
 
 Read the words I have italicised and the absurdity comes 
 out, for variability, or "the power of varying" is an inherent 
 property of organisms. 
 
 It is the changed conditions of life which call variability 
 into action. 
 
 1 The Present Evolution of Man, by G. A. Reid, p. 116.
 
 Ill 
 
 ADAPTATION (Continued) 
 
 THE reader may be thinking that I have wandered away from 
 my "Critical Examination of Modern Rationalism "; but since 
 Haeckel and Biichner avowedly base their Monism and Materi- 
 alism upon Darwinism, and other rationalistic writers dwell 
 much upon it, my object has been through the preceding 
 sections of this Appendix to show conclusively, first, that 
 Darwinism was founded upon errors ; so that the main prop 
 and stay of Materialistic Monism has no foundation in fact. 
 Secondly, that Darwin's alternative to Natural Selection is, 
 after all, the true and correct interpretation of the origin of 
 species by Evolution. 
 
 The reason why Darwinism is accepted by Materialists as 
 the foundation of their system, appears to be because the 
 whole process of Evolution, if based on Natural Selection, is 
 not reducible to any natural law. It is a mechanical hap- 
 hazard system, which Huxley called a " method of trial and 
 error ". 
 
 Since Natural Selection requires indefinite variations, out 
 of which one or two individuals are selected, the rest perishing, 
 there is no definite relationship between the accidental, favour- 
 able variations and the being's requirements in adaptation to 
 the new environment. If such happen to occur, so far so good ; 
 but if they do not, then all must perish. 
 
 There could scarcely have been a better illustration to dis- 
 prove the whole process of Darwinism, than Darwin's own 
 description of an imaginary " noble and commodious edifice," 
 
 (174)
 
 ADAPTATION 175 
 
 supposed to be built of unprepared stones, in order to explain 
 the process by which he thought species represented by the 
 edifice arose by Natural Selection of accidental variations /.*., 
 the fragments of rock picked up at the base of a cliff. 
 
 " If an architect were to rear a noble and commodious 
 edifice, without the use of cut stone, by selecting from the 
 fragments at the base of a precipice wedge-formed stones for 
 his arches, elongated stones for his lintels and flat stones for 
 his roof, we should admire his skill and regard him as the 
 paramount power. 
 
 "Now, the fragments of stones, though indispensable to 
 the architect, bear to the edifice built by him the same rela- 
 tion [literally, there is none at all] which the fluctuating varia- 
 tions of each organic being bear to the varied and admirable 
 structures ultimately acquired by its modified descendants." 1 
 
 Darwin admits that, with regard to the use to which the 
 fragments of stone may be put, " their shapes may be strictly 
 said to be accidental " ; just as he acknowledges the favourable 
 variations to be accidental, and not occurring in any necessary 
 connection with the requirements of the organism. 
 
 The essential feature which Darwin overlooked is, that // 
 is quite impossible to construct a "noble and commodious 
 edifice" out of unhewn and unprepared stones and with no 
 prepared mortar. No one except prehistoric man or his immedi- 
 ate successors has ever so built a house at all. 
 
 Consequently the argument defeats itself, and, in fact, may 
 be utilised by the Theist who believes in Evolution by natural 
 law ; that as all noble and commodious edifices must be built 
 with stones and bricks prepared by man, so the structure of 
 organisms shows definite natural laws in the evolution of the 
 tissues out of which the organs are built up. 
 
 We see here, as throughout the whole of the organic world, 
 a marked Directivity of a special kind not observable in the 
 inorganic or mineral kingdom. 
 
 Moreover, the further inference is that the architect himself 
 
 1 Animals and Plants under Domestication, ii., p. 430.
 
 176 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 supplies the directivity in the construction of the house, just 
 as the mason and brickmaker do in the manufacture of the 
 materials. 
 
 Hence, by analogy, there must be Mind, somewhere, be- 
 hind the responsive power of protoplasm in making cells, in 
 building up tissues and in the construction of organs and 
 thereby evolving a new variety. 
 
 Now let us turn to Haeckel and see what use he makes of 
 Natural Selection to furnish his Monism with its foundation. 
 
 He has many references to Natural Selection, especially 
 when he treats of man's mental and moral traits. The follow- 
 ing quotations will illustrate what he has to say on this element 
 of Darwinism. 
 
 (1) "No authority can be acknowledged by Rationalism 
 which is not prepared to show that its claims and teachings 
 are consistent with fact and reason." 
 
 (2) " The tyrant who is prepared to ' wade through slaughter 
 to a throne ' becomes an angel of wisdom and love when com- 
 pared with an Almighty designer who plans Evolution of a race 
 of perfect beings from a speck of protoplasm by the tedious, 
 wasteful and agonising process of Natural Selection." 
 
 The two passages here quoted suggest the following re- 
 marks : 
 
 (1) If Rationalists are prepared to follow this sound piece of 
 advice, it is for them to show that the claims of Darwinism are 
 consistent with fact ; for Haeckel and others base their Ration- 
 alism upon it. 
 
 (2) This is a sample of a common style of writing of 
 Rationalists, when they state that it is impossible to reconcile 
 the slaughter of animals and plants with a beneficient Creator. 
 This will be considered on another occasion later on. 
 
 " Darwin gave us the key to the Monistic explanation." 
 " Mechanism alone can give us a true explanation of natural 
 phenomena, etc." l He quotes an observation of Kant's that " It 
 is impossible tp explain the origin of a single blade of grass 
 
 1 See supra, p. 25.
 
 ADAPTATION 177 
 
 by material laws uncontrolled by design," and adds : " Seventy 
 years afterwards Darwin achieved the task which Kant deemed 
 impracticable "- 1 
 
 " Darwin has not only proved by his theory of selection that 
 the orderly processes in the life and structure of animals and 
 plants have arisen by mechanical laws without any preconceived 
 design ; but he has shown us in the ' struggle for life ' the 
 powerful natural force which has exerted supreme control over 
 the entire course of organic evolution for millions of years." 2 
 
 " He discovered in the principle of selection that direct 
 cause of transformism which Lamarck had missed." 3 
 
 Other Rationalistic authors, as Biichner and the anonymous 
 author of Mr. Bal/our s Apologetics and many others, write in 
 the same strain, endeavouring to account for everything, 
 material, physiological and psychical by the Deus ex Machind, 
 Natural Selection. 
 
 It is, therefore, most important to lay emphasis on the fact 
 that not only has Darwin, Wallace, or any of their followers 
 never brought forward a single instance of the evolution of a 
 plant or animal in the wild state, which could be shown to be 
 in accordance with Darwinism ; but, on the other hand, all 
 positive evidence inductive and experimental establishes the 
 totally different method of procedure which Darwin himself 
 foreshadowed. 
 
 Indeed, Evolution by Adaptation, on the one hand, and 
 Natural Selection on the other, afford good illustrations respec- 
 tively of the Inductive and Deductive methods of reasoning, 
 when nothing but probabilities are to be had instead of axiom- 
 atic truths. 
 
 Evolution, per se, is based on an enormous number of 
 facts, of great variety and world-wide distribution, as well as 
 revealed in the past history of life by palaeontology. This 
 inductive evidence is most strongly corroborated by " experi- 
 mental proof" derived from cultivation and domestication ; so 
 that at the present day Evolution stands on an impregnable 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 266. 2 P. 276. s P. 80. 
 
 12
 
 I 7 S PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 basis ; and the very suggestion of any alternative is quite un- 
 thinkable. 
 
 When, however, we turn to Nature and try to discover how 
 Evolution has come about ; that is to say, how and under what 
 circumstances, variations of structure make their appearance, 
 become fixed, and so give rise to new varieties and species, we 
 have the two alternatives which Darwin laid before us Adap- 
 tation and Natural Selection. 
 
 The former is based on as innumerable a supply of facts 
 as Evolution itself, because, as we have seen, it lies at the 
 foundation of Evolution or may be said to be identical with it. 
 Given the responsive power of protoplasm and some new con- 
 ditions of life Evolution is the result. 
 
 On the other hand, Natural Selection is based on two as- 
 sumptions : (i) that individual differences give rise to variations 
 of a sufficient amount and constancy to have a selective value ; 
 (2) that when new conditions of life are present, the offspring 
 vary indefinitely. On these two hypothetical "axioms" 
 Natural Selection was considered as solving all problems in the 
 organic world, including man and his psychological phenomena, 
 and even to include death ! 
 
 Natural Selection is thus quite comparable to the numerous 
 "final causes" or "designs" of the older Ideologists' a priori 
 assumptions without an inductive basis they easily explained 
 everything by assuming that it was "designed". Such, at 
 once, put a barrier to all further investigations ; and so does a 
 belief in Natural Selection. 
 
 Bacon saw the utterly unphilosophical character of this 
 deductive method of reasoning : " The handling of final causes, 
 mixed with the rest in physical enquiries, hath intercepted the 
 severe and diligent enquiry of all real and physical causes, and 
 given men the occasion to stay upon these satisfactory and 
 specious causes, to the great arrest and prejudice of further 
 discovery "- 1 
 
 Natural Selection has had a precisely similar effect. It has 
 1 De Augment. Sc., ii., 105.
 
 ADAPTATION 179 
 
 been invoked at every turn and step in biological inquiries. 
 It has been assumed that any result, bodily or mental, could 
 be attributed to Natural Selection. 
 
 The following example, will illustrate the difference between 
 the ways a teleologist and an Evolutionist would regard the same 
 phenomenon, Rev. W. Kirby, in the second volume of his 
 Bridgewater Treatise, dealing with the history, habits and 
 instincts of animals (1835), says of the hermit crabs, " whose 
 abdomen being naked, and unprotected by any hard crust, their 
 Creator has given them an instinct, which teaches them to com- 
 pensate this seeming defect, by getting possession of some 
 univalve shell, suited to their size, which becomes their habi- 
 tation, and which they carry about with them as if they were its 
 proper inhabitants. These crabs are particularly formed for 
 the habit that distinguishes them." After describing several 
 points of structure in adaptation to their abode, Mr. Kirby 
 concludes, " This whole structure proves that they are formed 
 with this particular view of inhabiting shells of a very different 
 tribe of animals ". 
 
 An Evolutionist inverts this interpretation. The "crabs," 
 having chosen to live in shells for some reason or other, 
 possibly for concealment to catch their passing prey, just as 
 some fishes bury themselves in the mud for a similar purpose, 
 degeneration from disuse has set in, and the hinder part 
 has modified itself as to become adapted to the shell ; so 
 that now the hermit crabs cannot exist without such a pro- 
 tection. 
 
 Design is always in anticipation of a use ; adaptation is 
 always the result of it whether it bring about degeneration or 
 enhancement ; usually both occur simultaneously. 
 
 Hence under Evolution, as I have already stated, structure 
 is never made at first in anticipation of a future requirement ; 
 but when once established by use or adaptation, then it is 
 developed before its use can be employed, as in the forma- 
 tion of the eye of a mammal while as a foetus. 
 
 Natural Selection does not hesitate to use Ideological
 
 i8o PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 language, and, unwittingly it may be, is sometimes as teleolo- 
 gical as Paley himself. 
 
 Indeed, if Natural Selection gave the death-blow to teleology, 
 it also revived it ; for it is somewhat astonishing to read the 
 many a priori assumptions of writers who attribute uses to 
 structures without testing them by experiment. Thus one 
 asserts that holly has spinescent leaves up to a certain height to 
 keep off browsing animals, but that it bears non-spinescent 
 leaves at heights they cannot reach. Not only is this by no 
 means a common condition, for trees are often entirely 
 spinescent from twelve to twenty feet in height ; but cows will 
 sometimes destroy a holly bush. Moreover, when the leaves are 
 young the spines are no protection whatever, being as flexible 
 as india-rubber. 
 
 Mr. Poulton in his Colour of Animals writes : " A very 
 beautiful and familiar illustration is given by Mr. Wallace 
 the white, upturned tail of the rabbit, by which the young and 
 inexperienced or the least wary individuals are shown the way 
 to the burrow. . . . The tail of the rabbit only becomes con- 
 spicuous when it is needed by other individuals of the same 
 species, and when the animal is already alarmed and in full 
 retreat for a place of security". Upon which Dr. James 
 Iverach observes : * " Another interpretation quite as plausible, 
 though lacking in the conspicuous element of utility to the 
 rabbit, is that the tail of the rabbit is of great advantage to 
 the dog who pursues it, for it directs his path straight to the 
 mark ; or to the sportsman who knows at once where to shoot. 
 In these instances the possession of the white tail is of disad- 
 vantage to the rabbit." 
 
 I quite agree with Dr. Iverach when alluding to the free 
 use Darwinians make of Natural Selection : " Natural Selection 
 is itself described as a metaphor; but as soon as we begin 
 to work with it, its metaphorical character disappears and it 
 becomes intensely real, and is quite capable of doing anything". 2 
 
 This is illustrated by Darwin's attempt to account for the 
 
 1 Evolution and Christianity, p. 119. 1 Op. cit., p. 121.
 
 ADAPTATION 181 
 
 structure of the mammalian eye, as comparable with the 
 structure of an optical instrument. If the reader will refer 
 back to my quotation of it he will find at least twenty supposi- 
 tions. Granting these, he concludes : " May we not believe 
 that a living optical instrument might thus be formed, as 
 superior to one of glass as the works of the Creator are to 
 those of man ? " l 
 
 On the other hand, I would say, recognise the universal 
 pov/er of response in protoplasm to external conditions in 
 the case of the eye it is light then the human eye could be, 
 and has been, evolved probably from some pigment spot on 
 the skin. 
 
 Since the preceding was written, the second edition of 
 the Text-book of Botany, by Strasburger, Noll, Schenck and 
 Schimper has appeared (1903). 
 
 In the first edition (1898) after describing Darwin's theory, 
 the authors mention some difficulties, such as the one often 
 made that "organs which would be incapable of exercising 
 their functions until in an advanced state of development," etc. 
 
 This paragraph is replaced by another in which they adopt 
 the view of Evolution by direct Adaptation as follows : " It 
 would appear . . . that the starting point for the origin of 
 new species is not afforded by the ' fluctuating variations ' 
 [individual differences] which continually occur, but by 
 more marked variations which have been termed ' Mutations '. 
 [They are here referring to Hugo de Vries' Die Mutations- 
 theorie, 1901.] The tendency is to assume the existence of 
 a development of the organic world due to original innate 
 capabilities of the living substance and not dependent on 
 selection. 
 
 "The origin of the large subdivisions of the animal and 
 vegetable kingdoms, the 'archetypes,' would be due to this sort 
 of Evolution. These archetypes have been, and are still, con- 
 tinually influenced by the environment, and by their reaction 
 to external conditions organisms have become more or less 
 1 Origin of Species, p. 146.
 
 i82 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 directly adapted. In this way striking resemblances in ex- 
 ternal form have arisen between organisms living under similar 
 conditions although belonging to different archetypes. [Com- 
 pare Cactacece. of Mexico with Euphorbias, Stapelias, etc., of 
 South Africa.] The progressive Evolution of the archetypes 
 as well as the direct adaptations to external conditions shown 
 by them [cultural experiments] are independent of selection." 1 
 
 1 A Text-book of Botany, Introduction, p. 3 (1903). I have already 
 called attention to Dr. Schimper's Botanical Geography on a Physiological 
 Basis. In other words, it is interpreted by " Adaptation to the Environ- 
 ment ". He was one of the contributors to this Text-book.
 
 IV 
 
 HEREDITY OF ACQUIRED CHARACTERS, A FUNDAMENTAL 
 PRINCIPLE OF EVOLUTION 
 
 As the raison d'etre of this book is the refutation of the basis 
 of Materialistic Monism, this chapter must be considered as 
 subsidiary to Evolution by Adaptation. 
 
 Darwin saw clearly that Evolution could not go on unless 
 acquired characters were hereditary. But Weismann steps in 
 with his theory of germ-plasm and limits heredity to its agency, 
 denying that the soma can acquire characters which can be 
 communicated to the germ-plasm, as being too deep-seated, and 
 so become hereditary. 
 
 My object, therefore, is limited to proving that the soma 
 does acquire characters, and that too in plants long before there 
 are any reproductive organs present. These latter, however, 
 viz., the flowers and fruits, do reproduce the characters, when 
 their seeds grow up, which were acquired by the vegetative 
 organs of the parents. 
 
 In the third page of The Origin of Species, Darwin 
 speaks of "the strong principle of inheritance so that any 
 selected variation will tend to propagate its new and modified 
 form". 
 
 This " tendency to heredity " was fully corroborated by M. 
 E. A. Carriere so long ago as 1865, in his work, Production et 
 Fixation des Varietes dans les Vegetaux, in which he says : 
 " Faisons aussi remarquer que les diverse combinaisons faits 
 pour en obtenir de nouvelles, reposent sur cette loi ge"ne"rale que, 
 dans la nature tout tend a se reproduire et meme a s'&endre, 
 
 (183)
 
 i8 4 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 que par consequent les modifications preuvent non-seulement 
 devenir he>editaires, mais qu'elles preuvent encore servir de 
 moyen pour arriver a d'autres modifications, a e"tendre et a 
 multiplier de plus en plus les series typiques." 
 
 Weismann and those who agree with him, contrary to 
 Darwin and H. Spencer, maintain that " characters acquired 
 by the soma are not transmissible ". Darwin based his theory 
 on a vast accumulation of facts derived from the cultivation of 
 plants and the domestication of animals, and thence deduced 
 the above opposite conclusion. Take, for example, the cab- 
 bage. Brassica okracea produces no varieties in the wild 
 state. It has done so to a very large extent under cultivation. 
 They have developed or " acquired " characters thereby, 
 through the complex and richer soils, as compared with that 
 of their native habitat. 
 
 The " acquired characters " of broccoli, Brussels sprouts, 
 greens, savoys, etc., are now fixed and hereditary. 
 
 What is true for the cabbage is true for all other garden 
 races. 
 
 If evidence is required from natural conditions, it is 
 abundantly forthcoming. Indeed, how Evolution could exist 
 at all without the transmission of characters acquired by the 
 soma is inconceivable. 
 
 It is asserted by the present Darwinians that the earlier 
 writers, as Herbert Spencer, Cope and Darwin, as well as the 
 later, Haeckel, Biichner, assume the point ; but bring forward 
 no experimental evidence. 
 
 The probability is that the inductive evidence is so over- 
 whelming that it becomes a " moral certainty " and axiomatic, 
 and so needs no " demonstration ". Hence Darwin never saw 
 any necessity for demonstrating so obvious a fact. 
 
 Still, as Weismann and others have put in a negation, one 
 must attempt to show where the fallacy lies. 
 
 Mr. Adam Sedgwick, for example, in a paper read before 
 the British Association, 1899, and published in Nature, 2ist 
 September, 1899, asks the question: "Is it possible by sub-
 
 HEREDITY OF ACQUIRED CHARACTERS 185 
 
 mitting an organism to a certain set of conditions, and thus 
 causing it to acquire certain characters, so to modify its repro- 
 ductive organs, that the same characters will appear in its 
 offspring as the result of the application of a different and 
 simpler stimulus ? " l 
 
 He then sums up " the argument as it at present stands : 
 (i) A change in conditions cannot affect the next generation 
 unless the reproductive organs are affected ; (2) from a con-' 
 sideration of the facts of the case, it is almost inconceivable 
 that the effect produced upon any organ of a given organism 
 by a change of conditions should so modify the reproductive 
 organs of that organism as to lead to a corresponding modifica- 
 tion in the offspring without the latter being exposed to the same 
 conditions [my italics] ; (3) the only effects which are certainly 
 known of changed conditions upon the reproductive organs 
 are (a) the production of sterility ; (b) an increase in genetic 
 variability." 
 
 Of these three propositions the first and second are 
 hypothetical. 
 
 Would it not have been better to study Nature to see what 
 happens ; and then argue from facts, so as to discover whether 
 the reproductive system does or does not bring out acquired 
 characters in the offspring? 
 
 In the first place, to demand the re-appearance of characters 
 acquired by an adult parent, i.e., during its growth from infancy 
 to maturity, in the first generation, is to ask for what Nature 
 does supply in full measure ; as for example in experiments 
 with the seed of wild parsnips, carrots, radishes, etc. Not 
 only does the increase in the size of the root " acquired " by 
 the first seeds sown reappear in the next, but it becomes 
 intensified ; i.e., of course, when sown in good garden soil. 
 
 But to ask if the acquired characters appear when the 
 offspring is removed to another environment is simply to ask 
 Nature to undo all that the parent had done for the next 
 
 1 It is not very clear what is meant by " a different and simpler " 
 stimulus.
 
 i86 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 generation. It is to demand Nature to violate her own 
 natural laws. 
 
 The rule is simply this, at least for plants : " Seeds are 
 sown in a new soil. They may grow up in some respects 
 different from the parent form by acquiring new characters. 
 If their seeds be sown in the same soil, under precisely the same 
 conditions^ the characters acquired by the parent will not only 
 be repeated by inheritance but intensified in the next, and 
 still more so in each succeeding generation. They then tend 
 to become fixed; so that after five or six years the characters 
 are fully formed, fixed and become permanently hereditary. 
 Such is the experience of agriculturists and horticulturists. 
 
 Any demands outside these conditions are hypothetical 
 and unreasonable. 
 
 The reader will observe that certain points are overlooked 
 by the Darwinian. First, the acquiring any new character is 
 done by the individual during the period of its development 
 from seed to maturity. Secondly, the seed of the next year 
 must be sown in the same conditions. It is useless to ask for 
 proof when the arbitrary condition of removing the offspring 
 to new conditions is demanded. Thus the late Prof. Jas. 
 Buckman, experimenting with seed from the wild cabbage, soon 
 secured several varieties under cultivation, "the tendency to 
 vary being much increased by repeated transplantation ". On 
 the other hand, he adds: "It may be remarked, as throwing 
 light on the nature of the changes by which the cultivated 
 varieties of this genus have been attained, that experiments 
 with seeds of plants showing any particular tendency, and 
 especially if repeatedly grown in the same soil, will ever result 
 in an increase of the peculiarity ".* 
 
 It may be added that if the offspring did not reproduce the 
 character at all, but had to acquire the same amottnt of change 
 as the parent, how could the full amount seen in our established 
 races of plants and breeds of cattle ever be obtained ? Each 
 generation adds an increment to its predecessor. I would call 
 
 1 The Treasury of Botany, s. v. "Brassica".
 
 HEREDITY OF ACQUIRED CHARACTERS 187 
 
 attention to the fact that in all the cabbage tribe the acquired 
 characters are secured before the flowers are developed. 
 
 I have no right to call upon a Darwinian who does not 
 believe in the heredity of acquired characters to "prove a 
 negative". It therefore is incumbent upon me to show, as 
 I have done above, on what grounds I most undoubtedly hold 
 to the view which Darwin maintained ; so I will now state the 
 position of a Darwinian as given to me by letter. 
 
 He says : " What is really in question is the power of the 
 individual to transmit to its descendants, not the tendency to 
 modification, but the actual modifications themselves ". 
 
 It is easy to see how this difficulty arises in the mind of 
 a Darwinian, for since any character which happens to have 
 appeared was a favourable one and preserved by Natural Selec- 
 tion, he has nothing to account for its appearance nor why 
 it may not be a fluctuating and transient "individual differ- 
 ence," or why it should reappear, especially if the conditions 
 of life be changed. 
 
 On the other hand, according to the law of self-adaptation 
 to the environment, it is totally otherwise. 
 
 To my correspondent's observations I would remark that 
 the transmission of the " tendency " is only recognised by the 
 reappearance of the acquired 'character, and the parent has 
 no other means of imparting the "modifications themselves" 
 than by giving its offspring the "tendency" and power to 
 reproduce them. 
 
 But this is hardly a correct way of stating the case. It is 
 not so much an inherited as an inherent tendency to respond 
 to the environment ; but having done so in one generation the 
 next has an increased power of response, since it not only 
 reproduces the amount acquired by its parent but adds to it. 
 
 Let us consider what really takes place. All organisms 
 arise from ova. When the egg is discharged or laid by the 
 parent, as in all oviparous creatures, or when the seeds and 
 spores are shed in the vegetable kingdom, they are no longer 
 under the influence of the parent. How, then, can any " actual
 
 i88 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 modification " which may not appear till long after the offspring 
 is hatched have been directly transmitted ? Is it not obvious 
 that the only thing which the parent can communicate to the 
 egg is the tendency, coupled of course with the capacity, i.e., in 
 a potential way, of reproducing the modification in due course ? 
 
 In the water-crowfoot, to be described below, the modifica- 
 tion, which has arisen in consequence of submergence, is the 
 dissected foliage, and this "actual modification " is not in the 
 seed ; nevertheless it appears subsequently. 
 
 If it be a viviparous being, in which the "actual modifica- 
 tions " are looked for, as transmitted by the parents to the off- 
 spring when born ; then I would say that we must still look to 
 the ovum for any potentialities in the fetus. 1 
 
 To return to my correspondent, he says : "It may be 
 sufficient to observe that no ' Darwinian ' doubts that the in- 
 dividual organism can be modified directly or by the action 
 of the environment ; or that the tendency to modification 
 [variability], being part of the congenital endowment of the 
 individual, is subject to heredity; and may be strengthened 
 during successive generations by selection, whether natural or 
 artificial. . . . The results of cultivation, as carrots and 
 radishes, have been reached by the aid of selection." 
 
 With the sentence which I have italicised I would at once 
 join issue. " Artificial Selection," which really means merely 
 " isolation," by the removal of others, has nothing to do with 
 any " strengthening," as he calls it. 
 
 It is inconceivable to me how the mere pulling up of all its 
 neighbours, so as to leave a plant alone, can be supposed to 
 
 1 One generally expects the best and truest criticisms in Nature ; in 
 which journal the reviewer of my little book, The Story of Wild Flowers, 
 thus writes : " Most open to criticism are the explanations offered of the 
 origin of certain structural and habitual features, by the inheritance of 
 the effects of repeated stimuli ". 
 
 If the words I have italicised mean that " the origin " of anything 
 is due to " inheritance," a moment's thought would have told the writer 
 that " the origin of structural features" must come before they can be 
 inherited. The cart has somehow got in front of the horse !
 
 HEREDITY OF ACQUIRED CHARACTERS 189 
 
 act in any such process. Indeed, the neighbouring plants 
 need not even touch or be near the individual to be selected. 
 There need be no struggle for existence at all. 
 
 What really takes place is, I repeat, the continuance of the 
 direct or definite action of the environment ; which first induced 
 the modification to arise ; and brings about an increased re- 
 petition of the acquired character in the offspring. 
 
 The garden parsnip, raised from seed of a wild plant, 
 described above, would grow bigger and bigger in every genera- 
 tion, if only one seed were planted so as to avoid selection 
 altogether. 
 
 My Darwinian correspondent appears to fall into the 
 common error of attributing some influence to natural and 
 artificial selection. All that selection does is to record what 
 lives and what dies. Hence, its province in Nature is confined 
 to the Distribution of animals and plants alone. 
 
 It is for the present Darwinian to prove what influence it 
 can have, especially as Darwin distinctly describes it as being 
 only a metaphorical expression. 
 
 Natural Selection, if we retain the phrase, of course, occurs 
 everywhere. It is a " natural law," but a natural law only means 
 "an observed order of facts ". 
 
 Thus it is easily seen to be a universal feature in Nature 
 that wherever beings are crowded, many die and a lesser number 
 live, whether they be animals or plants. If a fever breaks 
 out in any district in London, some catch it and perhaps die, 
 others do not. 
 
 The causes of death may be due to constitution, etc., but in 
 no case is it due to injurious varietal structural characters. 
 
 That is all that is meant by Natural Selection. 
 
 If it be maintained that Natural Selection implies more or 
 has any " strengthening " powers, it is for the Darwinian to 
 prove it. 
 
 I will now proceed to give concrete examples in illustration 
 of the preceding remarks. There are two lines of " proof" open 
 to a scientist ; who, however, should, wherever it be possible,
 
 IQO PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 try to combine both. One is INDUCTIVE, the other EXPERI- 
 MENTAL evidence. Now, I seem to notice that it is mainly 
 zoologists who deny that " acquired characters " are hereditary. 
 Whether this is because they lay little or no value on inductive 
 evidence at all events, they do not always realise the fact that 
 sufficient inductive evidence requires no experimental proof in 
 addition or whether it be because animals do not lend them- 
 selves so readily to experimental verification as plants, I cannot 
 undertake to say. The latter, however, as it seems to me, afford 
 overwhelming proof along both lines of evidence. I shall give, 
 therefore, what I regard as convincing examples of both 
 methods, thereby demonstrating the heredity of acquired 
 characters. 
 
 First, with regard to experimental verification. Darwin 
 based his theory mainly on observations upon Animals and 
 Plants under Domestication, which he published in two volumes 
 with this title. 
 
 I will therefore take one or two cases from the cultivation 
 of plants. 
 
 If seed of the wild radish, carrot, parsnip or cabbage be 
 collected and we sow them in a well-prepared garden soil they 
 will all grow very vigorously. They need not be crowded ; 
 and at the end of the season the roots of the first three kinds 
 instead of being slender in size but tough and wiry in texture 
 will be found to have " acquired " a certain degree of fleshiness. 
 Taking seed from one such plant and sowing it as before, 
 under the same conditions, the roots of the second generation 
 will be larger than those of the first generation ; an increment 
 has been added to what was acquired by the first generation. 
 Repeating this process for some five or six generations a fine 
 kitchen-garden "root" will be obtained. It will then have 
 become "fixed," having arrived at what may be called the 
 " average maximum " size. 
 
 Such, then, is an experimental proof of the heredity of 
 acquired "somatic" or "vegetative" characters. 
 
 Similar experimental proof is applicable to all root crops,
 
 HEREDITY OF ACQUIRED CHARACTERS 191 
 
 as well as to all the many forms of cabbage, kale, cauliflowers, 
 etc., which are derived from the wild plant of our sea-cliffs, 
 Brassica oleracea. It applies to the various forms of parsley, 
 beans, peas, etc., and, among flowers, to wallflowers, nasturtiums, 
 snapdragons, foxgloves and many others which have produced 
 "races" without the element of hybridisation, with which I 
 am not now concerned. 
 
 If a Darwinian says that these results have been reached 
 by " Artificial Selection " then it is for him to prove that it has 
 anything to do with them. 
 
 The following are illustrations proving how a merely 
 mechanical force can affect plants, producing characters which 
 can not only be acquired but become fixed and hereditary. 
 
 Pliny tells us that in his day the Greeks had discovered 
 a way of converting the " female " or long-rooted rape into the 
 " male " or turnip-rooted form by sowing the seed in a stiff 
 soil. I have already had a previous occasion to mention 
 the fact that M. Carriere in raising "radishes" from the wild 
 Raphanus Raphanistrum, which has a long wiry root, also 
 found that he obtained a larger proportion of long-rooted 
 forms in a loose soil, and of turnip-rooted ones in a stiff soil. 1 
 
 Lastly, M. H. de Varigny refers to M. Languet de Sivry's 
 experiments with the wild carrot, and who met with precisely 
 similar results. 2 
 
 At the present day these various forms of roots have become 
 " fixed" and "come true" by heredity. We seem, therefore, 
 to have incontrovertible evidence of the heredity of somatic 
 characters originating from a merely more or less obstructive 
 soil. 
 
 Moreover, these characters are all acquired long before 
 any sexual apparatus is present in the plants themselves that 
 first acquired them. 
 
 1 Origine des Plantes Domestiques demontree par la Culture du Radis 
 Sauvage. See above, p. 164. 
 
 2 Experimental Evolution, by H. de Varigny, quoting from Societe 
 Royals et Centrale d' 'Agriculture, se'r. 2, vol. ii., 1846-47, p. 539.
 
 192 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Let us now take a case of a suddenly "acquired size" 
 in a native plant. M. Hugo de Vries collected seed from 
 semi-wild plants of (Enothera Lamarckiana and sowed them in 
 the Botanic Garden of Amsterdam in 1887. In 1888 a new 
 and dwarf form appeared among them. "Ces nains m'ont 
 donn6 de leurs grains une race que j'ai cultive"e jusqu'en 1894." 
 He named it nanella. 
 
 Similarly, in 1895, a new variety appeared which he called 
 gigas. By self-fertilisation he secured 450 plants in 1897, which 
 "sans aucune exception, avaient les caracteres decrits . . . pour 
 1' QLnothera gigas. . . . La nouvelle espece etait done constante 
 des la premiere generation, sans trace d'atavisme." 
 
 He regards nanella as a " variety," but gigas and five others 
 he names "mutantes," as being of a higher character and equiva- 
 lent to new " species ". " On appelle ces nouvelles productions 
 des mutantes, comme on appelle des variantes les individus 
 diffe'rant du type moyen sous le rapport de la variabilite in- 
 dividuelle. Les mutantes sont les produits directs des muta- 
 tions, elles proviennent d'une autre espece et n'ont eu, parmi 
 leurs ai'eux, autant qu'on connait leur histoire, aucun qui ait 
 eu la meme forme." 
 
 In M. Hugo de Vries' experiments x here quoted, he found 
 that actually new species according to his opinion appeared 
 suddenly (such was (Enothera gigas, a robust plant) and re- 
 mained fixed from the very date of their appearance. Darwin 
 had a somewhat similar experience with a tall white-flowered 
 Mimulus luteus, which came up in the third year, among his 
 sowings. It was so prolific by self-fertilisation that it com- 
 pletely outstripped the intercrossed plants in the proportion of 
 147 capsules to 100 of the latter. 2 
 
 The first and important observation is that selection had 
 nothing to do with either the appearance or continuance of 
 these forms. 
 
 1 " Recherches Expgrimentales sur 1'Origine des Especes," Revue 
 Generate de Botanique, vol. xiii., p. 5 (Jan. 1901). 
 2 Cross and Self-fertilisation of Plants, pp. 79, 348.
 
 HEREDITY OF ACQUIRED CHARACTERS 193 
 
 The second is that none of the six or seven " mutantes " of 
 M. Vries ever occurred wild ; but resulted from their being 
 cultivated under the artificial conditions of a garden. Such has, 
 of course, been the case with all cultivated races of flowers, 
 fruits and vegetables. 
 
 Hence, their characters were in all cases "acquired" in 
 response to the direct action of the environment ; and as M. 
 H. de Vries proved, the acquired characters reappeared from 
 the first generation onwards, and so proved themselves to be 
 hereditary. 
 
 The idea that " the reproductive organs cannot be affected " 
 is at once disproved by the acquired characters reappearing in 
 the seedlings. 
 
 I had much talk with the late Prof. Sickenberger, of the 
 School of Medicine, Cairo, when in Egypt some years ago ; 
 and he was good enough to give me the following information : 
 " I have read with great interest your publication on Dr. 
 Weismann's theory, and I am very glad to see that your con- 
 clusions are entirely in accordance with my own observations. 
 I believe, if Weismann had had more special knowledge of 
 botanical matters he would not have undertaken to apply 
 his theory to plants. You have completely refuted l by your 
 explanations his assertion that a continuity of germ-plasm 
 exists in a certain series of somatic cells only. I cannot admit 
 any essential difference of characters between species and 
 varieties. Such being only due to greater or less degree of 
 qualities acquired by the influence of external conditions in 
 a longer or shorter time. Hybridisation comes in, in a second- 
 ary way, mixing those acquired qualities with another series. 
 Hereditary persistency is, I believe, nothing else than the 
 maintenance of those acquired qualities under the power of 
 inertia (gesetz der Tragheit). The more any acquired qualities 
 have changed the anatomical and chemical constitution of a 
 plant, so much the more will those qualities be persistent. If 
 
 lu Dr. Weismann's Theory of Heredity applied to Plants," Natural 
 Science, vol. i., p. 171, 1882. 
 
 13
 
 i 94 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Weismann says ' acquired characters cannot be transmitted at 
 all,' every day in Egypt contradicts this opinion, and the fact 
 that ' species of plants in Egypt have remained unchanged for 
 thousands of years ' proves only that the climatic conditions 
 of Egypt have remained all the time unchanged. 
 
 " On the other hand, seeds of ' gignut,' a variety of Cannabis 
 sativa from Europe, produces by the third generation the true 
 Cannabis sativa yarn. Black mustard, Brassica nigra, is trans- 
 formed into the endemic B. bracteolata, Mayer, in the second 
 generation. Also the thick-rooted celery assumes in the first 
 year the much foliated form with a thin root-stock, like the 
 summer spontaneous form of Egypt. 
 
 " I have had myself the opportunity of substantiating these 
 facts several times. 
 
 " On the other hand, it must be proved that external influ- 
 ences are acting in other ways upon the germ-plasm than 
 upon the somato-plasm. All action in Nature is based upon 
 chemical and physical forces so that really the constitution 
 of the pretended germ-plasm must be different from that of the 
 somato-plasm."
 
 HEREDITY OF ACQUIRED CHARACTERS 
 (Continued) 
 
 The mass of evidence now to be considered is the " induc- 
 tive". Scientists are perfectly willing to accept this line of 
 proof in other branches of knowledge than biology. 
 
 Thus, physicists tell us they know a good deal about the 
 composition of the sun. Experimental chemical proof is ob- 
 viously out of the question. Their knowledge is based on the 
 accumulation of coincidences. The first discovered was that 
 between the line D in the solar spectrum and the mono- 
 chromatic yellow bar seen in vapourised soda. So far, it was 
 a single or merely remarkable coincidence and nothing more. 
 But when it was found that numerous other elements could be 
 " paralleled " with lines in the spectrum, the coincidences 
 became so numerous that physicists accepted this induction as 
 ample evidence to "prove" that the same substance existed 
 in the sun. 
 
 Similarly is it with all the influences deducible from palaeont- 
 ology, as, e.g., the famous genealogy of the horse from the 
 five-toed primogenital Eohippus, or whatever it may be called, 
 in the eocene strata through a succession of three-toed forms, 
 as the Hipparion. etc., till the one-toed Equus is reached. 
 
 This satisfied Huxley that it undoubtedly indicated the 
 line of Evolution of our domesticated horse of to-day. 
 
 But this conviction is based on purely inductive, that is, 
 accumulative evidences. Any experimental verification of ex- 
 tinct animals is obviously impossible. 
 
 (195)
 
 ig6 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 So, too, we may apply this line of argument to existing 
 plants and animals. The difficulty only lies in selecting from 
 the enormous mass of such evidence at our disposal. 
 
 Since it has been found experimentally how easily most 
 plants will change their structures and forms as soon as they 
 are grown in very different soils and climates from those of 
 their natural habitats, one naturally infers that they will behave 
 in Nature in a way analogous to that which they do under 
 cultivation ; provided the change of environment can furnish 
 a sufficient stimulus, as does a richly prepared garden soil. 
 
 Linnaeus long ago (1763), noticed that when he studied 
 batches of plants received from foreign countries, there was 
 often a certain superficial fades or likeness between many of 
 them ; though there need not have been any real affinities : 
 "Primo intuitu distinguit saepius exercitatus botannicus plantas 
 Africae, Asiae, Americae, Alpiumque, etc. " l 
 
 Modern botanists have applied the term "representative" 
 to plants when they live in widely different countries and may 
 be either different species of the same genus or plants of no 
 affinity, but assume similar vegetative forms or physiognomy. 
 
 Thus many members of the family Cactacea inhabiting hot, 
 dry, rocky districts of Mexico, strikingly resemble species of 
 the genus Euphorbia in the hot but dry regions of Africa, as 
 well as the Stapelias of South Africa and Adenium of Arabia, etc. 
 All these, though belonging to totally different families, yet 
 have similar columnar, thick, fleshy, leafless but spiny stems. 
 
 In all species of Euphorbia living in Europe, there is no 
 tendency whatever to produce the cactus-like stem. It only 
 appears under similar climatic and other conditions of life in 
 which the cacti themselves live. 
 
 The induction, therefore, is that, first, the tendency to pro- 
 duce the fleshy stem has arisen through the influences or 
 "direct and definite action," as Darwin called it, of the 
 specially dry environment 
 
 But this tendency has now become a fixed character ; im- 
 
 1 See Origin of Plant Structures, p. 13.
 
 HEREDITY OF ACQUIRED CHARACTERS 197 
 
 manent in the life of the plants, so that the fleshy stem, to- 
 gether with its other characteristics, are reproduced whenever 
 the plants in question are raised from seed as in England, that 
 is under totally different conditions of life from those of their 
 natural habitats. 
 
 So that not only the tendency but the power to produce 
 the actual modifications is hereditary. 
 
 The above cases illustrate what happens to plants where 
 they grow in very dry, hot and barren regions. Let us now 
 see what takes place in water. 
 
 A common feature in aquatic dicotyledonous plants is to 
 have the blades of their submerged leaves finely divided into 
 capillary segments. This occurs in numerous plants of as many 
 families and of no affinity between them. The following are a 
 few examples : the water-crowfoot (Ranunculacece) ; Cabomba, 
 (Nymphceacece) ; water milfoil, (Haloragece) ; Helosciadium in- 
 undatum ( Umbellifera) ; water violet (Primulacece) ; Ccrato- 
 phyllum {Ceratophyllece) ; and many others might be named. 
 
 Moreover, not only do we see completely formed leaves or 
 leaflets in allied terrestrial species as of buttercups compared 
 with Ranunculus trichophyllus, or in Helosciadium nodiflorum, 
 etc., but both forms of leaf may be borne by the same plant, if 
 it have some floating on or raised above the water, and others 
 below it ; as in Ranunculus heterophyllus, Cabomba, Proscr- 
 pinaca, etc. 
 
 Indeed, it frequently happens that a leaf is so situated that 
 half of it develops under water and the other half in the air. 
 When this is the case, the former is divided into fine, thread- 
 like segments, and the latter half is flat and complete. More- 
 over, the anatomical tissues of the former are adapted to a sub- 
 merged life, while these of the latter are equally so for the air. 
 
 It not infrequently happens when Ranunculus trichophyllus, 
 which is normally entirely submerged, is growing very crowded 
 in a small pond, that some of its branches are forced upwards 
 so as to grow into the air ; then all parts above the water-line 
 grow in adaptation to an aerial existence ; all below the line
 
 198 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 being suited for a submerged life. Other plants, as the water 
 milfoil, do the same thing. 
 
 On the other hand, some species have degenerated to a 
 greater degree so that they have lost this power of adaptation. 
 Such I found to be the case with R. circinatus (?) and Elodea 
 canadensis, both of which sent up several shoots into the 
 air when grown in a bowl of water ; but in no case were aerial 
 leaves produced, as they shrivelled up at once and perished 
 just as sea-weeds do. 
 
 I think the reader will now see that coincidences between 
 the divided modification of the leaf-blade with normal sub- 
 mergence are as numerous as the agreements between the 
 absorption bands in the solar spectrum and the coloured bands 
 of vapourised elements. 
 
 If the induction is perfectly legitimate in the latter it must 
 be equally so in the former, which has the additional aid of 
 experimental corroboration. The inevitable conclusion is that 
 the dissected type of foliage seen in these submerged leaves is 
 the "actual modification" produced by the watery medium in 
 which the plants live. That is to say, the latter is the stimulus 
 to which the living protoplasm responds and has brought about 
 the structure in question. 
 
 Mr. Herbert Spencer expressed this in his generalisation : 
 " Under new conditions the organism immediately begins to 
 undergo certain changes in structure fitting it for its new con- 
 ditions ". 
 
 The next point to notice is that the dissected leaf is 
 hereditary. When I brought this case of the dissected foliage 
 of submerged plants before my Darwinian friend he observed : 
 "Experimental evidence of the truth of your view as to the 
 submerged leaves of dicotyledons is still lacking ". He is not 
 alone in not realising the fact that the above inductive evidence 
 was amply sufficient to establish a natural law, and really needs 
 no experimental evidence ; still, as such has now been obtained, 
 it is satisfactory to find that the inductive evidence was correct 
 and conclusive without any experiment at all.
 
 HEREDITY OF ACQUIRED CHARACTERS 199 
 
 The proof has been found in experiments with Proscrpinaca 
 palustris, a plant of the United States of the same family as our 
 water milfoil and mare's-tail (Haloragece). This plant is am- 
 phibious ; when the leaves are in the air, they are completely 
 formed, being of a narrowly lanceolate type, with a serrated 
 margin ; but when submerged the plant bears leaves consisting 
 of the midrib and lateral veins only, so that it acquires a 
 "pectinate" or "comb-like" form. 
 
 In order to ascertain the actual cause of the change of form, 
 Mr. McCullum experimented in various ways, finding that even 
 a saturated air produced the submerged form ; and that by 
 eliminating all other probable or possible causes, water only 
 could be credited with inducing the submerged type of foliage. 
 He thus writes : 
 
 " The essential feature common to the water and moist air 
 is the inhibition of transpiration and the consequent choking 
 of the cells and diluting the protoplasm with water. This can 
 be tested by growing the plants entirely under water and at the 
 same time drawing the water out from the protoplasm ; or in 
 reality causing evaporation or transpiration by means of high 
 osmotic pressure. Plants producing water-leaves were placed 
 in nutrient solutions of a strength not quite sufficient to plas- 
 molyze them : also in very dilute solutions made up to the 
 same osmotic pressure with KC1 and also Ca(NO 3 ) 2 . These 
 were allowed to evaporate down, becoming gradually stronger. 
 When they reached a strength of solution equal to about half 
 N salt solution the water leaves ceased to form, and the air 
 type of leaf appeared. " * 
 
 Here, then, we have the desired experimental evidence that 
 the dissected form of foliage found in so many submerged 
 plants is actually caused by the superabundance of water 
 saturating and weakening the protoplasm. 
 
 Now let us return to Ranunculus heterophyllus or R. tricho- 
 
 1 " On the Nature of the Stimulus causing the Change of Form and 
 Structure in Proserpinaca palustris," Bot. Gaz., vol. xxxiv., p. 93.
 
 200 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 phyllus ; for these prove that this " acquired character " of the 
 dissected foliage is hereditary. 
 
 If the seeds of these plants be sown in a garden border 
 they all come up and grow perfectly well. They first put forth 
 finely dissected foliage by heredity ; and the first named 
 subsequently bears complete forms of leaf-blade, as if the plant 
 had by that time grown so as to reach the level of the surface 
 of the imaginary water. Hence, the acquired characters are 
 thus proved to be hereditary ; and not caused in each genera- 
 tion by its growing in water. 
 
 The whole plant, however, is altered in its anatomical struc- 
 ture in order to fit it for an aerial life. If it be transferred to 
 water when full grown, all the leaves perish ; but a new set are 
 soon produced in adaptation to a submerged life. 
 
 This experiment will be enough, as Nature has not two or 
 more methods of procedure in acquiring, fixing and making 
 characters hereditary. 
 
 Without the possibility of doing this, Evolution would come 
 to a standstill. 
 
 The Darwinian says : " A change in conditions cannot 
 affect the next generation unless the reproductive organs are 
 affected ". But this is exactly what does happen. The en- 
 larged fleshy root of a parsnip is the character acquired by the 
 parent. It is formed long before the reproductive organs exist 
 at all. Nevertheless it reappears in the offspring of the first 
 generation ; so that an increment is successively added in the 
 second, third, fourth, etc., generations until the maximum size 
 is secured and fixed, when it is hereditary. 
 
 If it be said that only the tendency to make a fleshy root 
 was started in the parent and conveyed to the offspring and 
 then " strengthened " by selection in the subsequent generations, 
 how could this tendency be accounted for, any more than the 
 actual character itself, if it be acquired before the flowers and 
 fruit are made ? 
 
 Surely the experiment proves that the whole constitution of 
 the plant is so effected, that when the flowers and fruit of the
 
 HEREDITY OF ACQUIRED CHARACTERS 201 
 
 parsnip are subsequently formed, they too partake of the in- 
 fluence. 
 
 If it were not so, not even the tendency to produce a large 
 and fleshy root would be hereditary or, as it is suggested, 
 " strengthened by selection ". 
 
 The same sized root could only be reproduced as that of 
 the original parent. 
 
 I will now give an interesting case from the structure of 
 tendrils. 
 
 The Virginian creeper of America (Ampelopsis hederacea) 
 bears a branched tendril, homologous with, that is formed out 
 of, flowering branches. Each little branchlet terminates in a 
 hooked point. As soon as one of these hooks catches a de- 
 pression in a rough wall the irritation induces it to swell and 
 grow into an adhesive pad ; which is never formed unless con- 
 tact is secured. 
 
 In the Japanese species (A. Veitchii) the tendril develops 
 half- formed pads on the tips of its branchlets, before any contact 
 has been made with the wall. 
 
 They can only become effectively adhesive after contact 
 has taken place. 
 
 The first-named species proves that the merely mechanical 
 contact is necessary for the very commencement of the develop- 
 ment of the pads. 
 
 The second proves that the tendency to produce them is so 
 strongly hereditary, that they now appear without any contact 
 at all ; i.e., the actual modification itself is, therefore, heredi- 
 tary, and only requires contact to perfect it, so as to become 
 an adhesive organ. 
 
 A similar difference resides between genera of Bignoniacea 
 as Darwin has pointed out. 1 
 
 The few cases I have given are but samples. Similar lines 
 of inductive evidence can be applied to all the organs of plants 
 and it might be added to animals. Experimental proof is 
 
 1 Climbing Plants, p. 102, note.
 
 202 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 often impossible ; nor is it needed whenever inductive evidence 
 is abundant. 
 
 It fully accounts for the numerous " representative" plants 
 and animals, as the "ericoidal" or heath-like forms so abun- 
 dant in South Africa and South-West Australia, the " cupres- 
 soidal " or cypress-like trees and shrubs and even herbs, as of 
 junipers, Alpine veronicas of New Zealand, and our own lyco- 
 podiums. The " junceous " type is seen in the rush-like forms 
 which betray many marsh plants, and the " muscoidal " of 
 Arctic and Antarctic, as well as of very high Alpine forms of 
 moss-like plants. 1 
 
 In conclusion, then, I would say that I understand by 
 heredity (i) that offspring, as a rule, resemble their parents 
 in every important feature, always allowing for " individual " 
 but trivial and inconstant variations. 
 
 (2) When the seed or even bulbs of plants are sown in 
 some surroundings, markedly different from their native habi- 
 tats, they usually at once begin to vary, often in all parts, 
 from the wild types. If many seeds of the same kind are 
 sown they all vary alike or "definitely" in all main particu- 
 lars, and not " indefinitely," to use Darwin's term and as he 
 supposed to be the case. Still, they may always show individual 
 variations of no importance, i.e., from a classificatory point of 
 view. 
 
 In five or six generations the new and "acquired char- 
 acters " become relatively " fixed " ; so that they will subse- 
 quently be reproduced by seeds, even when the surrounding 
 conditions, which first incited the protoplasm to bring about 
 these adaptive modifications, no longer exist. 
 
 Hence I maintain that "acquired characters " are heredi- 
 tary. Thanks to this, not only do so large a number of " races " 
 in flowers and vegetables " come true " by seed under cultiva- 
 tion, but Evolution in Nature could not exist without it. 
 
 I deal mainly with plants, as that is my special province, 
 
 1 See my paper on " Mimetic Resemblances in Animals and Plants," 
 Natural Science, February, 1899, p. 121.
 
 HEREDITY OF ACQUIRED CHARACTERS 203 
 
 but the argument of Adaptation applies equally well to animals. 
 Thus just as the dissected type of foliage has been acquired 
 under water, so the "paddle" form of limb has been evolved 
 by use in aquatic animals, or in some of an amphibious habit. 
 Thus it occurs in the Crustacea, in fins of fishes, in extinct 
 marine reptiles, as the Ichthyosaurus and Plesiosaurus, etc., in 
 modern cetacea, the seals, in penguins and auks, and in the 
 tail of the beaver. 
 
 Similar adaptations are seen in the bilobed tail of fishes, 
 reptiles and cetacea. 
 
 Though organs may be similar in appearance and acquired 
 for the same purpose they may be of different origins and 
 differently constructed. Thus the tendril of a vine is a meta- 
 morphosed flowering branch, but that of the pea is a metamor- 
 phosed leaf. 
 
 To make the tail of a cod, Nature has run the spine into 
 the upper lobe, the lower lobe being made with "hypural" 
 bones ; but in certain extinct marine reptiles, a similar bilobed 
 tail was made by the spine penetrating the lower lobe. Lastly, 
 in the horizontal bilobed tails of cetacea, the spine terminates 
 at the base, the tail having no bone within it at all. 
 
 One more instance out of thousands, which I will leave the 
 reader to follow out for himself. If a lad wishes to walk fast, 
 he often does so on his toes ; and in a walking match the rule 
 is insisted upon that both heel and toe must be on the ground 
 at every step. Now, all running animals stand on their toes, 
 as horses, dogs, gazelles, etc., the heel being permanently up- 
 lifted in the air. 
 
 Inductive evidence, based on innumerable instances, leads 
 to the conclusion that the habit of running being habitual, the 
 bones of the foot have become permanently adapted to the 
 action ; thereby supplying great rapidity either in escaping from 
 the carnivorous enemy or in the latter following its prey. 
 
 I mention these few instances to show the versatile power 
 of protoplasm ; which can turn any organ to account for con- 
 structing something different, if some change is desirable, and
 
 204 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 a new structure is to be acquired to suit the habit and conveni- 
 ence of the organism. 
 
 Besides hereditary structures and habits, hereditary skill 
 must be observed. Young birds can build just as good nests, 
 as a rule, as the old ones. "Trap-door" spiders can make 
 exquisite "retreats," when they are quite young, in no way 
 inferior to those of adults ; though it is said that they are not 
 always equally so ; and are consequently sometimes more easily 
 discoverable by their enemies. Still the difference between a 
 "good" nest or retreat made as a first attempt, by an animal, 
 and the period covered by a son in learning the trade of his 
 father is very different. 
 
 It is impossible, too, for silkworms raised in paper trays 
 from the egg to have learnt how to make their exquisite silk 
 cocoons, or spiders their geometrical webs. 
 
 Skill is thus equally hereditary with the art itself; though 
 there is no reason for supposing these instincts to have been 
 directly impressed upon them by the Creator, but that they 
 have been acquired and perfected through generations, and the 
 skill has then become a fixed trait of their constitution and a 
 hereditary feature. 1 I shall have more to say upon Instincts in 
 Part II. 
 
 1 As I have discussed and criticised Dr. Weismann's theory of heredity 
 elsewhere, I need only refer the reader to my paper in Natural Science, 
 vol. i., p. 171.
 
 PART II 
 
 MAN
 
 CHAPTER I 
 
 MAN'S ORIGIN BY EVOLUTION 
 
 WE do not know, nor can we conceive, how the first 
 protoplasmic living being appeared on this earth. I am 
 as convinced of continuity as any one, wherever there is 
 evidence of it ; but I refrain from forcing my belief in it, 
 where there is absolutely no evidence, as at the origin of 
 terrestrial life. A time may come when the problem will 
 be solved and continuity may bridge the gulf between 
 the non-living and the living, but we have not yet arrived 
 at that period. 
 
 Once grant the Origin of Life, and I see no necessity 
 for any break whatever. Man has closed the series of 
 living beings, as the latest and most complete. 
 
 In Genesis (i. 26) we read : " And God said, Let us 
 make man in our image, after our likeness : and let him 
 have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl 
 of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and 
 over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. 
 So God created man in his own image, in the image of 
 God created he him ; male and female created he them." 
 
 Such is the Elohistic account of the creation of man. 
 The second or Jehovistic history runs as follows (ii. 7) : 
 " The Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, 
 and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life ; and man 
 became a living soul ". 
 
 It may be noticed that the ideas of God are 
 (207)
 
 208 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 quite differently expressed. In Gen. i. 26 God is a 
 spiritual Being; but in Gen. ii. 8 God is human. 
 
 The first is only compatible with a tolerably highly 
 intellectual conception of Deity, and itself marks an ad- 
 vanced stage in man's mental development. 
 
 On the other hand, God being represented as a man 
 appears to be a more child-like and primitive conception ; 
 and perhaps comes nearer to what was probably the 
 earliest idea of a Deity, namely, a human ancestor. 
 
 Prof. Sayce has shown how the religion of Babylonia 
 was essentially anthropomorphic, 1 and that there is a 
 strong parallel between the story of Eden and the 
 cosmogony of Eridu, the capital town on the shores of 
 the Persian Gulf, as the sea was one hundred and more 
 miles further north than it is now, some thousands of 
 years ago. 
 
 On the other hand, the cosmogony which the late Mr. 
 G. Smith deciphered has many points of contact with the 
 first chapter of Genesis. Prof. Sayce says, " It belongs to 
 an age of religious syncretism and materialistic philosophy, 
 and is of late date ". 2 
 
 Both accounts, of course, represent the ideas of early 
 thinkers about the origin of man ; and how he came into 
 existence. What truths can we discover in them ? 
 
 In the first, the central idea is man's mental, not 
 bodily, kinship with the Deity ; as shown by his powers 
 of Dominion over the world. It does not require much 
 experience to know that there is something in man which 
 imparts his superior power over animals. Indeed, St. 
 James says : Man has tamed every kind of animal, but 
 the tongue no man can tame (iii. 7, 8) ; that is, he cannot 
 tame himself! Moreover, animals know that man is 
 
 1 The Religions of Ancient Egypt and Babylonia, p. 498. 
 *0p. cit., p. 387.
 
 ORIGIN OF MAN 
 
 209 
 
 superior to them ; we shall see later how this comes 
 about. 
 
 However, I will so far anticipate what I shall have to 
 say about man's mind hereafter, by observing that what 
 separates man from animals is his power of making 
 abstract ideas, objects of thought. This lies at the root of 
 all his higher qualities. Hence he alone has volition 
 while all animals remain sense-automata and non-moral. 
 
 The writer of Gen. i. probably had not thought this 
 fact out ; but he was quite aware of the supremacy of 
 man ; and he seems to have considered that it was in 
 this feature that he must be like the Deity. 
 
 Hence, he represents God as making man in his own 
 likeness. 
 
 The mental supremacy of man, therefore, is the special 
 characteristic of the first or Elohistic account of his 
 creation. 
 
 In the second or Jehovistic, more attention is paid to 
 the body, both of Adam and Eve. While the supremacy 
 of man is only feebly represented in his naming all the 
 animals ; still, his becoming " a living soul " seems to 
 indicate the desire of this writer to emphasise his mental 
 qualities as being in some way different from those of 
 animals of which nothing of this kind is mentioned. 
 
 Evolution now teaches us that man was the result of 
 successive generations, or by " descent with modification," 
 as it has been expressed, from the lowest animals ; but 
 we have not yet discovered the missing links to prove by 
 objective evidence the genealogy of the genus Homo 
 from the common stock with the existing ape-family. 
 
 Unscientific people often suppose that Darwin meant 
 that existing apes, or some one of them was the ancestor 
 of man. This is not the case ; what Evolutionists main- 
 tain is that there was a common stem which embraced 
 
 14
 
 210 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 both simian and human characteristics, before they be- 
 came differentiated along separate lines. The letter Y 
 will represent it. The stem is the so-called " generalised 
 type," which gave rise to two, or very likely more than 
 two branches, one of them ending in man, the other in 
 forms of the existing monkey tribes. 
 
 If it be asked when this took place, the answer can 
 only be based on analogies. Thus, in Greece, for ex- 
 ample, a large number of fossil remains of mammalia 
 have been unearthed. 
 
 They belong to the later Miocene or early Pliocene 
 period, according to geologists. Not one single species 
 there found is now living. Moreover, several of them are 
 " generalised types," embracing features of what are now 
 distinct genera of animals, which appeared in the next 
 period or later Pliocene. Thus, the Ictitherium com- 
 bined characters of the hysena and civet. Hyaenarctos 
 unites as the name implies the hyaena and bear. 
 Kuonarctos combines the dog with the bear, and so on. 
 
 Now, in the next or Pliocene period, we find the 
 animals becoming differentiated ; and the existing genera 
 appearing. Thus, Equus the horse, occurs here for the 
 first time; whereas his three-toed ancestor, Hipparion, 
 was among the remains of the preceding period. 
 
 Hence, judging by analogy, as the horse, hyaena, bear, 
 etc., are existing now, so man may have appeared well 
 differentiated from the Simiadce, for the first time, in the 
 later Pliocene epoch. 
 
 Geologically speaking, this period immediately pre- 
 ceded the Glacial epoch, in the northern hemisphere ; 
 and from other evidence there is every reason to suppose 
 man to have been preglacial. 
 
 Something akin to a missing link is thought by 
 some scientists to have been found in Java, and has
 
 ORIGIN OF MAN 211 
 
 been called Pithecanthropus erectus, meaning " erect- 
 monkey-man ". 
 
 Haeckel does not hesitate to consider jit to be at least 
 one of the long-desired missing links ; but Haeckel is apt 
 to deduce conclusions which he wishes to have ! 
 
 Whether it will turn out to be such or not remains to 
 be seen ; for the fragments are really insufficient to prove 
 conclusively whether it be " man " or " monkey," or both 
 combined; but that there was a long line of ancestry is 
 fully believed in by scientists on inductive evidence ; for 
 embryology, human and comparative anatomy, as well as 
 man's numerous " rudimentary organs," supply such an 
 enormous amount of facts, that the probabilities are 
 overwhelming of man's descent from the animal world. 
 
 These facts need not be repeated here, as they are 
 well known, and may be found in Haeckel 's History of 
 the Creation and Huxley's Man's Place in Nature, etc. 
 Such have established the affinities between man's body 
 and those of other vertebrates beyond all dispute. 
 
 The most important question about man is : How 
 comes it that he has developed a mind so much in 
 advance of that of all other animals ? Is it different in 
 kind as well as greater in degreel 
 
 We may note that man's body differs in the much 
 longer time it takes to reach maturity, occupying many 
 years, whereas a dog and a horse arrive at the adult 
 stage in a very few. Similarly man's mind follows suit 
 in requiring a lengthened period for its development. 
 
 The late Dr. W. B. Carpenter suggested an explana- 
 tion as to how this mental difference may have come 
 about. Animals, such as monkeys as well as the car- 
 nivora, use their teeth for offensive purposes. This re- 
 quires not only large canine teeth, but very powerful 
 muscles to work the lower jaw.
 
 212 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 These " temporal " muscles have broad bases on the 
 external surface of the skull, one on either side, requir- 
 ing large and deep depressions in which they are fixed. 
 
 These external depressions necessitate a small internal 
 brain cavity and a correspondingly small and more or less 
 lowly developed brain. 
 
 Now, a young monkey often has a quite globular 
 skull ; but as it grows to maturity, it assumes a longer 
 form with the above-mentioned external depressions. 
 
 Some unknown conditions of life, perhaps insular, 
 probably prevailed in which there was a comparative 
 freedom from enemies, and consequently a less struggle 
 for existence ; so that as a consequence a disuse of the 
 jaw for fighting purposes allowed the skull to retain the 
 more globular form when adult. The brain now followed 
 suit, and not only became larger, but more developed, in 
 having more numerous convolutions and an increase in 
 the amount of " grey matter " accompanied, as a correlated 
 result, with an increase of intelligence ; to which both 
 skull and brain reacted. 
 
 A time arrived when a new mental power was evolved, 
 or superadded to that which man still has in common 
 with animals, that of realising abstract ideas. 
 
 As a human being epitomises the history of vertebrates 
 in his development from an " egg " to his adult stage ; so 
 do we see in the development of a child these mental 
 stages in progress. At first the infant is simply a living 
 automaton with no mind at all. It soon begins " to take 
 notice," i.e., a dawning intelligence of the outer world 
 awakens through the senses ; but for a long time it is 
 utterly powerless to realise an abstration ; and if you try 
 to explain to a little child the idea of God, who does not 
 appeal to its senses, it cannot conceive anything beyond 
 a Being something like its own father.
 
 ORIGIN OF MAN 213 
 
 A time comes, however, in its mental development 
 but you cannot say when that its power of grasping the 
 idea of things which do not solely appeal to the senses 
 is attained. 
 
 At this point it passes the limits of all animals ; which 
 stop short at sense perceptions with a corresponding 
 reasoning power upon concrete things only. 
 
 This conclusion is the result of the study of the habits 
 of animals. It becomes more and more apparent that 
 their reasoning powers, which are often very considerable, 
 always concern concrete objects, which appeal to their 
 senses. But, besides doing this, man, and man alone, can 
 reason in abstract ideas as well. 
 
 To make this clearer, I will quote a passage from my 
 book Christian Beliefs Reconsidered in the Light of Modern 
 Thought (1^4, p. 63). 
 
 " There is no reason, e.g., to suppose that any animal 
 in the wild or natural condition ever eats except when it 
 is hungry ; 1 and as soon as the instinct of hunger is 
 satisfied it ceases to do so. It undoubtedly derives a 
 certain amount of pleasure from the act of eating, as shown 
 by such as a man-eating tiger ; so far man may do the 
 same, but here enters the sharp line of distinction between 
 him and them, and upon which his whole moral nature 
 hinges ; a moral nature which no other being can acquire. 
 He alone can think of or make the abstract idea of Plea- 
 sure an actual object of thought. He can remember and 
 estimate the pleasure of eating, as an abstract idea super- 
 added to the recollection of the physical act of eating. 
 He can, in a word, convert the pleasure of eating into an 
 end, instead of eating with the natural motive of nourish- 
 ing the body. He can thus abuse that gift of Nature, 
 
 1 Domesticated animals, like pigs and oxen, are in an abnormal con- 
 dition of life.
 
 214 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 the pleasure which accompanies eating, and even live to 
 eat, instead of eat to live. Such is the glutton, the epi- 
 cure or gourmand. I do not mean to say one should 
 never eat anything simply for the pleasure of eating, but 
 it is the abuse of this pleasure which constitutes the moral 
 evil or the vice ; which no wild animal can entertain in 
 thought. 
 
 " Animals, however, having no power of abstract 
 reasoning, cannot abuse natural laws. They cannot be 
 moral or immoral, but remain non-moral, living auto- 
 mata, void of all volition." 
 
 What I have here said of the evolution of man's 
 mental powers from a consciousness of the Concrete only 
 to that of the Abstract, and his passing from being an 
 Automaton only to a Volitional Being, is reproduced in 
 history. Thus Mr. Bussell uses precisely the same terms 
 as the above in his work on the different philosophers of 
 Greece. 1 He speaks of the " individual " rebelling against 
 political restraints hitherto borne in a quiescent sub- 
 mission as being " now mature and fully self-conscious," 
 and illustrates it by the Chinese : " We call the Chinese 
 civilisation immature, because the sense of individuality 
 there is not yet awakened, but lies sleeping buried in 
 the torpor of immemorial traditions, and bound with the 
 fetters of unreflecting civic morality. Man is here almost 
 an automaton, a puppet, guided by the unseen influences 
 of ancestral example, the spirit of the state-inherited 
 tendencies ; he has all but lost his gift of spontaneous 
 initiative." 
 
 This last phrase is equivalent to Volition which is 
 opposed to Automatism. 
 
 But we may go further. Every one of us is more 
 
 1 The School of Plato, p. 66.
 
 ORIGIN OF MAN 
 
 215 
 
 than half an automaton in all we do day by day. All 
 routine is done without giving us any call for reflection, 
 choosing or changing the order of routine. We dress in 
 the morning automatically, it may be thinking about 
 other things all the time, we eat our breakfast, go off to 
 the city, work for hours, as matters come before us, as 
 clerks or managers ; we regularly return by the same 
 train, seizing our familiar corner, and so on till we go to 
 bed. It is practical automatism throughout. Volition is 
 more or less in abeyance and is rarely called upon for a 
 deliberate choice. 
 
 Nevertheless the will is there, always ready at a 
 moment's notice to decide upon an act of importance 
 which brings alternatives of procedure before us. We 
 pass out of the automatic into the volitional state at a 
 moment's notice as occasion requires. Animals never 
 can. They are always automatic. 
 
 Now let us see what are the consequences of this con- 
 sciousness of having the power of being able to grasp an 
 abstract idea; that is one about anything which does 
 not come within the cognisance of the senses. 1 
 
 The first result is that Man can think of himself, that 
 is, his " conscious soul," as we call it, or the Ego. Hence 
 man alone can be self-conscious, realising his own person- 
 ality as something other than his body. 
 
 The next step is that he realises the existence of 
 similar souls in his fellowmen and women ; that each has 
 his or her Ego, too. 
 
 Next, when he sees works in Nature very much after 
 the fashion of his own or of other men, or when he 
 realises that he has power to move himself and other 
 
 'For convenience I limit the meaning to this application; though 
 of course the word "goodness" is an abstraction in a different sense 
 from " God ".
 
 216 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 objects, and sees objects in Nature moving, as the clouds, 
 trees waving their leaves, the sun and moon crossing the 
 heavens, etc., he begins to imagine the existence of some 
 beings doing these things. Some bodiless beings which 
 he calls spirits. 
 
 The other source of spirits is believed to be ancestral ; 
 and possibly this was a more primitive one than the pre- 
 ceding. 1 
 
 Early man, like modern savages, whether as the result 
 of dreams or otherwise, somehow conceived men to live on 
 after death, and to become more powerful when freed 
 from the body ; and as savage men are far oftener more 
 cruel than beneficent, so there arose the idea of the 
 necessity of appeasing them by offerings of roast meat 
 and choice vegetables, incense and drink, whereby they 
 were pleased and appeased. An instructive instance of 
 this is seen on the occasion of the exit from the ark. I 
 will quote a short passage from one of the Babylonian 
 Deluge stories which the reader can compare with that 
 in Genesis. 
 
 " The ark reached Nizir and rested on the mountain 
 unable to pass. Day after day for six days the ark rested 
 on the mountain of Nizir. On the seventh I sent forth a 
 dove which flew hither and thither, and finding no resting 
 place, returned. I sent forth a swallow which also found 
 no resting place and returned And I sent forth a raven 
 which wandered to and fro, devouring and floating on the 
 waters, and did not return. Then I sent the animals 
 
 l Prof. Sayce in his last work, The Religions of Ancient Egypt and 
 Babylonia, shows how fundamental this idea was in the religion of the 
 latter (p. 280 et seq.) 
 
 Col. J. Gamier endeavours to show that even celestial deities were 
 human beings, subsequently located in the heavenly bodies. The Wor- 
 ship of the Dead.
 
 ORIGIN OF MAN 217 
 
 forth to the four winds, and poured out a libation on an 
 altar built on the peak of the mountain, an offering of 
 herbs in sevens, with reed, pine and simgar. The gods 
 gathered at the smell, yea, the gods gathered at the 
 savour, like flies they gathered at the sacrifice." 1 
 
 Mr. Herbert Spencer accepted the theory that traces 
 religion to the worship of ancestors, 2 the deities being 
 the spirits of ancestors. 
 
 Dr. Morris Jastrow 3 observes that this theory implies 
 that " the personification of the powers of Nature likewise 
 rests upon ancestral worship, for the dead having powers 
 denied to the living, their spirits may choose a tree or a 
 stone as an abiding place, and even the large heavenly 
 bodies are conceived as remote ancestors of the living, 
 under the influence of a primitive theory of emanation ". 
 
 Dr. Jastrow observes, however, that : " Apart from the 
 unsatisfactory character of any attempt to derive Nature- 
 worship from ancestor- worship, there is no reason why 
 one should be dependent upon the other. 4 
 
 The story of the flood would, however, seem to show 
 something of the sort ; for while a sacrifice of roast meat 
 would imply the presence of a once human being, who 
 alone could appreciate it ; yet the gods are supposed to 
 be aloft and come down to enjoy it, and in the Biblical 
 account the Deity has power "to set the bow in the 
 heavens " as being an Omnipotent Celestial God. 
 
 Man's automatism includes his emotions, grief, fear, 
 joy, love, and others are spontaneously excited by 
 appropriate causes, and form no part of his volition ; 
 though this may be brought into play to control them to 
 
 1 Chaldean Flood Story, in The Composition of the Book of Genesis, 
 by E. T. Fripp, p. 190. 
 
 2 See Principles of Sociology, chaps, viii. to xvii. 
 
 3 The Study of Religion, p. 184. *Op. cit., p. 186.
 
 218 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 some degree. It is often observed that animals share 
 most at least of these, omitting laughter for example, 
 while Evolution recognises their origin in man as a result 
 of their existence in mammalia. Indeed, since man's 
 emotions are similar to those in animals, it has often 
 been stated as a proof that his mental qualifications have 
 been evolved as well as his body. Thus Romanes in his 
 works on Mental Evolution in Animals and Mental 
 Evolution in Man, shows that, just as man does, so do 
 animals manifest surprise, fear, parental affection, jealousy, 
 affection, sympathy, emulation, grief, revenge, shame and 
 remorse. These are all automatic emotions and are 
 identical with the same feelings in man. But they are 
 outside the consciousness of abstract reasoning, the pe- 
 culiarity of man. They deal with concrete objects as a 
 rule in both animals and man ; but man can also entertain 
 some at least of these emotions for abstract reasons, which 
 do not appeal to the senses ; as a fear of hell, the hope 
 of heaven, emulation for honour, shame before God, etc. 
 
 As long as an animal, as a dog, can bring a cause 
 within the region of the senses, by automatic reasoning 
 of course, he is not afraid ; as when the wind blows the 
 leaves about ; but a dog lying by a wall was terrified 
 when he saw an open parasol, lying on the ground, roll 
 along by itself, for he did not know the wind had arisen. 
 Another dog lying on the beach began to bark furiously 
 at the wheels of a bathing machine which began to move 
 up the beach, being drawn up by a long rope ; for the 
 dog could not understand how it could (apparently) move 
 of its own accord. 
 
 There does not appear therefore to be any difference 
 in kind between an animal's emotions and man's ; it is 
 only when man brings his higher conscious reasoning to 
 bear upon them, that their effects may be altered.
 
 ORIGIN OF MAN 219 
 
 This is the only difference in kind, if it be so allowed, 
 viz., that between concrete and abstract. 
 
 Whence arises this power which man alone possesses ? 
 Perhaps Dr. Iverach is not far wrong when he says : 
 " Perhaps the greatest feat ever performed in psychology 
 is performed by Mr. Spencer when he affirms : ' Not only 
 do feelings constitute the inferior tracts of consciousness, 
 but feelings are in all cases the materials out of which, in 
 the superior tracts of consciousness, intellect is evolved by 
 structural combination ' {Psychology, vol. i., p. 192). That 
 is something worth knowing ! " l 
 
 For my part, I prefer to be an Agnostic as to how 
 consciousness arose, and still more how self-consciousness 
 was superadded ; but facts seem sufficient to warrant the 
 conclusion that while the higher animals have only the 
 former, man has both. 
 
 Mr. H. Spencer's interpretation conveys no definite 
 meaning to me. 
 
 Romanes tried to throw light upon it as follows : 
 " Receptual or outward self-consciousness is the practical 
 recognition of self as an active and a feeling agent ; while 
 conceptual or inward self-consciousness is the introspective 
 recognition of self as an object of knowledge and there- 
 fore as a subject, etc.". 
 
 What does all this and a great deal more mean 
 but that / am conscious of Myself, can mentally talk 
 about myself, compare myself to other selves, etc., etc. I 
 am not conscious, however, of having two sorts of self- 
 consciousness. Everything outside of Ego comes under 
 "consciousness" without the "self". Dr. Iverach, I 
 think, rightly observes : " At all events, Dr. Romanes 
 has not made clear what he means by conceptual self- 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 164.
 
 220 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 consciousness. Nor has he made good the distinction 
 between outward and inner self-consciousness." l 
 
 " Following Locke, he [Romanes] makes the power 
 of forming abstract ideas to belong only to man. ' There- 
 fore, I think,' says Locke, ' beasts compare not their ideas 
 further than some sensible circumstances annexed to the 
 objects themselves. The other power of comparing, 
 which may be observed in man, belonging to general 
 ideas, and useful only in abstract reasonings, we may 
 probably conjecture brutes have not.' But does not the 
 distinction between conscious and self-consciousness begin 
 at an earlier stage ? " 2 asks Dr. Iverach. 
 
 I would regard Locke to be the more correct, because 
 self-inspection or self-consciousness is a particular instance 
 of the more general property of making an abstraction, in 
 this case, the Ego, an object of thought. 3 
 
 The two remaining consequences of Man being alone 
 able to entertain abstract ideas are the Consciousness of 
 having the power to choose or " Free Will," and the con- 
 ception of " Immortality". These will be considered 
 hereafter. 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 170. *Op. cit., p. 171. 
 
 3 1 was not aware that Locke had forestalled me ; for I drew this 
 distinction between man and animals in my Actonian Prize Essay, Evolu- 
 tion and Religion, p. 151 (1873), and emphasised it in Christian Beliefs 
 Reconsidered in the Light of Modern Thought, pp. 63 et seq. (1884). I gave 
 Romanes a copy of this latter work ; and he said he fully agreed with me 
 as to what I had written. He had previously regarded " Speech " as the 
 fundamental difference ; but animals of the same kind have indubitably 
 some power of communication between them, though it may always con- 
 cern matters of sense. 
 
 I have no intention of entering upon the field of discussion about the 
 connection between mind and "grey matter," or of consciousness and 
 brain. The reader will find the true theories of Materialism, interaction 
 and parallelism well discussed by Mr. Stout, who himself adopts the last 
 as a provisional hypothesis (Manual of Psychology, Introduction, chap, i., 
 p. 3, on " Mind and Body ").
 
 CHAPTER II 
 
 RATIONALISTIC VIEWS OF SCIENCE AND KNOWLEDGE 
 
 MODERN Rationalists not only take their name from 
 Reason, but exalt it as almost omnipotent, at least as far 
 as the material world is concerned. Thus Mr. C. T. 
 Gorham says : " Knowledge ends with the material pheno- 
 mena ; beyond, conjecture holds the field, and explana- 
 tion becomes guesswork ", l In fact, whatever cannot 
 have a rational explanation by observation and experi- 
 ment is not to be accepted as a scientific truth according 
 to him and other Rationalists. 
 
 Science and reason doubtless might be infallible, if 
 only we were always quite sure of our facts ; for Facts are 
 Truth ; but science, as representing co-ordinated human 
 knowledge, is always progressive. Truth is only ulti- 
 mately secured, not only by observation and experiment 
 with verification, to which these authors seem to limit us, 
 but by inductive evidence coupled with a continual eli- 
 mination of unsupported deductions, a priori assumptions 
 and errors. 
 
 The following will supply the reader with some of 
 the anonymous author's descriptions of science occurring 
 in Mr. Balfour's Apologetics. 
 
 (i) " Science assumes the Universality of the Law of 
 Causation." 
 
 1 Faith, its Freaks and Follies, p. 44. This author completely fuses 
 " Faith " " belief " and " credulity ". 
 
 (221)
 
 222 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 (2) " Science lays bare the natural causes of all pheno- 
 mena ". l 
 
 (3) " Knowledge courts the most rigorous investiga- 
 tion." 2 
 
 (4) " The fabric of science is based on the evidence of 
 the senses, and on inferences which are drawn from 
 them." 3 
 
 (5) " Science remains firmly planted on the im- 
 pregnable ground of experience." 4 
 
 (6) " The facts and theories of science receive daily 
 an overwhelming confirmation from general consent, from 
 success in practice, and from common sense." 5 
 
 (7) " Science is the one thing certain " (L. Stephen). 6 
 
 (8) " Knowledge can only be gained by means of 
 observation, corrected and verified by experiment." 7 
 
 " If any such knowledge of the supernatural can be 
 shown to exist it must take rank as scientific truth." 
 
 "The so-called knowledge [of God] must be sub- 
 mitted to the tests of observation and experiment ; if it 
 is knowledge at all it is capable of verification." 8 
 
 (9) " Reason declares with overwhelming force that 
 everything which cannot be proved by scientific means is 
 incapable of proof." 9 
 
 (10) "Science is knowledge verified and reduced 
 to system." 10 
 
 (n) " Life in its lowest forms involves relations and 
 correspondences with the surrounding world. And what 
 are these but incipient knowledge ? . . . From this we 
 get brain ; and we have thus living illustrations of the fact 
 that reason has proceeded from non-reason." n 
 
 (12) " The moral ideal of Rationalism is truth, and on 
 
 *Pp. 20, 21. 2 P. 24. 3 P. 26. 4 P. 26. 
 
 8 P. 31. 6 P. 32. 7 P. 34. 8 Pp. 34, 103. 
 
 P. 34. 10 P. 102. "P. III.
 
 RATIONALISM AND SCIENCE 223 
 
 no other foundation than truth can any lofty or durable 
 system of ethics be reared." 1 
 
 (13) " Human reason is the highest product of earthly 
 evolution, the apex and not the ground of man's exist- 
 ence." 2 
 
 I do not think this author can be a scientifically 
 trained man ; for he would have known that science can 
 by no means be trusted so far as he writes about it. 
 The very term " provisional or working hypothesis," 
 which scientific men constantly employ, indicates the 
 uncertainties associated with the pursuit of various 
 branches of science. Some have never got beyond it, 
 as the proving the existence and nature of ether. 
 
 This author appears to limit science to " observation 
 and experiment" (4, 5, 8,) and says it "lays bare the 
 natural causes of all phenomena". 
 
 No scientific man will endorse that statement. We 
 can readily recall a few phenomena of which science has 
 never yet laid bare the cause. 
 
 In astronomy, what was the original cause of rota- 
 tion? 
 
 In chemistry, what is the cause of chemical affini- 
 ties? Haeckel's erotic theory is too puerile for con- 
 sideration. 
 
 In physics, what is the cause of gravity and the cor- 
 relation of forces generally ? 
 
 In biology, what is the cause of the translation of 
 molecular vibrations in the brain to consciousness ? 
 
 Science may try to lay bare these causes, but she has 
 never yet succeeded and probably never will. 
 
 We all know that science is not infallible now : what 
 what was it before the nineteenth century ? A mass of 
 
 1 P. 151. 'Pp. 212, 213.
 
 W 4 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 empiricism. Compare the science of medicine, say of the 
 fourteenth century, with that of to-day. Thousands of 
 drugs and recipes as well as charms, then used in all 
 faith, have been utterly discarded. Many were based on 
 the a priori notion that " like cures like," so that ground 
 up cherry-stones were supposed to be a remedy for stone ; 
 plants with a yellow juice, as the celandine, would cure 
 jaundice, etc. 
 
 Who will pronounce the science of medicine to-day 
 as infallible, or as " the one thing certain (7) " ? 
 
 Has science solved all the problems of any one branch 
 of knowledge to-day ? Experts in every line know that 
 theories and working hypotheses are all that can be held 
 on many points. 
 
 Or again, Does modern science know no reed, broken 
 or unbroken, upon which it leans ? 
 
 Let us follow the author's words : " Science courts the 
 most rigorous investigation". Well, I have given it in 
 the matter of Darwinism ; and the result of the investiga- 
 tion is that this much-valued basis of Rationalism and 
 Materialistic Monism has not a particle of evidence to 
 support it. 
 
 The author of Mr. Balfours Apologetics replied to 
 my observations that he ignores too much the evidence 
 of inductive evidence (i.e., the accumulation of coinciden- 
 ces and probabilities), and says, " I do not ignore this 
 fact, but I would point out that all inductive evidence 
 rests ultimately on a basis of observation and experi- 
 ment Induction is a generalisation from experience." 
 Experience, however, is not experiment. We experience 
 the difference between day and night ; but no experiment 
 can prove that the sun does not go round the world in 
 twenty-four hours. A pendulum set swinging north and 
 south will soon appear to be swinging between north and
 
 RATIONALISM AND SCIENCE 
 
 225 
 
 east ; but this is no proof; it is only a corroborative 
 probability that the earth is rotating under it. He denies 
 that my illustration of the spectroscope is a just one, and 
 says : " We actually subject the photosphere of the sun to 
 observation and experiment". I unhesitatingly deny 
 this ; for if the photosphere be composed of gaseous iron, 
 sodium, etc., not one of these elements ever reaches us. 
 Nothing but ethereal vibrations arrive at the spectroscope. 
 These, we believe, indicate the presence of those elements ; 
 but it is only an inference. My object in quoting the 
 above paragraphs is to show, first the exaggerated value 
 put upon Reason by Rationalists, and their inconsistency 
 in not recognising the importance of inductive evidence 
 where experiment is impossible. 
 
 Now let us turn to Haeckel's views on science. 1 
 (i) "Truth unadulterated is only to be found in the 
 temple of the study of Nature ; and that the only avail- 
 able paths to it are critical observation and reflection 
 the empirical investigation of facts and the rational study 
 of their efficient causes. . . . The Goddess of Truth 
 dwells in the Temple of Nature. . . . The rich gifts which 
 the Goddess of Truth bestows on us are the noble fruits of 
 the tree of knowledge and the inestimable treasure of a 
 clear unified view of the world." 2 
 
 These quotations will be sufficient. Other Rational- 
 istic authors write in the same strain ; but all true scien- 
 tists will recognise this as hyperbolic language, which far 
 exceeds the modesty of a Newton ! The serious omis- 
 sion, however, which I have emphasised, and shall do so 
 again, is the almost invariable want of any due apprecia- 
 tion of inductive evidence ; which can be quite equivalent 
 to a mathematical demonstration ; as in the Truth of the 
 rotation of the earth. 
 
 1 The Riddle of the Universe. * Pp. 345, 346. 
 
 15
 
 226 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 If we turn to metaphysicians, we find, on the other 
 hand, that reason is from one cause or another somewhat 
 slighted in certain directions. Thus Prof. H. Jones says : 
 " No age has employed reason more, nor trusted it less, 
 than our own ". l He contrasts the estimate of reason 
 in two regions by saying : " If, on the one hand, the great 
 mass of the ' expert evidence ' of philosophers, psycholo- 
 gists and theologians is condemnatory of human reason, 
 the practical confidence of the day in the uses of the 
 intelligence remains, on the other hand, quite unshaken," 
 . . . but " scientific men themselves are unable to deny 
 that their premisses are only ' working hypotheses/ and 
 their whole procedure, in the last resort, only tentative ". 
 
 He is here encroaching upon, if not contradicting, the 
 Rationalist's creed. For Materialistic Monists, as we have 
 seen, base everything on what they believe has been 
 thoroughly " reasoned out," viz., Darwinism, though it 
 is proved to have been based on a false premise. 
 
 Then Prof. Jones adds : " Thus at the very moment 
 when human reason is charged in the high places of 
 abstract thought with every weakness, it is believed to 
 be bringing in a richer harvest of practically valid truth 
 than the world has seen at any other period of its history ". 
 
 He then classifies the sciences as follows : " It may 
 be maintained, and with some truth, that it is only in the 
 field of physical inquiry that man's natural powers have 
 unequivocally proved their strength. The supraphysical 
 sciences, such as Biology, Physiology, Psychology, An- 
 thropology, Political Economy not to mention Ethics, 
 Social and Political Philosophy, Theology and Meta- 
 physics lack the demonstrative security and the predic- 
 tive power of the Mathematical and Physical sciences." 
 
 * " Reflective Thought and Religion," Hibbert Journ., i., p. 229, etc.
 
 RATIONALISM AND SCIENCE 227 
 
 This quotation brings us to the point. He appears 
 to be comparing, or contrasting, if he be not putting one 
 against the other, viz. y Deductive and Inductive reason. 
 He does not recognise the value of the latter in these 
 so-called " supraphysical " sciences. The former is that 
 employed by Euclid and other mathematicians. It is 
 safe for them to do so, because there are only a few 
 axioms or postulates upon which the whole of the super- 
 structures are built ; and if the steps in their logical 
 sequences of any proposition are correctly made, they' 
 cannot arrive at any other conclusion than a Q. E. D. 
 
 In astronomy the occurrence of eclipses can be fore- 
 told with accuracy hundreds of years in advance, if neces- 
 sary. 
 
 The laws of heat, light, electricity, and magnetism are 
 known ; so that they can be trusted to do their work, and 
 utilised, as their effects are constant. But in biology it 
 is not always so. Data are more complex on which to 
 reason ; but inductive reasoning now meets the case, so 
 that to an enormous extent the conclusions of biological 
 scientists are perfectly sound and equivalent in value to 
 mathematical demonstrations. 
 
 In astronomy it has to be trusted ; thus, I repeat, the 
 conviction that the earth revolves on its axis in twenty- 
 four hours is solely founded on inductive evidence. 
 Similarly is our knowledge of the elements in the sun 
 established on faith in the accumulation of coincidences, 
 on which probabilites are based. These are of so high 
 an order, that they force the moral conviction, and any 
 alternative becomes unthinkable. 
 
 It is solely on inductive evidence that the Copernican 
 system has superseded the Ptolemaic. 
 
 In biology the great doctrine of Evolution is largely 
 based upon induction ; for probabilities pour in from all
 
 228 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 quarters palaeontology, comparative anatomy, embry- 
 ology, transitional forms of living beings, etc. ; such are 
 more than ample to establish the truth of it ; so that any 
 alternative proposed at the present day to Evolution 
 (whatever be the actual process in Nature) is absolutely 
 inconceivable. 
 
 In fact, we live upon inductive evidence every day of 
 our lives. We trust ourselves in trains because the pro- 
 bability that we shall arrive at our destination safe and 
 sound is of a high order, i.e., a practical but not absolute 
 certainty. 
 
 Circumstantial evidence is another example. No one 
 saw the crime committed ; but the supposed criminal was 
 condemned from the accumulation of facts which all 
 pointed to the one probability of the man having done 
 the deed. 
 
 Now Rationalists are inconsistent ; they cannot but 
 admit the foregoing, yet refuse to believe in God, free- 
 dom and immortality, because they (as they assert) escape 
 " practical demonstration," but they can be all shown to 
 be overwhelmingly probable : and that is all we want in 
 this world. We must live by faith (i.e., inductive evidence) 
 in the spiritual world and not only by sight. 
 
 Darwinism, however, was not based on inductive 
 reasoning, but solely on a priori assumptions, that is, 
 deductive reasoning, on an assumed basis ; but without 
 any axiom or postulate which could not be gainsaid. 
 " Indefinite variations " might be called Darwin's axiom ; 
 but unfortunately they only existed in his own imagination. 
 
 Now it is strange to find Rationalists so strongly 
 maintaining the supremacy of reason, yet all bowing 
 down in abject obeisance to authority in the form of 
 Darwinism ; which they regard as the very " basis of 
 Monism ".
 
 RATIONALISM AND SCIENCE 
 
 229 
 
 Natural Selection of Darwinism is, in fact, a Deus ex 
 macliina for Haeckelian Monists and Darwinians like 
 Weismnnn. It comes in handy whenever and wherever 
 some explanation is wanted. It can do anything and 
 everything, without giving one the trouble of thinking or 
 investigating the causes of phenomena. 
 
 Thus, the Mind and Reason are equally regarded as 
 being due to Natural Selection ; so too is the aesthetic 
 sense, while Morals follow suit. Thus it is said : " The 
 capacity of the human intellect is in conformity with 
 what we might expect, on the theory that it has been 
 evolved for practical purposes by the process of Natural 
 Selection ".* 
 
 " Reason is ' the roof and crown of things ' ; it is the 
 final result of a long process of Natural Selection." 2 " The 
 development of the aesthetic sentiments may be explained 
 as one of the inevitable results of the operation of Natural 
 Selection." 3 
 
 Since, however, Darwin came to see that self-adapta- 
 tion to the " definite " action of the environment is the 
 cause of new variations in animals and plants : experience 
 shows us that aestheticism and tastes for forms of art are 
 matters of cultivation. This means that the more we 
 exercise our brains in studying these things, the more the 
 brain will respond and become educated. 
 
 Such is only a particular instance of the universal 
 process of " response to the environment," perfectly 
 analogous to the education of reason and other mental 
 traits by practice. It thus falls under the law of use, by 
 which structure is developed in the bodies of animals and 
 plants. 
 
 As another trait of the mind, is the love of beauty. 
 
 1 Mr. Balfour's Apologetics, p. 87. 
 
 Op. cit., p. 93. P. 71.
 
 230 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Here Materialism enters into the strangest opposition to 
 Christianity it is possible to conceive. This is what 
 Haeckel says : " Monism enters into its strongest opposi- 
 tion to Christianity on the question of beauty. Primitive 
 Christianity preached the worthlessness of earthly life, 
 regarding it merely as a preparation for an eternal life 
 beyond. Hence it immediately followed that all we 
 find in the life of man here below, all that is beautiful in 
 art and science, in public and private life is of no real 
 value. The true Christian must avert his eyes from 
 them ; he must think only of a worthy preparation for the 
 life beyond. Contempt of Nature, aversion from all its 
 inexhaustible charms, rejection of every kind of fine art, 
 are Christian duties." 1 
 
 Could anything be more grotesque? What do all the 
 art galleries of England and the Christian world mean ? 
 
 Haeckel has an eloquent passage upon the lovely 
 forms of life discovered during the nineteenth century ; 
 but says : " This progress of modern times in knowledge 
 of the true and enjoyment of the beautiful expresses, on 
 the one hand, a valuable element of our Monistic religion 
 [?] but is, on the other, in fatal opposition to Christianity." 2 
 
 Every reader will perceive what a travesty this is of 
 true Christianity. Whence Haeckel derived this absurd 
 idea, I know not. Christianity not only prepares man 
 for the next world, but ennobles his life on earth. A 
 true Christian enjoys his life in company with his Maker ; 
 for he reads " sermons in stones and good in everything ". 
 Not a flower or an insect, nor the lilies of the field and 
 the fowls of the air, but tell him of his Creator as well as 
 remind him of Christ. 
 
 The very fact that he can enjoy life, as well as all 
 
 1 The Riddle of the Universe, p. 347. 2 Op. cit., p. 352.
 
 RATIONALISM AND SCIENCE 231 
 
 creatures, each in its several way, is a witness to the 
 presence of a Mind who could evince His love for all his 
 creatures, by evolving a nervous system as the physical 
 basis of mental enjoyment. 
 
 But Monists see nothing of this ! They must have 
 physical proof of God. 
 
 " Science," writes the anonymous author of Mr. Bal- 
 fours Apologetics, 1 neither affirms nor denies the exist- 
 ence of God ; she has no need to trouble herself about 
 any such hypothesis. ... It is altogether excluded from 
 the domain of science, which can recognise nothing that 
 is not based on knowledge. . . . The so-called knowledge 
 must be submitted to the tests of observation and ex- 
 periment ; if it is knowledge at all, it is capable of 
 verification, and the verdict must be final." 
 
 Inductive evidence is here, I repeat, utterly ignored. 
 
 1 P. 102.
 
 CHAPTER III 
 
 RATIONALISTIC VIEWS OF PSYCHOLOGY, REASON AND 
 
 INSTINCT 
 
 AFTER having accumulated facts, as a basis of know- 
 ledge, and then co-ordinated them according to their 
 various relationships, and so classified them scientifically, 
 we endeavour to trace out the natural laws or the in- 
 variable orders of sequences. 
 
 In so doing one observes not only distinct causes and 
 their effects ; but definite objects secured by the various 
 forces at work. This is called Reason in Man. 
 
 When we look for evidences of reason in Nature, 
 other than man, such being acts done with some appar- 
 ently special motive and not merely automatic repetitions 
 only, we find it exemplified through the whole of the 
 organic world, not only in animals but in plants. As 
 reasoning in animals has been denied by some, it is as 
 well to give an instance recorded by Romanes which that 
 observer regards as distinctly proving reason in a dog. 
 His definition is that " for an action to be rational it must 
 be performed with conscious deliberation, or with thought- 
 ful adaptations of means to ends ". 
 
 " I drove with the dog from its country home, as a 
 present to a friend who lived in a town some ten miles 
 distant. Several weeks afterwards I again drove to visit 
 this friend, and when my horses were being harnessed for 
 the return journey the terrier must have reasoned from 
 
 (232)
 
 RATIONALISM AND PSYCHOLOGY 233 
 
 analogy that I was about to return home, and thereupon 
 formed the resolution of accompanying me to the hunting 
 ground of his puppyhood. But he must further have 
 reasoned that since on the occasion of my previous visit 
 I had purposely left him behind as a present to my friend, 
 I should not on this occasion be inclined to take him 
 home. Lastly, he must have reasoned that there was 
 one expedient whereby he could solicit my protection 
 on the homeward journey without the danger of being 
 imprisoned, and this expedient he adopted ; for after 
 we had vainly searched for Skye, to prevent his follow- 
 ing my dog-cart, I started, and when two miles on my 
 way home, I overtook him, lying in the middle of the 
 road, with his face towards the town, evidently expecting 
 my approach. And as the dog had clearly contemplated, 
 the distance was too great for me to return with him to 
 town, so that, as he had clearly intended, I had to take 
 him with me to his old home in the country." l 
 
 He gives another story of a dog lying down in a 
 kitchen while the cook was trussing a fowl. As soon as 
 she left the room, he seized it, carried it out and buried 
 it He then came back and lay down as before, mimicking 
 innocence. Unfortunately for the dog the gardener saw 
 him bury it, and brought it back. 
 
 The following is reproduced from the Daily Telegraph 
 of Qth March, 1903 : "A burglar has just been detected, 
 a fortnight after he had assisted in the work of the 
 robbery, by a wonderfully sagacious dog belonging to the 
 gentleman at whose expense the depredation had been 
 committed. The owner lives in Paris, and his villa at 
 Charenton having been ransacked, he had stocked it with 
 new furniture. After a heavy morning's toil, he was pro- 
 
 1 "Animal Intelligence," a lecture by G. J. Romanes, 1879.
 
 234 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 ceeding to a restaurant to recruit exhausted nature when 
 the spaniel suddenly ran after a well-dressed man who 
 was walking about fifty yards in front and began to bark 
 loudly. The owner hurried after the animal to call it 
 back, but, instead of obeying him, it attacked the stranger, 
 fixing its teeth into his trousers and holding on for all it 
 was worth. The gentleman then perceived that this was 
 one of his garments, which had disappeared on the night 
 when his villa was pillaged, so he spoke to a wood- 
 ranger who happened to be passing, and the man was 
 conducted to the police station, where he was forced to 
 confess that he had had a hand in the burglary, though 
 he declined to give the names of his accomplices. So 
 the dog had turned out to be an excellent dectective." 
 If one may recognise reason in animals whenever such 
 " reasonable " acts are done, i.e., when certain means are 
 employed to secure special ends, which are outside their 
 normal procedures, then we apparently can see such in 
 the actions of animals which possess no brains at all, 
 but only a nervous system. 
 
 Thus, if the head of a frog be cut off, and a little acid 
 be rubbed on the inner side of one of the legs, the other 
 leg is instantly drawn up and turns the foot to try and 
 rub off the acid from the other leg. 
 
 This may be called a " reasonable " act, but it is 
 simply an unconscious, mechanical, reflex action from the 
 spinal cord ; for if a long needle be now thrust down and 
 destroy the cord, all action of the leg ceases immediately. 
 A frog which has been deprived of its cerebral hemi- 
 spheres, swims perfectly in water and is indeed obedient 
 to all sorts of stimulus. The reflex action which accounts 
 for all its movements shows an entire want of any spon- 
 taneity, and is purely automatic, as it takes place precisely 
 in the same way under the same stimulus. Unlike
 
 RATIONALISM AND PSYCHOLOGY 235 
 
 stimuli associated with consciousness it can learn nothing 
 by experience. 
 
 If there be any feeble consciousness associated with 
 such reflex action, it cannot be determined ; but the 
 consciousness of the higher animals and man, which is 
 often obviously accompanied with reflex action, depends 
 upon the efficiency of the superficial grey matter of the 
 brain over and above the sub-cortical tissues. 
 
 Thus is it all through the animal kingdom from man 
 to an amoeba, that innumerable actions evincing all the 
 characteristics of reason are done by unconscious proto- 
 plasm alone. 
 
 Even in the actual construction of cells, the rule is for 
 the nucleus in the middle to divide into two leaving a 
 space between them. Then a " cell-plate," to form a new 
 wall, is laid down between them ; thus dividing the cell 
 into two. This process is repeated ad infinitum till the 
 animal or plant ceases to grow. 
 
 Two special cases have been described above, 1 but I 
 will here repeat where difficulties had to be met. When 
 the nucleus was situated at the side of the cell, it began 
 to divide into the two halves which travelled across the 
 cell, laying down the cell-plate as they went along, until 
 they reached the opposite side. 
 
 In another case the cell-plate was made by means of 
 the nucleus bulging out into a flattened spheroid till it 
 touched the opposite sides. 
 
 Practical protoplasmic reasoning might very well 
 define this behaviour ; though it was undoubtedly due to 
 unconscious automatism which performs these apparently 
 rational proceedings. That is precisely what it is, from 
 the formation of cells to the habits of a monkey. 
 
 1 Part I., chap, xii., pp. 62, 64.
 
 236 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 The reasoning is always automatic and connected 
 with concrete matters, which suggest to the nervous 
 system or the brain or protoplasm generally what should 
 be done, and the protoplasm in every case does it accord- 
 ingly. 
 
 Similarly nine-tenths of man's reasoning is of the same 
 kind, and is known as " common-sense " when external 
 objects and circumstances suggest to the brain a course 
 of action which it follows at once. He does many 
 reasonable acts from morning till night, as already ex- 
 plained, but none of them make any special call upon 
 his volition. His will, however, is always ready to 
 respond, if there is any occasion for choosing between 
 two courses of action, which may involve or require some 
 abstract motives wherewith to decide upon the most 
 desirable. 
 
 The question arises, Does this inherent property of 
 reason, seen in all organic beings and in the very cells of 
 which they are built up not to add the inherent power 
 the nucleus possesses to build up different forms in re- 
 sponse to new conditions of life, the basis of evolution 
 indicate Mind though "the reasonable acts" be them- 
 selves automatically done (whether consciously or uncon- 
 sciously) ? 
 
 One writer I have quoted would ask after the manner 
 of Philip, " Show us your God ? " Of course, this is im- 
 possible ; but may we not say in the words of Sir Oliver 
 Lodge : " Look for the action of the Deity, if at all, then 
 always ; not in the past alone, not only in the future, but 
 equally in the present. If His action is not visible now, 
 it never will be, and never has been visible." : 
 
 If Paley's watch did not require a visible watchmaker 
 
 1 Hibbert Journal, i., p. 214.
 
 RATIONALISM AND PSYCHOLOGY 237 
 
 to substantiate the Argument of Design, neither does the 
 doctrine of Evolution require God's visible presence to 
 substantiate His Reason in Nature. 
 
 I need only refer the reader to Paley's work for in- 
 stances in the animal kingdom ; so now let us take a few 
 illustrations from the vegetable world. 
 
 If a man has to cross an arid desert, he carries water 
 with him. If plants live in dry rocky places, where rain 
 falls for a few weeks only in the year, they provide them- 
 selves with water-storage tissues. 
 
 If plants have weak stems, they often convert their 
 leaves or flowering branches into tendrils, and moreover 
 provide them with a sensitiveness to touch, so that they 
 coil spirally around any object with which they may 
 come into contact. So, men make rope ladders. 
 
 As the embryo of seeds would perish on germination 
 if they had not food to live upon until roots and leaves are 
 made, Nature provides them with the necessary substances 
 in reserve, wherewith to fight the battle of life ; just as a 
 convoy accompanies soldiers on the march. 
 
 Similarly many plants have found out methods of 
 propagation without seeds, as potatoes. To do this 
 reserve food materials are stored up for the " eyes " or 
 young shoots to live upon until they have roots and leaves, 
 like germinating seeds. These are but a few of " reason- 
 able " processes whereby " means " for " ends " are provided 
 by the plant in view of future contingencies, etc. 
 
 Such processes are all effected by automatic proto- 
 plasmic " reason," if it be permissible to use the term in 
 this sense where consciousness is absent. 
 
 Haeckel, indeed, does attribute a " soul " with all 
 its properties to primordial cells, that is, in fact, to proto- 
 plasm ; but I should prefer to limit " reason " to acts 
 associated { with consciousness, and use the word "adapta-
 
 238 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 tion," which covers the whole ground, however " reason- 
 ably " the process of adaptation be carried out. 
 
 Now the question follows : Suppose we use the 
 word reason, first, for its recognised use by a most ac- 
 complished metaphysician, who deals entirely with ab- 
 stract thought. Secondly, with the concrete applications 
 of man in everyday life ; as well as on the part of the 
 higher animals, who never get beyond such concrete use 
 of it. 
 
 We then pass it on to apparently " reasonable acts " 
 of reflex action and instinct, till at last we find it in 
 the protoplasm of a cell ; for " means " to secure " ends " 
 occur throughout from top to bottom of the living world. 
 Then are we not justified in concluding that the highest 
 form of reason as seen in man, substantiates the belief 
 that an even higher Mind than his is behind the whole 
 series ; that this Logos or " Directivity " proves by inductive 
 evidence a conscious reason in the recognised Power be- 
 hind Nature ? 
 
 This conclusion Rationalists may not regard as scien- 
 tific, but it is philosophical. 
 
 There is a type of reasoning which is called " common- 
 sense," to which I have just alluded. This appears to be 
 " reasoning about very obvious matters and experiences ". 
 
 An example is the best way of illustrating this ; as it 
 is simply a generalisation from experiences. 
 
 Suppose it has been showery in April all the morn- 
 ing but clears up about noon, and the sun breaks out. A 
 man and his young son go out for a walk. The father 
 puts on his greatcoat and takes his umbrella. 
 
 The son seeing the sun shining does neither. Another 
 shower comes up in an hour. The father says : " Why 
 didn't you put on your coat and bring an umbrella ? You 
 might have known (or ' your common-sense ' might have
 
 RATIONALISM AND PSYCHOLOGY 239 
 
 told you) that another shower was likely to come up in 
 April." 
 
 The father had " common-sense " based on experience ; 
 the boy had none. 
 
 If an adult be deficient in common-sense, we call him 
 " stupid," and we commonly say " he did not stop to 
 think ". The boy acted on a deduction from insufficient 
 data Because the sun was shining, therefore it will be 
 fine. The boy went through a process of intuitive or 
 automatic reasoning ; but as it was a pure deduction, it 
 was fallible. 
 
 This covers a large field of man's imperfect reasoning, 
 lying between conscious, reflective reasoning, where all 
 the data available are mentally collected ; and the pro- 
 cess of " jumping to conclusions," i.e., deductive and a 
 priori assumptions, which generally turn out to be er- 
 roneous. 
 
 If the word reason be only legitimately restricted to 
 conscious acts performed with some definite end in view ; 
 then instinct in many cases also stands for many acts 
 performed with some definite ends in view, but without 
 the creature knowing what the " ends " may be. It par- 
 takes therefore, of an automatic character, due to some 
 inherent directivity independent of the creature's know- 
 ledge. 
 
 In themselves the acts may have apparently all the 
 characteristics of reason. This leads one to suppose that 
 they were truly reasonable acts in the ancestral per- 
 formers ; but have now become fixed and inherited traits 
 or instincts. 
 
 This may not imply to all, for some are at present 
 quite inexplicable. With regard to Instinct, there are dif- 
 ferent views. Herbert Spencer has described it as " com- 
 pound reflex action " ; but Mr. Romanes would add the
 
 240 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 element of " consciousness ". Mr. Reid would define it as 
 follows : " The faculty which is concerned in the con- 
 scious adaption of means to ends, by virtue of inborn 
 inherited knowledge and ways of thinking and acting ". 
 
 He then gives an example : " The young alligator or 
 the young turtle instinctively seeks the water on emerging 
 from the egg, i.e., they seek it by virtue of their inborn 
 and inherited knowledge and ways of thinking and acting. 
 Instinct is clearly transmissible." 1 
 
 In this case Instinct seems synonymous with inherited 
 memory of the water as the medium in which the parental 
 alligator and turtle lived. 
 
 But numerous instincts i.e., at least habits, which 
 would be now called "instinctive," can be grouped or 
 classified with what must have been "reasonable" acts 
 and done through " conscious adaption of means to ends ". 
 I will take one or two instances. 
 
 Little pigs go at once to the sow's teats. That is 
 instinct ; but the sucking process itself is regarded as due 
 to reflex action. The calf's habit of butting the udder 
 is common to all and can only be instinctive ; certainly 
 it is not taught to do so by the mother cow. 
 
 Prof. A. Newton regards the instinct of the cuckoo in 
 putting its egg in the nest of some other bird as an in- 
 herited habit. " Everyone who has sufficiently studied 
 the habits of animals will admit the tendency of some of 
 these habits to become hereditary. That there is a 
 reasonable probability of each cuckoo most commonly 
 putting her eggs in the nest of the same species of bird, 
 and of this habit being transmitted to her posterity, does 
 not seem to be a very violent supposition." 2 
 
 Mr. O. H. Latter after criticising the above observes : 
 
 *0p. cit., p. 137. 2 Dictionary of Birds, p. 123.
 
 RATIONALISM AND PSYCHOLOGY 34* 
 
 " In spite of these criticisms I am compelled by the re- 
 sults of my investigations to admit that I now believe 
 Prof. Newton's theory to be, in the main, correct". 1 
 
 If hermit crabs, to which I have already alluded, 
 now supply instances of an hereditary instinct converted 
 into an absolute necessity, their enemies supply reasoning 
 in adapting their habits towards them ; for it has been 
 noticed that a very young octopus will at once seize a 
 hermit crab; but as the latter had fixed stinging zoo- 
 phytes over the shell [by reason], the octopus recoiled 
 and let its prey escape. Subsequently it was observed 
 to avoid hermit crabs. But older animals of the same 
 species managed cleverly to pull the crab out of its house 
 without being stung. 2 
 
 If the acquiring of any habits come under what Mr. 
 Reid calls " psychological change," i.e., from a previous 
 state, when no such habit existed ; and the habit in this 
 case probably arose from the direct, conscious adaptation 
 of means to ends ; then, such are obviously inherited, and 
 the fact that these habits run in direct descent of par- 
 ticular genera or species is an additional evidence that 
 they have become fixed, automatic traits in the race in 
 question. Hermit crabs now have the instinct to go 
 searching for " houses to let ". 
 
 Let us take another example. 
 
 Soles, as fry, are, like other fishes, bilaterally sym- 
 metrical ; but they soon assume the generic habit of 
 lying flat on the ground more or less embedding them- 
 selves in the shingle. The bodily form changes in con- 
 formity with th''s changed and acquired habit ; as the 
 form of the fry indicates the ancestral type. 
 
 Their present habit suggests the primary purpose of 
 
 1 Biometrika, i., p. 166. 
 
 2 Stout's Manual of Psychology, p. 257. 
 
 16
 
 t+t PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 trying to hide themselves at the bottom of the water 
 to escape their enemies. Both form and habit have now 
 become perpetuated and hereditary. 
 
 For a hen to scratch up the ground is a reasonable 
 procedure. It was a direct act of reason in the first that 
 did it. Experiments prove that it is now instinctive in 
 chickens ; as Mr. Reid shows in the following instance. 
 " Without any opportunities of imitation when kept quite 
 isolated from their kind, chickens begin to scrape when 
 from two to six days old. Generally, the condition of 
 the ground was suggestive." Some chickens were hatched 
 on a carpet, where they were kept for several days. 
 " They showed no inclination to scrape, because the stimu- 
 lus supplied by the carpet to the soles of their feet was of 
 too novel a character to call into action the hereditary in- 
 stinct ; but when a little gravel was sprinkled on the carpet, 
 and so supplied the appropriate or customary stimulus, the 
 chickens immediately began their scraping movements." l 
 
 In this case, therefore, we have a primary act of 
 Reason to start with. It becomes an Instinct in the 
 race ; which is then performed by Reflex Action. 
 
 Dogs bury bones. Such an act is due first to reason- 
 ing powers, with the object, presumably, of keeping them 
 hidden from other dogs, so that they may eat them on 
 some future occasion. This has now become a hereditary 
 habit. Even a puppy in a room has been watched trying 
 to bury a biscuit in the corner, first, by scratching at the 
 boards to make a hole ; then after placing the biscuit 
 where it imagined the hole to be, it tried to bury it by 
 pressing it down with its nose. It came away apparently 
 quite satisfied with the result. Any "common-sense" 
 was conspicuous by its absence. 
 
 Experiments of Dr. Allen Thomson, F.R.S., op. (it., note, p. 159.
 
 RATIONALISM AND PSYCHOLOGY 243 
 
 Mr. Reid compares the three processes as follows : " It 
 is to be noted that instinctive action is as sharply divided 
 from reflex action by the fact that it results from con- 
 sciousness, as it is divided from rational action by the fact 
 that it is due to inborn not acquired knowledge and ways 
 of thinking and acting." l 
 
 If he means "not acquired" by the individual itself, 
 he may be right, though prolonged habit may become 
 instinctive in animals, as it does automatic in man ; but 
 from the cases given, instincts seem certainly in some 
 cases to be hereditary reasonable acts, but done auto- 
 matically, the adaptation of means to ends being lost or 
 grotesquely imitated. Thus a tame beaver kept indoors 
 is said to have made a " dam " in the corner of a room by 
 collecting all the small articles it could get, such as 
 brushes, sticks, etc. This seems to be a case of " instinct 
 at fault ". 
 
 Some writers say " instinct never fails," but this is 
 incorrect ; for example, I have found the solid spine of 
 an echinoderm pierced by the boring of some carnivorous 
 univalve. Woodpeckers have injured telegraph poles. 
 
 Again one instinct may clash with another. Thus 
 swallows which had built and hatched eggs too late in the 
 season, abandoned the brood when the instinct to migrate 
 was present. 
 
 A great deal has been written on Instinct in animals ; 
 the majority of cases (if not all) seem to be hereditary 
 habits originally acquired by use and adaptation to the 
 surroundings. I think we may regard this principle of 
 Adaptation to the Environment as applicable to the origin 
 of habits as well as structures, as explaining at least most 
 of them. Thus various kinds of birds always build pre- 
 
 1 op. tit., p. 147.
 
 244 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 cisely the same kinds of nests, as of thrushes, blackbirds, 
 rooks, etc., respectively. Evolution will not allow that 
 any particular kind of bird first built one of the shape 
 and structure now peculiar to the species, other than as 
 a result of experiment. I mean, the bird could not have 
 had any previous instruction as to how it should be built. 
 
 But having once succeeded to its satisfaction, the 
 same nest becomes, so to say, an hereditary feature ; and 
 the power to make it an heirloom. 
 
 It is thought the young birds receive instruction from 
 their parents. It is very possible, not to say likely, that 
 such is the case ; but experiments have shown that it is 
 not always necessary. Thus a greenfinch's egg hatched 
 under a canary proved to be a hen and subsequently 
 built a normal greenfinch's nest. A young bullfinch 
 taken early has been known to do the same thing. 
 
 Whether trap-door spiders learn how to make nests, 
 I do not know, but those of very small spiders I possess 
 are just as beautifully made as if by full-grown individuals. 
 
 Similarly, habits of instinct seen in insects seem to 
 have been originally successful experiments, which having 
 proved to be useful are repeated ad infinitum by heredity. 
 Thus certain wasps paralyse spiders, but do not kill 
 them, for food for their grubs. The exact spot where 
 the nerve ganglion is may have been originally found by 
 " trial and error " ; but once discovered, the stinging the 
 victim there has become hereditary. 
 
 Birds and insects are said to change their usual habits 
 if they alter their habitats, if it be necessary to do so, 
 under the influence of the environmental conditions ; just 
 as their own bodies become modified giving rise to new 
 varieties or species. 
 
 It is said, for example, that the hive-bee has been 
 known to abandon the hexagonal cell, and lapse into
 
 RATIONALISM AND PSYCHOLOGY 245 
 
 forming the circular form, after the ordinary type of the 
 humble-bee. While trap-door spiders make excellent 
 doors to their chambers in Mentone, our English species 
 makes none, but simply tears a hole in the wall to drag 
 its prey inside and then mends it again. 
 
 This method appears to have now become a fixed 
 and instinctive habit. 
 
 On the other hand, there are some instincts which are 
 still inexplicable such as the so-called " homing " of 
 animals. Dogs and cats have been taken long distances 
 by train, and yet have found their way back across 
 several counties. No one at present seems able to 
 explain how it is done. 
 
 With regard to the homing instinct Romanes records 
 " Evidence of a cat finding its way home from London 
 to Huddersfield, a distance of 200 miles ; of a dog 
 returning to its home in Sutherlandshire from Berwick- 
 on-Tweed, having been taken to Berwick by sea, and 
 returning by land, etc. In such cases short cuts are often 
 made over third sides of triangles ; but it is interesting 
 that in one of my cases, communicated to me by an 
 intelligent correspondent, some horses, in taking a short 
 cut for home, were brought up, after a journey of several 
 hundred miles, on the end of a peninsula, where they do 
 not seem to have had sense enough to double back." 
 
 Homing instinct cannot be identically the same thing 
 as that of a carrier pigeon ; for as Prof. Loeb says : " It 
 seems to be certain that the carrier pigeon finds its way 
 back by the visual memory of the locality from which it 
 started." He says the same thing of solitary wasps, bees 
 and ants. 1 
 
 Prof. Loeb remarks : " It always seemed to me one 
 
 1 Comparative Physiology of the Brain, p. 196.
 
 246 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 of the most wonderful arrangements in Nature that, in 
 many species, the female lays her eggs in places where 
 newly born larvae find just the kind of food they require. 
 The fly lays its eggs on decaying meat, etc., and it is on 
 these substances that the young larvae feed." l 
 
 I cannot see where the difficulty lies, for the fly was 
 a grub itself once : and has only to remember what it fed 
 on before it fell asleep and woke up as a fly ! 
 
 Another instinct is that of amusement. Probably all 
 animals, if we did but know their habits sufficiently, amuse 
 themselves in some way or another. It is particularly 
 noticeable in domesticated animals, especially the young. 
 It is also very patent in insects, as gnats, flies, butterflies, 
 etc. But what is very apparent is that each kind of 
 animal plays in precisely the same manner generation 
 after generation. We never seem to see any initiative 
 now, though their games must have originated at some 
 time. Thus, flies darting backwards and forwards, 
 pirouetting when they meet, is a familiar instance. Such 
 is a habit which is now evidently hereditary. 
 
 Dogs, cats, and savages as well as mediaeval knights 
 at "play" mimic fighting. This suggests the probable 
 origin of that custom ; while the sexual instinct may 
 account for the " pirouetting " peculiarities of insects. 
 
 Birds again afford many curious habits, each kind 
 amusing themselves after their fashion. Thus the 
 peculiar custom of constructing and decorating "runs" 
 of the bower-birds is characteristic of the genus and 
 an hereditary instinct. 
 
 They know exactly what they like and where to put 
 it. If the bird has placed a brightly coloured object at a 
 particular spot, and it be intentionally shifted by the 
 
 1 Comparative Physiology of the Brain, p. 186.
 
 RATIONALISM AND PSYCHOLOGY 247 
 
 owner of the birds (in captivity), it is at once put back 
 into its place. 
 
 Instincts have often been confounded with reflex 
 actions ; and it is, indeed, not always easy or possible to 
 differentiate them. A moth flying to a candle has been 
 called an instinct ; but Prof. Loeb shows that it is pro- 
 bably nothing but a mechanical response to the excite- 
 ment of light. 1 
 
 V. Hartmann would define instinct as "purposeful 
 action without consciousness ". This definition, however, 
 would apply equally well to shrinking in one's sleep from 
 a touch, or a frog trying to remove a drop of acid from 
 its leg, without a head, or swimming without a brain ; 
 those being obviously reflex actions. 
 
 Darwin's greatest difficulty was the cell-making in- 
 stinct of worker bees, which can never leave offspring 
 to inherit the habit. 
 
 A very simple theory will explain it. Eimer has 
 shown that when a female grub, which would become a 
 worker, is made to become a queen bee, she attains not 
 all the many points of structure but the physiological 
 peculiarities of a queen. 
 
 In other words, these latter are potentially present in 
 every female egg the queen lays. 
 
 Hence, all that is required to be assumed is that the 
 ancestral queen used wax to make hexagonal cells and 
 collected honey and pollen ; but queens have now ceased 
 to do these things, it having been taken over by the 
 workers, in whom these traits are hereditary. In the 
 case of wasps of the genus Vespa, not only do the 
 workers but the queen still makes hexagonal cells. 
 My sole object in discussing thus briefly the question 
 
 1 Comparative Physiology of the Brain, pp. 179-183.
 
 248 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 of instinct is to show that the idea of Natural Selection 
 having anything to do with it is superfluous. 
 
 Leaving animals and coming to man we observe that 
 all children pass through the various stages of reflex 
 action, instinct and reason, first in concrete matters, then 
 finally with abstract ideas. 
 
 As an illustration of the first, if one places the fore- 
 finger across the open palm of a baby's hand, its fingers 
 at once close upon it, like the tendril of a pea on a stick. 
 Such an act is simply due to reflex action in consequence 
 of the stimulus excited by touch. 
 
 As an example of childish instinct a little child will 
 run away from a stranger like any wild animal, through 
 instinctive fear. 
 
 A little girl in a poor cottage was observed nursing a 
 hearth-brush ; its parents were too poor to buy it a doll 
 The " maternal instinct " was there but somewhat mis- 
 applied ! 
 
 A child seeing his father going out goes and fetches 
 his stick. It has automatically reasoned that its father 
 will want it on his walk. So far its reason is concerned 
 (like that of all animals) with a concrete matter ; but if it 
 be old enough, it will reason, still automatically, that its 
 father will be pleased at its thoughtfulness. The child is 
 then entertaining an abstract idea, but it is not conscious 
 of reasoning it out. 
 
 To make my position clearer, and in order to show that 
 conscious reasoning may pass into unconscious automatic 
 reasoning, let us suppose a man looks at his watch. It is 
 11.30 P.M., his usual bed-time. He takes out his watch 
 key and proceeds deliberately, attentively and consciously 
 to wind up the watch. At that moment a servant enters 
 the room, his attention is called to the servant. When 
 he has gone, he cannot be sure that he wound up his watch
 
 RATIONALISM AND PSYCHOLOGY 249 
 
 or not, and tries it with the key, and finds that it has been 
 wound up. 
 
 Hence his hand had automatically done the reasonable 
 act which his consciousness had previously determined 
 to do. 1 
 
 An interesting passage in St. John's Gospel illustrates 
 three stages of mental perception which may be described, 
 first as merely a sense-percept ; secondly, where mental 
 attention is added ; thirdly, an abstract reflection is super- 
 added to the previous observations. Casual and attentive 
 observation are both possible in animals, but the third is 
 not. 
 
 I allude to the account of John and Peter going to the 
 tomb of our Lord. 2 John arriving first, looks in and in 
 the semi-darkness " sees " the linen cloths " lying ". Peter 
 enters and " beholds " them as well as the napkin that 
 was about His head, not lying with the linen cloths, but 
 " rolled up " in a place by itself, i.e., on the usual head- 
 rest. 
 
 The meaning of this is that the long linen bands with 
 which a corpse was bound, as referred to in the case of 
 Lazarus, were still " lying " (/cet/ie^a ra 606via) flat on the 
 stone slab, just as if they were still bound round the body 
 of Jesus, enclosing, it is presumed, the spices, as no 
 mention is made of them being scattered about. The 
 napkin too, retains its form (evTerv\iyfievov) as if it were 
 wrapped about the head. In a word, the body had dis- 
 appeared without disturbing the cloths and the napkin. 
 
 The disciples leave the tomb, and John, at least, now 
 not only " sees " or " beholds," but " knows " the meaning 
 of it all. He realises for the first time (for as yet they 
 knew not the Scriptures) that the Lord has risen indeed. 
 
 I 1 have frequently done this myself. "John xx. i-io.
 
 250 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Observe the three words used for "seeing". John 
 first " sees " (/SXeVet) i.e., he saw the cloths lying but 
 they implied nothing peculiar. Peter enters and " be- 
 holds " (JdewpeT) i.e., his attention is aroused by some 
 strange fact. Lastly, John comes away having " seen 
 with his mind " (etSe) and understood the meaning of 
 what he saw.
 
 CHAPTER IV 
 
 METAPHYSICAL CONCEPTIONS OF THE SENSES 
 
 A RATIONALISTIC author says : " We deny that the 
 senses even occasionally deceive us ". l Let him place 
 his hand in water at 35 F., and then in water of 60, 
 when the water will feel decidedly warm ; but if he had 
 first placed it in very hot water and then transferred it to 
 water at 60, this latter temperature would feel quite 
 cold. " Colour blindness " most certainly does " occasion- 
 ally deceive us," and hearing sounds is by no means 
 infallible. 
 
 So again he says, " The testimony of the senses is 
 ultimate and irrefragable truth," 2 and that there is "no 
 such firm basis in Religion ". 
 
 It is easy enough to deceive the senses, not only that 
 of touch but that of sight. A person looking in a stereo- 
 scope for the first time would suppose the single object 
 was one of three dimensions or solid ; whereas he would 
 find two pictures and both of them flat. 
 
 Again, looking at a mask on the hollow surface or 
 inside, with a strong light upon it, the mask will appear 
 solid like a face, so that to say the senses are an ultimate 
 test and irrefragable is scarcely true. One sense must be 
 corrected if possible by another, but this is not always 
 practicable. 
 
 By reducing psychology to physiology Haeckel would 
 
 1 Mr. Balfour's Apologetics, p. 22. *0p. cit., p. 28. 
 
 (250
 
 252 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 bring all mental and moral phenomena into line with 
 bodily secretions. But it cannot be done. Worship and 
 bile are as incompatible as to ask for a gallon of know- 
 ledge or reduce life to foot-pounds in weight. 
 
 So with Religion, it is said we gain nothing by calling 
 " force " " God ". Names are not of importance : but it 
 is, to believe in God as a Living Being, whom you, at 
 least, think you can trust and look to for help in distress 
 not for temporal matters, as Rationalists suppose we 
 only do but for spiritual help to bear up against the 
 trials and troubles of this world, the continual source of 
 wholesome discipline for man's soul. Those who know 
 what this means, laugh to scorn the impotent wailings of 
 the Rationalist ; who is continually carping at the so- 
 called " physical evils of this world (as incompatible with 
 a " good and merciful God ") because he has not perfect 
 conditions about him. 
 
 The Christian can no more escape from tribulation 
 than the Materialistic Monist, and, from his point of 
 view, it would not be the best thing for him if he could. 
 " No Cross, no Crown " is the Christian's motto ; while 
 faith leads him to believe that "eye hath not seen, 
 nor ear heard, nor hath it entered the heart of man to 
 conceive what God hath prepared for them that love 
 Him ". 
 
 His experience is that it is better to live by faith as 
 well as, and not only by sight with the sure and certain 
 hope of Everlasting Life. Far better and happier and 
 encouraging than to look forward to annihilation at 
 death ! 
 
 The intellectual Rationalist and Haeckelian Monist 
 may do so philosophically ; but his creed will not help 
 the untutored masses to be pure in heart and body and 
 righteous as a " social duty " only. If you have no taste
 
 METAPHYSICS 253 
 
 for virtue, why be virtuous at all, as long as you do not 
 violate the laws of the land ? 
 
 "If by ' religious truth ' be meant the doctrine of the 
 existence of God and of human immortality, we think it 
 would be difficult to show that there is any general ' need ' 
 to believe in these things " ( Mr, Balfour's Apologetics, 
 p. 28). 
 
 It is easy to say this ; but the whole history of man 
 belies it. I will contrast two writers on this point. No 
 one will gainsay that Prof. E. B. Tylor's authority is 
 practically final : " The assertion that non-religious tribes 
 have been known in actual existence, though in theory 
 possible, and perhaps in fact true, does not at present 
 rest on that sufficient proof which for an exceptional 
 state of things we are entitled to demand. The evidence 
 given is often mistaken, and never conclusive." 1 
 
 On the other hand, Haeckel, to support his monistic 
 views, boldly asserts : " It has been absolutely proved by 
 modern comparative ethnology that many uncivilised 
 races of the earliest and most primitive stage had no 
 notion either of immortality or of God ". 2 He mentions 
 " the Veddahs of Ceylon," " several of the earliest groups 
 of the nearly related Dravidas," " the Indian Seelongs," 
 " some native Australian races," " several of the primitive 
 branches of the American race in the interior of Brazil, 
 on the upper Amazon, etc., have no knowledge either of 
 gods or immortality". I have no means of verifying or 
 disproving this ; but am inclined to trust Tylor rather 
 than Haeckel. 
 
 It is admitted that the senses are developed by Evolu- 
 tion. The eye came from a pigment spot. The ear from a 
 feeble perception of aerial vibrations, etc. The author 
 
 1 Primitive Culture. 2 The Riddle of the Universe, p. 196.
 
 254 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 alluded to reminds us that " Helmholtz has shown that 
 there is a mathematical correspondence between the 
 atmospheric vibrations which produce exquisite har- 
 monies and the physical effects of these vibrations on the 
 nervous system. Thus in all his musical developments 
 man has done little more than lay bare [and develop ?] 
 the natural correspondences which exist between himself 
 and the universe." l 
 
 We all know that a man's " ear for music " can be 
 cultivated ; that is to say, it responds to the more and 
 more highly complex musical compositions that it hears. 
 The " definite action " of the orchestra plays upon the 
 protoplasm of the ear, which thus responds more and 
 more to it, thereby building up structures which enable 
 the man to appreciate " classical " compositions more than 
 he did at first. 
 
 The author is right, as I have already shown, in saying 
 man can only " lay bare " or reveal the eternal har- 
 monies of sound waves, which must have existed potenti- 
 ally ever since air came into existence. 
 
 The question arises, Did harmony between certain 
 notes arise sua sponte in accordance with eternal laws of 
 vibrations ; but the air which conveys them was not 
 eternal ; or did some conscious Power have something to 
 do with it ? Had He any intention in framing the laws 
 of sound for man's delectation ; as he is the only being 
 who can discover and reveal them ? 
 
 Of course, Nature gives no answer. " Notes " certainly 
 give pleasure to birds, and possibly to other animals 
 which cannot sing, 2 but they are only sequences of dif- 
 ferent wave lengths, without the order in which man alone 
 
 1 Mr. Balfour's Apologetics, p. 76. 
 
 2 A friend had a mare which became very unmanageable in her stall 
 when the band played in the street, till she was taken out to hear it.
 
 METAPHYSICS 255 
 
 can arrange them. No two birds have ever been known 
 to sing a duet. 
 
 But when we see what intense pleasure music affords 
 man, from the tom-tom to Handel's (i Messiah," we take 
 it as one of the innumerable coincidences which point 
 to Intention between the supposed Creator and His 
 creation. 
 
 The same argument applies to the appreciation of 
 works of art the " aesthetic sense " from the primitive 
 drawings of animal forms on bones by pre-historic man to 
 the pictures in the National Gallery. 
 
 Further, as C. Kingsley thought, we cannot exclude 
 Fun and Humour from our list of " Intentions". Fun is 
 abundantly displayed among animals, but humour, wit 
 and laughter appear to be confined to man. Certainly 
 it is so when based on abstract ideas. But monkeys seem 
 to be humorous about concrete things ; as when I saw a 
 monkey at the Zoo snatch a lady's pocket-handkerchief, 
 wrap his head up in it and then bound off from perch 
 to perch. 
 
 Man is often spoken of as the only laughing animal. 
 It mainly arises in consequence of strong incongruities 
 presented to the sight or imagination ; but why we 
 should laugh though it gives us pleasure is inexplic- 
 able. Thus, a clergyman had hung a number of pictures 
 of sacred subjects in his vestry for some time for the in- 
 struction of his villagers. The village attendant on 
 coming in after their removal, burst out laughing and 
 said : " How funny the vestry looks without the pictures ". 
 Is it possible to explain why one should laugh at any 
 unaccustomed contrasts ? At all events it is a natural 
 law that they somehow cause us amusement. This is 
 why conundrums hold their ground so tenaciously among 
 us ; and they are especially " funny " when the abstract
 
 256 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 and concrete are brought violently into contrast ; thus, 
 to avoid being either too suspicious or too credulous when 
 attending a spiritualistic seance, you should try to " hit 
 the happy medium ". 
 
 With regard to the preceding and all other kinds of 
 " play of our feelings " the author quoted says : " We 
 know that any explanation lies within the realm of 
 physiology " ; but physiology and psychology are only 
 names for co-ordinated observations on the phenomena of 
 life. What is it which has primarily caused the pheno- 
 mena which we group under the terms of physiology and 
 psychology? All the examination of brain and nerves 
 would never have suggested the results of pleasure and 
 enjoyment, of wit, fun and laughter and all the aesthetic 
 pleasures. 
 
 The author makes the postulate, "given life and 
 feeling," then everything else follows. Possibly so ; but 
 Who first gave the Life and the Feeling ? 
 
 We have now seen what a Rationalist has to say about 
 the senses and God. The Monist Haeckel declares that 
 there is no God ; while Secularists and Agnostics assert : 
 " I do not know what you mean by the term. There 
 may be one but the word God conveys nothing to my 
 mind " (Bradlaugh). 
 
 Now let us turn to a Metaphysician. The latest 
 exponent of a conception of God is given in a work by 
 Mr. Herbert Rix. 1 
 
 He begins by saying that there is " the need of a 
 Faith " ; a statement which no one will dispute ; and he 
 recognises enthusiasm, as in art, etc., as worthy of the 
 name of religion. In this he has followed the late Sir J. 
 Seeley in his Natural Religion ; but this is not what 
 
 1 A Dawning Faith, or The World as a Spiritual Organism (1903).
 
 METAPHYSICS 257 
 
 ninety-nine people out of a hundred understand by the 
 term. 
 
 " We need religious thought and theory ; a view of 
 the universe as vital and as the expression of a living 
 Power." l This may be thought acceptable in a way ; 
 but he soon tells us that in his view the " universe is 
 nothing else than the manifestation of a Living God ". 
 One notes the change of terms I have italicised. 
 
 He starts to prove this by misusing the word " uni- 
 verse ". " It implies unity, but to most people it is a 
 'sum-total'". 3 He thus omits the " verse" while re- 
 taining the " uni ". Prof. Skeat, however, says that the 
 word means " combined into a whole " ; and that is a 
 " sum-total" of innumerable differentiated units. 
 
 " Faith in a universe obliges you to believe that there 
 is but one self-existing being. Call it God, call it Matter, 
 call it Mind . . . there is only One." 4 So, too, Haeckel 
 reduces everything to Matter and Force and calls them> 
 One Substance. 
 
 To prove his theory Mr. Rix tells us to suppose a 
 number of independent realities, as souls. Souls are 
 finite, such as men, and if existent without bodies, will 
 still presumably be finite; but the author suddenly 
 shifts his ground and adds : " If there are more than one, 
 they must in some sense or other be mutually exclusive ". 8 
 But this would be characteristic of "infinite or self- 
 existent souls," not " souls " as we understand the term, 
 as signifying independent realities. 
 
 He says, then, of " souls," " If they be in space they 
 are not independent, your beings are not self-existent ". 
 
 If we assume them to be human souls indeed, we 
 know of no other kind the consciousness of one soul is 
 
 * op. /., P . 14. 'P. 58. P,33- 
 
 4 P. 36. 5 Op. cit., p. 38. 
 
 17
 
 258 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 independent of the consciousness of another soul ; and 
 no one supposes human souls to be self-existent 
 
 Consequently, being no metaphysician, I am at a loss 
 to understand the use of the original supposition of im- 
 agining what does not exist. 
 
 If he means that there cannot be two infinite souls 
 co-existent in space and time, why not say so, and the 
 matter is settled? 
 
 He further adds : "Annihilate space and they fall 
 into identity or nothingness " ; but as it is impossible to 
 annihilate space even in thought, no finite mind can 
 foresee what would happen, if matter be not annihilated 
 too, of which he makes no mention. 
 
 He thus seems to begin with what is finite, quickly 
 changes it into the infinite, and then imagines what will 
 happen, if all be swept away, apparently, very like a 
 conjurer's trick. 
 
 Mr. Rix then describes in detail the Conservation of 
 Energy as reducible to One, and all matter equally so to 
 a possible single element ; then he fuses matter and 
 force together and so, Hi presto ! gets his " uni " 
 omitting the " verse". 
 
 In doing this he makes two strange errors : one, that 
 nitrogen is peculiar to the animal kingdom and that an 
 "atom" resembles the " x" of an algebraical equation 
 in being "no more a real thing than that". But x has 
 a very real value, namely, the answer to the equation ; 
 it only represents it, as long as it is unknown. 
 
 " Either Matter or Energy," he says "is, taken by itself, 
 an abstraction and not a reality." * Is there nothing " con- 
 crete " in the Universe ? " Motion apart from matter is, 
 in fact, unthinkable." But it is perfectly conceivable 
 
 'P. 56.
 
 METAPHYSICS a 59 
 
 as vibrating in ether, and ether is not regarded as 
 Matter. 
 
 Hence Mr. Rix comes to the conclusion of " One 
 Entity, that of Energised Matter = Universe = God ". 
 
 He then discusses the universe as an " organism " and 
 says there can be unity with diversity. He starts with 
 the assumption " Nature lives ". . . . " It is all life . . . 
 nothing is inert, even a stone is not inert." But non- 
 inertness is not what we understand by " life ". He is 
 here merging or confounding physical molecular motions 
 with life. A stone is not all alive, as he asserts. To say 
 so is one thing, but to correlate its internal vibrations 
 with life in any organism, is quite another matter : and so 
 he comes to the conclusion that " the Universe which we 
 call material is in every particle and shred of it alive ".* 
 It can only be said so, by quite illegitimate abuse of 
 terms and their meanings. Stones do not grow and 
 propagate as all animals and plants do, and until Mr. 
 Rix or other metaphysician can find flints breathing, 
 digesting or breeding, I, for one, utterly refuse to recognise 
 molecular vibrations as synonymous with the above 
 phenomena, characteristic of life. 
 
 Haeckel traces " soul " to a protoplasmic cell and 
 " life " to ether ; but has scarcely reached Mr. Rix's 
 position. 
 
 His next point is " the world you see is not so certain 
 as the visual sensation itself". ..." Sight is more certain 
 than the existence of anything that is seen ". 2 He says 
 there is no place for that which we call matter, it is a 
 phantom and a dream. 
 
 But is he right ? How about colour, which is a purely 
 " visual sensation ". Indeed the author disproves his 
 
 1 P. 67, he is by no means alone in this idea. * P. 92.
 
 2<5o PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 own statement by confessing to be himself " colour- 
 blind " ! 
 
 For, in the first place, how can we have any visual 
 sensations at all, if there be no objects external to cause 
 it ? We only see them by aid of the light derived from 
 them, and light must have a source. 
 
 But, secondly, the structure of the eye, the optic 
 nerve and the brain itself, all being composed of matter, 
 fall under his expression " the world you see," and are 
 therefore nothing but phantoms. How can the " visual 
 sensations " themselves, which depend entirely on things 
 which he admits are " uncertain," " phantoms," " dreams " 
 be more certain than these things themselves ? 
 
 Similarly with touch, taste, smell and hearing. They 
 are all only " feelings ". He says " even in forms (as of a 
 book) there is nothing but feeling, nothing but mind or 
 spirit, whichever you like best ". " The only thing of 
 which we have any certainty is spirit." 
 
 How Mr. Rix can say this, when his own eyesight 
 habitually deceives him, is incomprehensible. 
 
 But how is it that he can write about " mind " or 
 "spirit" at all ? If a man had no senses he could have 
 no "mind". He would be a blank. His mind and 
 spirit have to thank his senses for their very existence 
 in a practical sense. He certainly could never be a 
 metaphysician or realise the Universe as an Organism. 
 Metaphysics, he tells us, supply the only proof. And 
 that proof arises by mental concepts, that must be, 
 therefore, by means of phantom eyes and phantom ears. 
 How, then, are metaphysicians to be trusted any more 
 than their bodily senses, upon which they primarily 
 depend ? 
 
 Mr. Rix makes no allusion to the theoretical origin 
 of matter from vortex-rings of ether ; about which Prof.
 
 METAPHYSICS afii 
 
 Dolbear is so far convinced that he says : " It is either 
 that theory or nothing, there is no other that has any 
 degree of probability at all ", l 
 
 If matter be really composed of vortex-rings out of 
 ether, then it might be called "etherial" instead of 
 "material" ; just as we speak of a "copper" because it 
 is made of copper ; but both words are necessary ; for it 
 is not usual for us to call any manufactured article by 
 the name of the material of which it is composed ; but 
 the very fact of there being any visual perceptions at all 
 possible, implies something external to the eye, corre- 
 sponding to these perceptions of the mind. All that 
 reaches the retina are vibrations, which, the reader 
 will remember, collectively make a minute inverted 
 picture on the sensitive membrane of the retina. This 
 is mysteriously present to consciousness as an erect 
 picture, not microscopically small, but in full dimensions 
 of the objective source of light as a landscape. 
 
 Defects of structure make the picture sometimes 
 untrustworthy or mental hallucinations create non-ex- 
 istent, but apparently true, external objects. But in- 
 ductive evidence based on sound conditions of eyes, 
 nerves and brains of the whole human race, furnished 
 by the widest experience of ourselves and others, establish 
 the truth of an external world beyond all question ; cor- 
 responding to what our "visual perceptions" mentally 
 realise. 
 
 As long as a man is a compound being of matter 
 and mind, not to add a bundle of physical forces, it seems 
 to one who is no metaphysician somewhat absurd to 
 confound these two things, and ignore one at the 
 expense of the other. 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 43 ; see above, Part I., chap. iv.
 
 262 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 As long as they are obviously mutually dependent in 
 a living being, so must they stand or fall together. 
 
 Though Mr. Rix approaches very near to the 
 " Monistic Religion " of Haeckel, who sees nothing but 
 " blind and unconscious " matter and force, he tells us, 
 "There is a Universe and ... it is spiritual, and this 
 spiritual universe or universal spirit is what we mean by 
 ' God.' 1 Is it a Self-conscious Being ? " 
 
 " In ourselves," he adds, " we all recognise within 
 the circle of conscious experience two dissimilar kinds of 
 experience ; which we term psychical and physical, mind 
 and matter or self and not-self." 2 
 
 Haeckel, we may remember, unites them, making 
 psychology a branch of physiology. 
 
 " But this distinction fails in the Universe," because, 
 " if the universe is indeed one, then to that one there 
 can be no beyond. . . . He [God] is the Universe. . . . 
 To Him, there is no matter as distinct from mind." 3 
 
 Now Mr. Rix, as before, so here, overlooks one 
 phenomenon, and that is ether, which is not matter. 
 Matter may perhaps be formed out of etherial vortex- 
 rings, but ether is ether and not matter. As it is the 
 great vehicle of forces, pervading the universe, inclusive 
 of all material objects, so God is a Spiritual Energy as 
 well. Hence, if we may use the term, I repeat, ether 
 would seem to be " the vehicle of Divine power ". 
 
 Still, the question is not yet answered " Is God a 
 Person who thinks and loves ? " 4 " Of course He can 
 He thinks in you, thinks in me and in every thinking 
 being. Your thought is God's thought. . . . He becomes 
 the individual and sets that individual thinking." 5 
 
 An obvious question arises Why, then, can two 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 137. 2 P. 139. 3 P. 141. 
 
 P. 147. 5 P. 149-
 
 METAPHYSICS 263 
 
 persons be ever totally at variance in their opinions 
 upon the same subject ? Why do men tell lies if it be 
 God who speaks their thoughts ? 
 
 I suppose we must discover, if we can, some sort of 
 answer in Mr. Rix's statement that "the Universal 
 Spirit has all that we have, but without its imperfections 
 and its bonds." But if the Universe is God, "all our 
 imperfections and bonds " must be part of the Universe 
 as much as all that is perfect and free, and therefore part 
 of God. 
 
 Mr. Rix finally attacks the question of a future life. 
 He says : " Death absolute, both our scientific creed and 
 our idealistic philosophy entirely deny". 1 Haeckel, 
 however, says that " immortality is that highest point 
 of superstition which is regarded as the impregnable 
 citadel of all mystical and dualistic notions ". 2 
 
 He first alludes to the decomposition of the body at 
 death, and its elements passing into other compounds, 
 but never becoming annihilated. This, of course, is 
 true; but the "body" is annihilated as much as a 
 house is destroyed when pulled down and its bricks are 
 used again for building some other and totally different 
 structure. Then he argues by analogy, that the soul 
 follows a similar course. " The individual (like matter) 
 cannot die absolutely, ... It may lose its present in- 
 dividuality and mingle with other and diverse individuals ; 
 but no particle of it can cease to be." 8 
 
 If that be true, then the individuality is lost, just as 
 that of the house or body is at death. It will afford no 
 satisfaction to know that one's individuality is dissipated, 
 whether by transmigration or any other sort of trans- 
 fusion, into some other soul. 
 
 1 P. 192. a Riddle of the Universe, p. 192. * P. 97'
 
 264 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 The other alternative Mr. Rix offers, is for the indi- 
 vidual " to lose itself in the Universal Soul," and he com- 
 pares us with buckets of sea-water let down again into 
 the ocean. " Well ! " he says, " this is the worst that can 
 happen, this mingling with the infinite." 
 
 In conclusion, Mr. Rix makes many statements 
 which I cannot agree with or refute ; because they 
 convey no sense to my unmetaphysical comprehension ; 
 such as : " What we call ' matter ' is only ' soul ' mis- 
 apprehended " ; " there is no gulf between matter and 
 mind " ; " matter is but the plane where the mind of God 
 meets the mind of the creature," etc., etc. 
 
 If all this and much more be edifying, instructive or 
 consoling, I am glad I am not a metaphysician. 
 
 I have taken Mr. Rix's book as a type ; for others 
 write in much the same strain.
 
 CHAPTER V 
 
 INDUCTIVE REASONING AND THE FAITH OF THEISTS 
 
 TURNING now to the consideration of the question 
 how far Science and Reason are compatible with Faith or 
 vice versa : I will take Prof. Henry Jones' article l as a 
 basis for a short discussion. 
 
 Prof. Jones tells us that philosophers and theo- 
 logians level charges against the ratiocinative use of the 
 intelligence, especially in regard to the " principles of our 
 moral and religious life " ; and he speaks of " our failure 
 to justify the faith that founds our practice, etc. ". 
 
 Now is not the controversy between " Science and 
 Faith," 2 based on a misunderstanding of the term 
 " Faith " ? What the Church has too often demanded of 
 the "faithful" is not "faith" but "belief," if not "cre- 
 dulity ". Prof. Jones quotes Mr. Balfour as saying " the 
 causes of belief are not Reasons. It is Authority rather 
 than Reason." 
 
 It is well, therefore, to be clear as to what one means 
 by the terms used. The Century Dictionary says " Faith 
 is a firm belief based upon confidence in the authority 
 and veracity of another, rather than upon one's own 
 knowledge, reason or judgment ". But with the Disciples 
 
 lu The Present Attitude of Reflective Thought towards Religion, 
 Hibbert Journal, i., p. 228. 
 
 2 The subject of Sir Oliver Lodge's paper in the same journal, i., pp. 46, 
 209. 
 
 (265)
 
 266 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 it was based not solely on our Lord's authority, but on 
 His whole life, as He stood confessed before them. They 
 knew Him, they reasoned out that He was the Christ ; and 
 His life was, in their judgment, the life every one should 
 imitate. This was pure inductive reasoning, upon which 
 they resolved to die for Him if called upon to do so. 
 The result of their Faith was loyalty to Christ It was 
 reasoning, but coupled with personal love l and aspira- 
 tion, though this latter was at the time misdirected. 2 
 
 First, then, by " Credulity " I mean accepting anything, 
 merely because somebody has asserted it utterly regard- 
 less of there being any likelihood of its being true. Thus 
 are gross superstitions spread ; all reasoning is totally 
 absent. " Belief" is the acceptance of a statement in the 
 same way, but there is some show of authority for the 
 statement. Thus the Creeds are presumably based on 
 Scripture, but are enforced on the authority of the 
 Church. 
 
 Thirdly, "Faith" is a totally distinct matter. One 
 of the best descriptions of Faith is given by the late 
 author of Ecce Homo. It runs as follows : 
 
 " When Christ rejected the test of right conduct which 
 society uses, He substituted the test of faith. It is to be 
 understood that this is not strictly a Christian virtue ; it 
 is the virtue required of one who wishes to become a 
 Christian. . . . He who, when goodness is impressively 
 put before him, exhibits an instinctive loyalty to it, starts 
 forward to take its side, trusts himself to it, such a man 
 has faith, and the root of the matter is in such a man." 3 
 
 If we ask why should any man do this, or what 
 reasons has he for so doing, the answer is that it was 
 
 1 John xxi. 15-17 ; note, our Lord uses the verb ayavav but Peter, <pi\e1v. 
 
 2 Matt. xx. 20, 21. 
 
 3 Ecce Homo, chap, vi., on " Christ's Winnowing Fan ".
 
 INDUCTIVE REASON AND FAITH 267 
 
 really inductive but nevertheless automatic reasoning, 
 tinged with the emotions and aspiration of love for 
 Jesus, evincing itself in perfect loyalty to Him. 
 
 When the Apostles said," Lord increase our faith," l 
 this request, following our Lord's remarks upon forgive- 
 ness as often as a man repents, was an outburst of long- 
 ing to attain to that perfection, which they saw in their 
 Master, so far above their own powerlessness to forgive. 
 It was a proof, too, that they saw Jesus was right and 
 that the thing was possible. 
 
 This is but a sample of what Jesus appeared to the 
 Apostles. They, as we say, instinctively felt, i.e., they 
 automatically reasoned, that His character was perfect, 
 and that it was their duty to imitate Him. Their faith 
 was reasonable confidence, based on experience in Him 
 and intensified by love. The basis of their induction as 
 to Christ's perfection was the innumerable points of 
 character and conduct, His manner of speech and teach- 
 ing. It was, adds Sir J. Seeley, especially "the tem- 
 perance in the use of supernatural power, the masterpiece 
 of Christ. . . ." It was " the inimitable unity" in His 
 Love and Power combined that made Him unique, 
 indicated by the word povoyevijs. It was, in fact, the 
 accumulation of coincidences all conspiring to this one 
 end, which constituted their inductive reasoning, which 
 we call " Faith in Jesus Christ ". To say, therefore, that 
 reason is not to be trusted, is to say that nine-tenths of 
 man's intelligence is useless. Of cor.rse, if the premises 
 be insufficient or false, then the reasoning based upon 
 them is false too ; and it is this which throws so much 
 discredit upon deductive reasoning. Thus Queen Mary 
 is reported to have said that she could not be doing 
 
 1 Luke xvii. 3-5.
 
 268 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 wrong in burning heretics, as God would otherwise do it 
 in hell. 
 
 " Credulity" requires no Thought; neither Head nor 
 Heart is concerned in it. 
 
 " Belief" is based on Head Knowledge only. 
 
 " Faith " combines Induction and the emotions of the 
 Heart as well. 
 
 My object in making these remarks is to lead up to 
 my contention that there need be no hostility between 
 Science and Faith, Christian Ethics and the three doc- 
 trines of God, Freedom and Immortality ; for Reason 
 has the same basis for all, namely Induction. 
 
 And, further, as Science looks to find experimental 
 proof in addition, so does Religion. St. Paul repeatedly 
 tells his readers "to prove," " themselves," or "what is 
 good," or " their own work," and lastly he writes to the 
 Thessalonians : " Prove all things ; hold fast that which 
 is good ".* 
 
 St. James boldly identifies Religion with practical ex- 
 periment, namely, by maintaining purity in oneself and 
 showing love towards others. 2 The knowledge gained 
 by this practical experiment in ethics confirms the in- 
 ductive evidence or Faith, and ratifies the promise that 
 " if any man willeth to do His will, he shall know of the 
 teaching whether it be of God ". 3 
 
 By Faith and experiment in holy living man dis- 
 covers a Natural Law unknown to him before, which is 
 called " Regeneration ". He wants no authority of man 
 or the Church. He only wants, as Sir J. Seeley said, 
 " Goodness placed impressively before him," and ex- 
 periment soon proves that his inductions were sound, 
 represented by his " Faith " ; namely, that the Christ- 
 
 1 1 Thess. v. 21. 2 Jas. i. 27. 'John vii. 17.
 
 INDUCTIVE REASON AND FAITH tfg 
 
 life is the best for him to live, as long as he is on this 
 earth. 
 
 Prof. Jones says: "The 'true' derives all its value 
 from the ' good '. In itself it is an abstraction . . . and 
 is incapable of satisfying the spiritual needs of man." 
 Of course it is. No abstraction can possibly do so. 
 That is just why the preaching of morals will never 
 regenerate the masses of mankind, as Aristotle said. 1 
 It is just because the 'true' must come down from the 
 clouds of metaphysics and take a concrete form in a 
 Person; Who is not the "true" but the "Truth," 
 that " Faith " may grasp it as a living principle. The 
 experiment has been tried. Jesus Christ was, and is 
 accepted, not as the "true," or as the "good," but solely 
 on the grounds that He was the living Truth and living 
 Goodness personified. 
 
 Rationalists are repeatedly asking, What is there new 
 in Christ's teaching ? The following is Harnack's reply : 
 " You ask, ' What was there that was new ? ' The question 
 is out of place in Monotheistic religion. Ask rather: 
 ' Had what was here proclaimed any strength and any 
 vigour ? ' I answer : Take the people of Israel and search 
 the whole history of their religion. Take history gener- 
 ally, and where will you find any message about God and 
 the good that was ever so pure and so full of strength 
 for purity and strength go together as we hear and read 
 of in the Gospels ? . . . Pharisaical teachers had proclaimed 
 that everything was contained in the injunction to love 
 God and one's neighbour. They spoke excellently, the 
 words might have come out of Jesus' mouth. But what 
 was the result of their language ? That the nation con- 
 demned the man who took the words seriously. All 
 
 1 Ethics, book x., chap. ix.
 
 270 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 that they did was weak, and, because weak, harmful. 
 Words effect nothing : it is the power of the Personality 
 that stands behind them. But He ' taught as one having 
 authority and not as the Scribes '. Such was the impres- 
 sion of Him which His disciples received. His words 
 became to them ' the words of life,' seeds which sprang 
 up and bore fruit. That was what was new." 1 
 
 Prof. Jones says : " Truth is not an end but only 
 means". This does not seem to have been St Paul's 
 idea. " I count all things to be loss for the excellency of 
 the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord ; " 2 who was 
 the Truth. What he meant was that he longed to arrive 
 at, and embody in himself to the full, the " Truth " or the 
 Perfect Character and Conduct, as represented in Jesus 
 Christ. That was the " end " of his aims. 
 
 Nor am disposed to admit that " even Natural 
 Science now acknowledges that its province is limited 
 and that within that province itself its premises are 
 assumptions and its conclusions only proximately valid ". 
 It is certainly limited by the number of known animals 
 and plants and objects of the inorganic world ; and as 
 investigations proceed, assumptions are of course neces- 
 sary as " working hypotheses " ; but a vast number of 
 conclusions are perfectly valid. The Doctrine of Evolu- 
 tion, for instance, has long passed out of the stage of an 
 hypothesis, and any alternative is now unthinkable. 
 " Darwinism," on the other hand, or the theory of the 
 " Origin of Species by means of Natural Selection" was a 
 pure assumption and based on errors ; as I have shown 
 above. Physics are a branch of Natural Science, and 
 our knowledge of the laws of physical forces is valid ; 
 and with regard to biology and physiology, which Mr. 
 
 1 What is Christianity ? p. 48. Phil. iii. 8.
 
 INDUCTIVE REASON AND FAITH 271 
 
 James calls " supra-physical," and says they " lack the 
 demonstrative security of the mathematical and physical 
 sciences," he seems to completely ignore the process of 
 induction, upon which the laws of living beings are 
 based. New truths, i.e., facts, are added to our know- 
 ledge every day. Formerly plagues and zymotic diseases 
 were thought, on a priori grounds, i.e., deductive reason- 
 ing on insecure data, to be visitations of Providence. We 
 now know that they are due to microbes and insanitary 
 conditions; and if natural science has not the " predictive 
 power of mathematics," it is a pretty safe conclusion that 
 if vaccination ceased the small-pox would flourish. 
 
 Inductive evidence is practically equivalent to a 
 Demonstration. Prof. Jones admits that "the age of 
 Faith in natural science is also an age which believes in 
 God ". Whence arises that faith in science, if it be not 
 itself inductive proof? 
 
 Apart from growing Rationalism, this may be true ; 
 but the growing Ritualism indicates a degeneracy from 
 faith, through belief to credulity. But if there is a faith 
 in natural science, it is simply because inductive reason- 
 ing is regarded as conclusive. Even in the exact sciences 
 it is present. We interpret all the physical phenomena 
 of the rocks seen in the various strata deposited through 
 geological ages of the past by induction alone. 
 
 Prof. Jones seems to me to ignore inductive evidence 
 when he says : " We do not seem to have the necessary 
 data for dealing with God, freedom and immortality". 
 " Reflective men are not able to give a reason for their 
 faith." 
 
 With regard to the first, Evolution has greatly 
 strengthened Paley's argument, which is mainly con- 
 cerned with biological facts, while the moral argument 
 is as strong as ever or stronger.
 
 2 7 2 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 If omnipotence be regarded as an attribute of God ; 
 then we can see it practically conferred on protoplasm. 
 
 To judge by the past and present, it is not too much 
 to say, Given but a single speck of living protoplasm 
 together with its nucleus, nothing more is wanted, from 
 which the whole of the animal kingdom, including man, 
 and the vegetable also, past, present and future, has 
 been, is being and will be evolved. 
 
 The " creative capacity " of protoplasm is practically 
 infinite. It has perpetually evolved structures with all 
 the appearances of design. Hence the belief in God as 
 the First Cause behind the veil of the Living World is 
 based on inductive evidence of a very high order indeed. 1 
 
 With regard to Freedom and Immortality, these will 
 form the subject-matter of other chapters. 
 
 The matters dealt with in this chapter are most ably 
 discussed by the late Auguste Sabatier in his Religions 
 of Authority and The Religion of the Spirit (Book iii., 
 chap, iv.), Williams & Norgate. The reader might also 
 profitably consult Pfleiderer's Evolution and Theology 
 and other essays (A. & C. Black), especially No. ix., 
 " Is Morality without Religion Possible or Desirable ? " 
 In this he points out both the untenability as well as 
 the impossibility of such ethics as Secularists and 
 Rationalists profess being accepted permanently by the 
 masses without any religious sanction. 
 
 1 1 make no apology for repeating this and other arguments for em- 
 phasis sake ; as a friend says " You would make Theism stand or fall by 
 Darwinism ". It stands on a far wider basis than Adaptation ; but I am 
 not concerned at present with other lines of induction.
 
 CHAPTER VI 
 
 FREE WILL AND AUTOMATISM 
 
 IT will now be as well to say a few more words on Voli- 
 tion, or Free Will as it has been called, for some mis- 
 understanding appears in the writings of Rationalists. 
 They deny it altogether, because they say it is regarded 
 as being " free " from all " motives " and " circumstances ". 
 
 If such be thought to be the condition of Free Will, 
 nothing is more absurd. 
 
 The will cannot be in evidence at all, unless some 
 circumstances call forth its exercise. There must be, at 
 least, two courses of action, or the possibility of doing or 
 abstaining from doing something. Moreover, there must 
 be some motive for one or the other course of action. 
 A man's will is only "free," in my estimation, in that 
 his volitional actions are not automatic. 
 
 A dog may have two objects before it, say a plate of 
 meat and to go for a run with its owner. It automatic- 
 ally leaves the plate and obeys the whistle, solely because 
 the latter acts automatically upon him as the more 
 powerful stimulus at the moment 
 
 Another dog will run after a fowl and kill it if it can 
 catch it ; all the whistling in the world may not stop it ; 
 for the fowl is a greater attraction than the whistle. 
 
 But suppose a man has a chance of making money by 
 cheating another under certain circumstances. He is 
 I 8 (273)
 
 274 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 conscious of the power to choose. It is this consciousness 
 (being an abstraction) of which a dog knows nothing. 
 
 The man then balances in his mind abstract motives 
 and probable consequences, the sense of right and wrong, 
 the influence upon character, etc., etc. He then ment- 
 ally returns to the choice and finally sacrifices the desire 
 for illicit gain and refuses to cheat the man. 
 
 The word " free " may not be a good adjective for 
 will ; but all it means, as I, at least, understand it, is that 
 man is conscious that he can deliberately choose ; whereas 
 a dog is bound by determinism and is therefore not 
 "free" at all. 
 
 Both man and dog are finally guided by the strongest 
 motive ; but in different ways, viz., by Volition and Auto- 
 matism, respectively. 
 
 Let us suppose, as another illustration, that a man 
 drives up to a door and leaves his horse and carriage 
 outside the house, for he knows the horse will remain 
 there. After a time the horse gets impatient and paws 
 the ground as a sign it wants to be off; but it cannot 
 move. Why does it not go off on its own account ? 
 Solely because it is an automaton and cannot realise that 
 it has the power to go ; nor has it the will to move, how- 
 ever much it may have the wish to do so. 
 
 The late Dr. W. B. Carpenter has developed this 
 subject admirably in his Mental Physiology, wherein he 
 says : " The Power of the Will is exerted in the pur- 
 posive selection (from among those objects of consciousness, 
 which Sensations from without and the working of the 
 internal Mechanism of Thought and Feeling within, 
 bring before the Ego) of that which shall be determinately 
 followed up. This state is what is termed Attention. 
 
 " It is solely by the Volitional direction of 'the Attention, 
 that the Will exerts its domination.
 
 FREE WILL AND AUTOMATISM 275 
 
 " It is in virtue of the Will that we are not mere think- 
 ing Automata, mere puppets to be pulled by suggesting- 
 strings capable of being played-upon by every one who 
 shall have made himself master of our springs of action ". l 
 
 Since the above-mentioned book was published, I 
 find Locke, Schopenhauer and other writers have enter- 
 tained the same idea. Thus the German philosopher, 
 writing on Reason, says : " It has always been understood 
 to mean the possession of general, abstract non-intuitive 
 ideas, named concepts, which are denoted and fixed by 
 means of words. This faculty alone it is which in reality 
 gives to men their advantage over animals." 2 
 
 As an illustration of what I call " automatic reasoning," 
 I should regard tactfulness. Some people have, as we 
 say, " great tact," in others it is often conspicuous by its 
 absence. The former seem to do or say just the right 
 thing at the right moment ; the latter generally do the 
 wrong one. Why is this? Neither have time deliber- 
 ately to think out the situation, and choose the wisest 
 words or best thing to be said or done on the spur of the 
 moment. The spontaneity of tact is its charm. 
 
 In the one person the mental qualification is present, 
 in the other the brain is lacking something. Such a 
 tactless person is one of whom it is sometimes said that 
 " he has not two ideas in his head," i.e., consecutive ones. 
 He blurts out his first thought. 
 
 In a tactful person, the same thought might arise, but 
 it is instantly and spontaneously checked by a following 
 tactful alternative ; so that the thought may occur to the 
 tactless man afterwards, when he sees the result of his ob- 
 servation, " what a fool I was to say that " ; but he could 
 not help it, for his volition was not equal to the occasion. 
 
 i P. 358. * The Basis of Morality, p. 71.
 
 276 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Mr. Mallock in writing upon " the seemingly absolute 
 dependence of mental conditions on physical," alludes to 
 the deterioration or absence of the will in certain cerebral 
 diseases as a proof of such dependence. He says : "Since 
 the brain is shown to control the will in those very 
 domains of conduct in which freedom is most vehemently 
 claimed for it, to suppose that the will is a separate and 
 independent force which imposes its orders on the organ- 
 ism of which it shows itself so frequently to be the slave, 
 is to indulge in a supposition for which science not only 
 affords no evidence, but which all the evidence collected 
 by science contradicts "- 1 
 
 It is an axiom now that all the mental phenomena, 
 whether of man or animals, and the physical basis of the 
 brain are intimately connected, and can mutually influ- 
 ence one another. Thus a tendency arising from some 
 abnormal cell-development can be suppressed by the 
 will, as that for drink, too often hereditary ; then the 
 abnormality after a time ceases to have the same power- 
 ful effect on the inclinations. Similarly, in a healthy 
 brain, study will affect the molecular structure of the 
 brain itself, the corresponding section was perhaps feebly 
 developed, physically ; but it will become strengthened 
 in response to mental efforts determined by the will. 
 
 Hence, as to the question of the brain determining 
 the will under normal conditions of health, the very fact 
 that Mr. Mallock has to appeal to diseased conditions 
 for his evidence when a man is an idiot, mad or a con- 
 firmed drunkard, etc., and has no will at all ; but is 
 simply an automaton is pretty conclusive that it is not 
 so under normal conditions of health. It is not the 
 " will " which becomes the " slave " ; for the man's will is 
 
 1 Religion as a Credible Doctrine, pp. 141, 142.
 
 FREE WILL AND AUTOMATISM 277 
 
 in abeyance ; he " lets himself go " and merely follows ' 
 the automatic impulses of his brain. 
 
 Physiologists have done much to localise sections of 
 the brain as controlling various actions of the body, and 
 thus undoubtedly are they also the physical bases of 
 many traits of character which are often hereditary. 
 
 Now this is absolutely necessary with animals. Thus, 
 for example, if one is attacked by another, it should 
 have combativeness and courage. These traits are at 
 once automatically called out by the onslaught of its 
 enemy. 
 
 Again, animals are automatically impelled by the 
 sexual instinct (based on the cerebellum) at certain 
 periods. 
 
 In graminivorous animals the fighting instinct has 
 degenerated ; anger and courage are more or less confined 
 to the males. Timidity is developed instead, and has 
 induced them to crowd together, not for any altruistic 
 or mutual aid ; but for self-interest and self-protection ; 
 as the chance of being caught by a carnivorous enemy is 
 greatly reduced for each individual. 
 
 Dr. F. Galton observed in South Africa that if a 
 particularly timid individual happened to find itself at 
 some distance from the herd, it rushed back, and was 
 not satisfied until it had " bathed itself" in the midst of 
 the others. 
 
 It is admittedly true according to many persons that 
 fixed regions of the brain of man are correlated with 
 traits of character as well as necessary bodily actions. 
 
 But the difference between Man and Animals is that 
 while these traits are entirely automatic in animals- 
 certain traits for example are peculiar to certain breeds 
 of dogs, respectively in man they would also be so 
 precisely as in animals if he had no self-consciousness; so
 
 278 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 that he alone can, so to say, look in upon himself, make 
 each trait of his character an object of thought and dis- 
 cuss with himself their effects as being good or bad, as 
 he is conscious of their relative powers and effects. He 
 then regulates their automatic action by volition. 
 
 This consciousness may have a definite tract to itself but 
 it is not known where and when that section is abnormal 
 or diseased, the man becomes an automaton like an 
 animal, his volition or will being arrested. 
 
 In health, however, it is the will which controls the 
 automatism of the brain and makes him a moral being. 
 
 Huxley was the great champion for automatism in 
 man ; and no one can deny that he brought a formidable 
 array of argument to prove that he is but not entirely 
 an automaton. 
 
 Huxley argued on the grounds of human and com- 
 parative physiology, from his evolutionary history and 
 from the remarkable case of a French sergeant who had 
 been shot in the head and recovered. In his normal 
 state he was perfectly sane and a moral man ; but he 
 had fits of abnormality when he would make cigarettes 
 of shavings, etc., and steal everything he could lay his 
 hands upon. 
 
 Now, the immediate inference from this case is that 
 men are not altogether automata, if they only become 
 such when suffering from brain lesions, when volition is 
 wanting or is in abeyance ; as in the case of the criminal 
 here mentioned ; for the following is a good illustration 
 of the difference between Automatism and Free Will. It 
 was presented to the judge trying a man for snatching a 
 scarf pin from an earl. 
 
 The prisoner handed in the following extraordinary 
 document : " My Lord, Before passing sentence, I think 
 it but justice to myself that I should honestly and sin-
 
 FREE WILL AND AUTOMATISM 279 
 
 cerely tell you what motives led me to commit the crime. 
 In the first place, I candidly admit that the robbery was 
 deliberately planned. I saw the Earl go into a shop, 
 but I waited till he came out I had time to reflect on 
 the crime and its consequences, but the devil was too 
 strong for me. I felt reckless with the recklessness of 
 despair. I snatched the pin and made off, but an un- 
 known irresistible power made me turn back and walk 
 into the gentleman's arms (laughter). In the whole 
 course of sixteen years of crime and infamy I have never 
 felt so unutterably miserable and so hopelessly cast 
 down. . . . My lord, the desire within me to commit a 
 theft is great, but believe me to be sincere when I tell 
 you that sorrow and remorse are not strangers to me. 
 How often the thought has flit across my mind that if I 
 only had the will and determination to reform and amend 
 my life I would brighten the last days of my old parents. 
 I would be good, but evil is strong within me. Many 
 and many a time, when coming out of prison, I have 
 formed good resolutions for amendment of my life. I 
 have tried over and over again to get an honest living, 
 but always failed for want of a helping hand." 
 
 But if my position be granted that when the brain 
 had reached a stage of development, beyond that of all 
 other animals, it permitted man to reason abstractedly 
 so that he alone, it might be added, can be a meta- 
 physician we obtain the clue to what is called " Free 
 Will," but which I should recognise simply as the con- 
 sciousness of the power to choose, whether they be concrete 
 objects or abstract motives, presented to the mind. 
 
 Besides Huxley, we find by their writings that the 
 Haeckelian Monists or Materialists, all deny the Freedom 
 of the Will in Man. 
 
 It is as well to consider therefore the untenableness
 
 28o PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 of their position. It seems based upon the idea of the 
 inevitable actions of natural law and the obvious auto- 
 matism in the greater part of man's behaviour. 
 
 But no one will deny that man is answerable to law 
 for his actions, viz., civil laws of his country and the 
 moral laws of religion. If he break the former he is 
 guilty and is punished by the Court. If he break the 
 latter he sins and has to answer to his God. 
 
 Now, insane people often do those things which in a 
 sane man would make him guilty or a sinner. We do 
 not recognise them to be so. Similarly, animals often 
 do what look like guilty acts ; as when a horse viciously 
 kicks his master and lames or kills him ; or a dog which 
 bites a man. We may muzzle it, but we do not punish 
 it. 
 
 It is, therefore, quite clear, and the reader could easily 
 multiply similar cases, that our universal practice is to 
 regard animals much in the same light as the insane, so 
 far at least as that " they are not responsible for their 
 actions ". What do we mean by that expression ? 
 
 What is that something which is equally wanting 
 in the insane man and in animals ? We never consider 
 a horse or a dog to be a morally responsible being. 
 Why has common consent established this distinction in 
 practice in the treatment of the insane and animals alike ? 
 
 The underlying cause of the difference is the want of 
 a consciousness of volition. 
 
 The term " Free " seems to have misled some writers. 
 They regard it, I repeat, as meaning " free from motives " 
 and " free from circumstances ". Thus the writer referred 
 to says : " The most ardent advocate of Free Will would 
 be annoyed if he were told that his choice was undeter- 
 mined by reasons and motives. ... A man's choice is 
 wholly determined by circumstances and motives, over
 
 FREE WILL AND AUTOMATISM 281 
 
 which he has no control." 1 The author here begs the 
 question, and leaves out of sight the man's consciousness 
 of the motives and the consciousness of the power to choose 
 one of two or more courses. If he would recognise the 
 fact that man can select his own reasons and motives for 
 doing one thing rather than another, he would see that 
 it is just that wherein his " freedom " comes in. 
 
 On the other hand, no animal has this consciousness 
 of the power to reflect upon courses of action ; but simply 
 rushes blindly to the strongest motive of the moment 
 which appeals to his senses. Such is pure automatism, 
 which makes all the difference between man and animals. 
 The former alone has volition. 
 
 To give an example of human automatism. The 
 late Prof. Adam Sedgwick was apt to be very " absent- 
 minded". One day he was walking up and down his 
 room, thinking perhaps of the Silurian strata with his 
 mind in Wales. Every time he approached the fireplace 
 he rang the bell. Again and again the servant came ; 
 for he said he had not rung it ; but at last he noticed 
 that the cord was still oscillating. The fact was the 
 sight of the bell-rope automatically suggested to his 
 brain the act of pulling. His volition was in abeyance 
 during his reverie. It was a purely automatic action, 
 there being no attention, as Dr. Carpenter says, or con- 
 sciousness present. We thus see that precisely the same 
 act may be done under two totally distinct states of the 
 mind. On the occasion mentioned Sedgwick was for 
 the time a pure automaton. 
 
 But suppose he wanted his servant at half-past one 
 o'clock. He would go to the bell to ring it, but suddenly 
 remembering that his servant might be at his dinner, he 
 
 1 Mr. Balfour's Apologetics, p. 56.
 
 282 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 hesitates. Herein steps in a new element that is the 
 consciousness of choice. And abstract reasoning deters 
 him. 
 
 A Determinist would say that he was just as much 
 restrained automatically as when he rang the bell auto- 
 matically. It is perfectly true that he had a motive for 
 not ringing the bell ; and that motive was based on 
 circumstances; but his attention was awakened, and he 
 would be perfectly conscious of the choice before him. 
 And that is all, as I understand it, that is meant by 
 Free Will. 
 
 I will now make some quotations from Mr. Mallock's 
 Religion as a Credible Doctrine, wherein he states the 
 case of the Determinist, and see where he appears to me 
 to be wrong. 
 
 " The act of will, as known to us by our own experi- 
 ence, is an act which invariably is determined by the 
 strongest motive ; and motive, again, is determined by 
 two things the talents and temperament with which an 
 individual is endowed at his birth, and the circumstances 
 by which, from his birth onward, he is surrounded." * 
 
 He would thus reduce Volition to Automatism ; but 
 the reader will have seen that an act is precisely the 
 same whether it be done unconsciously or done with 
 attention and consciously, as in pulling the bell-rope. 
 
 In the latter case Will or Volition is present ; in the 
 former it is in abeyance. As soon as Attention and 
 Consciousness of the power to choose come into the 
 mind, Volition decides the act. 
 
 The story of the ass placed between two bundles of 
 hay and starving because both were equally tempting is 
 grotesque, but theoretically true for an ass ; because it 
 
 >P. 90.
 
 FREE WILL AND AUTOMATISM 283 
 
 is an automaton. Practically, the slightest turn of the 
 head would be sufficient to save his life, for it would 
 attack the bundle then seen. 
 
 But put a tempting dish of oysters as well as some 
 other equally tempting before a man. He might reflect 
 upon the possibility of the oysters being contaminated 
 and the consequent probability of some " illness " (an 
 abstract idea) accruing. His attention, conscious con- 
 centration of thought, are awakened. Abstract motives 
 enter his brain. He is fully alive to the importance of 
 exercising a prudent course of action ; and thus Volition 
 decides the choice. 
 
 Besides our natal characteristics Mr. Mallock adds : 
 " As surely as our characters determine our will and our 
 brains determine our character, so do our physiological 
 antecedents determine the idiosyncrasies of our brain". 1 
 
 But we are not altogether and entirely so auto- 
 matic as all that ; though nine-tenths of all we do is 
 probably done automatically. Consciousness saves the 
 situation. 
 
 It is quite true that a man known to be thoroughly 
 honest is certain to act honestly next week ; but we do 
 not know what contests he went through, what resolu- 
 tions his will had made, before he became the man we 
 know him as " automatically honest ". 
 
 A man grows up it may be with certain inherited 
 qualifications (as drunkard's children are often predis- 
 posed to drink) but he was not born with his environment. 
 He grows up to be a man, and goes into business ; 
 temptations to dishonesty surround him. He sees others 
 dishonest and thriving accordingly ; but he fights the 
 inducements to go wrong. If he were solely an auto- 
 
 *0p, cit.,pp. 93, 94.
 
 284 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 maton he would yield ; but he gets the mastery by his 
 Volition, and so acquires the character and the reputation 
 for honesty. All through the struggle there was the 
 consciousness of the power to choose. The abstract ideas 
 of " honour," " honesty " are continually forcing them- 
 selves upon his attention. All this and much more may 
 form motives, before he has deliberately " made up his 
 mind " to be always honest. 
 
 Something like this appears to have been the process 
 our Lord's mind went through in His temptation in the 
 wilderness. "This," writes Sir John Seeley, the late 
 author of Ecce Homo, " was the excitement of His mind 
 which was caused by the nascent consciousness of super- 
 natural power." ..." He is awe-struck rather than 
 elated by His new gifts ; He declines to use for His own 
 convenience what He regards as a sacred deposit com- 
 mitted to Him for the good of others. In His extreme 
 need He prefers to suffer rather than to help Himself from 
 resources which He conceives placed in His hands in 
 trust for the kingdom of God. Did ever inventor or 
 poet dare to picture to himself a self-denial like this? 
 The chief point in His temptations was to use force (as 
 was expected of the Messiah of the Jews) in the establish- 
 ment of His kingdom." 
 
 No one can read that wonderful " Temptation in the 
 Wilderness " and regard it merely as a piece of automat- 
 ism on the part of Christ. Attention, concentration of 
 mind, powerful, abstract motives, circumstances, Con- 
 scious Power of Choice, firm deliberation and final issue, 
 all conspire to illustrate one of the most powerful displays 
 of Volition that the world has ever heard of. 
 
 Mr. Mallock says : " Any act which we consciously 
 will to perform and do not perform automatically, or 
 under presence of physical coercion, we perform and will
 
 FREE WILL AND AUTOMATISM 285 
 
 to perform because our nature is such that we look on 
 the results of such an act as desirable". 1 
 
 The latter part of this sentence seems to refute the 
 first, for if " our nature " is the mainspring of the action, 
 then what we have done is performed " automatically " ; 
 though his expression : " Any act which we consciously 
 will" removes it from automatism. And he further 
 concludes : " The bondage of our wills, in every act 
 of willing, to the sole desire, or the strongest desire of 
 the moment is absolute, necessary, invariable. It admits 
 of exceptions no more than does the law of gravitation 
 itself." 2 
 
 But there is no " bondage " in a conscious choice of 
 motives ; the bondage comes in when you have not the 
 power to choose and are unconsciously bound by the ex- 
 ternal and strongest motive ; when your will is wanting 
 or too weak to protest ; and you allow yourself to be 
 an automaton, as the criminal described above. 
 
 A hypnotised person when told to clap his hands 
 will go on doing it until the hypnotiser stops him. I 
 have witnessed this ; and the performer's attention being 
 elsewhere directed, the man fell exhausted under the 
 table but could not cease clapping his hands. He was 
 then an automaton, pure and simple. On the other 
 hand the hypnotiser, when his attention was drawn to 
 him, and was conscious of the possible harmful effect, 
 at once brought his volition to hear and un-hypnotised 
 the man. 
 
 Mr. Mallock 3 refers to a work by Dr. Ward, in which 
 that author says that desire is of two kinds. He calls 
 one " spontaneous impulse," the other he calls " resolve ". 
 These are only other phrases for "Automatism" and 
 
 1 Op. cit., pp. 96, 97. 2 Op. cit., p. 101. Op. cit., p. 106.
 
 286 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 " Free Will " ; and Mr. Mallock in combating it falls into 
 the error of supposing " freedom " means " irrespective 
 of circumstances ". 
 
 It is here where, as it seems to me, lies the funda- 
 mental error ; namely, in assuming that because the word 
 " free " is attached to " will," that it must mean " free from 
 motives and independent of circumstances". 
 
 It is only by the circumstances that the attention is 
 aroused. Then follows the consciousness of the power to 
 choose and the mind enters upon a train of abstract 
 reasoning about motives, etc., which finally settle the 
 question of Volition. 
 
 Mr. Mallock may well ask : " How is it possible that 
 the desire which we call resolve can arise independently 
 of the circumstances ? " 
 
 I should not make " resolve " a synonym for " desire," 
 but the final result of a mental procedure of which 
 "desire" was the first term. For we may put the two 
 alternatives thus. Some circumstance occurs which 
 raises a desire. We may follow it blindly, i^., auto- 
 matically, without making any resolve at all. 
 
 Or, we may reflect upon the consequences of pur- 
 suing that desire and then make a resolve not to 
 follow it up. In that case it has passed under the 
 Volition. 
 
 Is not the Determinist, then, misled by the term 
 " Free " ? Whoever first suggested it, could not have 
 thoroughly grasped the real conditions of the " will ". I 
 repeat that the very same act may be done, on the one 
 hand, automatically ; or, on the other, with the attention 
 and conscious intention. In the first case Volition is in 
 abeyance, in the second it is present. 
 
 There are thus two very distinct conditions ; and 
 the Determinist has no right to confuse them as one.
 
 FREE WILL AND AUTOMATISM 287 
 
 I will take one more illustration from Mr. Mallock's 
 book. 1 
 
 "In reality, so far as reason and observation can guide 
 us, the one is the result of circumstances no less than the 
 other ; both are equally mechanical ; and if resolve 
 differs from spontaneous impulse at all, it differs only 
 as a donkey engine differs from the main machinery of 
 a locomotive with parts of which it now and then puts 
 itself into gear." 
 
 But a donkey engine is of the same nature as a loco- 
 motive ; both work automatically as soon as an impulse 
 has been received from without; they both illustrate the 
 unconsciousness of human automatic actions. 
 
 But neither of them can represent the presence of At- 
 tention or of a Consciousness of the power to choose ; or 
 the mental, abstract deliberations undergone by what we 
 call Volition. 
 
 Automatism may be considered as having different 
 degrees, according to the amount in the want of attention^ 
 and when there is none. 
 
 The extreme condition is that of the hypnotised 
 person clapping his hands or one in reverie like Prof. 
 Sedgwick ringing the bell quite unknowingly. In both 
 cases the acts are done through suggestion. 
 
 But it often happens that we do things, while thinking 
 of something else, but do not altogether lose sight of what 
 we are doing ; as in eating one's dinner and talking to one's 
 neighbour simultaneously. One remains still conscious 
 of the plate of food, but the process not requiring special 
 attention, the eyes and the hands do their work almost 
 entirely on their own account, and the teeth follow suit. 
 
 Similarly a whole page of a book may be read aloud, 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 115.
 
 288 PRESENT- DA Y RA TIONALISM 
 
 the correct modulations of the voice according to the 
 sense being given ; yet the mind may have wandered 
 away and be thinking of something else ; and the reader 
 at the end may not have the slightest idea of what he 
 has been reading about. I have often done this myself. 
 
 I have repeatedly wound up my watch while going 
 upstairs to bed ; but on reaching my bedroom could not 
 say whether I had done it or not, and had to try the key 
 to find out. 
 
 On the other hand, as an illustration of Attention and 
 Volition, Dr. Carpenter alludes to a person learning to 
 play the piano. At first great attention has to be paid 
 both to the notes and fingers. These are compelled by 
 volition to go down on to the right keys. But a practised 
 musician has been known to play waltz after waltz when 
 actually asleep. All the dancers had to do was to begin 
 another tune when a change was wanted, and the sugges- 
 tion was automatically followed up by the sleeper. 1 
 
 To illustrate these stages, Dr. W. B. Carpenter 
 distinguishes the automatic cough as arising from some 
 irritation in the throat. This may take place in sleep 
 with unconsciousness ; or when we are awake, with con- 
 sciousness. He compares this with the volitional cough ; 
 when an audience intentionally cough to interrupt a prosy 
 speaker. But even this, as it seems to me, need not be 
 volitional ; the inducement to stop the speaker suggests 
 to the brain to cough, and the cough automatically 
 follows. 
 
 But suppose one of the audience says to another, 
 "Don't cough, it's rude, and he is doing his best" ; then 
 volition wakes up, the man hesitates, and finally deliber- 
 ately suppresses the rising cough. 
 
 1 Dr. Carpenter told me of this incident which he had received from a 
 correspondent after reading his book.
 
 FREE WILL AND AUTOMATISM 28$ 
 
 The controversy between the Determinists and 
 Volitionists is interminable. Why is it confined to man 
 alone ? No allusion is ever made to free will in animals, 
 yet if man has it not, why is he not classed entirely with 
 them ; as he would be a pure automaton. But let that 
 pass. 
 
 The matter is put thus : 1 
 
 " There is no effect without an antecedent cause." 
 Granted. 
 
 " What then of the human will ; does it act without a 
 cause ? " Certainly not. 
 
 " Does it cause itself? " Certainly not. 
 
 " Is the will merely the result of forces namely de- 
 sires [or motives] ? " Yes, the strongest motive prevails. 
 
 " Consequently the action follows the strongest in- 
 clination, i.e., the man yields to the most powerful 
 influence ? " Yes, certainly. 
 
 And so the Determinist claims the victory ! 
 
 But he has overlooked the most important element 
 of Consciousness in the process of a deliberate selection of 
 motives suggested by the circumstances. 
 
 Precisely the same act may be done when the man 
 is automatically impelled by the strongest motive, just as 
 when the elements of mental attention, consciousness and 
 deliberation are present. 
 
 Take the case described by Mr. Forester. He says : 
 "A man with a liking for spirits deliberates [but to 
 ' deliberate ' at once destroys determinism] as to whether 
 he shall drink a glass of brandy. He has been told by 
 his doctor not to drink brandy. He thinks it will pro- 
 bably do him harm [here we have abstract reflection} and 
 may be a downward step in a course which will ultimately 
 
 1 See The Faith of an Agnostic, by G. Forester, chap, xii., " Some Old 
 Riddles ". 
 
 19
 
 s$o PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 be his ruin [here motives begin to appear]. He has a 
 strong desire to avoid such evils. On the other hand, 
 he has a physical craving, a strong desire to drink the 
 brandy [here he is conscious of choice ; and of the power 
 to choose\. According as the one or the other of these 
 desires prevail, so must he act." 1 Precisely so ; but the 
 presence of consciousness makes all the difference between 
 acting " deliberately," as Mr. Forester admits, and acting 
 " automatically " where there is no " consciousness of 
 choice," but merely involuntary impulse ; as that which 
 impels an habitual drunkard, who seizes the glass and 
 drinks it ; having allowed himself by degrees to be 
 automatically impelled by the very sight of liquor. 
 
 To continue arguing against the volitionist, by saying 
 the will acts without a motive or free from circumstances 
 seems to be absurd and useless. 
 
 No act can possibly be done without them. You 
 cannot be angry " without a cause ". 2 But you can 
 allow your temper to rise in the heart without suppressing 
 it, and give vent to angry words and deeds. Or, on the 
 other hand you can restrain the impulse and show no 
 outward signs. 
 
 Something or some one gave occasion for your angry 
 feelings to assert themselves within you. That was the 
 " circumstance ". You had abstract reasons for thinking 
 it was wrong to give way to angry passions. There was 
 the " motive ". You were conscious of the choice, and by 
 an effort of will restrained yourself. 
 
 A dog cannot do this. Being a pure automaton, his 
 exhibition of temper is in exact proportion to the in- 
 ternal excitement which has been aroused in him. 
 
 Man alone can be conscious of the power to restrain 
 
 1 Op. cit., pp. 265 e t seq. 
 
 'These words are struck out of the revised version (Matt v. 22).
 
 FREE WILL AND AUTOMATISM 2gi 
 
 himself, or else to give vent to his passions; and that 
 makes just all the difference between Volition and 
 Automatism ; between morality and immorality in man 
 and the non-morality of an animal. 
 
 The difficulty in which a Determinist is landed by 
 trying to reconcile moral responsibility with automatic 
 response to influences is well seen in Huxley's conten- 
 tion : 
 
 " A man's moral responsibility for his acts has nothing 
 to do with the causation of these acts, but depends on 
 the frame of mind which accompanies them". Mr. 
 Forester, who quotes this, well observes that " the ' frame 
 of mind ' is, like other things, the effect of antecedent 
 causes ; and how is it alleged that one is morally re- 
 sponsible for such causes or their effects?" 
 
 It is sometimes asserted by Determinists in proof of 
 his complete automatism, and that the will is not really 
 "free," if one knew a man's character, one could foretell 
 what his actions would be under every circumstance. 
 
 This is only partially true. Take, for example, ex- 
 treme cases. It is perfectly certain that a habitual 
 drunkard will drink a glass of spirits if offered to him. 
 It is equally certain that a thoroughly honest man will 
 not take a bribe. But with nine-tenths of mankind, it is 
 quite uncertain how a man will behave under certain 
 previously untried circumstances ; and it is not until the 
 critical moment arises, that the very question of Free Will 
 may come in at all (see below, p. 323). 
 
 Determinists argue as if man was altogether auto- 
 matic. Nine-tenths of his daily routine may be ; but 
 there is the fact of our not being able to foresee which of 
 two choices both equally moral or non-moral, both 
 equally useful or equally anything else, as far as an out- 
 sider could judge the man will decide upon ; inasmuch
 
 2Q2 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 as we cannot follow the abstract reasoning in his mind, 
 which supplies him with the final motive for choice. 
 
 All this is common experience, and the two extremes 
 prove it ; because the drunkard has " let himself go ". 
 He has allowed the law in his body to get the upper 
 hand ; and has not willed the law of his mind to contest 
 the lust for drink. He has become a complete automaton. 
 What volition he had is practically gone. 
 
 On the other hand, the true Christian has overruled 
 the law of his body. He has acquired such an ascendency 
 over his inclinations to evil, so that he too has also become 
 an automaton ; but for goodness ; such is now habitual to 
 him, and all inclination for wrong-doing has gone. He 
 will now certainly act righteously when a choice is pre- 
 sented to him. 
 
 He has become a "natural law" for good unto 
 himself, as the drunkard has become a natural law to 
 himself for drunkenness, though they stand at the very 
 opposite poles of conduct. 
 
 I think we may also see how Altruism could now 
 arise from abstract reflection. We start from parental 
 affection in animals, and the automatic care for offspring, 
 till they become independent ; but rarely longer ; for 
 although it is said that weak animals, as Cervidcz, Bovidce, 
 etc., herd together for mutual aid ; yet if one is sick the 
 others worry it to death ; or if a wolf of a hunting pack be 
 shot, the others fall upon it as prey. These facts show 
 that there is more self-interest than altruism in herding. 
 
 But when we come to man, who can entertain ab- 
 stract reflections about other men as well as himself, his 
 first altruistic idea would probably be "do not do to 
 others what you do not wish them to do to yourself". 
 
 This is the primitive and purely negative law, ex- 
 emplified in the old Jewish morality.
 
 FREE WILL AND AUTOMATISM 293 
 
 The next stage appears to be that of the Greek 
 philosophers to do good to blood relations. Thus a 
 speaker in the Republic of Plato defines "Justice" as 
 doing as much good as one can to one's friend and as 
 much harm as possible to one's enemy. 
 
 In both stages foreigner and enemy were identical, 
 as seen by the words etcOpos and hostis. 
 
 Christ's " new commandment " was " Love your 
 enemies ". The word for " personal love " in Greek was 
 <j>i\ia ; but it was Christ who converted it into an " Enthu- 
 siasm for Humanity," and He sanctified the word ' 
 
 Agape is philia spiritualised.
 
 CHAPTER VII 
 
 THE ETHICS OF RATIONALISM AND CHRISTIANITY 
 
 WITH regard to ethics and their origin, Haeckel regards 
 psychology as a branch of physiology, and invents a 
 form of protoplasm which he calls " neuroplasm " or 
 nerve-plasm, as the organic source of it. 
 
 The author of Mr. Bal fours Apologetics does not 
 touch upon this physical origin of ethics, but remarks 
 that, " The human heart has a deep reverence for justice, 
 love and mercy a reverence which in higher natures is 
 instinctive, and which has been engendered in the whole 
 race, in varying degrees of strength, by millions of years 
 of family and social life." x 
 
 The following are passages dealing with ethics : 
 
 (1) "If Rationalism may be said to include a religion 
 at all, one half of it at least consists of ethical truths and 
 ideals, and no impartial observer would deny that leading 
 Rationalists have been distinguished by an intense devo- 
 tion, both in conduct and in precept, to the great moral 
 principles which embody the highest wisdom and the 
 loftiest aspirations of the race." 2 
 
 (2) " The moral law has grown out of the needs of 
 man, and springs from the human heart. That man 
 should do justice, love mercy, speak truth, and help his 
 needy and suffering fellows, are injunctions which are 
 
 1 0f. tit., p. 29. *lbid. 
 
 (294)
 
 ETHICS 
 
 295 
 
 valid, binding and beautiful, because, if they are set at 
 naught, human society becomes impossible." 1 
 
 (3) " However men may differ as to the origin of 
 morality, they tacitly unite in subjecting all ethical 
 maxims to the test of practice, and in judging them by 
 the standard of results." 2 
 
 (4) " It is the struggle for existence which gives these 
 things all their force and meaning, and which alone 
 makes possible the existence of vice and virtue." 8 
 
 (5) "By 'holiness' we mean high moral character, 
 and affirming that morality could be developed only 
 under such chequered conditions as this world affords, 
 we hold that altruism or holiness loses none of its beauty 
 when we discover that its origin may be found in the 
 instinctive yearnings of lowly parent organisms towards 
 their helpless offspring, and that it forms part of the 
 machinery of natural selection which aims at the pre- 
 servation and elevation of the race." 4 
 
 (6) " The ages of faith were ages of ignorance, im- 
 morality and crime. The growth of civilisation is de- 
 pendent upon the growth and spread of Rationalism ; and 
 few persons will deny that the modern rise of the ration- 
 alistic spirit has been accompanied by a slow but sure 
 uplifting of the manners and the morals of the people. 
 Sound rationalist doctrine has a wider and firmer hold 
 of the human mind than at any previous period in the 
 history of mankind, and we think no well-informed 
 observer will deny that in the Western world the aver- 
 age ethical standard is higher than it has ever been 
 before." 5 
 
 (7) " The Rationalist hopes and believes that while 
 at present the reconciliation between Egoism and Al- 
 
 1 Op. cit., pp. 41, 42. a Op. cit., p. 43, * Op. cit., p. 49. 
 
 4 Op. cit., p. 50. 8 Op. cit., p. 60.
 
 2Q6 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 truism may not be possible in the case of each individual, 
 it will one day be effected for the race." l 
 
 (8) " Considering that man is the denizen of a universe 
 which can only be known to him through sense-percep- 
 tion . . . supernatural religion may perish at its touch, 
 but the religion of duty and virtue will become more virile, 
 and will acquire a firmer hold upon the human heart. 
 The moral ideal of Rationalism is truth, and on no other 
 foundation than truth can any lofty or durable system of 
 ethics be reared." 2 
 
 (9) " Taking the human race as a whole, it is clear 
 that Christianity cannot be specially identified with ' the 
 main stream of religious advance' (Balfour)." 3 
 
 (10) "Other things being equal, a man's happiness is 
 in direct proportion to his virtue." 4 
 
 The author's appreciation of the New Testament can 
 be gathered from the following passage : 
 
 (11) "The New Testament contains nothing original 
 or important in the shape of speculation. The system 
 which we find in its pages is mainly a compound of 
 Jewish theology and demonology with the myths of 
 Paganism, modified by some admixture of neo-Platonic 
 philosophy, and the ethical maxims which had filtered 
 slowly into the Greek and Roman world from the Far 
 East. It is one of the commonplaces of criticism that 
 Christianity possesses nothing of ethical importance 
 which is not shared to an equal degree by other religions, 
 such as Buddhism and Zoroastrianism." 5 
 
 (12) Speaking of Christ's death the author puts it in 
 this form : " It is conceivable that one of the Caesars 
 might have sacrificed his only begotten son for the sake 
 of some petty hamlet containing not more than twenty 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 62. *Op. cit., p. 151. *Op. cit., p. 181. 
 
 4 Op. cit., p. 190. & Op. cit., p. 187.
 
 ETHICS 
 
 297 
 
 inhabitants. . . . This would be infinitely larger in pro- 
 portion to the Roman Empire than is the earth in pro- 
 portion to the Universe. If there be a personal being 
 who has created all things and who sustains them by 
 the force of his will, it is antecedently incredible that 
 such a being would assume the form of one of his 
 humblest creatures, and would allow himself to suffer 
 an ignominious death while thus transformed, in order 
 to save these creatures from his own eternal venge- 
 ance." l 
 
 The author concludes his book with the following 
 sentiments : 
 
 (13) "Men are turning with disgust from the dark 
 jungles and miasma-laden valleys of supernaturalism 
 to the sunny plains and green hill-sides of Nature, il- 
 lumined with the light of Science, and glowing with the 
 ever-expanding influence of universal brotherhood and 
 love. . . Theology may perish, but humanity will survive, 
 and will work out its salvation from ignorance and wrong 
 not with the aid of mystic doctrines and narrow religious 
 dogmas, but through the magic power of science, joined 
 with the wondrous force of human self-sacrifice and love" * 
 The reader will note that the sentences italicised are en- 
 tirely due to Christianity alone. 
 
 I now propose to make some comments upon the 
 passages quoted and numbered. 
 
 To begin with his preliminary observation, I do not 
 know whence the author obtained his idea of "millions 
 of years for the human race ". Man could not have ap- 
 peared earlier than the Pliocene epoch at most, judging 
 by analogy with other mammalian animals all of the 
 preceding or Miocene epoch being now extinct, whereas 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 197. a Op. cit., 228. (My italics.)
 
 298 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 the Pliocene saw the introduction of man's contemporary 
 the horse, etc. 1 
 
 This, however, is not a point of any great importance. 
 
 (1) The reader will note the author's insertion of the 
 word " leading " before " Rationalists ". They may be 
 what he describes ; but the old question arises, How 
 about the "masses," the "millions" that Mr Gould 
 would wish to annex ? 2 The great complaint is the want 
 of enthusiasm among the followers of Rationalism ; and 
 as we have seen in the first two chapters of this book, 
 the past thirty years have proved the powerlessness of 
 Secularism or Rationalism to satisfy the demands of 
 the feeling of reverence in the heart of man. 
 
 (2) The author here says, "The moral law springs 
 from the human heart ". Religion, as Christ taught us, 
 does, but pure morality was a matter of discipline. 
 Love, justice, mercy, truth, helping the needy and suffer- 
 ing are no doubt now valid and binding ; but were not 
 so universal as he would seem to imply. History, 
 certainly, does not support this idea ; pity for a foe was 
 regarded with contempt. 
 
 As an example, where the above traits would be ex- 
 pected to be first seen, as a broad general rule the wife 
 was bought and remained a chattel or slave as with the 
 Kaffirs of to-day. The children were no better off; the 
 Roman parent had the power of life and death over 
 them ; and female infants were regularly exposed to 
 death, if not wanted, as they are in China to-day. 
 " Millions of years " have not done away with this 
 abominable custom. 
 
 The true family life began with Christianity. Yet 
 
 1 See above, p. 210. 
 
 2 The New Secularism," Agnostic Annual, 1903, p. 16 ; see above, 
 pp. ii et seq.
 
 ETHICS 
 
 299 
 
 Monistic writers show a strange distortion of this obvious 
 truth. Thus Buchner says : " It is clear from many 
 passages in the Gospels that the founder of Christianity 
 was an enemy of the Family. . . . One day, when he 
 was teaching the people and was called by his mother 
 and brothers during his discourse he asked, annoyed at 
 the interruption [?], ' Who are my mother and brothers ? ' 
 and answered himself by pointing to his disciples. Ac- 
 cording to Luke (xiv. 26) he made the hatred of one's 
 own parents and sisters a condition of discipleship, etc." 1 
 To such absurdities will literalism carry people, who 
 cannot "read between the lines," or see deeper than 
 the actual words. 
 
 The reader will find the true interpretation of our 
 Lord's words in Seeley's Ecce Homo : " He could have 
 neither part nor lot with men destitute of enthusiasm . . . 
 and once when it seemed that the magic of His presence 
 and words would draw His entire audience into the 
 number of His followers, alarmed lest He should find Him- 
 self surrounded by half-hearted or superficial and merely 
 excitable adherents, He turned suddenly upon the crowd, 
 and with one of those startling expressions which He 
 seldom, and yet all great reformers sometimes, employed, 
 declared that He could receive no man who did not hate 
 his father and mother and his own life." 2 
 
 Illustrations of this come only too often in practical 
 life : for it is a common thing for one member, say, the wife, 
 to see no harm in smuggling lace ; but it jars against the 
 husband's conscience, or vice versa; and unpleasantness 
 at least ensues : or a husband tries to pass his son as 
 under age when over twelve. The wife is the more con- 
 scientious and remonstrates. It is not the person one 
 
 1 Last Words on Materialism, p. 88. P. 138.
 
 3 oo PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 is called upon to hate, but his or her want of a truly 
 Christian conscience. 
 
 Again, with regard to nations, in all the past history 
 of the world, love and mercy were practically unknown 
 virtues. To show pity for a conquered foe was thought 
 contemptible. It was not done till Christ came and taught 
 mankind the true nature of brotherly love (Agape in 
 Greek) which lies at the root of the Christian family, race 
 or nation ; as well as international comity. 
 
 It was this which broke down the wall of partition, 
 first between Jew and Gentile, and then between all 
 Gentile nations, respectively. 
 
 The author says that one half of Rationalism, at least, 
 consists of ethical truths and ideals, which he describes in 
 the words of Jesus. It is remarkable that the ethics of 
 Jesus Christ are found to be enforced by Unitarians as 
 Channing and Martineau, by Renan, whose Jesus is an 
 " impossible man " ; and now by Monists, Secularists, 
 Rationalists, etc. In fact, Christ's ethics have lived in 
 spite of erroneous creeds and persecutions. They have 
 outlived disbeliefs, and are accepted by modern Agnostics, 
 Secularists, Materialists, Monists, Rationalists and avowed 
 Atheists ! 
 
 Never was a prophecy more completely fulfilled than 
 that even the Gates of Hell should not prevail against 
 them ; for they are the Spirit of His Church ! 
 
 Modern Rationalism here asserts that moral truths 
 and ethics have been simply developed out of the needs 
 of man ; that certain rules of conduct as, " Thou shalt not 
 kill," etc., have been formulated by human societies for 
 their well-being and maintenance. . . . "The Jewish laws 
 of the Old Testament well represent this origin, so does 
 the Roman law, etc . . ." This is quite true ; but the 
 ethics of Jesus Christ stand on a different level. They
 
 ETHICS 301 
 
 are not simply moral maxims or a code of laws like the 
 Decalogue. 
 
 It is repeatedly urged by Rationalists that Jesus 
 Christ said nothing new ; that all His moral teaching is 
 to be found in that of the past reformers of the world 
 who preceded Him. 
 
 But there is this fundamental difference. No re- 
 formers had previously been able to enforce their moral 
 maxims upon the great majority of their contemporaries. 
 They have all died and left no important religious results. 
 It was so, first because they never possessed any suffi- 
 ciently strong motive power wherewith to enforce them. 
 
 Philanthropic maxims, for example, fall unheeded 
 upon the ears of the masses of mankind, because no 
 altruistic spirit is universally present in man. The beauty 
 of virtue and purity may help a noble-minded man, 
 already predisposed to be virtuous, "to keep himself 
 unspotted from the world " ; but it is waste of words to 
 tell this to the selfishly vicious man ; or indeed to the 
 multitude. 
 
 Moreover, it was never Christ's intention to give us 
 moral maxims only ; but Living Principles. In fact, as 
 the author of Ecce Homo so well says : " On the greater 
 number of questions on which men require moral guid- 
 ance, He has left no direction whatever ". 1 Seeley, too, 
 has well described the profound difference between 
 Christ's method of moral legislation and that of the 
 philosophers. He says : " Instead of giving laws to His 
 society, He would give to every member of it a power of 
 making laws for himself. ... A man's actions result 
 from the state of his mind ; and if that is healthy they 
 will be right, if not, they will be wrong. Such language 
 
 'P. 135-
 
 302 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 was new in the mouth of a legislator. . . . Philosophers 
 had always made it their study to bring their minds into 
 a healthy condition . . . but we do not find Him in agree- 
 ment with philosophers. . . . They placed it in reason 
 . . . He in enthusiasm." l 
 
 The ancient Greek philosopher who succeeded by aid 
 of his reason to control his passions from committing 
 acts which according to his ideas of morality were un- 
 advisable was called " virtuous ". But " Christ went 
 further and pronounced the desire in the heart, when the 
 gratification of it would be culpable, to be sin ". Such a 
 man as subdues his thoughts and not merely suppresses 
 the outward act is called in Christian language " holy ". 
 
 Seeley contrasts the two thus : " The one, so far as 
 he is virtuous, is incapable of crime ; the other, so far as 
 he is virtuous, is incapable of temptation ". Again " A 
 virtuous man is one who controls and coerces the anarchic 
 passions within him, so as to conform his actions to law ; 
 a holy man is one in whom a passionate enthusiasm 
 absorbs and annuls the anarchic passions altogether, so 
 that no internal struggle takes place ; and the lawful 
 action is that which presents itself first and seems the 
 one most natural and most easy to be done." 2 
 
 What then was the " enthusiasm " which carries all 
 before it? The law-making power or root of morality 
 in human nature, trained and developed into the Christian 
 spirit, was a^d-rrr} ; " the love not of all men nor yet 
 of every man, but of the man in every man ". . . . " It is 
 natural to man to love his kind, and Christ commands 
 us only to give nature play." " What the law of love 
 and the golden rule did for mankind was to place for the 
 first time the love of man as man distinctly in the list of 
 
 'Pp. 136, 137. 2 P. 141.
 
 ETHICS 303 
 
 virtues, to dissipate the exclusive prejudices of ethnic 
 morality and to give selfishness the character of sin." l 
 
 Now follows the important question, how is this 
 enthusiasm for purity and love to be kindled ; when we 
 think of "What an ardent enthusiasm He demanded 
 from His followers, and secondly, how frail and tender 
 a germ this passion naturally is in human nature". 8 
 
 It was by the force of example : 3 " The most lost 
 cynic will get a new heart by learning thoroughly to 
 believe in the virtue of even one man. Our estimate of 
 human nature is in proportion to the best specimen of 
 it we have witnessed. This then it is which is wanted 
 to raise the feeling of humanity into an enthusiasm ; 
 when the precept of love has been given, an image must 
 be set before the eyes of those who are called upon 
 to obey it, an ideal or type of man which may be 
 noble and amiable enough to raise the whole race and 
 make the meanest member of it sacred with reflected 
 glory. 
 
 " Did not Christ do this ? Did the command to love 
 go forth to those who had never seen a human being 
 they could revere? Could His followers turn upon Him 
 and say, How can we love a creature so degraded, full 
 of vile wants and contemptible passions, whose little life 
 is most harmlessly spent when it is an empty round of 
 eating and sleeping ; a creature destined for the grave 
 and for oblivion when his allotted term of fretfulness and 
 folly has expired ? Of this race Christ Himself was a 
 member, and to this day is it not the best answer to all 
 blasphemers of the species, the best consolation when 
 
 >P. 151. 2 P. 152- 
 
 3 As many Rationalists and others may not have seen this passage, I 
 quote it in full as one of the many eloquent ones in Sir J. Seeley's Ecct 
 Homo.
 
 34 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 our sense of its degradation is keenest, that a human 
 brain was behind His forehead and a human heart beating 
 in His breast, and that within the whole creation of God 
 nothing more elevated or more attractive has yet been 
 found than He ? And if it be answered that there was 
 in His nature something exceptional and peculiar, that 
 humanity must not be measured by the stature of Christ, 
 let us remember that it was precisely thus that He wished 
 it to be measured, delighting to call Himself the Son of 
 Man, delighting to call the meanest of mankind His 
 brothers. If some human beings are abject and contempt- 
 ible, if it be incredible to us that they can have any high 
 dignity or destiny, do we regard them from so great a 
 height as Christ ? Are we likely to be more pained by 
 their faults and deficiencies than He was ? Is our standard 
 higher than His ? And yet He associated by preference 
 with these meanest of the race ; no contempt for them did 
 He ever express, no suspicion that they might be less dear 
 than the best and wisest to the common Father, no doubt 
 that they were naturally capable of rising to a moral 
 elevation like his own. There is nothing of which a man 
 may be prouder of than this ; it is the most hopeful and 
 redeeming fact in history ; it is precisely what was 
 wanting to raise the love of man as man to enthusiasm. 
 An eternal glory has been shed upon the human race by 
 the love Christ bore to it. And it was because the 
 Edict of Universal Love went forth to men whose hearts 
 were in no cynical mood but possessed with a spirit of 
 devotion to a man, that words which at any other time, 
 however grandly they might sound, would have been but 
 words, penetrated so deeply, and along with the law of 
 love the power of love was given. Therefore also the 
 first Christians were enabled to dispense with philo- 
 sophical phrases, and instead of saying that they loved
 
 ETHICS 
 
 305 
 
 the ideal of man in man, could simply say and feel that 
 they loved Christ in every man." * 
 
 But there was something more. " Christ believed it 
 possible to bind men to their kind, but on one condition 
 that they were first bound fast to Himself". 
 
 The history of Christianity is replete with characters 
 in whom "self was lost and found in Christ" from St 
 Paul to to-day. 
 
 Christ Himself has been the One and only Motive 
 which has been all sufficient for a holy life. Well, again, 
 does Seeley remark : " Among all the men of the ancient 
 heathen world there were scarcely one or two to whom 
 we might venture to apply the epithet ' holy '. In other 
 words, there were not more than one or two, if any, who 
 besides being virtuous in their actions were possessed 
 with an unaffected enthusiasm of goodness, and besides 
 abstaining from vice regarded even a vicious thought 
 with horror. Probably no one will deny that in Chris- 
 tian countries this higher-toned goodness, which we call 
 holiness, has existed. Few will maintain that it has been 
 exceedingly rare. Perhaps the truth is, that there has 
 scarcely been a town in any Christian country since the 
 time of Christ when a century has passed without exhibit- 
 ing a character of such elevation that his mere presence has 
 shamed the bad and made the good better, and has been 
 felt at times like the presence of God Himself. And if 
 this be so, has Christ failed or can Christianity die ? " 2 
 
 (3) It is quite true that practical experience is the 
 only test of the worth of any maxim. Hence was it 
 that our Lord said : " If any man willeth to do His will, 
 he shall know of the teaching, whether it be of God, or 
 whether I speak from Myself". 3 
 
 i Pp. 154-156. 2 P. 161. 'John vii. 17. 
 
 20
 
 306 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 The whole Christian world has thus verified Christ's 
 words, and Rationalists also recognise them as true in 
 spite of their rejecting Him as the Divine Master. 
 
 (4) This author, like Haeckel and Biichner, attributes 
 everything to Natural Selection as having caused it. 
 There is an intense " struggle for existence " between 
 what St. Paul calls " the law in his members " and " the 
 law in his mind," or between the tendency of evil and 
 the aspiration to goodness. That is the sphere of the 
 struggle, and the issue is either debasement or nobility, 
 which may be called the " survival of the fittest," if the 
 latter prevail through the power of the will. 
 
 The primary cause, however, is overlooked ; and that 
 is the consciousness of the struggle, and of the power to 
 determine which of the two " laws " shall win the battle. 
 Therein lies man's moral responsibility. Animals can 
 entertain no such struggle ; they are non-moral. 
 
 (5) In this paragraph he speaks of "holiness," but 
 does not seem to realise that, as Seeley says, it was a 
 word unknown and unsuited to man before Christ came. 
 As in the use of this word, so is it often the case that 
 Rationalists adopt the Christian phraseology, but attribute 
 Christian ethics to natural causes rather than to Jesus 
 Christ, the true source. Though altruism may find its 
 natural source in parental love, and in what Seeley calls 
 a spark of " natural kindliness," it could never have been 
 formed into a flame of enthusiasm by any other means 
 than by a Divine Personality. Plato saw that and Christ 
 proved it to be true. 
 
 The ethics of Jesus supply the clear historical origin 
 of the development of Christian love, or 'AyaTrrj. 
 
 It was intensified in the family circle ; as shown by 
 the elevation of the wife to her proper sphere as a help 
 meet for man ; in the realisation of the sacredness of
 
 ETHICS 307 
 
 child-life. It was expanded in the relationship between 
 master and man, by the abolition of slavery. It closed 
 up the breach between them, and destroyed the natural 
 hatred among nations ; or, as it is described, Jesus broke 
 down the partition wall between Jew and Gentile, for 
 Christianity regards all men as brothers in Christ. 
 
 It is the beneficent Gesta Christi to which we look 
 for all this and much more. Natural Selection, which 
 has nothing whatever to do with the origination or the 
 development of anything, could never do anything of 
 itself. It was Christ who poured this Spirit of Love 
 upon the world. In His short life on earth the funda- 
 mental principles of all true spiritual religion were 
 founded. No further developments are needed or pos- 
 sible. Christianity is Final. 
 
 (6) In this paragraph the Rationalist takes credit 
 for what is really due to Christ. It is perfectly true that 
 when Christ came, Greece and Rome were sunk in 
 ignorance, immorality and crime ; but it was the leaven 
 of Christ's teaching that in time brought about a revolu- 
 tion in these things. It was by the example of all that 
 was pure, good, loving and noble as seen first in Jesus 
 Christ, and afterwards in the followers and martyrs that 
 won heathendom from vice and immorality. It is due 
 to this and not to Rationalism that the " average ethical 
 standard is higher than it has ever been before ". 
 
 (7) In this paragraph we have a good example of 
 the common fallacy about the " race ". Like the terms 
 genus, " crowd," " congregation," a race is only a word to 
 stand for a multiplication of the individual. Thus a pug 
 dog is an individual, all pug dogs form a "race" or 
 " breed ". 
 
 The Church of England limits a "congregation" to 
 three individuals.
 
 308 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 The very essence of Christianity is that the race, i.e. t 
 all men, is " saved " by the salvation of each, individually. 
 Salvation is simply the Christ-like character and conduct. 
 No "race" can be saved if its individuals be not ; for the 
 term is simply an abstraction. How then can the author's 
 hope for the reconciliation between egoism and altruism 
 be true for the race, if that reconciliation be not found in 
 the heart and life of each individual of the race? 
 
 It has been said that Nature is regardless of the in- 
 dividual, but is careful of the type. No biologist can 
 endorse that. The type is the " species " or " genus," or 
 whatever word stands for a " group " of individuals. How 
 then can Nature care more for the type than for the in- 
 dividuals of which it consists ? 
 
 But what does Evolution say ? Travelling back 
 through the past history of the world we find types have 
 come and gone over and over again. They have been 
 swept away as soon as the individuals vanished. 
 
 It has often been observed that Christianity differs 
 from Judaism, in that Christ proved the love of the 
 Father and Himself for each individual soul ; whereas 
 a Jew was a unit in the race, for which Jahweh only 
 cared. That may have been generally the human way 
 of thinking ; but there is plenty of evidence that many 
 regarded the God of Heaven otherwise as a God of 
 mercy, the God of the fatherless and the widow ; as One, 
 who though inhabiting Eternity, could yet dwell with 
 the humble and the contrite man. 
 
 It is this trait of the Deity which Christ especially 
 taught by imparting a new meaning to " Father ". In 
 the Old Testament as "Father," He was the Creator 
 only, as Father in the New Testament, we have a living 
 Parent who will, so to say, speak to us face to face. 
 
 (8) Though supernatural religion may not be ap-
 
 ETHICS 30Q 
 
 preciable to sense-perception, to which Rationalists and 
 Materialistic Monists would seem to reduce everything, 
 yet we may reasonably ask knowing the past history of 
 Christianity why will Duty become more virile than it 
 has been among Christians? Duty to whom, we ask? 
 Who or what is there that can command Duty, if there 
 be no God to whom obligations are due? 
 
 The Secularist would reply Duty to one's fellow- 
 creatures : so does Christianity. 
 
 History does not corroborate the author's conclusion. 
 A mentally strong and naturally virtuously disposed 
 person such as the author may be must not judge of 
 the masses of mankind by himself. He says : " The moral 
 ideal of Religion is Truth " : so is it with Christianity ; 
 which is based on Christ, who proved Himself to be the 
 Way and the Truth ; and we may adopt his words 
 " On no other foundation than Truth can any lofty or 
 desirable system of ethics be raised " no other name 
 under Heaven is there by which man can be saved. 
 
 The author need not claim for Rationalism what his- 
 tory distinctly proves to have been due to the Spirit of 
 Christ. 
 
 (9) It is Christianity alone with which the main theme 
 of religious advance can be identified, as Mr. C. Loring 
 Brace has so admirably shown in his Gesta Christi. 
 
 (10) That a man's happiness is in direct proportion to 
 his virtue is not a discovery of Rationalism ; but the 
 assurance of Jesus, who told His disciples that " their joy 
 should be full " ; though men as He warned them 
 might kill them thinking they were doing God service. 
 
 This result of His ethics the peace He left with us 
 is a natural law and as such is to be traced to God as its 
 author, whose "peace passeth all understanding". 
 
 (i i) If there is really nothing original or important in
 
 310 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 the New Testament, why was it written ? Why has more 
 literature been written about that little cluster of writ- 
 ings than on any subject in the world ? How is it that 
 men, far more learned than this anonymous author who 
 is perhaps wise in not disclosing his name have unani- 
 mously found proof of a revealing of God the Father in 
 the " Unique " Person (Movoyevrjs) of Jesus Christ ; as 
 well as of the promulgation of the Brotherhood of Man 
 CAydirr)) ; and the means of reconciling man to God 
 (the great At-one-ment) ? 
 
 (12) To write in the year 1903 that Christ died "in 
 order to save these (humblest creatures), from His own 
 eternal vengeance " simply shows a profound ignorance 
 of the truth, and is self-condemnatory, and needs no 
 comment. 
 
 (13) Nature never supplied " the Universal Brother- 
 hood and Love " nor " the wondrous force of human self- 
 sacrifice and love ". He may not know it, but strange 
 to say they were first promulgated and established by 
 Jesus Christ in these Gospels, of which he speaks so 
 slightingly ! 
 
 If this author and other Rationalists wish to know 
 what is meant by " the Spirit of Christianity," I would 
 strongly recommend the three following books Sir John 
 Seeley's Ecce Homo, Harnack's What is Christianity? 
 and the third book of A. Sabatier's Religions of Authority 
 (Books I. and II.), and the Religion of the Spirit (Book 
 III.).
 
 CHAPTER VIII 
 
 RELIGION AND RATIONALISM ' 
 
 WE are now approaching the all-important question as 
 to the use of Religion. Monists like Haeckel, who put 
 God aside as non-existent, and regard the universe as 
 the issue of blind unconscious forces, can have no religion 
 at all in the ordinary sense of the word, which always 
 implies the existence of some spiritual Power upon whom 
 man believes himself to be in some way dependent. 
 The Power is always supposed to be conscious, in some 
 sort analogous to man who possesses consciousness. 
 
 Nevertheless, Haeckel devotes a chapter to the 
 " Monistic Religion ". Let us see, therefore, what he 
 has to say about it. In drawing a comparison between 
 Science and Christianity, he says : " One of the most 
 distinctive features of the existing century (nineteenth) 
 is the increasing vehemence of the opposition between 
 Science and Christianity ". 2 
 
 This is a somewhat too strong expression ; for many 
 scientists have been, and many are now Christians. But 
 is not Haeckel here confounding Christianity with eccles- 
 iasticism or perhaps Roman Catholicism of the continent 
 including his own country? Did he clearly perceive 
 
 1 1 would refer the reader to Pr. Loofs Anti-Haeckel, for a refutation 
 of Haeckel's chapter xvii., on "Science and Christianity" in his Riddle 
 of the Universe. It is published by Hodder and Stoughton, 6d. 
 
 2 The Riddle of the Universe, p. 316. 
 (311)
 
 312 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 that Christianity, in the only true sense of the word, is 
 nothing else than the Christ-like character as seen in 
 and taught by Jesus Christ Himself and His apostles ; 
 and the pure religion is that defined by St. James, 1 the 
 bitter opposition which Rationalists, Monists and others 
 express towards the Christian religion would greatly 
 subside. 
 
 " Primitive Christianity " is discussed by Haeckel and 
 he adds : " Christ Himself, the noble prophet and en- 
 thusiast, so full of the love of humanity, was far below 
 the level of classical culture ; he knew nothing beyond 
 the Jewish traditions." 2 
 
 It is a common thing to depreciate Christ among 
 Rationalists ; thus, e.g., Mr. Charles Watts writes of 
 Him : 3 His character was " weak ". His teaching " objec- 
 tionable " ; there is nothing " original " in His ethical 
 teaching, His conduct was " narrow-minded ". He was 
 in "no sense perfect". His precepts are "unreliable". 
 His language was " unrefined ". He lacks " a true 
 method of reasoning and a uniformity of character ". He 
 exhibited an "injudicious example". He was "severe" 
 when He should have been " gentle ". When He ought 
 to have been " firm" He was " vacillating and cowardly," 
 etc. Then Mr. Watts asks : " Who would really be- 
 lieve in His teaching to practice self-mutilation or to hate 
 one's relations, or to accept a premium for deserting 
 wife ? " 
 
 If Mr. Watts and Haeckel are right, have all 
 Christians, learned and unlearned, been stupidly blind, 
 awaiting for nearly 2000 years downwards, for Mr. Charles 
 Watts' interpretation ? 
 
 Will Rationalists ever be able to learn that Christ 
 
 1 Chap. i. 27. *Op. cit., p. 319. 
 
 8 The Miracles of Christian Belief.
 
 RELIGION AND RATIONALISM 313 
 
 spoke metaphorically and not literally? "Without a 
 parable spake He not unto them." 
 
 Haeckel's observation that Jesus Christ knew noth- 
 ing beyond the Jewish traditions is so remarkable that 
 it is difficult to conceive, not only how he came to make 
 it, but that he could believe any intelligent reader of the 
 New Testament could accept it. 
 
 To take one point only. The religion of Judaism 
 was based on a ritual of outward forms and ceremonies 
 as well as traditions. Christ placed religion in the 
 heart within, on principles, abolishing the whole of the 
 Jewish ceremonial as well as the traditions of the elders 
 altogether. 
 
 In alluding to St. Paul Haeckel says : " The remark- 
 able personality of Paul, who possessed much more 
 culture and practical sense than Christ, is extremely 
 interesting, from the anthropological point of view, 
 from the fact that the racial origin of the two great 
 religious founders is very much the same. Recent his- 
 torical investigation teaches that Paul's father was of 
 Greek x nationality and his mother of Jewish." 
 
 " The statement of the apocryphal gospels, that the 
 Roman officer Pandera was the true father of Christ, 
 seems all the more credible when we make a careful 
 anthropological study of the personality of Christ." 
 Later on, Haeckel puts the supposition as a certainty 
 " The name of Christ's real father, ' Pandera ' points 
 unequivocally to a Greek origin ". 2 
 
 Every reader of St Paul's epistles knows that what 
 Haeckel said of him was not his own estimate of him- 
 self, that his great ambition was " to apprehend Christ," 
 and feared lest he might be considered " reprobate ". 
 
 i op. dt., p. 321. * Op. tit., P. 337-
 
 3M PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Haeckel's appeal to the Apocryphal Gospels for evi- 
 dence must be a somewhat desperate resort ! 
 
 He goes on to say : " The ethical craving of our 
 emotion is satisfied by Monism, no less than the logical 
 demand for causality on the part of Reason ". l 
 
 The ethical craving may be perhaps satisfied in highly 
 intellectual individuals ; but neither Haeckel nor English 
 Rationalists can bring forward any proof that it is so 
 among the masses of men and women. If the preach- 
 ing of Morality has been found to fail, Monism will 
 certainly not succeed. As with Rationalism, there is the 
 want of Motive Power ; which, as we have seen, is felt so 
 keenly by Rationalistic writers. 
 
 " We do not seek a mighty revolution but a rational 
 reformation of our religious life. And just as 2000 years 
 ago, the classic poetry of the ancient Greeks incarnated 
 their ideals of virtue in divine shapes, so may we, too, 
 lend the character of noble goddesses to our three 
 rational ideals. We must inquire into the features of the 
 three goddesses of the Monist Truth, Beauty and 
 Virtue ; and we must study their relation to the three 
 corresponding ideals of Christianity which they are to 
 replace." z 
 
 The fallacy underlying all this is that the average 
 man cannot worship an ideal or an abstraction. He can 
 feel no emotion for them any more than for Comte's grand 
 fare; or than one can for gravitation. Religion cannot 
 stand upon any other basis than reverence for a Con- 
 scious Being. 
 
 But Haeckel rejects the only Being who has and can 
 excite enthusiastic reverence. 
 
 " We must reject what is called " Revelation," the 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 340. * Op. cit., p. 344.
 
 RELIGION AND RATIONALISM 315 
 
 poetry of faith, that affirms the discovery of truth in a 
 supernatural fashion, without the assistance of reason. 
 ... In this respect it is quite certain that the Christian 
 system must give way to the Monistic. ... In our 
 search for truth we have to devote ourselves solely to the 
 study of Nature." l 
 
 But the Christian system of religion is something 
 which will not fall under observation of, or experiment 
 with, Nature. It deals largely with spiritual matters 
 which do not appeal to the senses. But, to say that the 
 belief in a Conscious Being we call God, which lies at 
 the basis of Religion, is not founded on reason, is not 
 true. It is the object of this book to show that many 
 lines converge to establish the belief in God by inductive 
 evidence ; for we have no other. It is, however, ample ; 
 and this process of reasoning in the spiritual world is 
 known as Faith " the proving of things not seen," 2 i.e., it 
 is the accumulative proof or " moral conviction " of Truths 
 which cannot be brought within the sphere of the senses. 
 
 " The idea of the good, which we call Virtue, in our 
 Monistic religion coincides for the most part with the 
 Christian idea of virtue ; viz., of the primitive and pure 
 Christianity of the first three centuries. . . . The best 
 part of Christian morality, to which we firmly adhere, is 
 represented by the humanest precepts of charity and 
 toleration, compassion and assistance." 
 
 " However, these noble commands ... are by no 
 means original discoveries of Christianity. They were 
 derived from earlier religions." 
 
 " Moreover, Christian ethics was marred by the great 
 defect of a narrow insistence on altruism and a denuncia- 
 tion of egoism." 3 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 345. * Heb. xi. i. Op. cit., p. 346.
 
 316 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Of course, one has no quarrel with Materialistic 
 Monism or Rationalism for accepting Christian ethics. 
 So far, they are Christians in spite of their infidelity ; but 
 when Haeckel says Christ insisted upon a " narrow " 
 kind of altruism with a " denunciation of egoism," he is 
 conspicuously in error. Duty to oneself is as much in- 
 sisted upon as duty to one's neighbour ; whether the 
 former be purity and honour, to which St. James refers 
 in his well-known definition of religion ; l or to working 
 for a livelihood. 2 Where the " narrowness " of altruism 
 appears in 'AyaTrr) one is at a loss to comprehend. The 
 Christian knows nothing of it. 
 
 " Two things certainly remain beyond dispute the 
 lofty principle of universal charity and the fundamental 
 maxim of ethics, the ' golden rule,' that issues therefrom ; 
 both, however, existed in theory and in practice centuries 
 before the time of Christ." 3 
 
 " In this greatest and highest commandment our 
 Monistic ethics is completely at one with Christianity." 4 
 
 It is gratifying to hear this conclusion of Monism ; 
 but it is quite obvious from all ancient history that the 
 " golden rule " was practically a dead letter, both among 
 individuals and between nations. Moreover, if the truth 
 could be recognised by Haeckel and Rationalists, the 
 above lofty sentiments would never have been known to 
 them had not Christ come. 
 
 1 Chap. i. 27. a Eph. iv. 28. 
 
 * Op. cit., p. 322. *Op. cit., p. 359.
 
 CHAPTER IX 
 
 THE ORIGIN OF MORAL EVIL 
 
 VOLUMES have been written on the origin of moral evil 
 and sin in man. Until the middle of the last century 
 the story of the fall as given in Genesis was supposed to 
 be historically true. Therefore, all the literature which 
 was based upon the theory of original sin is now out of 
 date and superfluous. 1 The question at the present day 
 is What has Evolution to say upon the subject ? 
 
 It is simply this We have seen how man's power of 
 realising an abstraction in his mind at once and entirely 
 separates him off from all the rest of the animal creation ; 
 in that consequently he alone can form some conception 
 of God. He is conscious of the power to choose, or 
 what is called free will. 
 
 Then he finds out for himself, or is told by others 
 from their experience, that he will suffer if he does 
 certain things. Such is his first idea of a natural law : 
 but so far there is nothing moral or immoral about it ; 
 just as all animals are non-moral. 
 
 But when a community or tribe is formed, it is soon 
 found that certain restrictions are necessary to be put 
 upon each individual. Then a moral law is framed ; 
 such as "Thou shalt do no murder," i.e., within the 
 community. Such may be enforced by penalties. 
 
 1 1 would strongly recommend to the reader Mr. F. R. Tennant'i 
 book on The Origin and Propagation of Sin. 
 
 (317)
 
 3 i8 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 We thus get at the stage known as " guilt," i.e., the 
 violation of a duty to the state. 
 
 The higher stage, in which a man believes himself 
 bound to duty to a God, brings with it the sense of 
 " sin ". 
 
 So that what we call " falling " is really, and indeed 
 obviously, " a conscious violation of law ". It is just what 
 the serpent is represented to have foretold ; that being 
 possibly the familiar experience of the writer of the 
 story. 
 
 Most of the acts of guilt, as theft and murder, were 
 not considered such in early days when every man's 
 hand was naturally against every other. Even nearly 
 up to our Lord's time, every nation of the East had been 
 naturally hostile against every other whom they might 
 attack, slay, despoil at will, not because of any quarrel 
 there need have been none but solely because they 
 were foreigners and that there had been no treaty. It 
 was Rome which gathered together into one hetero- 
 geneous mass all the nations of the then world ; and so 
 made a rough field more or less prepared to be sown with 
 the seed of the gospel. 
 
 Now, the whole matter as to the origin of evil is put 
 into the short sentence of St. Paul : " I had not known 
 sin but by the law ... for without the law sin was 
 dead ". 1 
 
 The story of Adam and Eve puts the case very 
 clearly. The writer, apparently wishing to account for 
 the origin of wickedness prevalent in his day, invents the 
 story and shows how the First Law given to man, 
 brings in the possibility of Sin, by its violation. The 
 command is like an order given by a parent to his 
 
 1 Rom. vii. 7, 8.
 
 ORIGIN OF MORAL EVIL 3ig 
 
 children playing in an orchard ; who were never told 
 before not to do anything. 
 
 Adam and Eve were non-moral before ; but the 
 moment they receive the command, " Thou shalt not eat 
 of the fruit of the tree," potential morality and immorality 
 is present ; so that what would have been a non-moral 
 act becomes an immoral one. 
 
 Law, therefore, is the indirect cause of guilt and sin, 
 by pronouncing certain previously non-moral acts to be 
 immoral. 
 
 It is not that man "fell," but that his eyes were 
 holden till he realised, as soon as he experienced it, what 
 would be the effect of violation of law on himself. 
 
 The story, then, represents the Discovery of Conscience 
 after the pronouncement of law, the possibility of guilt 
 or sin, with its concomitant shame. 
 
 With the powerful aid of a " conscience towards God," 
 constantly warning and shaming man, he has learnt how 
 he is now able to rise to a divine height ; though he is 
 equally conscious that he may sink lower than the beasts 
 that perish ; for without law man would for ever remain 
 on the same dead level of animal non-morality, when 
 nothing is good, nothing is evil. There would be no Con- 
 trast and no need for Volition. 
 
 Let us then consider this all-important Law of Con- 
 trasts, which supplies the basis both for man's moral 
 elevation as well as for his possible degradation, since 
 no evolution ever takes place without a possible devolu- 
 tion or degradation in some other direction. 
 
 A most important result of man's powers of abstract 
 reasoning, and of his consciousness of the power of 
 choosing, is the origin of this conception of evil 
 whether that word be his estimate of physical occurrences 
 without, or what is called " sin," within himself.
 
 320 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 The so-called " physical evils " in the world are those 
 events which he does not like ; but they are relative 
 matters. A storm ruining his nearly ripe corn he calls 
 an "evil"; but coming after a drought has prevailed, 
 when the seed is germinating, it is a " blessing ". 
 
 The old saying "It is an ill wind which blows no- 
 body any good," implies how rare such an occurrence is. 
 It represents the fact that all events imply their contrasts. 
 
 If there were never these uncertainties in Nature, we 
 could not, e.g., speak of good and bad weather. If we 
 were never ill, we should not know what to be unwell 
 meant and we could not speak of health as " good," for it 
 is only by comparison that we are aware of health at all ; 
 as we are perfectly unconscious of the working of the 
 internal organs of our body until something goes wrong. 
 
 Such contrasts prevail everywhere, and we talk of 
 heat and cold, light and darkness, etc. 
 
 Similarly with regard to man's moral conduct, we 
 describe it as good or bad. But why? What regulates 
 Conduct ? The answer is " Law ". " I had not known 
 sin but by the law," writes St. Paul ; l but laws, as made 
 by man, at least, are very variable not to say capricious 
 or even contradictory ; for we often find one race of men 
 regarding as correct what another thinks incorrect, as 
 the " religious " practices of the ancient Greeks compared 
 with Christian conduct. 
 
 Thus, if a comparison between Judaism and Chris- 
 tianity be made, we find rites and ceremonies to be 
 the essence of the one, their utter abolition to be a funda- 
 mental feature of the other. The highest ideal of a 
 Rabbi was to multiply and endeavour to perform the 
 greatest number of the traditions and religious ceremonies 
 
 1 Rom. vii. 7.
 
 ORIGIN OF MORAL EVIL 3 ai 
 
 possible. Such was his idea of the "Righteousness 
 of the Law". 
 
 We turn to Christianity and we find the whole 
 of the ceremonial law was a mistake, and " Righteous- 
 ness of Faith " takes its place. 
 
 Hence we discover a fundamental contrast between 
 these two laws of Judaism and Christianity, respectively. 
 
 If it be asked why some men follow one line of 
 conduct and others follow a quite different one ; both 
 thinking they are right in obeying law, it is just be- 
 cause human-made laws are never perfect nor universal ; 
 whereas Spiritual laws as revealed by Jesus Christ 
 are found by experience to be applicable to all races 
 at all times. 
 
 But whatever law men believe to be right and obey, 
 that is, act up to their light, feeble though it may be, 
 they cannot be called in question. If he obeys, we may 
 call him relatively moral, and relatively immoral if he 
 disobey it. 
 
 But Law may be " natural " as well as human. 
 
 By " natural law" is only meant an "observed order 
 of facts " ; that is, certain events always take place under 
 the same circumstances. This uniformity is said meta- 
 phorically to be in obedience to law. It represents 
 what always is. It only differs from human laws, in that 
 these represent what man always ought to be. 
 
 Now animals, by not having the power of abstract 
 reasoning and possessing no consciousness of the power 
 to choose, i.e., volition, cannot be moral or immoral, but 
 are simply non-moral or living automata. 
 
 Man, alone, on the other hand, can be both moral or 
 immoral, for he alone is conscious of the universal law of 
 contrasts, and can use or abuse nature's laws, say of health ; 
 and he can also obey or disobey human laws. 
 
 21
 
 322 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Herein, then, lies the application of Free Will to the 
 spiritual world. 
 
 It is the consciousness of having the power to restrain 
 oneself from abusing natural or other laws, whenever 
 circumstances demand our attention to decide upon our 
 course of action, and to do so from strong motives. 
 Those as far as Christians are concerned are love to 
 God and His Christ; for this includes all terrestrial 
 motives, as of nobility of character, and love to fellow- 
 creatures (agape). 
 
 If a man restrain himself from violating human laws, 
 through fear of punishment on breaking them, he ex- 
 hibits an outward, formal or prudential morality only. 
 If he restrain himself for the love of God, he is guided 
 by a religious motive and the aspiration for holiness. 
 
 Thus do we realise the difference between guilt and 
 sin. A law court only knows the former ; whereas the 
 latter implies a previous firm conviction of the existence 
 of a Holy God. 
 
 Consequently, no nation in the world realised to the 
 full what sin meant before Christ came, unless we except 
 the psalmists and prophets ; but even they had not 
 reached a full realisation of sin against the Father. The 
 words in Hebrew and Greek meant " missing one's aim " ; 
 and mainly referred to failures in ceremonial duties. 
 
 Whatever man-made law lays down at any period, 
 such, of course, must be obeyed at the time ; but such 
 laws become obsolete, are repealed, and new ones sub- 
 stituted to fit later times and conditions. 
 
 On the other hand, God's laws, moral or religious, are 
 eternal. Such are the Laws of Philanthropy, Edification, 
 Mercy and Forgiveness. 1 
 
 ' As enumerated by Seeley (Ecce Homo).
 
 ORIGIN OF MORAL EVIL 323 
 
 Such are only appreciable by their contrasts ; and it 
 is our free will which is called upon to decide our actions 
 in obeying these laws and to overcome the inducements 
 to abuse instead of use them, i.e., to be loving and 
 philanthropic instead of churlish and selfish ; instead of 
 boldly resenting it, acquiescing feebly in wrong-doing. 
 To forgive seventy times seven, if an erring man repent, 
 rather than harbouring an unforgiving spirit in the heart. 
 It is only by thus ruling ourselves, that we gradually 
 tend to become at last automatically pure, holy, loving 
 and forgiving. Such is the highest possible state for 
 man to acquire " To be perfect as the Heavenly Father 
 is perfect," or as St. John says : " A child of God cannot 
 sin ". 
 
 Determinists say, as a proof of a man having no 
 " free " will, that you can tell beforehand how a man will 
 act if you know his character. This is perfectly true, 
 and especially so of the perfect Christian ; because what- 
 ever a man's character has become, it is finally the issue 
 of his own will. The perfect Christian of forty years of 
 age has passed through the period when his will deter- 
 mined that he would not be immoral. Another may, at 
 the same age, have the character of a roue ; because he 
 made no effort to restrain his passions, but gave full rein 
 to the " law of the flesh " ; which now, at forty, has the 
 mastery, and he cannot restrain himself any longer. 
 
 Now, is it only Utility which lies at the bottom of 
 conduct, or is the motive power for self-restraint the 
 duty to self and others ? The former is the Secularist's 
 assertion. Is it only because "honesty is the best 
 policy" that a man does not defraud his neighbour? 
 
 There is something else, and that is Conscience ; we 
 recognise it by sensations, either an unpleasant feeling 
 arises in the mind on one occasion or a self-satisfied one
 
 324 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 on another, following certain actions we have done, 
 respectively. 
 
 Whence does it arise ? 
 
 As long as we are compelled to obey man-made laws 
 for fear of punishment, conscience is for the most part a 
 very feeble affair if it exist at all. The Greek could only 
 say, " I know nothing against myself," 1 if he had done 
 the prescribed duties of the state ; just as the young 
 man said to Christ, " All these have I kept from my 
 youth up ". Similarly, schoolboys are, as a rule, obedient 
 to the master's orders, through fear of punishment ; but 
 if they can find a quiet corner where they can light a 
 cigar, they do not hesitate to break the rule, and think 
 none the worse of themselves for so doing. 
 
 Again, many people, even in Christian England (to 
 say nothing of Orientals), " see no harm " in cheating the 
 Government, by evading taxes in part, in smuggling, or 
 a railway company, by trying to pass a child over age, 
 as if he were under, etc. Though the same persons 
 would hesitate before doing a " dirty trick " to their 
 neighbours. 
 
 A fully developed conscience is only in correlation 
 with the belief of a Holy God. 
 
 A dog will sneak away ashamed of itself, if found out 
 in having done something for which it has been beaten. 
 So, too, to be discovered is in the eyes of a non-consci- 
 entious person the real " crime," not the act itself. 
 Shame only follows on discovery, if it come at all. 
 
 But with a " conscience towards God," as soon as 
 reflection follows the act, shame is felt, whether one's 
 fellow-men know of it or not. 
 
 Herein is seen the keen insight into human nature 
 
 1 The verb <rvyei5fi>cu.
 
 ORIGIN OF MORAL EVIL 325 
 
 of the writer of the story of Adam and Eve ; for he 
 represents shame as following the act of disobedience 
 before its discovery by God. 
 
 A beautiful picture by Mr. Long called " Christ or 
 Diana," well illustrates the awakened conscience. A 
 girl, who has become a Christian, refuses to put incense 
 on the altar of the goddess. A score of figures at least 
 are around her ; but not one understands why she refuses. 
 It is merely a state ceremony ; a state law orders her to 
 do it ; it is a political test To put some incense on the 
 altar was less as an honour to Diana than obedience to 
 the state. That young girl, alone of all the crowd, 
 knows what conscience means. 
 
 The state, of course, has no alternative but to send 
 her to the arena. 
 
 The occasion has arisen ; the " circumstances " are 
 all there. She is conscious of the power of her will to 
 submit or to refuse. The conscience supplies the motive 
 for refusal. A more powerful motive than that of obey- 
 ing the state is present in her mind, viz., the Abstract 
 Conception of Duty to her Master, Christ. The Will has 
 been called into action, and she refuses to belie her con- 
 science 1 at the expense of saving her life. 
 
 It is hardly necessary to add much on Original Sin. 
 The conception that all men became tainted through 
 being descended from Adam and Eve is, of course, a pure 
 
 1 The Greek word for " conscience " is a\ivtCbi\au. It does not ap- 
 pear to be of common occurrence in Greek literature, being only known 
 in a passage quoted from the lost works of the poet Menander. St. Paul 
 uses it, and even quotes a line from Menander " Evil communications 
 corrupt good manners ". This shows that the idea of conscience was not 
 at all prominent to the Greek. Nor, indeed, could it have been, when we 
 consider what the moral conduct of the gods and goddesses was supposed 
 to be. It was Christianity which brought about the development of a 
 " pure conscience towards God ".
 
 326 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 fiction ; but all men can fall by excessive yielding to 
 their natural and/w se sinless feelings ; that is by abus- 
 ing and not using natural laws of their body and mind. 
 
 As a rule these lower properties are stronger than the 
 tendency or wish to rise above them ; and every one will 
 readily echo the words of St. Paul : " Oh, wretched man 
 that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death ? " 
 And the remedy is supplied by himself; while prayer 
 will strengthen the will to restrain oneself instead of 
 yielding automatically to impulses. 
 
 It has been said by a believer in Natural Selection, 
 that the animal ' : propensities are inevitably strong in 
 man, because they are, or once were, useful or necessary 
 to life, and were therefore through countless ages inten- 
 sified by Natural Selection ; so there is no reason left 
 for referring their clamorous importunity to an evil bias 
 or a corrupted nature ". l 
 
 If the habits of animals be observed their instincts 
 are so completely regulated by natural laws that they 
 are strictly periodic and never abused, for it is " use," as 
 the ancient philosopher said, not " Natural Selection," 
 which strengthens any habit. 
 
 Man alone can think of the abstract idea of" pleasure," 
 and can therefore abuse natural law, by exceeding and 
 repeating the use to an abnormal and excessive degree. 
 It is this which intensifies the craving whether it be drink 
 or the sexual passion. Natural periodicity has been 
 completely broken down, or at all events not observed. 
 
 The tendency to possess the "craving" becomes only 
 too often hereditary ; and it is in this limited sense and 
 degree to which science would abbreviate the term 
 " Original Sin," and convert it into " parental taint ". 
 
 1 The Origin and Propagation of Sin, F. R. Tennant, p. 93.
 
 CHAPTER X 
 
 RATIONALISTIC VIEWS OF PHYSICAL EVILS ; AND THE 
 LAW OF "INIDEALITY" 
 
 ALL Rationalists make much of so-called " physical 
 evils," and ridicule the idea of their being consistent with 
 a good, just and Loving God who cares for Humanity 
 and other creatures He has made. 
 
 For if God be the author of Creation, He must 
 knowingly have made the world so that man should 
 suffer by catastrophes, such as storms, deluges, volcanic 
 outbursts, etc. 
 
 Of course, this so-called paradox has perplexed men 
 from time immemorial, before and after the days of Job. 
 
 The question is, What is the Christian interpretation ? 
 
 The Old Testament idea of "judgments" has long 
 ceased to be held, since our Lord alluded to the Tower 
 of Siloam ; but He taught us to read a moral lesson from 
 accidents and catastrophes. 
 
 Why is it that some men, such as Rationalists, seem 
 to see something very terrible and inconsistent in Nature's 
 forces, when man suffers from them ; but Christians, who 
 see them too, do not feel them to be so heavy a burden 
 on the mind ? May not the answer be that the Christian 
 has no fear of death ; while the man who believes that 
 he will vanish altogether and not survive it, regards it as 
 terrible ? 
 
 (327)
 
 328 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 There may be no hereafter or there may ; but the 
 Christian has an ideal life in prospect in hope. 
 
 He knows he must die sooner or later, according to 
 natural law, and he is prepared to go, whenever his turn 
 may come. As long as he is in this world he uses it 
 without abusing it. All his faculties, aesthetic, pursuit 
 of knowledge, love of science, etc., as well as moral and 
 ethical traits are exercised to the full. Why should he 
 fear death ? " Perfect Love casteth out fear. " 
 
 Why is it that so many Rationalists write pages of 
 pessimistic words about physical evils ? Thus writes the 
 anonymous author in one of several passages of his 
 book : " Does God, as revealed in Nature, show more 
 regard for the moral growth of man than for the stability 
 of the heavens ? The answer of every thoughtful and 
 candid observer must be that he recks no more of man 
 and his physical and moral growth than of the flies 
 which in early autumn are swept out of existence by the 
 blighting frost of a single night. What does God care 
 for the moral growth of the multitudes of human beings 
 whom he destroys by the frightful agency of earthquakes 
 and volcanic eruptions ?"..." Mr. Balfour may reply 
 that this physical destruction is not of cardinal impor- 
 tance in connection with his argument, and that the 
 moral growth ceases here only to be resumed in some 
 celestial sphere. But how does he know this? ... In 
 the absence of evidence to the contrary, we are bound to 
 conclude that death is the end of man, and that the 
 moral growth which is extinguished on earth is extin- 
 guished for ever." l 
 
 This is the writer who says : " This so-called know- 
 ledge [he is speaking of the knowledge of God] must be 
 
 1 Mr. Balfour' s Apologetics, p. 201.
 
 PHYSICAL EVILS AND "INIDEALITY" 329 
 
 submitted to the tests of observation and experiment ; if 
 it is knowledge at all, it is capable of verification, and 
 the verdict of science on the subject must be final." 1 
 
 I have already had occasion to point out that science 
 is ready to accept inductive evidence as equivalent to a 
 demonstration where none other is possible ; that 
 science by no means limits her requirements of proof 
 to " observation and experiment " ; and it is perfectly 
 obvious that the " proof" of immortality cannot be so 
 tested ; but, like the rotation of the earth, the probability 
 is of a very high order, and has proved amply sufficient 
 for millions of believers in a hereafter. 
 
 That probability will be considered later on. 
 
 Three papers appeared in the first number of the 
 Hibbert Journal, p. 114, upon "Catastrophes and the 
 Moral Order" (Martinique and St. Vincent, May, 1902). 
 In the first, by Prof. G. H. Howison, that author says, 
 in referring to Monists and Rationalists who assert the 
 incompatibility of catastrophes with a good Providence, 
 and ask, " Can such things be, and the supposed Author 
 and Ruler of Nature still be merciful and just and good ? " 
 
 " In this outcry we come upon the real burden of the 
 problem of Evil, and discover its source. Its source is 
 the traditional form of our Theism, and its burden comes 
 from attributing to God the authorship of Nature, with 
 all its apparatus for cruel torture, as we know these now. 
 To Materialism, to sheer Naturalism, to Atheism, there is 
 no enigma of Evil ; thinkers of all these types have Evil 
 before them as a fact simply ; they have no Almighty 
 Intelligence to blame for it ; their only business with it 
 is to avoid it so far as man can, and to bar it finally out 
 of life, if perchance that be possible." If not, then the 
 
 1 Op. dt. t p. 103.
 
 330 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 words may be said " But brothers, you can end it when 
 you will ". 
 
 But to the Theist the question remains : " Can this 
 problem of Evil be solved ? " This author seems to 
 think not ; that attempts hitherto have all been failures 
 and " must forever remain a failure ". " The fatal mis- 
 take has been the attempt to unite this universal causality 
 of God with His essence as Love." 
 
 He concludes by saying : " Indubitably, we stand in 
 need of a new idealism, which shall be so thoroughly 
 pluralistic, as to avoid both forms of literal Creationism 
 whether the Dualism of the Hebrew or the Monism of 
 modern thinking and which, while it refers Nature and 
 all its woes derivatively to minds, presents as the minds 
 other than God, and places God in a purely ideal or final- 
 causal relation to them, and thus to the system of Nature 
 dependent upon them ". 
 
 This appsal to " minds other than God " does not 
 seem feasible in the face of the Laws of Continuity and 
 the Conservation of Energy. 
 
 Rev. R. A. Armstrong in the second essay begins by 
 reminding us that the St. Vincent catastrophe is by no 
 means peculiar, and that 215,000 people were overwhelmed 
 by a wave in the Ganges in 1891. "In fact they are 
 no more terrible or more sad than the normal," and 
 minimises the effects by adding : " Death left mourners 
 few and rare. A multitude were spared the sorrows of 
 orphanage or widowhood. Where for these was death's 
 sting ?"..." We have not to ask ' Were these men of 
 Martinique sinners above the rest ? ' but rather, ' What 
 were these husbands and wives, parents and children, 
 lovers and beloved of Martinique, that God blessed them 
 thus above the rest, robbing death of its sting, the grave 
 of its victory ? ' "
 
 PHYSICAL EVILS AND "INIDEALITY" 331 
 
 If the author himself were asked, which would he 
 prefer to die peacefully of old age, i.e., normally ; or be 
 burnt up by a fiery hot blast as the victims were in that 
 volcanic outburst, what would be his reply ? I am not 
 surprised that this statement met with rather severe 
 criticism in the second number of the Hibbert Journal. 
 But he admits "they are only pleas in mitigation of 
 judgment ; and the arraignment still lies against an 
 Almighty God that He might have arranged things 
 otherwise than He has". 
 
 " One consideration indeed there is for the special 
 comfort of him whose trouble lies in the contemplation 
 of catastrophes. It is of their very essence that, in 
 human history, they are exceptional." So are railway 
 accidents and falling towers, as of Siloam and others ; 
 still such catastrophes do occur. 
 
 In conclusion, he leaves the concrete physical side of 
 the question and observes : " But the main trust of 
 Theism must for ever be in the spiritual experience of the 
 individual man. ... If the witness of the Spirit be with 
 him, if he has known God working in him in his sorrow, 
 in his temptation, in his remorse, in the blessed experience 
 of reconciliation, the fires of all the volcanoes will not burn 
 nor the waters of all the floods avail to quench his faith." 
 
 The third writer is Rev. Dr. R. F. Horton, who observes 
 that men do not seem to remember that catastrophes 
 are part of natural law. " On every occasion of sudden 
 disaster the mind feels bound to discuss the question 
 again ab initio." He agrees with the previous writer in 
 saying : " It is surely illogical and childishly inconsistent, 
 accepting the fact that some 30,000,000 of people perish 
 by old age, disease, accident or their own fault every 
 year in the ordinary way, to see in that nothing to shake 
 one's faith in Providence."
 
 332 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 " But the value of such a catastrophe, from an intel- 
 lectual and spiritual point of view, may be, that it calls 
 our attention to the catastrophic nature of human life, and 
 requires us to settle our accounts with the fact, which is 
 forgotten because it is not regular but intermittent." 
 
 This, of course, is in accordance with our Lord's 
 remark : " Unless ye repent, ye shall all likewise [spiritu- 
 ally] perish ". 
 
 He alludes to the power of the will to mitigate pain ; 
 as seen in the calmness of the martyrs at the stake, 
 justified by the consciousness of righteousness, and in 
 Jesus Christ on the cross ; but his critic rightly observes 
 that there is the element of free will present, whereas at 
 Martinique and St. Vincent the deaths were involuntary. 
 
 Lastly, he refers to the belief in a future life as the 
 key to the problem : " The Stoic saw half the truth when 
 he knew that the just and resolute man cannot be shaken 
 by the ruins of a falling world. The Christian sees it 
 all when he says, ' Nevertheless we, according to His 
 promise, look for new heavens and a new earth wherein 
 dwelleth righteousness '." 
 
 Mr. C. Cohen criticises the last two writers in the Hib- 
 bert Journal (vol. i., p. 360). He observes generally, if 
 man did the things which catastrophes do, he would be 
 regarded as guilty : why then is not God ? 
 
 " The Apologia of Messrs. Horton and Armstrong does 
 not touch the really vital issue . . . which is, Why 
 should they occur at all ? ... " It is the duty of the 
 Theist to justify in God a method of working or of instruc- 
 tion that would be condemned in man." 
 
 "The argument does show that the Martinique 
 disaster is in line with the general course of Nature ; but 
 this only amounts to saying that if ' Providence ' is at 
 fault here, it is at fault everywhere else."
 
 PHYSICAL EVILS AND 'IN1DEALITY" 333 
 
 I will now add some remarks and begin by criticising 
 the critic. Mr. Cohen says that if such a slaughter were 
 cruel in a man, it must be so in God. 
 
 But he overlooks the fact that ten times greater 
 slaughter by man has never been regarded as cruel, but 
 the right thing to do ! 
 
 If there is any one thing that man has gloried in from 
 the remotest times to the present day, and from the 
 lowest savage to the highly civilised Englishman, it is 
 WAR. 
 
 Is not there, therefore, a ring of disingenuousness 
 about the whole argument ? Men cry aloud against the 
 holocausts on those West Indian islands ; but as long as 
 men persist in inventing the most horrible engines of 
 warfare and try to sink or set on fire ships, laden with 
 hundreds of human beings, do their best to mutilate 
 their fellow-creatures with cordite, lyddite, and I do not 
 know how many more inventions, surely it is scarcely 
 apposite to complain of catastrophes as executed by 
 God, when they do their very utmost to surpass Him in 
 destruction ! 
 
 But what is the true situation ? Death is a law of 
 Nature. No one complains of that. At eighty years of 
 age, all of us will be pretty ready to go, being tired of 
 this world, finding ourselves isolated nay, we shall pro- 
 bably long to go ! 
 
 The Rationalist's complaints, therefore, seem to rest 
 on two grounds. One is that the young and middle- 
 aged do not wish to go yet. The other is that no one 
 likes to feel bodily pain, nor, I will add, give a cause of 
 grief to others. 
 
 If any be Atheists, they can quit the world painlessly 
 at any time. It is curious how pessimistic they are. 
 Haeckel writes a long passage, and the author of Mr.
 
 334 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 Balfours Apologetics, pages repeating himself in de- 
 scribing the physical evils of the world. 
 
 With regard to pain, we must remember that man 
 could not have pleasure without the possibility of pain. 
 Death by catastrophe is not of longer duration than by 
 disease or old age ; it is generally exceedingly short if 
 not instantaneous. 
 
 I take it, that pessimism about catastrophes arises 
 from a want of Faith and a belief in a future life. 
 
 If Christ's teaching be true, and the promise that 
 " he who willeth to do of the teaching shall know if it be 
 of God," has over and over again been verified by ex- 
 perience ; then His conduct bears witness to another truth 
 that He showed Himself to be superior to all " evils," 
 throughout the whole period of His ministry. He not only 
 taught His disciples to care nought for them, even if they 
 should be scourged and killed, but gave Himself up as an 
 example to a torturing death, in full faith of an Eternity. 
 
 It is worth while observing that there is a perfect 
 analogy between external Nature and the internal 
 nature of man. Within the latter are joy and grief, 
 enthusiasm and pessimism, pleasure and pain. So too, 
 is it externally : Nature surrounds us all with untold 
 blessings and sunshine, for the greater part of mankind 
 and the greater part of their lives. 
 
 But, on the other hand, we are from time to time re- 
 minded that there are and may recur at any time, 
 volcanic eruptions, storms at sea and floods. 
 
 But man risks them. He builds towns on the flanks 
 or foot of volcanoes. He sends his bhips all over the 
 oceans, etc. So, too, he travels by rail, knowing all the 
 while that there is always a chance o: an accident. But 
 he does not care about it in the least Nothing of these 
 things deters him.
 
 PHYSICAL EVILS AND "IN IDEALITY" 335 
 
 Do we not thus begin to see a certain natural law in 
 us and about us ? I call it " The Law of Inideality," 
 meaning that nothing in this world ever reaches the Ideal 
 which man can conceive of what he would like. 
 
 I quote the following from a paper I wrote upwards 
 of thirty years ago. 1 
 
 " One of the Arguments of Design was supplied by 
 The Adaptation of External Nature to the Physical Con- 
 dition of Man. This was the title of the volume of the 
 Bridgewater Treatises, by Dr. J. Kidd, F.R.S. 
 
 " I cannot but think that many adaptations of man and 
 animals and plants, as well to their sphere of existence, 
 have been much overrated ; for, in fact, they are greatly 
 limited. The conclusion arrived at from a study of such 
 adaptations has been expressed by science somewhat as 
 follows : Animals and plants, and we may include man, 
 do not necessarily live where conditions may be best 
 suited to them, but where other animals and plants, as 
 well as inorganic or physical conditions, will let them 
 live, when they cannot migrate or get away from 
 them. 
 
 " This is the result of the intense struggle for exis- 
 tence and survival of the strongest which obtains every- 
 where. This is a universal fact, and covers the sphere of 
 man's existence as well as that of all other organisms. 
 It requires but a slight observation, provided the mind 
 be free from preconceived ideas, to see that no animal or 
 plant is absolutely or perfectly adjusted to its sphere of 
 existence for every day of its life. These adjustments 
 are ever varying round a mean condition of a fair state 
 of comfort and happiness. Averages in this world must 
 be looked for only. A vast amount of very imperfect 
 
 1 " Natural Theology considered with reference to Modern Phil<x 
 sophy," Journal of Transactions of the Victoria Institute, 1872.
 
 336 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 adaptations must be taken into account in considering 
 the conditions of life upon this planet. 
 
 " I will confine my remarks here to the relative con- 
 dition of man, in his adaptation to his environment ; for 
 this element of adaptation in the Argument of Design 
 seems to have been too much depended upon. Moreover 
 Dr. Kidd's remarks will afford a good illustration of the 
 faulty a priori or deductive reasoning of the teleologists 
 of the old school. 
 
 " Starting with the truism that man can now exist upon 
 this world a possibility which, perhaps, did not exist 
 during the greater part of the world's history we have 
 to consider the degree of perfection to which this adapt- 
 ability has arrived ; and a careful scrutiny will not bring 
 out more than a relatively perfect view. Consider his 
 wants. Food stands foremost. Now his calculations on 
 the produce of his fields can never be absolute. He may 
 be in no way to blame ; but after all his care and striving, 
 his harvest may be ruined. Again : one of the most 
 essential elements which furnishes to sustain our immense 
 manufactures is coal. We may regard coal as 'provi- 
 dentially ' stored up for man's use ; but we can conceive 
 if it be there by God's providence that it might have 
 been far more accessible and less dangerous to procure ; 
 for even with the most careful processes being adopted 
 for its extraction, an enormous loss of life has occurred. 
 So, too, with regard to calamities by fires, earthquakes 
 and storms. Who can foretell the fate of man, who is 
 ever liable to destruction from natural causes which he 
 cannot always avoid, and has no power to control ? Not 
 to mention diseases, hundreds of instances show an absence 
 of a conceivably perfect adaptation between himself and 
 his environment. In Dr. Kidd's contribution to the Bridge- 
 water Treatises, he alludes to the beneficial effect of wind
 
 PHYSICAL EVILS AND "INIDEALITY" 337 
 
 in dissipating intense heat, and as a preventive against 
 the evils of a stagnant atmosphere, ' those currents of air 
 which administer in various modes as well to the luxury 
 and comfort of man, as to his most important wants'. 
 But in his description he alludes as much to the destruc- 
 tive effects of wind as to its benefit, and to the existence 
 of ' stagnant air producing [?] horrible effects, as goitre in 
 Switzerland ' ; l while of hurricanes he can only say, ' but 
 on some occasions we have immediate demonstration of 
 their remedying a greater evil [than the destruction of 
 life and property which hurricanes cause] ; viz., dissipating 
 swarms of ants in the island of Grenada ! ' It may be 
 questioned whether the latter is really a greater evil than 
 the destruction of hundreds of human beings ! Again, 
 of Swiss valleys, all he can say is, ' We may well be 
 thankful that our lot has not been cast in certain regions 
 of the earth, in those Alpine valleys, for instance, whose 
 scarcely human inhabitants attest the dreadful conse- 
 quences of a confined atmosphere '. He seems to forget 
 that if God be the Author of Nature, He must have 
 arranged the ' stagnant air as much as the hurricane '. 
 
 " But what do we infer from all this and much more 
 might be added as to the atmosphere being charged with 
 pathogenic microbes, etc. but that the physical adjust- 
 ment of man to the atmosphere is anything but abso- 
 lutely satisfactory?" 
 
 Now, an Atheist or modern Rationalist might easily 
 appeal to Dr. Kidd's descriptions, and tauntingly ask : 
 " Is this the work of your beneficent God ? " 
 
 Moreover, if we consider man's adjustments to ex- 
 ternal conditions, everything else besides the atmosphere 
 furnishes similar, so-called " evils ". 
 
 1 So common is this complaint among women, that a girl who had 
 not one used to be ridiculed by her companions 1 
 
 22
 
 338 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 In other words, there are the same, only " relatively 
 perfect," i.e., imperfect conditions, those, than which he can 
 always conceive far better, wishes for far better, and 
 hopes for far better hereafter. 
 
 The philosopher is thought to have said a clever 
 thing when he remarked on the structure of the eye that 
 had a manufacturer brought it to him, he would be 
 ashamed to show so imperfect an instrument. This may 
 be somewhat of an exaggeration, but the truth underlying 
 it is that nothing is absolutely perfect but everything 
 may be nevertheless " very good," and good enough for 
 this world. 
 
 Imperfect adaptations are the invariable law of this 
 world. Now, many may feel disposed to ask : " Is not all 
 this very derogatory to the Deity, who is a God of love 
 and mercy? " I, at once and unhesitatingly, say " No ! " 
 It is not for man to pronounce what may or may not be 
 derogatory to God, if he believe in His existence. The 
 finite mind cannot estimate the wisdom of the Infinite. 
 It is this unphilosophical way of weighing God's actions 
 in our own mental balance, which has brought so much 
 contempt upon the methods and assertions of the tele- 
 ologists. 
 
 I would maintain that Natural Theology, as a science, 
 must be studied "objectively," that is inductively and 
 not " subjectively " ; that is arguing deductively on an 
 assumed datum. Theologians must not shirk a full and 
 thoroughly impartial observation of the phenomena of 
 the world. We can only discover His laws by a close 
 examination of His works, their interactions, and their 
 actions upon ourselves, and the universal presence of 
 law applicable to all cases of what was called design, 
 including the adaptation of man and animals to their 
 sphere of existence, I include under the Law of Inideality ;
 
 PHYSICAL EVILS AND "INIDEALITY" 339 
 
 by which, I repeat, I would signify that nothing in 
 Nature ever reaches that ideal state of perfection which 
 is conceivable. It expresses what I have called a relative 
 state of perfection. I call it a natural law, because law is 
 expressive of an order of facts, and this law admits of 
 universal application, applies to everything thought to be 
 " designed " though now known to be " evolved," and is, 
 therefore, like other natural laws, a universal witness to 
 the will of God. 
 
 Under this same head of Adaptation, I would allude 
 to a statement of Mr. Herbert Spencer, who in his usu- 
 ally powerful reasoning in support of Evolution, has made 
 a slip (as it seems to me) in dealing with this subject in 
 his article on the special creative hypothesis. 1 
 
 In speaking of the parasites to which man is sub- 
 jected, he asks : " Shall we say that man, ' the head and 
 crown of things,' was provided as a habitat for these 
 parasites ? or shall we say that these degraded creatures, 
 incapable of thought and enjoyment, were created that 
 they might cause unhappiness to man ? One or other 
 of these alternatives must be chosen by those who con- 
 tend that every kind of organism was separately devised 
 by the Creator. Which do they prefer? With the 
 conception of two antagonistic powers, which severally 
 work good and evil in the world, the facts are congruous 
 enough" 
 
 I italicise the last sentence as seeming to me to be 
 bordering on absurdity, under any hypothesis. For, if 
 parasites be an " evil " and man the " good," the argument 
 cannot stop with man ; and we shall soon become utterly 
 perplexed to know which animals are " good " and which 
 are " evil ". If those which prey on others, such as 
 
 1 Principles of Biology, ist ed., voL i., p. 344.
 
 340 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 parasites on man, be (as is evidently intended by Mr. 
 Spencer) evil ; then a fortiori, all carnivorous animals 
 must be " evil " and we must presume all herbivorous 
 animals "good," and man himself must therefore be 
 " evil " too. But we have started with the idea that he 
 was " good " and his parasites " evil ". Of what character 
 then are those animals, besides man, that partake of a 
 mixed diet, as the rat and pig ? 
 
 Let us recognise this world as never furnishing more 
 than a relative condition of things ; while the "purpose" 
 of that, too, is not difficult to see, now that we have the 
 light of Christ's revelation as to the meaning of the 
 world thrown upon it ; namely, as a state of probation 
 for man to fit him for a higher destiny than any which 
 this world can furnish. If we accept this as a universal 
 truth, we shall not discolour our view of creation by 
 erroneous views of God's goodness, much less by ration- 
 alistic, monistic or atheistic ideas.
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 ETHER AS THE VEHICLE OF DIVINE POWER AND THE 
 HUMAN SOUL 
 
 I HAVE had something to say upon the origin of matter 
 out of vortex-rings of ether. I now wish to show that 
 the theory is feasible which supposes God to be wherever 
 ether is supposed to be. That is, they are both infinite 
 in space. 
 
 Ether penetrates all matter, inorganic and organic 
 alike ; and as it is the vehicle for all kinds of physical 
 forces, so it may be the instrument of the soul of man 
 when parted from the body. It, therefore, may be the 
 universal inter-communicating medium of all conscious 
 beings in the universe. 
 
 I do not think, therefore, that we can conceive of 
 anything in Nature better than the ether, capable of 
 "imaging," so to say, an Infinite Spiritual Power. 
 
 If ether be a fact, then it must be practically infinite 
 and eternal, and is not matter, as we understand matter. 
 The evidence of its existence depends upon induction 
 based on the transmission of light and other vibratory 
 forces. We do rot think of those which cause light in 
 our brains as self-conscious ; but that own self-concious- 
 ness may be dependent, not so much on the matter of 
 our bodies, as upon the ether which inter-penetrates the 
 substance of our brains ; hence, we can begin to imagine 
 
 (341)
 
 342 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 the Infinite Ether as the Vehicle of an Infinite Conscious 
 Being. 
 
 The idea of " God residing with the humble and 
 contrite heart," and our Lord's expression : " We will 
 make our abode with him who loves," etc., may have 
 a physical as well as spiritual interpretation. We all 
 do practically assume it, by praying in silence, fully 
 believing that there is a sympathetic Spirit which can 
 help our mental aspirations. Our souls must "vibrate 
 in unison with God," and response comes as truly as 
 when a note struck on a violin causes the same to sound 
 in a distant piano. 
 
 Our own vibrations are constantly changing. God's 
 are permanent and uniform. " With Him there is no 
 variableness nor turning of the shadow," *>., on the 
 dial ; for God is, so to say, always on the meridian. 
 
 It is for us to put ourselves in unison with Him ; 
 that is " at one " with Him, not for Him to be reconciled 
 to us. 
 
 Again, it is well known that two waves may meet, 
 whether air-waves giving sound or ether-waves giving 
 us light, and if they do not coincide, silence and dark- 
 ness may be the result, respectively ; so that we seem to 
 see an analogy with St. Paul's expression, " Quench not 
 the Spirit ". 
 
 A pure and loving heart vibrates in unison with 
 God. A lustful and rebellious thought produces discord 
 with, it may be, direful consequences. 
 
 It may be suggested that this " ethereal " notion may 
 be all fanciful, and only a picturesque if not grotesque 
 analogy ; but there would seem to be some basis for 
 believing that our "soul" or the Ego is not so much 
 dependent on the body made of flesh, as one of ether 
 permeating it.
 
 ETHER THE VEHICLE OF THE SOUL 343 
 
 To supply some, perhaps only a slight ground for 
 this supposition, I will describe briefly the result of 
 careful observations on experiments made by a gentle- 
 man who possesses the powers of revealing (not reading 
 any thought), whatever was within the brain of any 
 person in the form of a mental picture. It may, perhaps, 
 in a way, lend some countenance to the ethereal theory 
 of soul-vibrations occurring in an ethereal counterpart 
 of the body. 
 
 The gentleman in question admitted that he had no 
 power to read any abstract thought passing through the 
 mind, so styled his entertainment "Thought Reveal- 
 ing ". From a careful study of all his successes as well 
 as failures, which were just as instructive, it became per- 
 fectly clear to me that whatever formed a mental picture 
 in the mind of the " Transmitter," as he called the person 
 operating with him, he, the " Revealer," could see and 
 describe it ; so that if you thought of a particular photo- 
 graph among a group of portraits lying on the table, he 
 would at once select it from any number. 
 
 His method of operation consisted first, in being 
 blindfolded ; for he said, though not necessary, it helped 
 him not to see. Then he would hold with his left hand 
 the right hand of the transmitter. He usually first 
 pressed his own palm strongly upon that of the trans- 
 mitter, often with a sliding motion. They then grasped 
 hands firmly. This was not, however, necessary, for 
 after pressing the palm he would sometimes withdraw 
 his hand to a distance of about twelve or fourteen inches, 
 so that the outstretched palms of both men faced each 
 other. They were then kept in this position. Under 
 this condition, without actual contact, he could " reveal " 
 just as readily. He told me that it produced a sensation 
 of taut cords, as it were, extending from palm to palm,
 
 344 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 but that if he removed his hand further away the " cords " 
 on the circumference began to " snap ". 
 
 His failures were as interesting as his successes ; 
 because they were always the fault of the transmitter 
 in consequence of his not following the direction, which 
 was that the transmitter should always imagine himself 
 doing whatever he wished the revealer to do ; so that he 
 thereby formed a mental picture of the act in his own 
 mind which the revealer then reproduced by doing it. 
 A few examples will illustrate some failures. 
 
 A scarf-pin was placed in the breast-pocket of a 
 gentleman's coat, the pocket being in the inside of the 
 coat, which was buttoned up. The revealer felt over the 
 spot, but outside the coat. His failure in extracting the 
 pin arose from the fact, elicited by questioning the trans- 
 mitter, that the latter forgot that he would have in 
 imagination to unbutton his coat and feel in the inside 
 pocket to get it, so that the revealer, of course, omitted 
 this part of the performance. 
 
 As another example : A gentleman having arranged 
 to think of something, stared at the wall. The trans- 
 mitter (being always blindfolded) at once began stroking 
 the wall at the spot. The experiment was abandoned, 
 as the transmitter said the action was incorrect. On 
 subsequently asking him what it was he wished the 
 revealer to do, he replied that it was to stroke the head 
 of a little dog which was in the arms of a lady standing 
 by. The transmitter had, therefore, failed to comply 
 with the revealer's primary condition, which was that he 
 should imagine himself looking at and stroking the dog's 
 head. Instead of that, by gazing hard at the wall instead 
 of at the dog, he introduced a disturbing element into 
 his own mind. The result was a combination of trans- 
 missions, for the revealer stroked the wall.
 
 ETHER THE VEHICLE OP THE SOUL 345 
 
 Another example may be added. The gentleman 
 in question said he could tell the name of my watch, or 
 number of a bank-note, or anything else which / knew 
 myself; provided I imagined myself writing it in the air, 
 as it were. Standing before a wall, and holding my 
 hand, he wrote in large letters with his finger, as I myself 
 thought of it, the name TUPMAN, on the wall. He 
 could not have guessed it, as the watch was made in the 
 early part of last century by a watchmaker of that name 
 living in Great Russell Street, and long since dead ; and 
 no watchmaker of that name exists in London. 1 
 
 On telling the revealer that I once transmitted a 
 wish upon a revealer in a hypnotic or somnabulistic con- 
 dition, with the aid of a copper wire some two yards 
 long, one end being bound round the hand of the 
 revealer, the other being in my own, he assured me that 
 he had done the same thing, but with a fine wire used for 
 electrical purposes, about twenty feet in length, between 
 himself and the transmitter ; and he named Mr. Carlisle, 
 the manager of the Irish Times, as the transmitter, and 
 a person with whom he could instantly and clearly reveal 
 anything. 
 
 There were, therefore, three distinctly different means 
 of communication from the transmitter to the revealer. 
 
 (1) By contact, by holding hands. 
 
 (2) Without contact, after previous contact of hands. 
 
 (3) With the connection by wire between them. 
 
 It is difficult to suppose that the body (*>., a material 
 communication} is the instrument ; since experiments (2) 
 and (3) show that the body is unnecessary. 
 
 It would seem, therefore, that the body is, as it were, 
 a necessary " outer case " as long as we are alive in this 
 
 1 An account of this and other experiments is given in Borderland, 
 No. iii., p. 260, 1894.
 
 346 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 world ; but that the Ego is really dependent upon an 
 " ethereal " structure permeating and perhaps exceeding 
 the material body in dimensions. 
 
 The authors of The Unseen Universe, take this view, 
 as the following quotation proves : " Let us begin by 
 supposing that we possess a frame, or the rudiments of a 
 frame, connecting us with the invisible universe, which 
 we may call the spiritual body "- 1 
 
 Again they write : " Thought conceived to affect the 
 matter of another universe with this may explain a future 
 state ". That is, by our having an ethereal body in con- 
 nection with the surrounding ethereal world. 2 
 
 Mr. H. S. Olcott, in his paper entitled " Psychometry 
 and Thought Transference," arranges experiments of the 
 latter phenomenon under five heads : " The transference 
 of Directions ; the transference of Visual Impressions ; 
 the transference of Sensation ; the transference of Words, 
 Names, Sentences, Tunes, Concrete Ideas, such as Histori- 
 cal Scenes, Apparitions ; and lastly Abstract Thoughts 
 and Ideas. 
 
 With regard to the last, however, all he can say is : 
 " It not infrequently happens that when two persons are 
 thinking out the same problem, the solution seems to 
 come to both simultaneously, so that both begin to utter 
 it at once. Or that if one is thinking on some philo- 
 sophical subject, the other begins to discuss the same 
 subject. However, this branch of thought-transference 
 does not very readily lend itself to experimentation." 
 
 The phenomenon called Psychometry appears to afford 
 another illustration of the probability that mental phe- 
 nomena are expressible as vibrations. The following is 
 a case : I sent a portion of a letter from a gentleman 
 abroad to an unknown lady in the north of England who 
 
 1 The Unseen Universe, p. 299. 2 P. 200.
 
 ETHER THE VEHICLE OF THE SOUL 347 
 
 possessed the psychometric powers. Nothing in the 
 writing could afford the least clue as to the writer or to 
 his whereabouts. All that she had to do was to hold the 
 latter, when his " aura," as it is called, influenced her in 
 some mysterious way that not only did she perceive that 
 the writer was in a village in India, but located it as some 
 forty miles from Madras ; which was correct. 
 
 If the writer had derived pleasure or sorrow from 
 certain events, the corresponding sensations are felt by 
 the psychometrist. 
 
 If such are referable to vibrations in ether " clinging " 
 to the object held in the hand, then we seem to have an 
 analogy with light ; that as the letter, so to say, was 
 charged with vibrations by the writer, these were repro- 
 duced as conscious sensations by the receiver ; just as 
 ether-vibrations are translated into light by the brain. 
 
 A passage which seems to bear on this subject is by 
 the authors of The Unseen Universe who observe : l " We 
 may go even further than luminiferous vibrations which 
 take their rise chiefly at the surfaces of bodies, and extend 
 our speculations into the interior of substances, since the 
 law of gravitation assures us that any displacement which 
 takes place in the very heart of the earth will be felt 
 throughout the universe, and we may even imagine that 
 the same thing will hold true of those molecular motions 
 which accompany thought. For every thought we think 
 is accompanied by a displacement and motion of the 
 particles of the brain, and we may imagine that somehow 
 in all probability by means of the medium these 
 motions are propagated through the universe." Views of 
 this nature were long ago entertained by Babbage, and 
 they have since commended themselves to several men 
 of science, and amongst others to Jevons. " Mr. Babbage," 
 
 1 P. 198.
 
 348 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 says this author, 1 " has pointed out that if we had power 
 to follow and detect the minutest effects of any disturb- 
 ance, each particle of existing matter must be a register 
 of all that has happened." 2 
 
 Mr. Frederic W. H. Myers writes as follows on his 
 experience of thought transference : 
 
 " We find that it is occasionally possible for an experi- 
 menter to produce by effort of will a hallucinatory image 
 of himself in the perception of a friend at a distance, with- 
 out any previous suggestion or anticipation that such an 
 image would appear. This fact, of which we have several 
 instances attested by trustworthy persons at each end of 
 the chain, forms a transition between ordinary experi- 
 ments in thought-transference and those spontaneous 
 hallucinatory images which occur so frequently at or about 
 the moment of death, and represent the dying person to 
 a distant friend who is often not even aware of the 
 illness." 3 
 
 The late Rev. H. R. Haweis was on one occasion too 
 unwell with a severe cold to be in his place in the pulpit 
 of St. James's Church, Westmoreland Street ; so a friend 
 preached instead. More than one of his congregation 
 told him the next day that they saw him in the pulpit by 
 the side of the preacher, and asked why he did not preach 
 and why he was there. Haweis, as he informed me him- 
 self, was sitting all the morning over the fire bemoaning 
 his absence from the pulpit ! 
 
 Mr. Myers" interpretation seems to be the most likely 
 one ; not that Haweis unconsciously projected an appear- 
 of himself into the pulpit, but two of his congregation 
 were en rapport with him, received the ethereal waves, 
 
 1 Principles of Science, vol. ii., p. 455. 
 
 2 Ninth Bridgewater Treatise. 
 
 3 Science and a Future Life, p. 26.
 
 ETHER THE VEHICLE OF THE SOUL 349 
 
 and their brains translated them into a vision of Haweis 
 where they were accustomed to see him. If this hy- 
 pothesis be true, it would be, of course, exactly parallel 
 to any visual object ; as only waves reach the eye, but 
 are translated by the brain into the object which trans- 
 mits them. It will also interpret the appearance of 
 wraiths of friends on the point of death.
 
 CHAPTER XII 
 
 RATIONALISTIC CRITICISMS UPON THE THEOLOGICAL 
 ASPECT OF GOD 
 
 THERE is a tolerable uniformity in writers of the Mon- 
 istic, Rationalistic and other kindred schools as to the 
 non-acceptance in the belief of God ; because it is want- 
 ing in such proof as they will only accept 
 
 Some, as Huxley, content themselves with the word 
 " Agnostic " ; Haeckel goes further and denies the ex- 
 istence of a conscious God altogether. 
 
 The question, therefore, arises : What sort of proof 
 do they require to satisfy them ? 
 
 I will select the author of Mr. Balfour's Apologetics, 
 and quote some paragraphs as representative of a typical 
 Rationalist's views. 
 
 (1) " To describe Theology as a department of know- 
 ledge is to beg the whole question at issue between 
 Rationalism and Religion." 1 
 
 (2) " Knowledge courts the most rigorous investiga- 
 tion. . . . What single fact or statement is there in the 
 realm of Theology which can be successfully submitted 
 to these conditions and may, therefore, be entitled to 
 rank as knowledge ? " 2 
 
 (3) " Science remains firmly planted on the impreg- 
 nable ground of experience. . . . Theology consists of 
 
 1 Op. dt., p. 24. s P. 24. 
 
 (350)
 
 RATIONALISTIC CRITICISMS 351 
 
 doctrines and speculations which are based on imagina- 
 tion and vain desire." 1 
 
 (7) "If by religious truth be meant the doctrines of 
 the existence of God and of human immortality, we 
 think it would be difficult to show that there is any 
 general ' need ' to believe in these things." 2 
 
 (8) " All faith which is not an inference from know- 
 ledge should be regarded with suspicion and distrust." 1 
 
 No doubt many doctrines or dogmas propounded by 
 the Church in past centuries were based on erroneous 
 interpretations of the Scriptures. These are gradually 
 being eliminated whenever modern scientific investiga- 
 tions into the true meaning of the documents reveal their 
 unsoundness. But there are some which the more they 
 are investigated the sounder appears to be their tena- 
 bility. The two alluded to above, viz. t the existence 
 of God, and human immortality ; and we may add man's 
 Will are based on inductive evidence of the highest 
 order ; for the first two are outside the sphere of " ob- 
 servation and experiment ". 
 
 I would, however, maintain that these do come within 
 the range of human knowledge as much as the Rotation 
 of t/ie Earth; which cannot be proved to be true by 
 either observation or experiment. According to Ration- 
 alists Ptolemy must have been right, and Copernicus 
 wrong. 
 
 As the opinions of a Monist, Haeckel speaks as 
 follows with regard to the Deity of Christians : 
 
 (i) " He is always conceived in a more or less human 
 form, as an organism which thinks and acts like a man 
 only on a much higher scale." 4 
 
 " The ' Trinity ' is not an original element in Chris- 
 
 1 P. 27. 8 P. 28. Pp. 33. 34- 
 
 4 The Riddle of the Universe, p. 283.
 
 352 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 tianity. Like most of the other Christian dogmas, it 
 has been borrowed from earlier religions." 1 
 
 " ' God the Father,' the omnipotent creator of heaven 
 and earth this untenable myth was refuted long ago by 
 scientific cosmogony, astronomy and geology." 2 
 
 " In the higher and more abstract forms of religion 
 [than anthropomorphic ideas], this idea of bodily ap- 
 pearances [as in the old Egyptian cult, in animals] is 
 entirely abandoned, and God is adored as a ' pure spirit ' 
 without a body. ' God is a spirit, and they who worship 
 him must worship him in spirit and in truth.' Never- 
 theless, the psychic activity of this ' pure spirit ' remains 
 just the same as that of the anthropomorphic God. In 
 reality, even this immaterial spirit is not conceived to be 
 incorporeal, but merely invisible, gaseous. We thus 
 arrive at the paradoxical conception of God as a gaseous 
 vertebrate" 3 
 
 In reply to the sentiments expressed in these quota- 
 tions, I would observe that the various conceptions of God 
 or of gods, seem always to have been in accordance with 
 the intellectual stages of man. It is man, in fact, who 
 conceives of his God in his own image. Thus the 
 immoralities of the deities of ancient Greece reflected 
 those of the Greeks themselves. 
 
 Man cannot possibly conceive of the nature of a 
 Spiritual Being not appreciable by the senses. He must 
 be anthropomorphically expressed ; but as man rises in 
 the scale of knowledge and of ideas of morality, so does 
 his idea of God become more and more refined. But 
 through many stages, morality, as we understand it, was 
 not necessarily associated with a divine nature at all. 
 Religion consisted solely of ceremony. 
 
 1 The Riddle of the Universe, p. 285. * Ibid., p. 284. 
 
 3 1 bid., p. 295.
 
 RATIONALISTIC CRITICISMS 353 
 
 Hence in the Old Testament, we find the conception 
 of God passing through various grades, so to speak, till 
 we come to the psalmists and prophets, who speak of 
 Him as loving and sympathetic towards man, the widow 
 and the orphan, as well as having righteous and merciful 
 traits of character taken from the improved condition of 
 man's mind and heart. 
 
 The important question which concerns us now is : 
 Are all these anthropomorphic conceptions of the Deity 
 purely Subjective creations of man's brain, or is there any 
 Objective reality corresponding to them ? 
 
 The Christian says "Yes"; but the Monist and 
 Rationalist say "No". 
 
 I maintain that the probabilities of a Conscious Mind 
 in Nature are as great as those in other matters which 
 men accept as undeniable truths ; but cannot prove by 
 experimental evidence. 
 
 It is worth while considering a few of them, to show 
 that the belief in God being based on parallel lines of 
 inductive evidence is quite as reasonable as many which 
 scientists hold. 
 
 It is advisable to select these from scientific conclu- 
 sions, because Monists and Rationalists assert that 
 science is par excellence the one thing to be trusted ; and 
 whatever cannot be brought within the pale of her 
 region, need not be accepted as infallible truth. 
 
 I have already alluded to the fact that the rotation 
 of the earth cannot be proved by observation and ex- 
 periment ; for it is only believed because it is infinitely 
 more probable that the earth revolves on its axis in 
 twenty-four hours, than that the sun and stars should 
 do so, considering their distances are so great or in- 
 calculable. 
 
 As another instance of Inductive Evidence let us 
 23
 
 354 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 turn to geology. Geologists tell us that the crust of the 
 earth is composed of " aqueous strata " and " igneous 
 rocks," etc. How do they know that these descriptive 
 adjectives are applicable and correct ? Solely by analogy 
 with existing processes going on in the world. As 
 geology represents past history, it cannot be recalled 
 and tested experimentally. And so we remain perfectly 
 satisfied with inductive evidence. The same reasoning 
 applies to the fossils upon which palaeontological evolu- 
 tion is based, and Huxley's interesting genealogy of the 
 horse from a small animal with five toes on each foot to 
 our own one-toed useful animal is entirely based on 
 inductive reasoning. 
 
 The establishment of Evolution generally is as largely 
 founded on inductive evidence as that of man is, by 
 embryology and anatomy ; but this great doctrine is 
 equally well based on experimental evidences of culti- 
 vation and domestication, and so when we have to draw 
 conclusions about prehistoric remains, we conclude that 
 flint weapons were made artificially by the flat facets or 
 planes all over them, even on the rudest palaeolithic ones, 
 showing longitudinal surf aces ; which cannot be accounted 
 for by the action of running water or other physical 
 forces in Nature. 
 
 We can imitate them closely, as the celebrated " Flint 
 Jack " did, who used to impose upon the unwary, but still 
 the conviction that they were artificially made by man out- 
 weighs any improbability that might rise in some people's 
 minds in consequence of their vast antiquity as seen in 
 their being associated with the sub-glacial mammoth and 
 woolly rhinoceros, etc., etc. 
 
 I hardly think the author of Mr. Balfour's Apologetics 
 will deny that these conclusions of science are as perfectly 
 sound and acceptable as if they were the " evidences of
 
 RATIONALISTIC CRITICISMS 355 
 
 the senses," which they are not, or " proved by experi- 
 ment," which they cannot be. 
 
 This being the case, neither he nor any Rationalist 
 can claim the right to refuse similar lines of evidence for 
 the belief in God and immortality of man if they can be 
 forthcoming. 
 
 Many theologians have written upon the Being of 
 God, and brought forward reasons which appeared to 
 them conclusive. Thus, Mr. S. Charnock, B.D., in the 
 middle of the seventeenth century, wrote a long treatise 
 entitled, Discourses on the Divine Providence and the 
 Existence and Attributes of God, from which I have 
 already had occasion to quote freely. Many of his 
 arguments are, as might be expected with the progress 
 of science and biblical study, out of date ; but some are, 
 and always will be, permanent, as long as the mind of 
 man remains as it is ; such as the production of " Order " 
 out of " Chaos," now called " cosmic vapour " ; the " origin 
 of living beings " in the world ; the argument of " Adap- 
 tations " and the presence of " Directivity " ; the existence 
 of Volition and Self-consciousness and the "Moral 
 Nature of Man," generally, etc. 
 
 Charnock quotes from several writers of early date 
 and we might go as far back, not only as Socrates, 
 but to the earliest dates known in history to show the 
 generally believed existence of a Deity of some sort 
 
 David declares that the heavens and the firmament 
 witness to a Creator. 1 So does Isaiah 2 and St. Paul, 
 but modern Rationalists can also see the heavens and 
 the fruitful seasons ; but they carry no weight as evi- 
 dencing a Mind. They demand "scientific proof". If 
 they want " experimental " proof, it is not to be had ; 
 but inductive evidence there is in ample abundance. 
 
 1 Ps. xix. a Is. xl. 12, 13, 18.
 
 356 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 The writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews says : " By 
 faith we understand that the worlds have been framed 
 by the word of God, so that what is seen hath not 
 been made out of things which do appear ; " l and by 
 faith he means what we now call " inductive evidence " 
 It is not mere belief on slight grounds or probabilities, 
 much less credulity on a mere statement without any 
 sort of proof or evidence, but only in some fallible 
 authority. 
 
 " How could this great heap be brought into being 
 unless a God had framed it ? " asks Charnock. " Every 
 plant, every atom, as well as every star, at the first 
 meeting whispers this in our ears, ' I have a Creator, 
 I am witness to a Deity'. Who ever saw statues or 
 pictures, but presently thinks of a statuary and limner ? 
 Who beholds garments, ships or houses, but understands 
 there was a weaver, a carpenter, an architect ? " 2 
 
 In a previous chapter I have carried this argument 
 further down, wherein we saw that every part and atom 
 of structure in living beings betrays Directivity ; which 
 cannot be accounted for by any known actions of purely 
 physical and chemical forces : and if a chemist can make 
 in the laboratory any organic substances, then he himself 
 is assuming the place of that Directivity which univer- 
 sally pervades the organic world. 
 
 If any one refuses to recognise the Power in Nature, 
 he violates the laws of his own mental constitution. 
 
 It is foreign from my province in this book, to combat 
 atheistic views, apart from the method I have followed in 
 proving the positive position by inductive evidence ; nor 
 do I touch upon Mr. Robertson's revival of the mythical 
 
 1 Heb. xi. 3. 
 
 2 Philo, ex Petav. Theol. Dog., torn, i., lib, i. cap. i, p. 4. [Ref. in 
 Charnock. vol. i., pp. 143, 144.]
 
 RATIONALISTIC CRITICISMS 357 
 
 idea of Christ ; nor to substantiate the Christian's belief 
 in a Personal God of Love. 
 
 Consequently I shall not do more than call attention 
 to the late Mr. Grant Allen's works. He is no doubt 
 right or most probably so in thinking that the primitive 
 idea of a God was an ancestral spirit ; l but this does not 
 prove that there is no God in reality. 
 
 His formidable work on The Evolution of the Idea of 
 God has for its object " the proof that in its origin the 
 concept of a God is nothing more than that of a dead 
 man, regarded as a still surviving ghost or spirit, and 
 endowed with increased or supernatural powers and 
 qualities. 2 
 
 That one, if not the, most primitive idea was ances- 
 tral is obvious. It explains the meaning of sacrificial 
 offerings of roast flesh, vegetables and incense ; but if it 
 be implied that there is no God at all, then I would reply 
 the universal consensus of opinion, collected by Mr. Grant 
 Allen, though it per se may be no proof yet it shows the 
 universal " feeling after God " through all time and space 
 since man has peopled this earth. It has been a groping 
 in the dark, till men gained a clearer light by philosophy 
 and science, apart from anything supposed to have been 
 revealed. 
 
 Having " proved " by inductive evidence the over- 
 whelming probability of the existence of a conscious 
 Mind or God in Nature, then all attempts to discover 
 Him are but progressive efforts and strivings to establish 
 what man has all along been intuitively convinced to 
 have existed, but could not prove, only realising Him in 
 his mind, anthropomorphically, according to his light, in 
 time and space. 
 
 1 So too Col. Garnier in his Worship of tht Dead. ' P. 19-
 
 CHAPTER XIII 
 
 INDUCTIVE EVIDENCE THE BASIS OF BELIEF OF THE 
 THEIST IN HUMAN IMMORTALITY 
 
 THE Soul as well as Life is not material, though inti- 
 mately bound up with it ; therefore it must be of the 
 nature of energy of some sort, perhaps a bundle of 
 vibrations of ether. 
 
 If a vibration be set up in a medium, that vibration 
 must go on for ever, if no other force intervene to stop it. 
 
 The same medium may be in motion with several 
 vibrations at the same time ; as we are all familiar with 
 the effects of an orchestra, the same air which enters our 
 ears carries many notes at once. Similarly the ether 
 carries many colours at the same moment into our pupils 
 when looking upon a picture or scenery. 
 
 Hence if our souls have an ethereal basis (perhaps 
 identical with St. Paul's " spiritual body ") there is 
 nothing inconceivable in the portion of ether constitut- 
 ing our soul-frame being agitated by numerous and 
 separate vibrations, recognisable as emotions, intellect, 
 conscience, etc. 
 
 As our whole soul is bound up with the whole body, 
 so each individual element of the former would seem to 
 be specially correlated with localised portions of the 
 brain, so that mental inequalities are due to unequal 
 developments of their respective sites. 
 
 We know from the sizes of the brain cavities of the 
 (358)
 
 IMMORTALITY 359 
 
 mammalia from the Eocene period to man that as their 
 evolution proceeded so did the development of the brain 
 as far as size is concerned ; but intelligence is correlated 
 not only with size but also with structure, such as an 
 increase in convolutions and grey matter, etc 
 
 As Evolution proceeds in accordance with use, and 
 the structure of their limbs, peculiar to each kind of 
 animal, are formed in direct response to the animals' 
 physical activities, according to the " principle of Least 
 Action," so brains develop in response to mental use ; 
 and the brains of animals were presumably evolved in 
 accordance with an increasing intelligence simultane- 
 ously ; and not much exceeding their requirements for 
 efficiency. 
 
 With man, not only has all this been equally true ; 
 but having acquired the power of realising abstract, 
 mental ideals, he can bring about an alteration in the 
 brain by volitional thought alone ; and secondly, in the 
 shape of his skull in adaptation to the increasing size of 
 the brain within it. 
 
 I know a man who as a boy had a remarkably re- 
 treating forehead. His former schoolmaster met him 
 when he was fifty-five. He said in my presence, " Let 
 me look at your profile, for it was a remarkable one when 
 you were at school". He found, however, that there 
 was nothing to remark about it. The boy had grown 
 into a great reader and student His brain had de- 
 veloped in response to use, and something like a hemi- 
 sphere had grown where a retreating forehead had beea 
 
 Darwin somewhere alludes to the same phenomenon. 
 
 Here, then, the Soul acted as a power over the 
 material structure of the brain and skull; just as 
 muscular exercise develops the muscles and bones of 
 the limbs ; but while actual movements of these bring
 
 360 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 about an enlargement of the muscles ; so thought causes 
 the brain to respond and develop itself accordingly. 
 
 Conversely, disuse will cause atrophy of both the body 
 and brain. 
 
 Materialists base their disbelief in the possibility of 
 immortality of the soul on its intimate connection with 
 the physical nature of the brain ; but they have nothing 
 to say about the possible existence of a " spiritual " or 
 more accurately "ethereal " body; to which I have alluded 
 in speaking upon " Thought Revealing". If the living 
 soul consist of ethereal vibrations, there is nothing to 
 disprove the possibility or probability of thought being 
 transmitted to a distance as ethereal waves of a peculiar 
 length, and thus establish telepathic communications, 
 somewhat like wireless telegraphy in physics. 1 
 
 If the preceding be any approximation to the truth, 
 then the essential thing is that the soul and its ethereal 
 counterpart may be separated from the grosser material 
 one which it is obliged to have in this world in order to 
 hold ordinary intercourse with other souls and apprehend 
 all terrestrial phenomena. 
 
 Rationalists and Monists would limit all possibilities 
 of acquiring knowledge to the senses; and what they 
 cannot take in, they say, need not be believed in as true ; 
 but our senses are greatly limited. In sight we only see 
 a fragment of the spectrum ; a cat is better off than we 
 are. A dog's perception of smell is far keener than ours. 2 
 
 But there are higher perceptions than mere response 
 to sight, sound, smelling, etc. 
 
 1 The reader will find this discussed by Dr. Minot Judson Savage in 
 his Life beyond Death, who " knows beyond question a case of telepathy 
 between the Indian Ocean and New York," p. 263. 
 
 2 As the authors of The Unseen Universe have replied to ten objec- 
 tions to an immaterial existence, I will content myself by referring the 
 reader to their refutation (pp. 202-210).
 
 IMMORTALITY 361 
 
 One man hears music, but it is but little more than 
 noise to him. In another it excites a rapturous emotion, 
 though both hear precisely the same notes. So is it with 
 painting. Again, one man has the emotion of philan- 
 thropy, which would embrace the whole world if possible ; 
 another feels nothing of the sort, and only cares for his 
 family ; or it may be even for himself alone. 
 
 Are these emotions to be limited to the senses, or are 
 they ethereal, psychical vibrations, though they may have 
 been set in motion through the material agency of the 
 senses ? 
 
 If it be said a man would not have had them at all 
 without a brain ; the answer is, Could they have come out 
 of a material chaos? It is more probable that they are 
 part and parcel of Life. They are in accordance with 
 natural laws in the ethereal world, and are echoes in 
 man's spirit of the Universal Spirit of God. 
 
 " Harmonies," whether in colours or sounds as compared 
 by men, are but revelations of possibilities of natural laws 
 framed by God. 
 
 If Evolution has been necessary to develop Man from 
 a Monad, why should it stop ? That it should cease as 
 far as the body goes is reasonable ; because man can 
 make tools and so there is no need to convert his limbs, 
 mouth and teeth into instruments ; but he has passed 
 the boundary line, not only in corporeal manufacture, but 
 in acquiring self-consciousness based on the power of 
 realising abstract ideas. This has opened out a new 
 science Human Psychology and as physiology is the 
 science dealing with the evolution of bodily life, so human 
 psychology is the science of the evolution of the human 
 soul ; and the great question is, if man's body has reached 
 the terrestrial goal, may not man's soul be just beginning 
 a corresponding career to be pursued hereafter ?
 
 362 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 As in the history of animals and plants there are 
 graduations in the phenomena of life ; so do we see 
 numerous stages of psychical progress in man in this 
 world. Some men have been and are highly intellectual 
 giants, others are religious saints. From them are all 
 stages downwards, whether as individuals or races. Some 
 are "survivals" with only "rudimentary ideas," just as 
 there are still living lowly organised plants and animals. 
 
 When is psychical evolution to end ? If it has taken 
 millions of years to evolve the body of man, may it not 
 take millions of years to perfect the human soul ? It is 
 very far from perfection now? We must live in Faith 
 and Hope and not only by Sight. 
 
 Now let us turn to Monists and Rationalists and hear 
 what they have got to say. I will take Haeckel's views 
 first. 
 
 He calls the conception of the immortality of the soul 
 the " highest point of superstition, which is regarded as 
 the impregnable citadel of all mystical and dualistic 
 notions ". He attributes the belief to " the selfish interest 
 of the human personality, who is determined to have a 
 guarantee of his existence beyond the grave at any price ". 1 
 
 " Thanatism," as he calls the mortality of the soul, " is 
 the opinion which holds that at a man's death not only 
 all the other physiological functions are arrested, but his 
 " soul " also disappears that is, that sum of cerebral 
 functions which psychic dualism regards as a peculiar 
 entity, independent of the other vital processes in the 
 living body ". . . . " Personal psychic activity is extin- 
 guished like every other physical function." 2 
 
 1 Op. cit., p. 192. 
 
 2 1 am not concerned here with Weismann's theory that unicellular 
 organisms, multiplying by division, are immortal. Haeckel repudiates it 
 altogether (op. cit., pp. 193, 194, 195).
 
 IMMORTALITY 363 
 
 The Materialist who builds his argument against 
 immortality solely on the destructibility of the body at 
 physical death, cannot refute the suggestion of the 
 ethereal body, the evidence for the existence of which has 
 been already given ; and if we ask, if man should rise 
 again, why should not all animals as well, it may be 
 replied that, although, as Butler argued, that for all 
 we know, animals may do so, yet a reasonable objec- 
 tion to this hypothesis is that they are not mentally 
 fitted for it. Since their minds are limited to the appreci- 
 ation of concrete terrestrial matters only, or to objects 
 which merely appeal to their senses, any mental con- 
 ception of " Life," abstractedly considered is,perse, either 
 here or hereafter precluded. 
 
 They would all be like " fish out of water " in a spiritual 
 world, where bodily organisations are non-existent. 
 
 Conversely, the very fact that Evolution has brought 
 about the power of conceiving abstractions, places man 
 completely above the animals ; and so, in a way, fits 
 him for a spiritual environment, beyond any which this 
 earth can supply. 
 
 If he were solely adapted for a terrestrial life, he is 
 no better off, but rather worse than the animals ; as they 
 are unable mentally to realise their own existence and 
 position here. Consequently a future existence is in- 
 conceivable, and, as far as can be seen or conjectured, 
 useless to them. 
 
 Now, are there any conditions requisite for man to 
 enjoy a future life ? 
 
 The following words of St. John seem to throw some 
 light upon this important question, from a psychological 
 point of view : " He that hath the Son hath the Life ; and 
 he that hath not the Son of God hath not the Life ". 
 
 These words are a paraphrase of what St. John
 
 364 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 reports our Lord to have Himself said : " This is the will 
 of My Father, that every one that beholdeth the Son, and 
 believeth in Him, should have eternal life ; and I will 
 raise him up at the last day ". l 
 
 Man may resemble the animals, and live a purely 
 automatic existence, their consciousness of volition being 
 arrested, dormant, or in the worst cases, practically ex- 
 tinct. They are what St. Paul calls " natural " as op- 
 posed to the " spiritual ". They allow themselves to 
 become automata like all animals ; namely, swayed by 
 the stronger motive at the time of temptation or other 
 occasion, without allowing themselves to reflect upon 
 their actions. 
 
 : The germ or spark of the higher life may be there 
 that potentiality of holiness which requires to be fanned 
 into a flame of enthusiasm for righteousness. 
 
 This possibility of Regeneration is in every one, or 
 the living the higher life in Christ. 
 
 Every one who lives up to his light is on the high road 
 to "have the Son," whether he ever heard of Him or not, 
 like the Good Samaritan. 
 
 St. Peter's vision revealed this truth to Him. 
 
 On the other hand, every one who refuses to live up 
 to his light, and persistently follows the ways of dark- 
 ness, repudiates the Son, "quenches the Spirit" within 
 him, and so he will not have Life or the Son. 
 
 Hence, and all the New Testament supports this 
 view, that it is the cultivation of the Spiritual Life which 
 ensures Immortality for man and man alone. 
 
 It may be said that many men are forced into evil 
 lives, by their environments ; that infants and children 
 have died, never having had the opportunity of a moral 
 education. But may not this be an argument for a future 
 
 1 John vi. 40.
 
 IMMORTALITY 365 
 
 life, that the opportunity will then be provided ? The 
 " germ " had no chance of growing here. It is said that 
 all will rise again, but while some rise to eternal life, 
 others do so to judgment; and a "second death" is 
 alluded to. 
 
 If the latter is to be the punishment for evil lives 
 spent on earth, we may ask why does it not coincide 
 with physical death ? 
 
 On the other hand, may not this intermediate period 
 the length of which is not stated be just what is wanted 
 to give all men another chance of redeeming their char- 
 acters and accepting the Son ? 
 
 If they do perish be annihilated such an end would 
 be due to their own fault. 
 
 It would be unwise for me to lay any stress on the so- 
 called " proofs " of the continuous existence after death, 
 in the " spiritualistic " phenomena exhibited by mediums. 
 I would refer the reader to Dr. Savage's Life Beyond 
 Death for the opinions of one who has studied the 
 subject as scientifically as it seems possible. 1 
 
 There is, however, one curious phenomenon with 
 which I am familiar, though I cannot do it myself I 
 allude to automatic writing ; and the question arises : Is 
 it due to the automatic action of the "sub-conscious" 
 part of the brain ; or is it due to intelligences which are 
 independent of the " operator," as I will call the writer ? 
 
 The first noticeable fact is, that the writers are In- 
 telligences of some sort. The operator is quite ignorant 
 as to what his or her fingers are going to write. More- 
 over, they will write of themselves, while the operator's 
 mind is occupied on other matters as when holding a 
 conversation with any one present. 
 
 1 Mr. William James in The Will to Believe, has also something to 
 say about it.
 
 366 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 The question is, how is it to be tested as to which 
 source it must be referred ? 
 
 In the case of the person (a lady) to whom I refer, 
 the hand-writing is not at all like hers. The formation 
 of the letters is quite different, often very quaint, as in 
 making little spirals or helices at the bottom of capital 
 letters ; or by beginning the circle of round letters as a, 
 o, g; etc., from left to right and then reversing it suddenly. 
 
 Sometimes a word is spelt wrongly, a few letters only 
 being made ; the hand stops, pauses as if for reflection, 
 then begins again to spell the word rightly. A sentence 
 may be half written when the writer stops, dashes a line 
 to a distance and writes no more. 1 
 
 Sometimes it shows humour. It wrote a sentence 
 very minutely ; the lady said : " Why do you write so 
 small ? " It immediately went on in a large childish 
 round hand. Such replies as " Don't be so inquisitive," 
 " Be patient," etc., come after questions, etc., etc. 
 
 The subject-matter of the sentences often differs toto 
 coelo from the lady's ordinary mental characteristics. 
 Thus, for example, when her second daughter was married 
 her hand wrote : " My word, you have put your foot into 
 it this time ! " I need hardly say there was nothing 
 whatever to justify this rude remark ; and it is difficult 
 to reconcile it with her own brain's automatic action ! 
 
 On another occasion the lady asked some question 
 and the reply came, " Oh ! go to blazes ! " Could that 
 have been her own subliminal consciousness ; or the 
 subsequent communication in another hand-writing, " We 
 apologise for that rude remark " ? 
 
 The writers 2 almost invariably say, " We " ; e.g., 
 
 1 Other " writers " have experienced this same peculiarity. 
 
 2 There are several distinguishable by the various kinds of expres- 
 sions, etc.
 
 IMMORTALITY 367 
 
 " We think " so and so, is a common commencement to 
 some trivial remark. 
 
 It does not hesitate to tell falsehoods about people : 
 and when asked "if it is true," adds " No we were only 
 funning ". 
 
 Like the experience of other automatic writers, the 
 Intelligences always say they are not allowed to say any- 
 thing about themselves or their condition either now or 
 formerly, one observing, " It's against the rules ". 
 
 On one occasion the " Intelligence " said she was 
 the lady's mother, and to prove her identity, told the 
 lady (her daughter) to remember a gentleman whom she 
 knew as a little child in Brussels. The question her 
 
 mother put was : " Do you remember Dr. and what 
 
 he used to say about his violin ? " For the first time 
 since she was ten years old, the lady recalled the fact 
 that he said he believed his violin had a " soul". 
 
 The " Intelligences " sometimes have names ; and one 
 failed for some time to write ; so the lady asked what 
 had become of him ? The reply was : " He is gone to be 
 an inspector of spirits ! " One of the lady's married 
 daughters is named Marion, but from a child she has 
 never been addressed by it, but has always been called 
 Maggie ; yet one of the writers persists in speaking of 
 her as " Mrs. Marion ". 
 
 These are but a few samples of what comes spon- 
 taneously from the lady's fingers. It is all trivial enough, 
 if not false ; but it is intelligent. 
 
 The following cases were communicated to me by 
 friends who vouched for their accuracy. The late Rev. 
 H. R. Haweis informed me that a relative of his used to 
 amuse himself by seeing what his hand would write. On 
 one occasion he asked what the carriage builder was 
 doing to his carriage, sent to be repaired, at that particular
 
 368 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 moment "Mending the hood," came the reply. He 
 had the curiosity to ask the carriage-builder if that was 
 true. It proved to be quite wrong. On the next occasion 
 he asked why the writer had told him wrong. The reply 
 came very deliberately " F-O-O-L ! " The gentleman 
 asked no more questions. 
 
 Another gentleman well-known in the horticultural 
 world told me that a " spirit " said on one occasion " X 
 is dead, you will hear by the next mail from America ". 
 He had no idea that his relative (X) was even ill. He 
 dated the paper and showed it to the late Dr. Hogg, who 
 corroborated the fact to me. On the day when the mail 
 was due, a black-edged envelope arrived at breakfast time. 
 He told me : " I handed it to my wife saying, ' you need 
 not open that ; X is dead. I knew it some time ago.' " 
 It proved to be true. 
 
 Another curious instance was the following : A party 
 of young people were amusing themselves one evening 
 with planchette. The pencil wrote, " Jack will be here 
 to-night". This caused great amusement because Jack 
 was in India, or thought to be. But within half an hour 
 " Jack " walked into the room ! 
 
 The following account of a " communication " by 
 automatic handwriting is given by Sir Horace Rumbold, 
 Bart., in his work Recollections of a Diplomatist^ It oc- 
 curred at the house of the American minister " Governor " 
 Curtin, as told by himself to Sir Horace : " At the very 
 eve of the great war, he was hard at work one day in the 
 government offices at Philadelphia, when he was told 
 that a person wished to speak to him on important busi- 
 ness. Although very busy, he consented to see the 
 applicant for a few minutes. The man ushered in was 
 unknown to him, apparently in poor circumstances, 
 
 1 Vol. ii., page 286.
 
 IMMORTALITY 369 
 
 while he evidently hailed from some Western State. 
 ' Mr. Curtin,' he said, ' I have a very urgent message 
 for you which I must put in writing.' He forthwith sat 
 down and began to scribble, Curtin watching him with 
 feelings that turned to utter amazement when he recog- 
 nised, in what flowed from the pen of this entire stranger, 
 the unmistakable handwriting of the mother he had lost 
 not long before, and to whom he was devotedly attached. 
 The message was not lengthy, but of an extraordinary 
 character. The man repeated that he had simply been 
 impelled to deliver the message in this form. 
 
 " What he had written was a rough forecast of the 
 chief events of the great contest which then had not 
 yet broken out. Curtin was so struck by the circum- 
 stances that he imparted them in confidence at the time 
 to friends in Philadelphia ; who, with him, afterwards 
 watched with intense interest the developments predicted 
 in the message. That Mr. Curtin told me this singular 
 story in perfect faith I cannot for a moment doubt." 
 
 These are a few " inexplicable " cases where no fraud 
 was possible ; as no knowledge of the events was pos- 
 sessed by any one in England or America. 
 
 The question, then, remains, which is more probable 
 that it is merely the automatic action of the brain, as 
 in dreams ; but, unlike dreams, the writing is always 
 intelligent, and without any of the incongruities that are 
 associated with dreams or is it really the work of 
 spiritual intelligences acting through the brain and 
 fingers of the operator? 
 
 Regarding the writing alone i.e., if it were not known 
 whose fingers wrote it the conclusion would certainly 
 be that it could not be that of the lady in question, as 
 it is always so completely different to her characteristic 
 features both in handwriting and subject-matter. 
 
 24
 
 370 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 
 
 If it be the sub-conscious or automatic brain, then 
 there are at least two if not more and totally different 
 intelligences within one and the same head. 
 
 I leave the reader, now, to draw his own conclusions, 
 only guaranteeing for the genuineness of the phenomena 
 above described which I have myself witnessed. 
 
 Mr. Frederic W. H. Myers, who has studied this 
 subject, attributes it as theoretically referable to "(i) 
 automatist's own mind, z.., things known and forgotten ; 
 (2) telepathic facts unknown to the automatist, but 
 known to some living person in his company or con- 
 nected with him ; (3) messages which contain facts ap- 
 parently not known to the automatist nor to any living 
 friend of his, but known to some deceased person, 
 perhaps a total stranger to the living man whose hand is 
 writing. I cannot avoid the conviction that in some 
 way however dreamlike and indirect it is the departed 
 personality which originates such messages as these." l 
 
 Conclusion. This brings me to the end of my task, 
 viz., to meet the objections of Rationalists raised against 
 the Belief in God, Free Will and Immortality, and to 
 emphasise the method of inductive evidence as supply- 
 ing ample " proof" to substantiate all these ; inasmuch 
 as the demand for "observation and experiment" is 
 irrelevant ; since that method of verification is obviously 
 out of the question. 
 
 1 Op. cit,, p. 33 (see Proceedings of the Society for Psychical Research, 
 pt. xvi., etc.)
 
 INDEX. 
 
 A. 
 
 Abstract ideas, peculiar to man, 212 ; 
 the Basis of the Moral Sense, 213 ; 
 consciousness of, 213 ; Locke on, 
 220. 
 
 Acquired characters, heredity of, 
 proved, 195 ff. 
 
 Adaptations, in fungi, 46 ; in plants, 
 55 ff., 169; contrasted with Crys- 
 tals, 63 ; Weismann on, 124 ; to 
 environment, 124 ; experiments 
 on, 170 ; and Natural Selection 
 contrasted, 177 ; substituted for 
 Natural Selection by German bot- 
 anists, 181 ; illustrations of, 196 
 ff. ; in aquatic animals, 203 ; in 
 Reason, 237. 
 
 jEthalium, composition of, 40. 
 
 Affinity, Haeckel's theory of, 20 ff. 
 
 Agape, or enthusiasm, true meaning 
 of, 302 ff. 
 
 Allen, Grant, on God, 357. 
 
 Altruism, wanting in animals, 292. 
 
 Analogy, argument of, 58. 
 
 Ancestral origin of gods, 216 ff. 
 
 Animals, generalised types of, 210. 
 
 Anticipatory functions and struc- 
 tures, 118 ff. 
 
 A priori assumptions, 239. 
 
 Aquatic an imals, Adaptations of, 203. 
 
 Aquatic plants, 197 ft. 
 
 Architect or Creator, 138. 
 
 Argument Cumulative, Paley's, 96. 
 
 Aristotle on inadequacy of moral 
 teaching, 13. 
 
 Artificial, organic products, 64, 65 ; 
 selection, 164-166; and natural, 
 166. 
 
 Atoms, sensation and will of, 20. 
 
 (370 
 
 Attention and Will, 274. 
 
 Author's experiences of Automatism, 
 
 287, 288. 
 Autogony, 44. 
 Automatism and Volition, 135 ; of 
 
 musicians, 141 ; powers of, 141 ; 
 
 contrasted with Volition, 214 ff. ; 
 
 and Reason, 248 ; and Free Will, 
 
 273 ff. ; illustrations of, 273 ff. ; 
 
 Huxley on, 278 ; of a prisoner. 
 
 278 ; and Prof. A. Sedgwick, 281 ; 
 
 and Hypnotism, 285 ; author's 
 
 experiences of, 287, 288 ; Dr. W. 
 
 B. Carpenter's illustrations of, 
 
 288 ; religious, acquired, 323 ; in 
 
 handwriting, 365, ff. 
 
 Babylonian account of the deluge, 
 216. 
 
 Bacteria, 44, 45. 
 
 Bateson and Scott on Individual 
 Variations, 165. 
 
 Bees' cells, 88. 
 
 Belief, in Deity, universal, 252 ff. ; 
 and Faith defined, 266-268. 
 
 Biblical origins of man, 208 ff. 
 
 Birds' nests, formed by hereditary 
 habit (instinct), 244. 
 
 Body, annihilation of, Rix's view 
 of, 263. 
 
 Brain, development of, 359. 
 
 Buchner on Darwinism, 25. 
 
 Buckman, experiments of cabbage, 
 carrot and parsnip, 165 ; belief in 
 the heredity of acquired charac- 
 ters, 1 86. 
 
 Bussell, on Socrates, 15, 16 ; on the 
 Chinese, 214.
 
 372 
 
 INDEX 
 
 C. 
 
 " Calculating " boys, 141. 
 
 Carbon theory, Haeckel's 42. 
 
 Carriere, origin of radishes, 164 ; and 
 heredity of acquired characters, 
 183. 
 
 Causality and Finality, 114 ff. 
 
 Cause, primeval, Divine Love, 143. 
 
 Causes, Final, 114 ff. 
 
 Cell-making Bees, 247. 
 
 Cells, Directivity in, 64. 
 
 Chances, epicurean view of, 138. 
 
 Chaos and monsters, 132 ; and Dar- 
 winism, 133. 
 
 Charnock, on the Origin of the 
 World, 34 ff. 
 
 Children, Instinct and Automatism 
 of, 248. 
 
 Chinese, Bussell on mind of, 
 214. 
 
 Christ, Personality of, 269, 270; 
 temptation of, 284; as example, 
 270; Ecce Homo on, 284, 303 
 ff. ; the true and only sufficient 
 motive power, 303 ; or Diana, 
 
 325- 
 
 Christianity, Rationalistic misrepre- 
 sentations of, 230, 299 ff., 310 ff. ; 
 and acceptance of, 316. 
 
 Church, Prof. A. H., and Directivity, 
 36. 
 
 Common Sense, 238. 
 
 Conscience, a weak, 324, a strong, 
 325 ; origin of, 319 ; requires be- 
 lief in God, 324. 
 
 Consciousness and Abstractions, 
 213, 283. 
 
 Constitution, basis of Natural Selec- 
 tion, 152-156. 
 
 Creator or Architect, 138. 
 
 Credulity defined, 266-268; in Ritual- 
 ism, 271. 
 
 Criticisms on Rationalistic views of 
 knowledge, 223. 
 
 Croll, on Molecular Motion and Ob- 
 ject in Nature, 75 ff. ; illustrations 
 of Directivity, 75 ff. 
 
 Crystals and Adaptations contrasted, 
 
 63- 
 
 Cuckoo, instinct of, 240. 
 Cynips and Galls, 129. 
 
 D. 
 
 Darwin, on Evolution and Design, 
 49; mental change to Agnosticism, 
 50; contrast between "definite" 
 and "indefinite" variations, 162 ; 
 letter to Wagner, 162 ; illustra- 
 tion of Natural Selection, as a 
 " Noble Edifice," 175 ; belief in 
 the heredity of acquired charac- 
 ters, 183. 
 
 Darwinism, basis of Monism, 25 ; 
 Romanes, on, 51 ; anticipations of, 
 by Paley, 94 ff. ; and Chaos, 133 ; 
 defined, 145 ; the " True," 145 ; 
 explained, 146, 147 ; in Germany, 
 149 ; summary of false data of, 
 160; no Natural Law in, 174; 
 abandoned by Schimper and 
 other German botanists, 181. 
 
 Death, not absolute (Rix), 263 ; the 
 Christian view of, 328. 
 
 Definite action, of the environment, 
 147 ; Buchner on, 148 ; and Natu- 
 ral Selection, mutually exclusive, 
 148 ; Vernon on, 148 ; Darwin's 
 illustrations of, 162 ; Darwin's 
 letter to Wagner on, 162. 
 
 Deity, cumulative evidence for belief 
 in, 35 ; inductive proof of, 57 ; 
 belief in, 252 ff. 
 
 Deluge, Babylonian account of, 216. 
 
 Descent of Man, explained, 209 ff. 
 
 Design and Evolution, 49; aban- 
 doned argument of, 92 ff. ; con- 
 trasted with Evolution, 179. 
 
 Determinism, views of, 282, 323 ; 
 argument for, refuted, 289 ; For- 
 ester on, 289 ; and Huxley, 291. 
 
 Directivity, term inventedby Church, 
 36 ; described, 46, 53, 57, 69 ff. ; 
 the origin of form and variation, 
 61 ff. ; in cells, 64 ; illustrated by 
 Dolbear, 72 ; by Croll, 75 ff. ; or 
 Logos, 238. 
 
 Distribution, by Natural Selection, 
 147. 
 
 Divine intentions, 255. 
 
 " Doctrine, Religion as a Credible," 
 282 ff. 
 
 Dolbear, on protoplasm, 65 ; on 
 transformation of energy in or-
 
 INDEX 
 
 373 
 
 ganisms, 70 ; on germination, 71 ; 
 on endosperm, 72 ; in life, con- 
 trasted with electricity, 73. 
 Duty, Secularist's view of, 4 ; Ab- 
 stractions as Motives, inadequate, 
 8, 9 ; to humanity, insufficient, 
 39- 
 
 Eberhardt, on Adaptations, 171. 
 
 Ecce Homo, quotations from, 299 ff. 
 
 Ecology, 146. 
 
 Elbow, structure of, 103 ; restora- 
 tion of, 104. 
 
 Electricity contrasted with life, 73. 
 
 Emotions, origin of, 218 ff. 
 
 Ends, recognised by coincidence, 
 115; and results, 116 ff., 126; 
 absolute and relative, 131. 
 
 Environment, Adaptations to, 124; 
 definite action of, 147. 
 
 Energy, transformation of, in 
 animals, 70. 
 
 Eohippus, 195. 
 
 Epicurean view of chances, 138. 
 
 Equus, Evolution of, 195. 
 
 Erysiphee, Evolution of, 46. 
 
 Ether, Haeckel, on, 20, 28 ff. ; nature 
 of, 33 ; vehicle of Divine power, 
 262, 341 ff. ; of human soul, 341 ff. 
 
 Ethics, Rationalistic, 294 ff. ; criti- 
 cisms on, 298 ff. ; experimental, 
 
 305- 
 
 Evils, physical and moral, 137 ; 
 meaning of, 320 ; Rationalists on, 
 327 ff. 
 
 Evolution, nature of, 28 ff. ; inor- 
 ganic, Materialistic view of, 28 ; 
 Haeckel's view of, 29 ; true method 
 of, 146 ; contrasted with Design, 
 179. 
 
 External world, proved by induction, 
 261. 
 
 Eye, its Evolution, 96 ff. ; Darwin's 
 hypothesis of, 100. 
 
 F. 
 
 Faith and Reason, Prof. Jones on, 
 265; of Christ's disciples, 266, 
 267 ; described in Ecce Homo, 266 ; 
 
 in Old Testament and New Testa- 
 ment, 308 ; identical with induc- 
 tion, 315. 
 
 Fall, meaning of, 318. 
 
 Final Causes, 114 ff. 
 
 Finality and Causality, 114, 121 ; 
 external, 130 ; hypothesis of, 139 
 ff. 
 
 Forces, chemico-physical, as life, 
 Rationalists' view of, 60 ff. 
 
 Foresight, in God and man, 142. 
 
 Forester, Mr., on Determinism, 289. 
 
 Free Thought, weaknesses of, 13. 
 
 Free Will, and Automatism, illustra- 
 tions of, 273 ; requires Motives, 
 289 ; requires Circumstances, 290 ; 
 explained, 291. 
 
 Function precedes Structure, 179. 
 
 Fungi, Adaptation in, 46. 
 
 G. 
 
 Galls and Cynips, 129. 
 
 Generalised types of animals, 210. 
 
 Genesis, truths in, 208 ff. 
 
 Genius, automatic, 141. 
 
 Germination, Dolbear on, 71. 
 
 God, Bradlaugh on, 24; inductive 
 proof of, 24 (et passim) ; Rational- 
 ists' demand of experimental proof, 
 24; ancestral origin of idea of, 
 216 ; a Self-conscious Being ? 
 (Rix), 262. 
 
 Gorham, and others, on Knowledge, 
 221 ff. 
 
 Gould, remedy for Secularism, 12. 
 
 Grain of corn, formation of, 80. 
 
 Guilt and Sin compared, 318. 
 
 H. 
 
 Habit and Skill, hereditary, 204. 
 
 Haeckel, on Origin of Protoplasm, 
 38 ff. ; Carbon Theory, 42 ; appli- 
 cation of Darwinism, 176; on 
 Origin of Life, 38 ; View of 
 Science, 225 ; and Tylor on belief 
 in deities, 253. 
 
 Harnack, reply to Rationalists, 
 269. 
 
 Hartmann, definition of instinct, 
 defective, 247.
 
 374 
 
 INDEX 
 
 Haughton, on the Principle of Least 
 Action, 87 ff. 
 
 Heredity of Acquired Characters, 
 denied by Weismann and others, 
 183 ff. ; proved from nature and 
 cultivation, 186, 189, 195 ff. ; in 
 Skill and Habit, 204 ; in making 
 nests, 244. 
 
 Hermit Crabs and Instinct, 241. 
 
 Herrara, on protoplasmic imitations, 
 42. 
 
 Hipparion, 195. 
 
 " Holy," Seeley on, 302, 305, 306. 
 
 Homing instinct, 245. 
 
 Hooker on Forms, 165. 
 
 Horse, Evolution of, 195. 
 
 Human mind, origin of, 211. 
 
 Humanity, enthusiasm for, 302 ff. 
 
 Humour, in Creation, Kingsley on, 
 
 255- 
 
 Huxley, on Vital Forces, 72, 73 ; on 
 Origin of Life, no ; on Evolution 
 of the Horse, 195 ; on Automa- 
 tism, 278 ; on Determinism, 291. 
 
 Hypnotism and Automatism, 285. 
 
 I. 
 
 Immortality, and superstition (Haec- 
 kel), 263, 358 ; impossible for 
 animals, 363 ; conditions of, 363 
 ff. 
 
 Individual Differences, inapplicable 
 to Origin of Species, 153 ; Vernon 
 on, 157 ; Bateson on, 165. 
 
 Induction, 177 ; illustrated, 197 ff., 
 353 ff. ; by Palaentology, 195 ; by 
 the Sun, 195 ; value of, 226 ff., 
 265 ; all-sufficient, 271. 
 
 " Inideality," Law of, 137, 327 ff. ; 
 explained, 335 ff. 
 
 Inorganic, world, 28 ; and organic, 
 contrasted, 51. 
 
 Instinct, Janet on, 141 ; Kirby on, 
 179 ; inherited memory, 239 ff. ; 
 of cuckoo, 240 ; in hermit crabs 
 and soles, 241 ; in chickens, dogs 
 and hens, 242 ; at fault, 243 ; v. 
 instruction, 244 ; homing, 245 ; 
 in animal amusements, 246 ; de- 
 fective definition of Hartmann, 
 247 ; in children, 248. 
 
 Intelligence, meaning of, 142. 
 Intentions of the Deity, 255. 
 
 J. 
 
 Janet, views on Instinct, 141. 
 
 Jones, Prof., on Reason, 226 ; on 
 Reason and Faith, 265. 
 
 Judaism contrasted with Chris- 
 tianity, 308. 
 
 Judgments, idea of, abandoned, 
 327- 
 
 K. 
 
 Kidd, on Human adjustments to 
 
 the environment, 336 ff. 
 Kingsley, on Humour in Creation, 
 
 255- 
 
 Kirby, on Instincts, 179. 
 Knowledge, Gorham and others on, 
 
 221 ff. (See Induction.) 
 
 Language, origin of, 149, 150. 
 Lankester, on Albuminoids, 41. 
 Laughter, Incongruities, cause of, 
 
 255, 256. 
 Law, of Substance, 19 ; man 
 
 answerable to, 280 ; of Contrasts, 
 
 320 ; Natural, meaning of, 321. 
 Least Action, Principle of, 87 ff. ; 
 
 in plants, 93. 
 Life, Origin of, 38 ff. ; Definitions 
 
 of, 67 ; Psychical, beginning of, 
 
 361. 
 
 Linnaeus, on plant fades, 196. 
 Literalism, misleading, 312 ff. 
 Locke, on Abstract Ideas, 220. 
 Logos, or Directivity, 238. 
 Long, " Christ or Diana ? " 325. 
 
 M. 
 
 McCullum, experiment on sub- 
 merged leaves, 199. 
 
 Mallock, on " Religion as a Credible 
 Doctrine," 282. 
 
 Malthus' theory, misapplied by Dar- 
 win, 151, 152.
 
 INDEX 
 
 375 
 
 Man, a Revealer, 102 ; Origin of, 
 207 ff. ; Biblical origins of, 208 
 ff. ; Descent of, explained, 209 ff. ; 
 contrasted with Animals, 277, 
 278, 321 ; answerable to Law, 280; 
 bodily Evolution ceased, 361. 
 
 Matter, as Vortex-Rings, 33 ; v. 
 Mind, 260. 
 
 Mechanical Principles in Nature, 
 87 ff., 102. 
 
 Memory, inherited, as instinct, 239 ff. 
 
 Mental Physiology, by Dr. W. B. 
 Carpenter, 274. 
 
 Metamorphoses, similar, from differ- 
 ent Organs, 105. 
 
 Metaphysics and the Senses, 251 ff. ; 
 Mr. Rix on, 256. 
 
 Mind, Origin of, 211; and Matter, 
 260. 
 
 Molecular Motion, Croll on, 75 ff. 
 
 Molecules, Origin of, 33. 
 
 Monera, require organised food, 44, 
 45 ; as degradations, 44. 
 
 Monism, Haeckel's description of, 
 18, 19 ; criticised, 22 ; why based 
 on Darwinism, 174. 
 
 Monist compared with Socrates, 
 
 15- 
 
 Monistic Religion, 311, 314. 
 
 Monsters and Chaos, 132. 
 
 Moral, and Natural Law, compared, 
 in; man, alone, 143; maxims 
 and living principles contrasted, 
 301 ; Ecce Homo, on, 301 ; Evil, 
 Origin of, 317 ff. 
 
 Morality and Religion, contrasted, 
 322. 
 
 Musicians and Automatism, 141. 
 
 Mutantes, 192. 
 
 N. 
 
 Natural, and Moral Law, compared, 
 in ; Law, Whewell on, in ; 
 Law, Interaction of, 113 ; Man, 
 the only Moral Being on Earth, 
 143 ; fades, among plants, 168 ; 
 Religion, Seeley on, 256. 
 
 Natural Selection, denned, 146 ; only 
 concerned with Distribution, 147 ; 
 and definite action, mutually ex- 
 clusive, 148 ; Darwin's descrip- 
 
 tion of, 152 ff. ; true application 
 of the term, 152 ; true basis of, 
 156; contrasted with Artificial 
 Selection, 166 ; true function of, 
 172 ; misuse of term, 173 ; Dar- 
 win's illustration of, 175 ; con- 
 trasted with Adaptation, 177 ; and 
 with Design, 178 ; its assumed 
 omnipotence, 179 ; Ideological 
 descriptions of, 180; has no in- 
 fluences, 189 ; a deus ex mac/rind, 
 229. 
 
 New Secularism, Gould on, 1 1 ff. ; 
 deficiency of, 12. 
 
 Nucleus, function and origin of, 43. 
 
 o. 
 
 (Ecology, 146. 
 
 QSnothera, variations of, 192. 
 
 Organic world contrasted with in- 
 organic, 51, 52, 67. 
 
 Organised Products made artifi- 
 cially, 47. 
 
 Organs, rudimentary, 137. 
 
 Origin, of the Universe, 33 ; of Life, 
 38, 107, 108, HI ; of Form by 
 Directivity, 61 ff. ; of Man, 208 ff. ; 
 and possible date of, 210 ; of gods, 
 as human ancestors, 216 ff. ; of 
 Emotions in Man, 218 ff. ; of 
 Senses, 253 ff. ; of Sin, 325, 326. 
 
 P. 
 
 Parsnip, proof of Heredity of ac- 
 quired characters, 200. 
 
 Paul and Christ, Haeckel on, 313. 
 
 Paul's demand for Proofs of Belief, 
 268. 
 
 Pearson, Karl, on Science, 26. 
 
 Phyllotaxis, 158, 159. 
 
 Physical evils, Rationalists on, 327 ; 
 quotations on, 329 ; interpretation 
 of, 334 ff. 
 
 Physico-chemical forces, only recog- 
 nised by Rationalists, 25. 
 
 Pithecanthropus, 211. 
 
 Plasmodium, Analysis of, 40. 
 
 Prisoner, a, on Automatism, 278. 
 
 Prodynamics, 19, 22. 
 
 Proof of God, 355 ff.
 
 INDEX 
 
 
 Protoplasm, Haeckel's, Origin of, 
 28 ff. ; imitation of, 42 ; Dolbear 
 on, 65 ; Responsive Power of, 129 ; 
 practically omnipotent, 178. 
 
 Pseudo-philosophy, 107. 
 
 Psychology and Rationalism, 232. 
 
 Psychometry, 346. 
 
 R. 
 
 Race, false ideas of, 307. 
 
 Radish, Carriere's origin of, 164. 
 
 Rationalism, based on Darwinism, 
 17 ; Definition of, 17 ; and 
 Science, 221 ; criticisms on, 223 ; 
 and Psychology, 232 ff. ; and 
 Ethics, 294 ff. ; and views of 
 Knowledge, 222 ; and idea of God, 
 criticisms on, 350 ff. 
 
 Rationalist Press Association, ob- 
 jects of, 17. 
 
 Reason, Prof. Jones on, 226 ; in 
 Animals, illustrations of, 232 ff. ; 
 and Adaptation, 237 ; and Faith, 
 Prof. Jones on, 265 ; in Structures 
 of Plants, 237 ; in Animals, 
 Romanes on, 232 ff. ; and Auto- 
 matism, 248. 
 
 Regeneration, 268. 
 
 Religion, Origin of, Smith and Sayce 
 on, 208 ; experimentally proved, 
 268 ; Defined by St. James, 268 ; as 
 a Credible Doctrine, by Mallock, 
 282 ff. ; and Rationalism, 311. 
 
 Representative Plants, 196, 202. 
 
 Responsive power of Protoplasm, 
 129 ff. 
 
 Revealer, Man as a, 102. 
 
 Ritualism and Credulity, 271. 
 
 Rix, Mr., on Metaphysics, 256 ff. ; 
 criticisms on, 257 ff. 
 
 Romanes, on Darwinism, 51 ; falla- 
 cies in his Argument, 51, 52 ; on 
 Mental Evolution, 218; on Ani- 
 mal Reasoning, 232 S. 
 
 Rudimentary Organs, 137. 
 
 S. 
 
 St. James, identification of Religion 
 
 and Practice, 268. 
 Salmon on Erysiphce, 46. 
 
 Sayce on Origins of Religion, 208. 
 
 Schimper, Botanical Geography on 
 a Physiological Basis, 171. 
 
 Schizomycetes, Schyzophycce and 
 Schizophyta, 45. 
 
 Science, and Rationalism, 221 ff. ; 
 Haeckel's views of, 225. 
 
 Secularism, the Old, defined, 3, 8 ; 
 Bradlaugh, Foote and Holyoake 
 on, 3 ; Utilitarian, 4 ; Happiness, 
 sole end of, 4 ; Morality, and God, 
 4 ; belief in God and Immortality, 
 5 ; its Motive Power insufficient, 
 5 ; Atheism and Theism, 5, 8 ; 
 contrasted with Christianity, 6 ; 
 the New, Gould on, n ff. ; its 
 defects and requirements, n. 
 
 Sedgwick, Prof. A., and Automatism, 
 281. 
 
 Sedgwick, Mr. A., views on He- 
 redity, etc., criticisms on, 184, 185. 
 
 Seeley, on Religious Motives, 14 ; 
 on Natural Religion, 256 ; on 
 Christ's temptation, 284. 
 
 Selection, Artificial, 164 ; Natural 
 (see Natural Selection). 
 
 Senses, Origin of, 253 ff. ; infallibility 
 of, a fallacy, 251 ; Metaphysical 
 view of, 251 ff. 
 
 Shame, Origin of the sense of, 324, 
 
 325- 
 Sickenberger, Prof., on Weismann's 
 
 views, 193. 
 Sin, Origin of, 213 ; unknown to 
 
 ancients, 322. 
 Slime-mould, 40. 
 Smith, G., on Origin of Religion, 
 
 208. 
 
 Socrates compared with Rational- 
 ists, 16. 
 
 Soles, instinct of, 241. 
 Soul, Origin of, 23 ; as Vibrations, 
 
 358 ; its various capacities, 361. 
 Sound, Laws of, their Origin, 254. 
 Species, Definition of, 163. 
 Spectrum Analysis of Sun, 195. 
 Spencer, on Origin of Life, in ; on 
 
 Adaptation, 198. 
 Stoicism and Christianity, Seeley 
 
 on, 14. 
 Structure, not caused by struggle, 
 
 154; preceded by Function, 179.
 
 INDEX 
 
 377 
 
 Struggle for existence, chief period 
 of life for, 154 ; and constitution, 
 156. 
 
 Submerged leaves, Origin of dis- 
 sected form of, 199 ; experiments 
 on, 199. 
 
 Substance, Law of, 19 ff., 29. 
 
 Systematist's requirements for Va- 
 rieties, 157. 
 
 T. 
 
 Tact, 275. 
 
 Teleology, Darwinian, 180. 
 
 Text-book on Botany (Strasburger, 
 
 etc.), Darwinism changed to 
 
 Adaptation in 2nd ed., 181. 
 Thanatism, 362. 
 Thought, Revealing, Experiments 
 
 in, 343 ff. ; Transference, 346 ; 
 
 Myers on, 348. 
 Trap-door Spiders and Retreats, 244, 
 
 245- 
 
 " True " Darwinism, 145, 161 ; ex- 
 plained, 147. 
 
 True, The, Prof. Jones on, 269. 
 
 Tylor v. Haeckel on Belief in Gods, 
 
 253- 
 Tyndall, on Origin of Life, 107 ff. 
 
 U. 
 
 Universe, Origin of, 33 ; The Un- 
 seen, Quotation on Life from, 69 
 ff. ; and Spiritual Body, 346. 
 
 Use and Disuse, effects of, 54, 55. 
 
 V. 
 
 Variation, Cause of, 163 ff., 167, 168. 
 
 Vernon on Definite Action, 148. 
 
 Verworn, Max, on Origin of Life, 38. 
 
 Vines on Yeast, 41. 
 
 Virginia Creeper, a proof of the he- 
 redity of acquired characters, 201. 
 
 " Virtue " of Ancients, 302 ; Bcce 
 Homo on, 302. 
 
 Vis Medicatrix, 136. 
 
 Vital Force, 60 ; Huxley on, 72, 73. 
 
 Volition, and Automatism, 135, 214, 
 232 ; lapse of, in abnormal cases, 
 276. 
 
 Vortex- Rings, 30 ff. ; Motion of, 30 ; 
 Lord Kelvin's view of, 32 ; Origin 
 of Matter, 33. 
 
 Vries, Hugo de, on Mutantes, 192. 
 
 W. 
 
 Wagner, Darwin's letter to, 162. 
 
 Wallace, in disagreement with Dar- 
 win, 153, 154, 170, 171. 
 
 Wasps paralysing spiders, 244. 
 
 Water Crowfoot, 200. 
 
 Watts, Mr. Charles, description of 
 Christ, 312. 
 
 Weismann, on Adaptation, 124; 
 his theory refuted, 193, 200. 
 
 Whewell, on Natural Laws, in. 
 
 Will requires Attention, 274. 
 
 World, Origin of, Charnock on, 34 ff. 
 
 Y. 
 
 Yeast, Analysis of, 41. 
 
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