Society, with ample materials for discourse before half a dozen meetings of that body; and that, to say truth, except for the progress of natural knowledge, we should not have been able to make even the tools by which these machines are constructed. And, further, it would be necessary to add, that although severe fires sometimes occur and inflict great damage, the loss is very generally compensated by societies, the operations of which have been 10 them? But no less certainly is the difference Surely, the principles involved in them are now admitted among the fixed beliefs of all thinking men? Surely, it is true that our countrymen are less subject to fire, famine, 5 pestilence, and all the evils which result from a want of command over and due anticipation of the course of Nature, than were the countrymen of Milton; and health, wealth, and wellbeing are more abundant with us than with rendered possible only by the progress of natural knowledge in the direction of mathematics, and the accumulation of wealth in virtue of other natural knowledge. due to the improvement of our knowledge of Nature, and the extent to which that improved knowledge has been incorporated with the household words of men, and has supplied Granting for a moment, then, the truth of that which the depreciators of natural knowledge are so fond of urging, that its improvement can only add to the resources of our material civilization; admitting it to be possible that the founders of the Royal Society themselves looked for no other reward than this, I cannot confess that I was so guilty of exaggeration when I hinted, that to him who had the But the plague? My Lord Brouncker's ob- 15 the springs of their daily actions. servation would not, I fear, lead him to think that Englishmen of the nineteenth century are purer in life, or more fervent in religious faith, than the generation which could produce a Boyle, 17 an Evelyn, 18 and a Milton. He might 20 find the mud of society at the bottom, instead of at the top, but I fear that the sum total would be as deserving of swift judgment as at the time of the Restoration. And it would be our duty to explain once more, and this time 25 gift of distinguishing between prominent events not without shame, that we have no reason to believe that it is the improvement of our faith, nor that of our morals, which keeps the plague from our city; but, again, that it is the improvement of our natural knowledge. and important events, the origin of a combined effort on the part of mankind to improve natural knowledge might have loomed larger than the Plague and have outshone the glare 30 of the Fire; as a something fraught with the wealth of beneficence to mankind, in comparison with which the damage done by those ghastly evils would shrink into insignificance. It is very certain that for every victim slain find a fair share of happiness in the world, by the aid of the spinning jenny. And the great fire, at its worst, could not have burned the supply of coal, the daily working of which, We have learned that pestilences will only take up their abode among those who have prepared unswept and ungarnished residences for them. Their cities must have narrow, unwatered streets, foul with accumulated gar- 35 by the plague, hundreds of mankind exist and bage. Their houses must be ill-drained, illlighted, ill-ventilated. Their subjects must be ill-washed, ill-fed, ill-clothed. The London of 1665 was such a city. The cities of the East, where plague has an enduring dwelling, are 40 in the bowels of the earth, made possible by such cities. We, in later time, have learned somewhat of nature, and partly obey her. Because of this partial improvement of our natural knowledge and of that fractional obedience, we have no plague; because that knowl- 45 edge is still very imperfect and that obedience yet incomplete, typhus is our companion and cholera our visitor. But it is not presumptuous to express the belief that, when our knowledge is more complete and our obedience the expres- 50 ments for creating wealth. When I contem sion of our knowledge, London will count her centuries of freedom from typhus and cholera, as she now gratefully reckons her two hundred years of ignorance of that plague which swooped the steam pump, gives rise to an amount of wealth to which the millions lost in old London are but as an old song. But spinning jenny and steam pump are, after all, but toys, possessing an accidental value; and natural knowledge creates multitudes of more subtle contrivances, the praises of which do not happen to be sung because they are not directly convertible into instru plate natural knowledge squandering such gifts among men, the only appropriate comparison I can find for her is, to liken her to such a peasant woman as one sees in the Alps, upon her thrice in the first half of the seven- 55 striding ever upward, heavily burdened, and teenth century. Surely, there is nothing in these explanations which is not fully borne out by the facts? Robert Boyle, an English chemist. 18 V. p. 280, supra. with mind bent only on her home; but yet, without effort and without thought, knitting for her children. Now stockings are good and comfortable things, and the children will un doubtedly be much the better for them; but surely it would be short-sighted, to say the least of it, to depreciate this toiling mother as a mere stocking-machine—a mere provider of physical comforts? Let us take these points separately; and, first, what great ideas has natural knowledge introduced into men's minds? I cannot but think that the foundations of 5 all natural knowledge were laid when the reason of man first came face to face with the facts of Nature; when the savage first learned that the fingers of one hand are fewer than those of both; that it is shorter to cross a stream than However, there are blind leaders of the blind, and not a few of them, who take this view of natural knowledge, and can see nothing in the bountiful mother of humanity but a sort of comfort-grinding machine. According to them, 10 to head it; that a stone stops where it is unless the improvement in natural knowledge always has been, and always must be, synonymous with no more than the improvement of the material resources and the increase of the gratifications of men. it be moved, and that it drops from the hand which lets it go; that light and heat come and go with the sun; that sticks burn away in a fire; that plants and animals grow and die; 15 that if he struck his fellow-savage a blow he would make him angry, and perhaps get a blow in return, while if he offered him a fruit he would please him, and perhaps receive a fish in exchange. When men had acquired this Natural knowledge is, in their eyes, no real mother of mankind, bringing them up with kindness, and, if need be, with sternness, in the way they should go, and instructing them in all things needful for their welfare; but a sort 20 much knowledge, the outlines, rude though of fairy godmother, ready to furnish her pets with shoes of swiftness, swords of sharpness, and omnipotent Aladdin's lamps, so that they may have telegraphs to Saturn, and see the other side of the moon, and thank God they 25 bud. Listen to words which, though new, are are better than their benighted ancestors. If this talk were true, I, for one, should not greatly care to toil in the service of natural knowledge. I think I would just as soon be quietly chipping my own flint axe, after the 30 manner of my forefathers a few thousand years back, as be troubled with the endless malady of thought which now infests us all, for such reward. But I venture to say that such views are contrary alike to reason and to fact. Those 35 who discourse in such fashion seem to me to be so intent upon trying to see what is above Nature, or what is behind her, that they are blind to what stares them in the face of her. I should not venture to speak thus strongly 40 if my justification were not to be found in the simplest and most obvious facts,-if it needed more than an appeal to the most notorious truths to justify my assertion, that the improvement of natural knowledge, whatever direction 45 it has taken, and however low the aims of those who may have commenced it-has not only conferred practical benefits on men, but in so doing, has effected a revolution in their conceptions of the universe and of themselves, 50 and has profoundly altered their modes of thinking and their views of right and wrong. I say that natural knowledge, seeking to satisfy natural wants, has found the ideas which can alone still spiritual cravings. I say that nat- 55 ural knowledge, in desiring to ascertain the laws of comfort, has been driven to discover those of conduct, and to lay foundations of a new morality. they were, of mathematics, of physics, of chemistry, of biology, of moral, economical, and political science, were sketched. Nor did the germ of religion fail when science began to yet three thousand years old:— 66 ... When in heaven the stars about the moon Look beautiful, when all the winds are laid, If the half-savage Greek could share our feel- Thus it seems impossible to imagine but that the foundations of all knowledge-secular or sacred-were laid when intelligence dawned, though the superstructure remained for long ages so slight and feeble as to be compatible with the existence of almost any general view respecting the mode of governance of the uni 19 From Tennyson's Specimens of a Translation of the Iliad in Blank Verse. verse. No doubt, from the first, there were certain phenomena which, to the rudest mind, presented a constancy of occurrence, and suggested that a fixed order ruled, at any rate, among them. I doubt if the grossest of Fetish worshippers ever imagined that a stone must have a god within it to make it fall, or that a fruit had a god within it to make it taste sweet. With regard to such matters as these, it is us to contemplate phenomena the very nature of which demonstrates that they must have had a beginning, and that they must have an end, but the very nature of which also proves 5 that the beginning was, to our conceptions of time, infinitely remote, and that the end is as immeasurably distant. But it is not alone those who pursue astronomy who ask for bread and receive ideas. hardly questionable that mankind from the 10 What more harmless than the attempt to lift and distribute water by pumping it; what more absolutely and grossly utilitarian? But out of pumps grew the discussions about Nature's abhorrence of a vacuum; and then it was dis but that air has weight; and that notion paved the way for the doctrine that all matter has weight, and that the force which produces weight is co-extensive with the universe,-in and endless force. While learning how to handle gases led to the discovery of oxygen, and to modern chemistry, and to the notion of the indestructibility of matter. first took strictly positive and scientific views. But, with respect to all the less familiar occurrences which present themselves, uncultured man, no doubt, has always taken himself as the standard of comparison, as the centre 15 covered that Nature does not abhor a vacuum, and measure of the world; nor could he well avoid doing so. And finding that his apparently uncaused will has a powerful effect in giving rise to many occurrences, he naturally enough ascribed other and greater events to 20 short, to the theory of universal gravitation other and greater volitions, and came to look upon the world and all that therein is, as the product of the volitions of persons like himself, but stronger, and capable of being appeased or angered, as he himself might be 25 soothed or irritated. Through such conceptions of the plan and working of the universe all mankind have passed, or are passing. And we may now consider, what has been the effect of the improvement of natural knowledge on 30 the views of men who have reached this stage, and who have begun to cultivate natural knowledge with no desire but that of "increasing God's honour and bettering man's estate." For example: what could seem wiser, from 35 theory of the persistence, or indestructibility, Again, what simpler, or more absolutely practical, than the attempt to keep the axle of a wheel from heating when the wheel turns round very fast? How useful for carters and gig drivers to know something about this; and how good were it, if any ingenious person would find out the cause of such phenomena, and thence educe a general remedy for them. Such an ingenious person was Count Rumford;20 and he and his successors have landed us in the of force. And in the infinitely minute, as in the infinitely great, the seekers after natural knowledge, of the kinds called physical and chemical, have everywhere found a definite order and succession of events which never seemed to be infringed. a mere material point of view, more innocent, from a theological one, to an ancient people, than that they should learn the exact succession of the seasons, as warnings for their husbandmen; or the position of the stars, as guides 40 to their rude navigators? But what has grown out of this search for natural knowledge of so merely useful a character? You all know the reply. Astronomy,-which of all sciences has filled men's minds with general ideas of a 45 been to devote themselves assiduously to that And how has it fared with "Physick" and Anatomy? Have the anatomist, the physiologist, or the physician, whose business it has eminently practical and direct end, the alleviation of the sufferings of mankind,-have they been able to confine their vision more absolutely to the strictly useful? I fear that character most foreign to their daily experience, and has, more than any other, rendered it impossible for them to accept the beliefs of their fathers. Astronomy,-which tells them that this so vast and seemingly solid earth is 50 they are the worst offenders of all. For if the but an atom among atoms, whirling, no man knows whither, through illimitable space; which demonstrates that what we call the peaceful heaven above us, is but that space, filled by an infinitely subtle matter whose particles are 55 the infinite minuteness of its constituent parts, seething and surging, like the waves of an angry sea; which opens up to us infinite regions where nothing is known, but matter and force, operating according to rigid rules; which leads astronomer has set before us the infinite magnitude of space, and the practical eternity of the duration of the universe; if the physical and chemical philosophers have demonstrated and the practical eternity of matter and of force; and if both have alike proclaimed the 20 A distinguished scientist of American birth, chiefly remembered for his experiments on the nature of heat. universality of a definite and predicable order made in natural knowledge has tended to extend and rivet in their minds the conception of a definite order of the universe-which is embodied in what are called, by an unhappy 5 metaphor, the laws of Nature-and to narrow the range and loosen the force of men's belief in spontaneity, or in changes other than such as arise out of that definite order itself. Whether these ideas are well or ill founded is not the question. No one can deny that they exist, and have been the inevitable outgrowth of the improvement of natural knowledge. And if so, it cannot be doubted that they are changing the form of men's most 15 cherished and most important convictions. And as regards the second point-the extent to which the improvement of natural knowledge has remodelled and altered what may be termed the intellectual ethics of men,-what Furthermore, the physiologist finds life to be as dependent for its manifestation on particular molecular arrangements as any physical or chemical phenomenon; and, wherever he extends his researches, fixed order and un- 20 are among the moral convictions most fondly changing causation reveal themselves, as plainly as in the rest of Nature. Nor can I find that any other fate has awaited the germ of Religion. Arising, like held by barbarous and semi-barbarous people? They are the convictions that authority is the soundest basis of belief; that merit attaches to a readiness to believe; that the doubting that when good authority has pronounced what is to be believed, and faith has accepted it, reason has no further duty. There are many excellent persons who yet hold by these principles, and it is not my present business, or intention, to discuss their views. All I wish clearly to bring before your mind is the unquestionable fact, that the improvement of natural knowledge is effected by methods which directly give the lie to all these convictions, and assume the exact reverse of each to be true. all other kinds of knowledge, out of the action 25 disposition is a bad one, and scepticism a sin; and interaction of man's mind, with that which is not man's mind, it has taken the intellectual coverings of Fetishism or Polytheism; of Theism or Atheism; of Superstition or Rationalism. With these, and their relative 30 merits and demerits, I have nothing to do; but this it is needful for my purpose to say, that if the religion of the present differs from that of the past, it is because the theology of the present has become more scientific than 35 that of the past; because it has not only renounced idols of wood and idols of stone, but begins to see the necessity of breaking in pieces the idols built up of books and traditions and fine-spun ecclesiastical cobwebs: and of cherish- 40 such. For him, scepticism is the highest of ing the noblest and most human of man's emotions, by worship "for the most part of the silent sort" at the altar of the Unknown and Unknowable. The improver of natural knowledge absolutely refuses to acknowledge authority, as duties; blind faith the one unpardonable sin. And it cannot be otherwise, for every great advance in natural knowledge has involved the absolute rejection of authority, the cherishing of the keenest scepticism, the annihilation of the spirit of blind faith; and the most ardent votary of science holds his firmest convictions, not because the men he most venerates hold them; not because their verity is tested by portents and wonders; but because his experience teaches him that whenever he chooses to bring these convictions into contact with their primary sources, Nature-whenever he thinks fit to test them by appealing to experi Such are a few of the new conceptions im- 45 planted in our minds by the improvement of natural knowledge. Men have acquired the ideas of the practically infinite extent of the universe and of its practical eternity; they are familiar with the conception that our earth is 50 but an infinitesimal fragment of that part of the universe which can be seen; and that, nevertheless, its duration is, as compared with our standards of time, infinite. They have further acquired the idea that man is but 55 ment and to observation-Nature will confirm one of innumerable forms of life now existing in the globe, and that the present existences are but the last of an immeasurable series of predecessors. Moreover, every step they have them. The man of science has learned to believe in justification, not by faith, but by verification. Thus, without for a moment pretending to despise the practical results of the improvement of natural knowledge, and its beneficial influence on material civilization it must, I think, be admitted that the great ideas, some of which I have indicated, and the ethical spirit which I have endeavoured to sketch, in the few moments which remained at my disposal, constitute the real and permanent significance of natural knowledge. If these ideas be destined, as I believe they 10 are, to be more and more firmly established as the world grows older; if that spirit be fated, as I believe it is, to extend itself into all departments of human thought, and to become co-extensive with the range of knowledge; if, 15 as our race approaches its maturity, it discovers, as I believe it will, that there is but one kind of knowledge and but one method of acquiring it; then we, who are still children, may justly feel it our highest duty to recognize 20 the advisableness of improving natural knowledge, and so to aid ourselves and our successors in their course towards the noble goal which lies before mankind. Frederick Harrison 1831 WALTER SCOTT (From The Choice of Books, 1880) theum, pronounce Fielding to be low, and Mozart to be passé. As boys love lollipops, so these juvenile fops love to roll phrases about under the tongue, as if phrases in themselves 5 had a value apart from thoughts, feelings, great conceptions, or human sympathy. For Scott is just one of the poets (we may call poets all the great creators in prose or in verse) of whom one never wearies, just as one can listen to Beethoven, or watch the sunrise or the sunset day by day with new delight. I think I can read the Antiquary, or the Bride of Lammermoor, Ivanhoe, Quentin Durward, and Old Mortality, at least once a year afresh. Scott is a perfect library in himself. A constant reader of romances would find that it needed months to go through even the best pieces of the inexhaustible painter of eight full centuries and every type of man; and he might repeat the process of reading him ten times in a lifetime without a sense of fatigue or sameness. The poetic beauty of Scott's creations is almost the least of his great qualities. It is the universality of his sym25 pathy that is so truly great, the justice of his estimates, the insight into the spirit of each age, his intense absorption of self in the vast epic of human civilisation. What are the old almanacs that they so often give us as his30 tories beside these living pictures of the ordered succession of ages? As in Homer himself, we see in this prose Iliad of modern history, the battle of the old and the new, the heroic defence of ancient strongholds, the long impend In Europe, as in England, Walter Scott re- 35 ing and inevitable doom of mediæval life. mains as yet the last in the series of the great creative spirits of the human race. Strong men and proud women struggle against the destiny of modern society, unconsciously working out its ways, undauntedly defying its power. How just is our island Homer! No one of his successors, however clear be the genius and the partial success of some of them, belongs to the same grand type of mind, or has 40 Neither Greek nor Trojan sways him; Achilles now a lasting place in the roll of the immortals. It should make us sad to reflect that a generation, which already has begun to treat Scott with the indifference that is the lot of a "classic," should be ready to fill its insatiable maw 45 glow alike in the harmonious colouring of his with the ephemeral wares of the booksellers, and the reeking garbage of the boulevard. We all read Scott's romances, as we have all read Hume's History of England; but how is his hero; Hector is his favorite; he loves the councils of chiefs, and the palace of Priam; but the swine-herd, the charioteer, the slave-girl, the hound, the beggar, and the herds-man, all peopled epic. We see the dawn of our English nation, the defence of Christendom against the Koran, the grace and terror of feudalism, the rise of monarchy out of baronies, the rise of often do we read them, how zealously, with 50 parliaments out of monarchy, the rise of indus what sympathy and understanding? I am try out of serfage, the pathetic ruin of chivalry, the splendid death-struggle of Catholicism, the sylvan tribes of the mountain (remnants of our pre-historic forefathers) beating themselves to pieces against the hard advance of 1 A temple in Athens, (so named because it contained the bust of Erectheus), generally regarded as one of the finest specimens of Greek architecture. The Caryatides are six robed female figures which support the Erectheum, and are choice examples of architectural sculpture. |