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diff --git a/2934.txt b/2934.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e54138b --- /dev/null +++ b/2934.txt @@ -0,0 +1,944 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of On the Advisableness of Improving Natural +Knowledge, by Thomas H. Huxley + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: On the Advisableness of Improving Natural Knowledge + +Author: Thomas H. Huxley + +Posting Date: January 6, 2009 [EBook #2934] +Release Date: November, 2001 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK IMPROVING KNOWLEDGE *** + + + + +Produced by Amy E. Zelmer + + + + + +ON THE ADVISABLENESS OF IMPROVING NATURAL KNOWLEDGE* + + +By Thomas H. Huxley + +[1] + + + +This time two hundred years ago--in the beginning of January, +1666--those of our forefathers who inhabited this great and ancient +city, took breath between the shocks of two fearful calamities: one not +quite past, although its fury had abated; the other to come. + +Within a few yards of the very spot on which we are assembled, so the +tradition runs, that painful and deadly malady, the plague, appeared in +the latter months of 1664; and, though no new visitor, smote the people +of England, and especially of her capital, with a violence unknown +before, in the course of the following year. The hand of a master has +pictured what happened in those dismal months; and in that truest of +fictions, 'The History of the Plague Year', Defoe shows death, with +every accompaniment of pain and terror, stalking through the narrow +streets of old London, and changing their busy hum into a silence broken +only by the wailing of the mourners of fifty thousand dead; by the woful +denunciations and mad prayers of fanatics; and by the madder yells of +despairing profligates. + +But about this time in 1666, the death-rate had sunk to nearly its +ordinary amount; a case of plague occurred only here and there, and +the richer citizens who had flown from the pest had returned to their +dwellings. The remnant of the people began to toil at the accustomed +round of duty, or of pleasure; and the stream of city life bid fair to +flow back along its old bed, with renewed and uninterrupted vigour. + +The newly kindled hope was deceitful. The great plague, indeed, returned +no more; but what it had done for the Londoners, the great fire, which +broke out in the autumn of 1666, did for London; and, in September of +that year, a heap of ashes and the indestructible energy of the people +were all that remained of the glory of five-sixths of the city within +the walls. + +Our forefathers had their own ways of accounting for each of these +calamities. They submitted to the plague in humility and in penitence, +for they believed it to be the judgment of God. But, towards the fire +they were furiously indignant, interpreting it as the effect of the +malice of man,--as the work of the Republicans, or of the Papists, +according as their prepossessions ran in favour of loyalty or of +Puritanism. + +It would, I fancy, have fared but ill with one who, standing where I +now stand, in what was then a thickly peopled and fashionable part of +London, should have broached to our ancestors the doctrine which I now +propound to you--that all their hypotheses were alike wrong; that the +plague was no more, in their sense, Divine judgment, than the fire was +the work of any political, or of any religious, sect; but that they were +themselves the authors of both plague and fire, and that they must look +to themselves to prevent the recurrence of calamities, to all appearance +so peculiarly beyond the reach of human control--so evidently the result +of the wrath of God, or of the craft and subtlety of an enemy. + +And one may picture to one's self how harmoniously the holy cursing of +the Puritan of that day would have chimed in with the unholy cursing and +the crackling wit of the Rochesters and Sedleys, and with the revilings +of the political fanatics, if my imaginary plain dealer had gone on +to say that, if the return of such misfortunes were ever rendered +impossible, it would not be in virtue of the victory of the faith +of Laud, or of that of Milton; and, as little, by the triumph of +republicanism, as by that of monarchy. But that the one thing needful +for compassing this end was, that the people of England should second +the effort of an insignificant corporation, the establishment of which, +a few years before the epoch of the great plague and the great fire, had +been as little noticed, as they were conspicuous. + +Some twenty years before the outbreak of the plague a few calm and +thoughtful students banded themselves together for the purpose, as they +phrased it, of "improving natural knowledge." The ends they proposed +to attain cannot be stated more clearly than in the words of one of the +founders of the organization:-- + +"Our business was (precluding matters of theology and state affairs) to +discourse and consider of philosophical enquiries, and such as related +thereunto:--as Physick, Anatomy, Geometry, Astronomy, Navigation, +Staticks, Magneticks, Chymicks, Mechanicks, and Natural Experiments; +with the state of these studies and their cultivation at home and +abroad. We then discoursed of the circulation of the blood, the valves +in the veins, the venae lacteae, the lymphatic vessels, the Copernican +hypothesis, the nature of comets and new stars, the satellites of +Jupiter, the oval shape (as it then appeared) of Saturn, the spots +on the sun and its turning on its own axis, the inequalities and +selenography of the moon, the several phases of Venus and Mercury, the +improvement of telescopes and grinding of glasses for that purpose, +the weight of air, the possibility or impossibility of vacuities and +nature's abhorrence thereof, the Torricellian experiment in quicksilver, +the descent of heavy bodies and the degree of acceleration therein, +with divers other things of like nature, some of which were then but new +discoveries, and others not so generally known and embraced as now they +are; with other things appertaining to what hath been called the New +Philosophy, which from the times of Galileo at Florence, and Sir Francis +Bacon (Lord Verulam) in England, hath been much cultivated in Italy, +France, Germany, and other parts abroad, as well as with us in England." + +The learned Dr. Wallis, writing in 1696, narrates in these words, what +happened half a century before, or about 1645. The associates met +at Oxford, in the rooms of Dr. Wilkins, who was destined to become a +bishop; and subsequently coming together in London, they attracted +the notice of the king. And it is a strange evidence of the taste for +knowledge which the most obviously worthless of the Stuarts shared with +his father and grandfather, that Charles the Second was not content with +saying witty things about his philosophers, but did wise things with +regard to them. For he not only bestowed upon them such attention as he +could spare from his poodles and his mistresses, but being in his usual +state of impecuniosity, begged for them of the Duke of Ormond; and, that +step being without effect, gave them Chelsea College, a charter, and +a mace: crowning his favours in the best way they could be crowned, by +burdening them no further with royal patronage or state interference. + +Thus it was that the half-dozen young men, studious of the "New +Philosophy," who met in one another's lodgings in Oxford or in London, +in the middle of the seventeenth century, grew in numerical and in +real strength, until, in the latter part, the "Royal Society for the +improvement of Natural Knowledge" had already become famous, and had +acquired a claim upon the veneration of Englishmen, which it has ever +since retained, as the principal focus of scientific activity in our +islands, and the chief champion of the cause it was formed to support. + +It was by the aid of the Royal Society that Newton published his +'Principia'. If all the books in the world, except the Philosophical +Transactions, were destroyed, it is safe to say that the foundations of +physical science would remain unshaken, and that the vast intellectual +progress of the last two centuries would be largely, though +incompletely, recorded. Nor have any signs of halting or of decrepitude +manifested themselves in our own times. As in Dr. Wallis's days, so +in these, "our business is, precluding theology and state affairs, +to discourse and consider of philosophical enquiries." But our +"Mathematick" is one which Newton would have to go to school to +learn; our "Staticks, Mechanicks, Magneticks, Chymicks, and Natural +Experiments" constitute a mass of physical and chemical knowledge, a +glimpse at which would compensate Galileo for the doings of a score of +inquisitorial cardinals; our "Physick" and "Anatomy" have embraced such +infinite varieties of being, have laid open such new worlds in time and +space, have grappled, not unsuccessfully, with such complex problems, +that the eyes of Vesalius and of Harvey might be dazzled by the sight of +the tree that has grown out of their grain of mustard seed. + +The fact is perhaps rather too much, than too little, forced upon one's +notice, nowadays, that all this marvellous intellectual growth has a no +less wonderful expression in practical life; and that, in this respect, +if in no other, the movement symbolized by the progress of the Royal +Society stands without a parallel in the history of mankind. + +A series of volumes as bulky as the 'Transactions of the Royal Society' +might possibly be filled with the subtle speculations of the Schoolmen; +not improbably, the obtaining a mastery over the products of mediaeval +thought might necessitate an even greater expenditure of time and of +energy than the acquirement of the "New Philosophy"; but though such +work engrossed the best intellects of Europe for a longer time than has +elapsed since the great fire, its effects were "writ in water," so far +as our social state is concerned. + +On the other hand, if the noble first President of the Royal Society +could revisit the upper air and once more gladden his eyes with a sight +of the familiar mace, he would find himself in the midst of a material +civilization more different from that of his day, than that of the +seventeenth was from that of the first century. And if Lord Brouncker's +native sagacity had not deserted his ghost, he would need no long +reflection to discover that all these great ships, these railways, these +telegraphs, these factories, these printing-presses, without which the +whole fabric of modern English society would collapse into a mass of +stagnant and starving pauperism,--that all these pillars of our State +are but the ripples, and the bubbles upon the surface of that great +spiritual stream, the springs of which, only, he and his fellows were +privileged to see; and seeing, to recognise as that which it behoved +them above all things to keep pure and undefiled. + +It may not be too great a flight of imagination to conceive our noble +'revenant' not forgetful of the great troubles of his own day, and +anxious to know how often London had been burned down since his time, +and how often the plague had carried off its thousands. He would have to +learn that, although London contains tenfold the inflammable matter that +it did in 1666; though, not content with filling our rooms with woodwork +and light draperies, we must needs lead inflammable and explosive gases +into every corner of our streets and houses, we never allow even a +street to burn down. And if he asked how this had come about, we should +have to explain that the improvement of natural knowledge has furnished +us with dozens of machines for throwing water upon fires, any one of +which would have furnished the ingenious Mr. Hooke, the first "curator +and experimenter" of the Royal 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 +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. + +But the plague? My Lord Brouncker's observation 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, an Evelyn, and a Milton. He might find the mud +of society at the bottom, instead of at the top, but I fear that the +sum total would be a deserving of swift judgment as at the time of the +Restoration. And it would be our duty to explain once more, and this +time 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. + +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 +garbage. Their houses must be ill-drained, ill-lighted, 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 such cities. We, in later times, 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 knowledge 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 expression 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 upon her thrice in the first half +of the seventeenth century. + +Surely there is nothing in these explanations which is not fully borne +out by the facts? 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, 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 well-being are more abundant with us +than with them? But no less certainly is the difference 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 the springs of their daily actions. + +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 guilty +of exaggeration when I hinted, that to him who had the gift of +distinguishing between prominent events 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 +of the Fire; as a something fraught with a 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 by the plague, hundreds +of mankind exist and 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, in the +bowels of the earth, made possible by 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 instruments of creating +wealth. When I contemplate 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, striding ever +upward, heavily burdened, and 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 undoubtedly 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? + +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, the improvement of 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 gratification of men. + +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 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 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 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 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, in her. + +I should not venture to speak thus strongly 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 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, 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 way that natural knowledge, in desiring to +ascertain the laws of comfort, has been driven to discover those of +conduct, and to lay the foundations of a new morality. + +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 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 to +head it; that a stone stops where it is unless 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 to a fire; that plants and animals +grow and die; 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 much knowledge, the outlines, rude though 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 bud. Listen to words which though +new, are yet three thousand years old:-- + + "...When in heaven the stars about the moon + Look beautiful, when all the winds are laid, + And every height comes out, and jutting peak + And valley, and the immeasurable heavens + Break open to their highest, and all the start + Shine, and the shepherd gladdens in his heart." [2] + +If the half-savage Greek could share our feelings thus far, it is +irrational to doubt that he went further, to find, as we do, that upon +that brief gladness there follows a certain sorrow,--the little light of +awakened human intelligence shines so mere a spark amidst the abyss +of the unknown and unknowable; seems so insufficient to do more than +illuminate the imperfections that cannot be remedied, the aspirations +that cannot be realized, of man's own nature. But in this sadness, this +consciousness of the limitation of man, this sense of an open secret +which he cannot penetrate, lies the essence of all religion; and the +attempt to embody it in the forms furnished by the intellect is the +origin of the higher theologies. + +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 universe. 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 hardly questionable that mankind from the 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 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 seething and surging, like +the waves of an angry sea; which opens up to us infinite regions where +nothing is known, or ever seems to have been known, but matter and +force, operating according to rigid rules; which leads 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 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. 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 discovered that Nature does not +abhor a vacuum, 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 short, to the +theory of universal gravitation 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. + +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; and he and his successors +have landed us in the theory of the persistence, or indestructibility, +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 seem never to be infringed. + +And how has it fared with "Physick" and Anatomy? Have the anatomist, +the physiologist, or the physician, whose business it has been to devote +themselves assiduously to that 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 they +are worst offenders of all. For if the 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 the infinite minuteness of its constituent parts, and +the practical eternity of matter and of force; and if both have alike +proclaimed the universality of a definite and predicable order and +succession of events, the workers in biology have not only accepted all +these, but have added more startling theses of their own. For, as the +astronomers discover in the earth no centre of the universe, but an +eccentric speck, so the naturalists find man to be no centre of the +living world, but one amidst endless modifications of life; and as the +astronomer observes the mark of practically endless time set upon +the arrangements of the solar system so the student of life finds the +records of ancient forms of existence peopling the world for ages, +which, in relation to human experience, are infinite. + +Furthermore, the physiologist finds life to be as dependent for its +manifestation on particular molecular arrangements as any physical or +chemical phenomenon; and, whenever he extends his researches, fixed +order and unchanging 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 all other kinds of knowledge, and out of the action 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 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 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 cherishing 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. + +Such are a few of the new conceptions implanted 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 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 +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 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 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 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 are among the moral convictions most +fondly 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 +disposition is a bad one, and scepticism a sin; 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 to bring clearly before your minds 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. + +The improver of natural knowledge absolutely refuses to acknowledge +authority, as such. For him, scepticism is the highest of 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 testified by portents and +wonders; but because his experience teaches him that whenever he chooses +to bring these convictions into contact with their primary source, +Nature--whenever he thinks fit to test them by appealing to experiment +and to observation--Nature will confirm 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 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, 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 +recognise 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. + + + + +[Footnote 1: A Lay Sermon delivered in St. Martin's Hall on Sunday, +January 7th, 1866, and subsequently published in the 'Fortnightly +Review'.] + +[Footnote 2: Need it be said that this is Tennyson's English for Homer's +Greek?] + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of On the Advisableness of Improving +Natural Knowledge, by Thomas H. 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