Picture - Cosmic Polymath

NEW THEORY OF MATTER 189
the outset) to an animal simply to mislead and deceive it. It might very well be asked w\iat is the object of
life and of sense organs in animals if it be not self-guidance, self-preservation, the power of reproduction, and
the capacity for living in harmony with other animals, with their natural surroundings.
The world is not an illusion. It exists and is composed of a congeries of the most marvellous substances each
adapted to the other. Everything about it is carefully thought out. The inorganic and organic kingdoms each play
a distinct role, but they nevertheless work in unison and according to a general plan. Nothing comes by chance.
All nature is co-ordinated and the boundaries of its actions and re-actions are accurately limited and defined.
The flora and fauna of the earth are complemental in the widest sense. Each is adapted to the other. The
several parts of animals, and especially their sense organs, are necessary to the perfect individual. They are original
and fundamental, but not redundant parts, and cannot be removed without inflicting a certain amount of injury
on the individual. The sense organs are never " make believes." They can always be rehed upon to give an
accurate idea of things as they are. The line of argument here adopted shows how wide of the truth are all
statements impugning the reliability of the sense organs in man. The subject assumes a graver aspect when we
are told that not only do the sense organs habitually deceive us, but that they cannot assist us in our quest after
science and the higher learning.
It will be an evil day for science and the higher learning when they are divorced from the sense organs and
relegated to the whimsical speculation of the closet philosopher.
I know of nothing more mischievous than the depreciating and behttling of the knowledge supplied by the
sense organs, either as regards its accuracy or its amoimt. Similarly, I know of nothing more illusory and dis-
appointing than placing reliance on the supposed facts furnished by the inner consciousness—facts which the sense
organs can alone supply.
There is no breach of continuity in the development of intellect from sense impressions as originally supplied
by the skin and the sense organs. The individual who is born devoid of general sensibility and the sense organs
cannot deal with even the most ordinary concerns of life. Still less can he grapple with the higher learning and
the more advanced problems of science. If this be so it is mere waste of time to discuss the possibility of any one
successfully dealing with the more recondite problems of existence, especially if he does not fall back upon the
sense organs for his training, experiences, and ultimate intellectual power.
They attempt an impossible task ; they seek to build a palace—a great airy structure—without foundations.
The sense organs, I venture to assert, furnish the basis of all legitimate speculation regarding the external world ;
without them there can be no trustworthy training for the acquisition of knowledge in the concrete.
The senses, if not perfect at the outset, can be educated. Nature makes provision for this. The eye can avail
itself of the microscope and telescope ; the ear can utilise the telegraph, telephone, phonograph, &c. ; and the
senses of smelUng, tasting, and touching can be subhmated and refined.
The modem microscope, with its increased multiple powers and its greatly improved definition, gradually
introduces us to finer and finer matter. The same is true of the spectroscope with its matchless capacity for analysis.
This instrument possesses the extraordinary power of dealing with incandescent matter at near and incalculably
remote distances, its bands of colour reveahng unmistakably the metals present in any particular glowing body,
wheresoever situated. The telescope and modern photography also contribute to the analysis of the heavenly
bodies in their own peculiar way ; nor must modern chemical analysis, with its numerous startling advances and
refinements, be overlooked. The several analytic processes have all the one object, namely, the training and per-
fecting of the sense organs and the revelation of matter in its finer and subtler forms.
mounted.
The philosophers who ignore the sense organs literally kick away the ladder by which they have
If there is a Hmit to the operations of the sense organs so there is a limit to the efforts of self-consciousness
and of intellect.
Imagination, however briUiant, can never take the place of fact, and so long as we are composed of matter,
and the extraneous imiverse is material in its nature, it is idle to attempt either to ignore or evade the grosser
matter in favour of a subtler matter.
A simple example will illustrate my meaning. We look at a table in the centre of a well-hghted room, and can
have no reasonable manner of doubt that the eye informs us correctly of its presence and general appearance.
It is a matter of no moment for my present contention whether the table be composed of the grosser matter repre-
sented by the time-honoured atoms and molecules or by the ether in vortex motion, electrical corpuscles, electrons,
ions. &c. The same sense organs and the same intellect furnish the knowledge requisite for expiscating both
theories : moreover, the two theories are not necessarily exclusive of each other, any more than the sense organs
and the brain which they inform and educate are exclusive.