APPENDIX.

SINCE the publication of my paper on "Materialism," more works than one have appeared, by scientific men of note, in which the writers having apparently discovered the dangerous tendency of materialistic doctrines, now attempt, as the Saturday Review shrewdly puts it, to temper materialism with faith. The fear that science is opposed to religion is a note of discord that has been sounded from time immemorial, and yet some of the greatest thinkers who ever lived have not found them incompatible. The marvellous discoveries of modern science, when looked at from the right

stand-point, afford additional proof of a wonderful and inscrutable Providence; and, in spite of assertions to the contrary, science has always been ultimately found to be the handmaid of religion, by furnishing accumulating evidence of design. The profound and truthful aphorism of Lord Bacon that—“A little philosophy inclineth man's mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds to religion," applies with equal force to the modern systems of philosophy as it did to those of his time. While science can well boast of the marvellous discoveries revealed by the microscope, especially those that have reference to the minute phenomena of life, it must at the same time be admitted that human sight, even when aided to the utmost extent possible by the greatest conceivable microscopic power, will never be able to perceive the minute specks which go to form the organic corpuscle. The same rule applies to telescopic as to microscopic observations,-the power of human vision

is limited as to distance as well as to size. A writer in the Edinburgh Review justly remarks, "the material substance in which the special changes are brought about that convert dead matter into living matter cannot be seen by human eyes. They occur in a region of material existence beyond the reach of the visual powers which have been accorded to man."

Two of the most eminent modern natural philosophers, Faraday and Brewster, were firm believers in the truths of Christianity, and they were men conspicuous for their brilliant discoveries of valuable scientific facts, who did not aim at gaining notoriety by the promulgation of crude, though startling hypotheses. Sir Humphrey Davy, a natural philosopher, whose genius is unquestioned, had strong religious convictions. With respect to the immateriality of the soul, he says, "That which teaches will not be felt; that which sees will not be visible;

E

that which commands sensations will not be

their subject." Again, "Locke said, Could not God have made matter think. Can a

house be its own tenant?"

In referring to the fact that some of our best scientific workers belonged to the clerical profession, the only names given were those of the Rev. Gilbert White and the Rev. Wm. Conybeare, but the list is a long one, and it may not be out of place here to add a few more

names:

Roger Bacon,

Seth Ward (Bishop of Exeter and afterwards of Salisbury, author of "Astronomia Geometrica"),

Wallis (a celebrated mathematician, second

only to Sir Isaac Newton),

Bradley (discoverer of aberration and nu

tation),

Pascal,