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The Pamphlet Collection of Sir Robert Stout: Volume 37

The Intelligibility of Nature

The Intelligibility of Nature.

From the second great discovery of modem science to which I referred, that of the law of evolution, it appears that, at least so far as it lies open to human eyes, the history of the universe is a connected whole. The course of events is not an endless repetition, the tiresome and everlasting spinning of a top about its own axis. Studied by intelligence, Nature becomes intelligible. From the fiery chaos of the limitless nebulosity, beyond which science cannot penetrate, to the cosmos of universal beauty and use which surrounds us, there has been an orderly and gradual progression. It is as if there had been in the whole process a regular inarch of thought—the development of a universal idea. I say as if; for it would be unbecoming to say more, however strong may be my own assurance that the appearance is a reality. Supposing that Mind had forecast the history of Nature with the intent to bring about the present order of things, it is impossible to conceive a more magnificently successful execution of the plan. It may be impossible to demonstrate this; but he would be as rash a man as king Alphonso of Castile who should fancy that he could have designed a grander or more admirable fulfilment of the purpose to evolve a universe. I think it to be in harmony with a rigidly scientific method to attribute the existent result to the only cause that will really explain it—namely, the ever-present activity of Mind. How the one Force of the universe should have pursued the pathway of evolution through the lapse of millions of ages, leaving traces so legible by intelligence to-day, unless from beginning to end the whole process had been dominated by Intelligence itself, it passes my ingenuity even to conjecture. To say that it must have been as it has been, is to evade, not answer, the question. The question may be indeed unanswerable; yet when an answer lies ready to our hand,—an answer which, if accepted, would illuminate so much that is dark,—it deserves at least the most respectful consideration from science itself. I ask no conces- page 18 sion to sentiment, which should follow, not lead; for every mind of virile power must acquiesce in the treatment of purely intellectual problems by purely intellectual methods. But viewing the universe as the result of a process of evolution stretching back into eternity, and finding this process grow daily more and more intelligible, I believe that science will sooner or later recognize the fact that, in the nature of things, no better proof of the intelligence of the cause could be conceived than the intelligibility of the effect. The more law science discovers in Nature, and the more clearly it perceives the tendency of all natural law to ultimate in a higher evolution of the universe, so much the stronger must this proof become. Every new adaptation that is brought to light strengthens the argument; and when the last seeming anomaly shall have been resolved into harmony with the great whole, the argument "will have become demonstration.

Moreover, so sure has modern science become that the system of Nature as a whole is thoroughly intelligible that conspicuous instances can be cited in which pure à-priori deduction has led to the discovery of facts previously unobserved. When, for instance, from the general analogies of the mammalian skeleton, Goethe inferred that the intermaxillary bone must exist in man as well as in the brutes, and found his anticipations verified by the fact; or when, from the law of gravitation and the perturbations of Uranus, Leverrier inferred the existence of an undiscovered planet, and directed the telescope of Galle towards the very spot in "the heavens where it was found; or when Sir William R. Hamilton, from the mathematical consequences of the undulatory theory of light, inferred the existence, at four points, of luminous conical envelopes whenever light is transmitted through crystals having two optic axes, and thus led Dr. Lloyd to the discovery of conical refraction,—in all these cases the intelligibility of Nature was assumed and experimentally proved. That is, admitting that genuine facts are taken for premises, it is to be anticipated that the deductions of pure reason will be born out by experience, even in hitherto unexplored regions of natural phenomena. Science will not always be blind to the enormous theistic value of such a principle as this. It shows 'that the laws of thought are also laws of being,—that Nature is intelligible because it is itself intelligence,—that man can comprehend the universe because both page 19 he and it are equally permeated by immanent mind. The moment that science fairly fronts the great problems of religious thought, which will never be solved again to human belief until science solves them, the unspeakable importance of such cases as I have cited will be duly recognized.