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    Juys 2, 1855.] THE LEADEB, 531 ^

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    THE PLURALITY OF WORLDS. jays on the Spi...

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  • Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.

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    per has traced the resemblance with great skill . The article " Geology " a well-deserved exposure of a book which is a type of a class of vicious ioks trying to discredit science , because science , discredits orthodoxy ; e book exposed is Mr . Elfb Taymib ' s Geology : its Facts and its Fictions A . Memoir of Colonel Butler "—a name familiar to readers of Schuvleb ' s ' allenstein—must not be passed over ; nor an erudite discursive paper " Ethnology , Religion , and Politics . " Altogether we pass a wet day ry cozily over these Magazines , and still leave several unread !

    Juys 2, 1855.] The Leadeb, 531 ^

    Juys 2 , 1855 . ] THE LEADEB , 531 ^

    The Plurality Of Worlds. Jays On The Spi...

    THE PLURALITY OF WORLDS . jays on the Spirit of the Inductive Philosophy , the Unity of Worlds , and the Philosophy yf Creation . By the Rev . Baden Powell . Longman . irlds beyond the Earth . By Montagu Lyon Phillips . Bentley . ( second article . ) agine a microscopic Animalcule moving amidst the vast spaces exiding between those mountainous masses , called grains of sand by men , i , in its wanderings , meeting with another Animalcule of a speculative ¦ n of mind , who forthwith commences an eloquent discourse respecting j worlds beyond their world , spaces vast and inaccessible , in comparison ; h which all spaces known to Animalcular experience are but as pin points ,

    ices peopled by beings of gigantic stature , whose modes of life are various 1 astounding . Our unspeculative Animalcule would be considerably zzled by such a revelation . Perhaps he would deny it altogether . Perds he would qualify it , by declaring that even if such spaces existed , they re probably not peopled ; and if peopled , certainly not blessed with the ; h and peculiar civilisation of Animalcules , certainly not capable of imalcular " large discourse of reason , looking before and after . " These ngs can only be of a p ulpy or gravelly kind , he would say , huge amorous absurdities , quite unworthy of comparison with us , " for whom the rid was obviously made , " with us to whom all other forms of life are jservient , with us who have the benefit they cannot have , the benefit of a

    3 pensation . Very much like this is the position of the author of the Essay on the irality of Worlds . B ut even more ludicrous is the position of the author More Worlds than One , the Hope of a Christian and Creed of a , Philoher . The former takes his stand upon our earth very much , as the v . Baden Powell observes , like the Chinese geographers , who cover the sater part of the map with the Celestial Empire , and confine the wretched abitants of Europe and America to insignificant outskirts . The latter is re cosmopolitan , but more absurd . Ranging on either side are two sses of combatants , profusely illogical and copiously rhetorical . The istion has become fashionable " ; and the Rev . Baden Powell , in the second ly of the work under review , holds the balance between the two parties , nting out with great felicity their abiding disregard of true inductive nciples , and their abiding error of theological confusion : —

    r iewed simply as a question of philosophical conjecture , or rational probability , dout reference to any ulterior consideration , the argument must be based on an snsion of inductive analogies , a generalisation ( so far as we can legitimately pursue upon the acknowledged relations of animated existence with physical conditions cosmical arrangements adapted to it . Ls he says , the question is one which must ever remain in uncertainty , and only position a philosopher can occupy in such a discussion is to see that question be discussed on proper grounds . For our own parts , while in sense wishing to circumscribe the wide and pleasant fields of conjecture [ fanciful speculation , we desire that it should be distinctly , understood t all argument on this matter is necessarily and eternally vitiated by the > ossibility of ascertaining the primary basis of fact . We cannot knoiu 2 ther the planets are inhabited by organic beings . We are left to con-; ure , and our coniectures are based upon analogies , which analogies mselves want confirmation . Reasoning on what is known , there are two

    itions which may be occupied with equal legitimacy . fjvat , that the p lanets cannot be regarded as inhabited by human beings , ess it can be proved that these planets are identical with our own in position , and in development . By this is meant , that it must be proved t Mercury , for example , not only contains the same chemical elementary iposition as our planet—the . same gases in the same proportions—but > the same immediate composition , i . e ., the same combination of elements ; if there be more carbonic acid in the atmosphere there can be no human iff to live in it . Now this state of immediate composition is part of the orij of the planet ; and unless all the episodes of the history have been our own , the result will not be like our own . The development of 3 on our planet is a part of the history of our planet ; nay , it has been Rested by German philosophers that the planet is itself an organism tin * through the same phases of development as the egg ( see Leader , 5 th y ) . " The most ordinary knowledge of embryology sutfices for the coniion that any variation in the conditions which will perturb the regular cession of these p hases , produces a variety , a monster , or a creature

    inable of living . , ., , t is quite clear that wo cannot prove , —that we cannot even p lausibly lecture—how far the planets are identical in elementary composition , in iediato composition , or in development . Wanting this proof , we cannot ue for the existence of human beings . Such presumption as there is , is inst the existence of human boings . Jut now , takinc "P the other position , the philosopher may say : Granted re are no human beings elsewhere than on our planet , because human ngs are products of a peculiar series of developments not presumable to re taken place tn the same serial order elsewhere ; but the question of Jn-. itantBVnot necessarily limited to the genus Homo Other /™ of hfi 1 exist , oven if the peculiar forms known toua do not exist . What those ns arew cannot know . Wo cannot even imagine them , for our nnagiioa is restricted within the limits of our knowledge ; we can only combine ton elements . There is not even evidence to show that these forms of

    life will display themselves in the modes known to us—viz ., as active , sentient , reflective . There may be intelligence in the other planets , even under - conditions totally unlike those known by us . And there may not . Taking the analogy of organic beings , we must first say , Not ; for , as far as our knowledge extends , intelligence is never found except connected with nervous tissue ; and , as nervous tissue is a peculiar , special combination of the elements , rare even on our globe , we cannot assume that nervous tissue will be found elsewhere . Yet this argument , seemingly so conclusive , call

    be met , and met by arguments drawn from the circle of known analogies . One may answer it thus : True , on our globe neurine alone has the property of sensibility ; but on another globe , under other conditions , sensibility may be the property of some other combination of matter . To deny this absolutely would be as unjustifiable as to deny that a nation could possibly have fire-arms because they had no nitre , and having no nitre they could have no gunpowder ; the truth , perhaps , being that this nation had gun-cotton , or some other explosive material . What gun-cotton is to gunpowder , an unknown x may be to neurine . May he ; one cannot say , it , is .

    We have thus argued pro and con . to show that argument is vain . The subject lies beyond real argument . On either side men are forced to begin and to end witli assumptions which they have no means of proving . Yet , in this field of gratuitous assumption each combatant alights , like Virgil's

    crow , Sicca secum spatiatur arena , ready to accuse his adversary of ignorance , if not of Atheism , and ready before all things to make his assumptions " proofs" of a tremulous orthodoxy . The Rev . Baden Powell , whose truly philosophic position in all these q uestions is nowhere more strikingly exhibited than in his rebukes to the Theologians—rebukes which come with tenfold force from a clergyman—has an admirable passage on this point : — The desire whether for peopling or for dispeopling planetary or sidereal worlds on theological grounds , appears to arise from the same fundamental misconception or disregard of the proper provinces and limits of philosophy and of theology which has led , in so many other cases , to an unhappy and incongruous mixture of the two , — producing nothing , as Bacon has so justly observed , but " a fantastical and superstitious philosophy and a heretical religion . " Of this mode of procedure we have had abundant instances in all stages of scientific advance .

    Without recurring to more ignorant ages , and the speculations of the schoolmen , we trace the very same spirit in later times in the formation of such systems as that of Tycho , founded on the idea of reconciling astronomy and Scripture ; in the vortices of Descartes , deduced by reasoning on theological grounds from the perfections of the Deity ; in the cosmical theories of the Hutchinsonians , or what they termed " Moses ' Principia , " founded on the Hebrew Scriptures , in opposition to Newton's ; and in our own times in the various schemes of the Bible geologists , each in succession presenting but some new shade or modification of the same radical misconception to take the place of # ts exploded predecessor .

    It is worth -while to dwell on this last instance as very instructive in its consequences , especially to those who have not antecedently taken more general views . Even at the present day there are not wanting occasional attempts to keep up the hopeless chimera of erecting theories of geology on the Mosaic narrative . It is needless to observe that , as all notion of an accommodation of the facts to the text has long since been given up by all sane inquirers , these attempts are now merely directed to explaining away the sense of the text ; in which they no doubt succeed by suck principles of verbal interpretation as , if fairly applied to other parts , would readily enable us to put on any given passage any required construction . All inquirers , possessing at once a sound knowledge of geology , and capable of perceiving the undeniable sense of a plain circumstantial narrative , now acknowledge the whole tenor of geology is in entire contradiction to the cosmogony delivered from Sinai ; a contradiction which no philological refinements can remove or diminish ; a case which no detailed interpretations can meet , and which can only be dealt with as a ¦ w hole .

    Mr . Powell is for giving unto Science the things which are scientific , and to Theology the things which are theological ; in this he is true to Bacon's energetic and admirable advice ; in this he is true to the spirit of inductive philosophy . . Quitting generalities , and coming to the Essay under review , we have to commend it for its tone , and for some incidental remarks . It is , however , less an Essay on the Plurality of Worlds than philosophical reflections on the mode in which that topic has been treated . Well worth reading , it brings no new arguments of importance towards an elucidation of the question : Are the Planets Inhabited ? He inclines to believe they are , and the following ingenious remark must be cited : —

    At any rate , when we reflect on the extremely varied forms of animated life on our own globe , on the diversified structures of different classes of animals , and the marvellous adaptations of their respiratory and circulatory functions to the conditions of their existence under the most varied circumstances , yet all preserving the moat recondite relations to analogy and unity of composition , we conceive there can exist no difficulty in imagining the possibility of living beings constructed with bodies of greater or less specific gravity , suited to the most widely different conditions of gravitation or atmospheric pressure in which they might be destined to live , and with respiratory , muscular , digestive , or locomotive powers and capacities developed in infinitely vari £ a degrees , according to the different conditions under which they might subsist , and tne media in which they might have to move—yet always preserving an unbroken analogy with some grand and universal scheme of uniformity , of which wo enjoy only partial glimpses ; while under any such variety of external form or condition t !» ey may be equally capable with ourselves of being the recipients of higher principles of intellectualmoralor iritual life

    , , sp . .. On this we venture a comment . Tho unity of composition Mr . 1 owell invokes is traced within a circle of conditions which are uniform . I hot to say , zoophyte , mollusc , and mammal , however various , have a certain uniformity P ^ vaihng amid variety b ecause ; U . ei . is ^ J —™« ^ S S ^ iS ^^ S ^^^^ 5 SnS ^ X ! ifi whte ' thl ^^^ fences botTcrthe elementary and i ™^ ™ W * ££ rtlit ^ ta ^^^^^ F ^ e , rand must trespass on tho reader ' s patience for another article .

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), June 2, 1855, page 17, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_02061855/page/17/