PROFESSOR TYNDALL'S ADDRESS.

Thames Star, Volume VII, Issue 1930, 11 March 1875, Page 4

PROFESSOR TYNDALL'S ADDRESS.

Address delivered before the British Association, assembled at Belfast, vMh additions, ly John Tyndall, F.R.S., President. London: Longmans, Gbbent, and Co., 1874,

■: ■ [CONTINUED.] The problem which had been preriously approached from abbre was now attacked from below; theoretic effort passed from the super- to the sub-sensible. It was felt that to construct the universe in idea it was necessary to hare some notion of its constituent parts~of what Lucretius subsequently called the 'First Beginnings.' Abstracting again from experience, the leaders of scientific speculation reached at length the pregnant doctrine of atoms aud molecules, tbe latest developments of which were set forth with such power and clearness at the last meeting of the British Association. Thought, no doubt, had long hovered about this doctrine before it attained the precision arid completeness which it assumed in the mind of Demdcritus,(l) a philosopher who may well for a moment arrest our attention. 'Few great men,' says Lange, a non-materialist, in his ex- ... cellent * History of Materialism,- to the spirit and to the letter, of which I am equally indebted, 'have peen so despitefully used by history as Democritus. In the distorted images sent down to us

through unscientific traditions there rev mains of him almost nothing but the name of " the laughing philosopher," while figures of immeasurably smaller significance spread themselves out at full length before us.' Lange speaks of Bacon's high appreciation' of Democritus—for ample illustrations of which lam indebted to my excellent friendl Mr Spedding, the learned editor and biographer of Bacon. It is evident, indeed, that Bacon considered Democritus to be a man of weightier metal than either. Plato or Aristotle, ; ; though their philosophy ' was noised and celebrated in the schools, amid the din and pomp of professors.' It was not they, but OJensericand Attila and the barbarians, who destroyed the atomic philosophy, i 'For at a time when all human learning had suffered; shipwreck these planks of Aristotelian and Platonic philosophy, as being of a lighter and more inflated substance, were preserved and came down to us, while things more solid sank and Almost passed into oblivion.' The son of a wealthy father, Dejaaocritus devoted the whoje of his inherited fortune to the culture of his mind. He travelled ., everj where; visited Athens when Socrates and Plato were there, but quitted the,city without making himself known. Indeed, the dialectic strife in which Socrates, so much delighted had no : charms for Demociritus, who held that ■'the man who readily contradicts and uses m&riy.'-..words 1- is unfit to learn anything truly right.' He is said to have discovered and educated Protagoras the sophist, being struck as much by the manner in which he,beinga hewer of wood, tied up his faggots as by the sagacity of his conversation. Democritus returned poor, from 1 hia travels, was; supported by his Brother^ and at length wrote his great work entitled ' Diakosmos,' which he read publicly before the people of his native town. . He was honoured by his countrymen in various ways, and died serenely at a great age. The principles enunciated by Democritus reveal his uncompromising antagonism to those who deduced the phenomena of nature from the caprices of the gods. They.are briefly these :—l. From nothing comes nothing. Nothing that exists can; be destroyed. .All changes are due to the combination and separation of molecules. 2. Nothing happens by chance. Every occurrence has its cause from which,, it foUows by necessity. 3. The only existing things are the atoms and empty space; all else is mere opinion. 4. The atoms are infinite in number and infinitely various in form; they strike together, and the lateral motions and whirlings which, thus arise are the beginnings of worlds. 5. The varieties of all things depend upon the varieties of their atoms, in number, size, and aggregation. 6. Thesoul consists of fine, smooth, round atoms, like those of fire These are the most mobile of all. They interpenetrate the whole body, and in their motions the phenomena of life arise. The first five propositions are a fair general statement of the atomic philosophy, as now held. As regards the sixth, Democritus made his fine smcoth atoms do duty for the nervous system, whose functions were then unknown. The atoms of Democritus are individually without sensation; they combine in obedience to mechanical laws; and not only organic forms, but the phenomena of sensation and thought are the result of their combination.

That<great enigma, 'the exquisite adaptation of one part of an organism to another part, and to the conditions of life/, more especially the construction of the human body, JDemocritus made no attempt te solre. Empedocles, a man of more fiery and poetic nature, introduced tlie notion of lpye and hate among the atoms to account for their combination and separation. this gap in the doctrine of Democritus, he struck in with the i penetrating thought, linked, hpjrerey,. wiui. some wild speculation, that it !aj in the nkture of "those combinations which were suited to their ends (ia other words* in. harmony with their environment) to maintain themselves, while unfit combinations, haying no proper habitat, must rapidly disappear. Thus more than: 2,000 years ago the doctrine of the ' surrival of the fittest,' which in our day, not on the basis of vague conjecture, but of positive knowledge, has been raised to such extraordinary significance, had received at all events partial enunciation. (2) (1) Born 460 B.C. (2) Lange, 2nd edition, p. 23. ; [Tolecontiimd,'}