“Besides that,” continues Schopenhauer, “these manifestations present to us a substantial and perfectly logical contradiction to materialism, and even to naturalism, because in the light of such manifestations, {60} that order of things in nature which both these philosophies seek to present as absolute and the only genuine, appears before us on the contrary purely phenomenal and superficial, and containing at the bottom of it a substance of things _à parte_ and perfectly independent of its own laws. That is why these manifestations—at least from a purely philosophical point of view—among all the facts which are presented to us in the domain of experiment, are beyond any comparison the most important. Therefore, it is the duty of every scientist to acquaint himself with them.”[137] To pass from the philosophical speculations of a man like Schopenhauer to the superficial generalizations of some of the French Academicians, would be profitless but for the fact that it enables us to estimate the intellectual grasp of the two schools of learning. What the German makes of profound psychological questions, we have seen. Compare with it the best that the astronomer Babinet and the chemist Boussingault can offer by way of explaining an important spiritualistic phenomenon. In 1854-5 these distinguished specialists presented to the Academy a _memoire_, or monograph, whose evident object was to corroborate and at the same time make clearer Dr. Chevreuil’s too complicated theory in explanation of the turning-tables, of the commission for the investigation of which he was a member. Here it is _verbatim_: “As to the movements and oscillations _alleged_ to happen with certain tables, they can have no cause other than the _invisible_ and involuntary vibrations of the experimenter’s muscular system; the extended contraction of the muscles manifesting itself at such time by a series of vibrations, and becoming thus a _visible tremor_ which communicates to the object a circumrotary motion. This rotation is thus enabled to manifest itself with a considerable energy, by a gradually quickening motion, or by a strong resistance, whenever it is required to stop. Hence the physical explanation of the phenomenon becomes clear and does not offer the slightest difficulty.”[138] None whatever. This scientific hypothesis—or demonstration shall we say?—is as clear as one of M. Babinet’s nebulæ examined on a foggy night.