Life and Matter: A Criticism of Professor Haeckel's "Riddle of the Universe"Lodge, Oliver, Sir
Religion
Life and Matter: A Criticism of Professor Haeckel's "Riddle of the Universe"
Lodge, Oliver, Sir
Haeckel, Ernst, 1834-1919. Welträthsel; Life -- Origin; Monism; Philosophy and religion
Exactly; it is quite probable. It is, in fact, improbable that man is
the highest type of existence. But if Professor Haeckel is ready to
grant that probability or even possibility, why does he so strenuously
exclude the idea of revelation, _i.e._, the acquiring of imparted
information from higher sources? Savages can certainly have
"revelation" from civilised men. Why, then, should it be inconceivable
that human beings should receive information from beings in the
universe higher than themselves? It may or may not be the case that
they do; but there is no scientific ground for dogmatism on the
subject, nor any reason for asserting the inconceivability of such a
thing.
Professor Haeckel would no doubt reply to some of the above criticism
that he is not only a man of science, but also a philosopher, that he
is looking ahead, beyond ascertained fact, and that it is his
philosophic views which are in question rather than his scientific
statements. To some extent it is both, as has been seen; but if even
the above be widely known—if it be generally understood that the most
controversial portions of his work are mainly speculative and
hypothetical, it can be left to its proper purpose of doing good rather
than harm. It can only do harm by misleading, it can do considerable
good by criticising and stimulating and informing; and it is an
interesting fact that a man so well acquainted with biology as
Professor Haeckel is should have been so strongly impressed with the
truth of some aspect of the philosophic system known as Monism. Many
men of science have likewise been impressed with the probability, or
possibility, of some such ultimate unification.
The problem to be solved—and an old-world problem indeed it is—is the
range, and especially the nature, of the connection between mind and
matter; or, let us say, between the material universe on the one hand,
and the vital, the mental, the conscious and spiritual universe or
universes, on the other.
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