His chief resumed: "No, we pretend to larger knowledge of living organisms; but how will our text-books be regarded by the teachers of the future? Will they not read us and smile over us as curious mixtures of truth and error--valuable as showing the state of science in our day? Do you dream of solving the mystery of life? Of bridging the chasm between the crystal and the non-nucleated cell? I do not. As I sat alone last night unable to sleep, my eyes ran over the backs of the books on my shelves--they were all there, all the great ones, Laplace, Spinoza, Descartes, Goethe, Spencer, Hegel, Kant, Darwin, all the wonder-workers. How masterful each had been in his time. How complacent of praise; how critical of the past! But here now they all stood gathering dust, and I thought: so will the unborn philosophers of the next century fold me up and put me away beside the other mouldy ones--curious but no longer useful. My book will be but an empty shell on the reef of human history. Of such cruelty are the makers of scientific advance." Morton was profoundly moved by the note of pathos, of disillusionment in the old man's voice. "Would you have me believe that these men we doubt to-day are forerunners of the future?" "I feel so. The materialists have had their day. Some subtler expression of matter is about to be given to the world, not as Kant gave it, but through experiment, and to men like Myers and Sir William Crookes may come great honor some day." "You would not have us weaken in our method?" Weissmann's manner changed. He resumed his most peremptory tone. "By no means. We must not relax our vigilant scrutiny of fact one atom's weight, but we must keep our minds open to new messages--no matter how repulsive the source." Morton sat for a moment in deep study, then said: "If I fail to stop the public announcement of Miss Lambert's powers, if Clarke's challenge is issued in spite of my protest, I shall ask the privilege of heading the committee in order to be present and shield her. If it comes to this, will you join me and support me?" "With pleasure." "But suppose the president and our board object?" "What right have they to object? So long as I do not neglect my duties they will not dare to object." "They will be scandalized. Two of us going into an investigation of this sort will seem to involve the whole school, and they may insist on our keeping out of it, so long as we are connected with the institution. If they ask for our resignation, the public will side with us, but all other institutions, and probably the bulk of our colleagues, will go against us. I hesitate, therefore, to ask you to take up this work. It is not a matter of bread and butter to me. I can resign, and I am thinking this is my best plan. At the same time I hope, for Miss Lambert's sake, that the public test will not be made."