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2i8 HERBERT SPENCER

ing quantity of motion, sensible or insensible, has for
its concomitant a decreasing aggregation of matter."

In regard to this Prof. Pearson remarks : " This
principle has, so far as I am aware, no real foundation
in physics ... it seems, so far as I can grasp it at
all, to flatly contradict the modern principle of the
conservation of energy" . . . the keystone of Spencer's
system.

(5) What has taken place since Spencer stereotyped
his First Principles seems to us to have rendered
it almost useless to attempt a detailed criticism of his
scheme of evolution—wonderful and stimulating as it
was and is. He spoke of his delight in " intellectual
hunting," and a great huntsman he certainly was, but
the venue has changed since his day. He did not
fully nor "always rightly utilise the chemistry and
physics of his time, and we have now to deal with a
new chemistry and a new physics.

Mr J. B.Crozier speaks of Spencer as "of all thinkers
ancient or modern the one whose power of analysing,
decomposing, and combining the complex web of
Matter, Motion, and Force is the most incontestable
and assured." He describes Spencer's system as " No
mere logical castle built of air and definitions, and
assuming in its premises, like the systems of the
metaphysicians, the very difficulties to be explained,
but a great granite pile sunk deep in the bed-rock of
the world, each stone a scientific truth, and all so
compacted and dove-tailed together that it was difficult
to find anywhere a logical flaw among their seams."

This is one view, but another will be found in
Prof. James Ward's Gifford Lectures on "Naturalism
and Agnosticism," in Mr Malcolm Guthrie's three



	2i8 HERBERT SPENCER ing quantity of motion, sensible or insensible, has for its concomitant a decreasing aggregation of matter." In regard to this Prof. Pearson remarks : " This principle has, so far as I am aware, no real foundation in physics ... it seems, so far as I can grasp it at all, to flatly contradict the modern principle of the conservation of energy" . . . the keystone of Spencer's system. (5) What has taken place since Spencer stereotyped his First Principles seems to us to have rendered it almost useless to attempt a detailed criticism of his scheme of evolution—wonderful and stimulating as it was and is. He spoke of his delight in " intellectual hunting," and a great huntsman he certainly was, but the venue has changed since his day. He did not fully nor "always rightly utilise the chemistry and physics of his time, and we have now to deal with a new chemistry and a new physics. Mr J. B.Crozier speaks of Spencer as "of all thinkers ancient or modern the one whose power of analysing, decomposing, and combining the complex web of Matter, Motion, and Force is the most incontestable and assured." He describes Spencer's system as " No mere logical castle built of air and definitions, and assuming in its premises, like the systems of the metaphysicians, the very difficulties to be explained, but a great granite pile sunk deep in the bed-rock of the world, each stone a scientific truth, and all so compacted and dove-tailed together that it was difficult to find anywhere a logical flaw among their seams." This is one view, but another will be found in Prof. James Ward's Gifford Lectures on "Naturalism and Agnosticism," in Mr Malcolm Guthrie's three