attributed of old to some Vis Formatrix of nature; and are now
attributed to some other abstract formula, as they will be to some
fresh one, and to a dozen more, before the century is out; because
the more accurately and deeply they are investigated, the more
inexplicable they will be found.

So it is; but the 'public' are not inclined to believe that so it
is, and will not see, till their minds get somewhat of a truly
scientific training.

If any average educated person were asked--Which seemed to him more
wonderful, that a hen's egg should always produce a chicken, or that
it should now and then produce a sparrow or a duckling?--can it be
doubted what answer he would give? or that it would be the wrong
answer? What answer, again, would he make to the question--Which is
more wonderful, that dwarfs and giants (i.e. people under four feet
six or over six feet six) should be exceedingly rare, or that the
human race is not of all possible heights from three inches to
thirty feet? Can it be doubted that in this case, as in the last,
the wrong answer would be given? He would defend himself, probably,
if he had a smattering of science, by saying that experience teaches
us that Nature works by 'invariable laws'; by which he would mean,
usually unbroken customs; and that he has, therefore, a right to be
astonished if they are broken. But he would be wrong. The just
cause of astonishment is, that the laws are, on the whole,
invariable; that the customs are so seldom broken; that sun and
moon, plants and animals, grains of dust and vesicles of vapour, are
not perpetually committing some vagary or other, and making as great
fools of themselves as human beings are wont to do. Happily for the
existence of the universe, they do not. But how, and still more
why, things in general behave so respectably and loyally, is a
wonder which is either utterly inexplicable, or explicable, I hold,
only on the old theory that they obey Some One--whom we obey to a
very limited extent indeed. Not that this latter theory gets rid of
the perpetual and omnipresent element of wondrousness. If matter
alone exists, it is a wonder and a mystery how it obeys itself. If
A Spirit exists, it is a wonder and a mystery how He makes matter
obey Him. All that the scientific man can do is, to confess the
presence of mystery all day long; and to live in that wholesome and
calm attitude of wonder which we call awe and r