Newark post., 1912-11-27

DIR. Edward \. Shafcr, the president
OF the British Association for the Adj
vanccment of Science, has recently at
tracted great attention by declaring, in
the course of a speech before that body,
that Immortality is but dream; that
matter produces all those manifestations
which we call life; that life has been
produced anew upon this planet over and
over again, and that, as some parts of
the body remain alive long after the event
called death has taken place, the life of
a man is not en- entity, but a mere result
Of material forces. These assertions are
not new. Other men as distinguished
think his conclusions wrong. No one is
ut all bound to accept them. His Observ-
ations are not of all facts, but only of
some phenomena. His conclusions are
not necessarily sound because of the
great number of his observations or be-
cause Of the care with which he made
them. His statement that 1.-The phenom-
pna of life can only be investigated by
the same methods as all other phenomena
of NATTER shows plainly enough that he
has been observing matter only and has
been assuming that life Is a man1feoIa-
ton of matter, and not of superior
force; that he also assumes that life is a
rorm of matter, thus begging the queS-
ion, and that he assumes to investigate
the life where exists the whole mental and
emotional world as he investigates crys-
taS and mud banks. This is betrayal
Of bias, for to investigate life rs one
would investigate matter is as unnatur-
ii and illogical as would he the investi-
cation of music by the methods of chem
lstry.
His assertions strike chill to many
minds, for it is a confirmation, to some,
Of position long held by other mate
ralists. The writer of this realizes the
vastness of the subject, but does not hest
tate to point out as ought to be done
more persistently by ADLER men, the
weakness of this philosophy.
That matter produces those manifes-
tations which we call life has not been
proved. DR.. Shafer has never produced
fe without life to begin with. No one
else has done it, Phenomena similar to
that produced by life have been produced,
but similarity is a poor argument and
no proof. That no life appears to the
senses save by the means of matter is no
more an evidence that all life is produced
by matter than is the presence OF elec
tricity in a wire proof that the wire
originates the electricity. Life forms
matter to its uses, according to prede
termined pattern; tree, an animal, a
man, according to the previous history of
the life which is acting. Matter of it.
self never does anything active, though
it may limit the activities of life, as does
a crooked limb for example. 1t is much
more reasonable to consider life as Il sea
in which matter floats, human and other
life being manifestations of the penetra
ton and using of matter by life, than it
is to imagine matter doing anything OIL
producing anything of itself Forces OF
various kinds move matter, but it has OF
itself neither life, intelligence nor action
Forces of various kinds, chemical, gray
ity, electrical, act upon it, but in the ages
no particle of matter ever moved, by any
mind or force by itself created, as ia,
as has been proven.
But even allowing that the world OF
matter does, as DR.. Shafer declares, pro
duce life with all its manifestations OF