Nature and the Gods

Ladies and Gentlemen,-No word has played a more important part in the discussion of scientific and philosophical questions than the word Nature.

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Excerpt:

Everyone thinks he knows the meaning of it. Yet how few have used it to express the same idea; indeed it has been employed to convey such a variety of impressions that John Stuart Mill asserts that it has been the "fruitful source" of the propagation of "false taste, false philosophy, false morality, and even bad law."

Now, I propose in this lecture that we start with some clear ideas concerning the meaning of such words, upon the right understanding of which the whole force of my arguments depends. What, then, is meant by the word Nature?

When used by a materialist it has two important meanings. In its large and philosophical sense it means, as Mr. Mill says: "The sum of all phenomena, together with the causes which produce them, including not only all that happens, but all that is capable of happening-the unused capabilities of matter being as much a part of the idea of Nature as those which take effect."

But the word Nature is often used, and rightly used, to distinguish the "natural" from the "artificial" object-that is, to indicate the difference between a thing produced spontaneously by Nature, from a thing wrought by the skill and labor of man.