Page:Convocation Addresses of the Universities of Bombay and Madras.djvu/570

 science being looked upon as affording a complete account of the universe—as embracing the alpha and the omega of knowledge. Against this tendency—a tendency favoured by the training you have received—you must ever be on your guard. If the several sciences give only the final deliverances that can be made for the time being in their respective spheres, something more is needed before we can be said to possess a genuine and comprehensive conception of the universe. What is that something more? It is included in what Aristotle calls the 'First Philosophy' it is the undercurrent in all metaphysical speculation, it finds its highest expression in theology. Each science, in its search after unity of cause and law, ultimately arrives at certain laws of the highest generality as far as that science goes. It is the business of the First Philosophy to gather together these general laws, with a view to their being combined into a few still more general principles. And it is only when the final utterances of all the sciences have been thus co-ordinated and, if possible, subordinated to higher generalizations, that we can be said to have an adequate conception of the universe as a whole. To reach this lofty point of view, a minute acquaintance with all the special sciences is not necessary. The branches of knowledge are many, but the intellectual faculties employed and the operations carried on in scientific investigation are comparatively few. A mind thoroughly trained in habits of observation, experiment, comparison, abstraction, generalization, and inference, possesses all the fundamental qualifications for undertaking the task of discovering those higher generalizations which unite the different and often seemingly-conflicting conclusions of the several sciences. Cultivate, therefore, this habit of bringing the conclusions of the special sciences face to face, of comparing them one with another, of seeking for some higher or more general principle or law of which they are the specialized forms. This is the genuine breadth of culture. This it is that shows us the special sciences in their true proportions, as parts of one stupendous whole, and gives us a conception of the universe at once comprehensive and satisfying. It is doubtless true that in striving after this comprehensive view of the universe, men have often ignored altogether what the special sciences have had to say, and thus have been led into the wildest extravagances, peopling the universe with meaningless abstractions. But if you follow the course I am recommending, you will not fall into this snare, for in every step you take you will tread on the solid ground of nature as presented to you by the respective sciences. Nor will this habit of mind, which seeks to co-ordinate and unify the