POETRY.
THE BATTLE OF THE BIOLOGISTS.
SCHIFEB, fresh from the perusal Of your stimulating screed, With its resolute refusal Of the vitalistic creed, I at once anticipated That a score of dons and deans Would denounce a view which rated Men no higher than machines. Yet 'tie clear you cannot kindle Embers of that fiery past, When iconoclastic Tyndall Launched his bombshell at Belfast.
For without a snort or splutter All the orthodox divines "Go on cutting bread-and-butter" On the ordinary lines.
Then it was the priests and preachers Who were loudest in their cries At the arrogance of teachers Building on a wild surmise.
Now it is the ranks of science That, by inner schism rent, Breathe a mutual defiance And implacable dissent.
Solvers of the World's Acrostic
Sought to cast Religion out; Now we see the New Agnostic
Racked with scientific doubt.
Wherefore he who, like a wafer, Clingeth to the angels' side Smiles to see you, doughty Schafer, By your colleagues scarified; Smiles to see Professor Minchin Heaving controversial bricks, Or Professor Geddes clinchin' With monistic heretics; Smiles when views materialistic, Ruled by chemists out of court, Gain from Lodge, the " spiritistic," An unqualified support; Smiles to learn that all the stages Of your argument to-day Were forestalled by earlier sages—. Huxley and the massive Ray; Gains a mild ironic solace
From the pages of the Mail, When he reads of Russel Wallace Going for you tooth and nail;
Sees, in fine, that theologians, When they grapple in the lists, Though they fight and hate like Trojans, Cannot match biologists.
C. L. G.
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