I. THE UNSEEN WORLD.

PART FIRST.

“What are you, where did you come from, and whither are you bound?”— the question which from Homer’s days has been put to the wayfarer² in strange lands — is likewise the all-absorbing question which man is ever asking of the universe of which he is himself so tiny yet so wondrous³ a part. From the earliest times the ultimate purpose of all scientific research has been to elicit⁴ fragmentary or partial responses to this question, and philosophy has ever busied itself in piecing together these several bits of information according to the best methods at its disposal, in order to make up something like a satisfactory answer. In old times the best methods which philosophy had at its disposal for this purpose were such as now seem very crude, and accordingly ancient philosophers bungled⁵ considerably⁶ in their task, though now and then they came surprisingly near what would to-day be called the truth. It was natural that their methods should be crude, for scientific inquiry⁷ had as yet supplied but scanty⁸ materials for them to work with, and it was only after a very long course of speculation⁹ and criticism that men could find out what ways of going to work are likely to prove successful and what are not. The earliest thinkers, indeed, were further hindered from accomplishing much by the imperfections of the language by the aid of which their thinking was done; for science and philosophy have had to make a serviceable terminology¹⁰ by dint¹¹ of long and arduous¹² trial and practice, and linguistic¹³ processes fit for expressing general or abstract notions accurately¹⁴ grew up only through numberless failures and at the expense of much inaccurate¹⁵ thinking and loose talking. As in most of nature’s processes, there was a great waste of energy before a good result could be secured. Accordingly primitive¹⁶ men were very wide of the mark in their views of nature. To them the world was a sort of enchanted¹⁷ ground, peopled with sprites and goblins; the quaint¹⁸ notions with which we now amuse our children in fairy tales represent a style of thinking which once was current among grown men and women, and which is still current wherever men remain in a savage¹⁹ condition. The theories of the world wrought²⁰ out by early priest-philosophers were in great part made up of such grotesque²¹ notions; and having become variously implicated²² with ethical²³ opinions as to the nature and consequences of right and wrong behaviour, they acquired a kind of sanctity, so that any thinker who in the light of a wider experience ventured to alter or amend²⁴ the primitive theory was likely to be vituperated as an irreligious man or atheist²⁵. This sort of inference has not yet been wholly abandoned, even in civilized²⁶ communities. Even to-day books are written about “the conflict between religion and science,” and other books are written with intent to reconcile the two presumed antagonists²⁷. But when we look beneath the surface of things, we see that in reality there has never been any conflict between religion and science, nor is any reconciliation²⁸ called for where harmony has always existed. The real historical conflict, which has been thus curiously²⁹ misnamed, has been the conflict between the more-crude opinions belonging to the science of an earlier age and the less-crude opinions belonging to the science of a later age. In the course of this contest the more-crude opinions have usually been defended in the name of religion, and the less-crude opinions have invariably won the victory; but religion itself, which is not concerned with opinion, but with the aspiration³¹ which leads us to strive after a purer and holier life, has seldom or never been attacked. On the contrary, the scientific men who have conducted the battle on behalf of the less-crude opinions have generally been influenced by this religious aspiration quite as strongly as the apologists of the more-crude opinions, and so far from religious feeling having been weakened by their perennial³⁴ series of victories, it has apparently³⁵ been growing deeper and stronger all the time. The religious sense is as yet too feebly developed in most of us; but certainly in no preceding age have men taken up the work of life with more earnestness or with more real faith in the unseen than at the present day, when so much of what was once deemed all-important knowledge has been consigned³⁶ to the limbo³⁷ of mythology³⁸.

The more-crude theories of early times are to be chiefly distinguished³⁹ from the less-crude theories of to-day as being largely the products of random⁴⁰ guesswork. Hypothesis, or guesswork, indeed, lies at the foundation of all scientific knowledge. The riddle⁴¹ of the universe, like less important riddles⁴², is unravelled⁴³ only by approximative trials, and the most brilliant discoverers have usually been the bravest guessers. Kepler’s laws were the result of indefatigable⁴⁴ guessing, and so, in a somewhat different sense, was the wave-theory of light. But the guesswork of scientific inquirers is very different now from what it was in older times. In the first place, we have slowly learned that a guess must be verified before it can be accepted as a sound theory; and, secondly⁴⁵, so many truths have been established beyond contravention, that the latitude⁴⁶ for hypothesis is much less than it once was. Nine tenths of the guesses which might have occurred to a mediaeval philosopher would now be ruled out as inadmissible, because they would not harmonize with the knowledge which has been acquired since the Middle Ages. There is one direction especially in which this continuous limitation of guesswork by ever-accumulating experience has manifested itself. From first to last, all our speculative⁴⁸ successes and failures have agreed in teaching us that the most general principles of action which prevail to-day, and in our own corner of the universe, have always prevailed throughout as much of the universe as is accessible to our research. They have taught us that for the deciphering of the past and the predicting of the future, no hypotheses are admissible which are not based upon the actual behaviour of things in the present. Once there was unlimited⁴⁹ facility for guessing as to how the solar system might have come into existence; now the origin of the sun and planets is adequately explained when we have unfolded all that is implied in the processes which are still going on in the solar system. Formerly⁵⁰ appeals were made to all manner of violent agencies to account for the changes which the earth’s surface has undergone since our planet began its independent career; now it is seen that the same slow working of rain and tide, of wind and wave and frost, of secular⁵¹ contraction⁵² and of earthquake pulse, which is visible to-day, will account for the whole. It is not long since it was supposed that a species of animals or plants could be swept away only by some unusual catastrophe⁵³, while for the origination of new species something called an act of “special creation” was necessary; and as to the nature of such extraordinary events there was endless room for guesswork; but the discovery of natural selection was the discovery of a process, going on perpetually under our very eyes, which must inevitably⁵⁴ of itself extinguish some species and bring new ones into being. In these and countless⁵⁵ other ways we have learned that all the rich variety of nature is pervaded⁵⁶ by unity⁵⁷ of action, such as we might expect to find if nature is the manifestation⁵⁸ of an infinite God who is without variableness or shadow of turning, but quite incompatible⁵⁹ with the fitful behaviour of the anthropomorphic deities⁶⁰ of the old mythologies⁶¹. By thus abstaining⁶² from all appeal to agencies that are extra-cosmic, or not involved in the orderly system of events that we see occurring around us, we have at last succeeded in eliminating from philosophic⁶³ speculation the character of random guesswork which at first of necessity belonged to it. Modern scientific hypothesis is so far from being a haphazard⁶⁴ mental proceeding⁶⁵ that it is perhaps hardly fair to classify it with guesses. It is lifted out of the plane of guesswork, in so far as it has acquired the character of inevitable⁶⁶ inference from that which now is to that which has been or will be. Instead of the innumerable particular assumptions which were once admitted into cosmic philosophy, we are now reduced to the one universal assumption which has been variously described as the “principle of continuity,” the “uniformity of nature,” the “persistence of force,” or the “law of causation,” and which has been variously explained as a necessary datum⁶⁷ for scientific thinking or as a net result of all induction⁶⁸. I am not unwilling⁶⁹, however, to adopt the language of a book which has furnished the occasion for the present discussion, and to say that this grand assumption is a supreme⁷⁰ act of faith, the definite expression of a trust that the infinite Sustainer of the universe “will not put us to permanent intellectual confusion.” For in this mode of statement the harmony between the scientific and the religious points of view is well brought out. It is as affording the only outlet⁷¹ from permanent intellectual confusion that inquirers have been driven to appeal to the principle of continuity; and it is by unswerving reliance upon this principle that we have obtained such insight into the past, present, and future of the world as we now possess.

The work just mentioned1 is especially interesting as an attempt to bring the probable destiny of the human soul into connection with the modern theories which explain the past and future career of the physical universe in accordance with the principle of continuity. Its authorship is as yet unknown, but it is believed to be the joint⁷² production of two of the most eminent⁷³ physicists⁷⁴ in Great Britain, and certainly the accurate knowledge and the ingenuity⁷⁵ and subtlety⁷⁶ of thought displayed in it are such as to lend great probability to this conjecture⁷⁷. Some account of the argument it contains may well precede the suggestions presently to be set forth⁷⁹ concerning the Unseen World; and we shall find it most convenient to begin, like our authors, with a brief statement of what the principle of continuity teaches as to the proximate beginning and end of the visible universe. I shall in the main set down only results, having elsewhere2 given a simple exposition of the arguments upon which these results are founded.

1 The Unseen Universe; or, Physical Speculations⁸⁰ on a Future State. [Attributed to Professors TAIT and BALFOUR STEWART.] New York: Macmillan & Co. 1875. 8vo. pp. 212.

2 Outlines of Cosmic Philosophy, based on the Doctrine⁸¹ of Evolution. Boston: J. R. Osgood & Co. 1875. 2 vols. 8vo.

The first great cosmological speculation which has been raised quite above the plane of guesswork by making no other assumption than that of the uniformity of nature, is the well-known Nebular Hypothesis. Every astronomer⁸⁴ knows that the earth, like all other cosmical bodies which are flattened⁸⁵ at the poles, was formerly a mass of fluid, and consequently filled a much larger space than at present. It is further agreed, on all hands, that the sun is a contracting body, since there is no other possible way of accounting⁸⁶ for the enormous quantity of heat which he generates. The so-called primeval nebula⁸³ follows as a necessary inference from these facts. There was once a time when the earth was distended⁸⁷ on all sides away out to the moon and beyond it, so that the matter now contained in the moon was then a part of our equatorial zone. And at a still remoter date in the past, the mass of the sun was diffused⁸⁸ in every direction beyond the orbit of Neptune⁸⁹, and no planet had an individual existence, for all were indistinguishable parts of the solar mass. When the great mass of the sun, increased by the relatively⁹⁰ small mass of all the planets put together, was spread out in this way, it was a rare vapour or gas. At the period where the question is taken up in Laplace’s treatment of the nebular theory, the shape of this mass is regarded as spheroidal; but at an earlier period its shape may well have been as irregular as that of any of the nebulae which we now see in distant parts of the heavens, for, whatever its primitive shape, the equalization of its rotation⁹¹ would in time make it spheroidal. That the QUANTITY of rotation was the same then as now is unquestionable; for no system of particles, great or small, can acquire or lose rotation by any action going on within itself, any more than a man could pick himself up by his waistband and lift himself over a stone wale So that the primitive rotating spheroidal solar nebula is not a matter of assumption, but is just what must once have existed, provided there has been no breach⁹² of continuity in nature’s operations. Now proceeding to reason back from the past to the present, it has been shown that the abandonment of successive equatorial belts by the contracting solar mass must have ensued in accordance with known mechanical laws; and in similar wise, under ordinary circumstances. each belt must have parted into fragments, and the fragments chasing each other around the same orbit, must have at last coalesced⁹³ into a spheroidal planet. Not only this, but it has also been shown that as the result of such a process the relative sizes of the planets would be likely to take the order which they now follow; that the ring immediately succeeding that of Jupiter would be likely to abort⁹⁵ and produce a great number of tiny planets instead of one good-sized one; that the outer planets would be likely to have many moons, and that Saturn⁹⁶, besides having the greatest number of moons, would be likely to retain some of his inner rings unbroken; that the earth would be likely to have a long day and Jupiter a short one; that the extreme outer planets would be not unlikely to rotate in a retrograde direction; and so on, through a long list of interesting and striking details. Not only, therefore, are we driven to the inference that our solar system was once a vaporous nebula, but we find that the mere⁹⁷ contraction of such a nebula, under the influence of the enormous mutual⁹⁸ gravitation of its particles, carries with it the explanation of both the more general and the more particular features of the present system. So that we may fairly regard this stupendous process as veritable matter of history, while we proceed to study it under some further aspects and to consider what consequences are likely to follow.

Our attention should first be directed to the enormous waste of energy which has accompanied this contraction of the solar nebula. The first result of such a contraction is the generation of a great quantity of heat, and when the heat thus generated has been lost by radiation into surrounding space it becomes possible for the contraction to continue. Thus, as concentration goes on, heat is incessantly⁹⁹ generated and incessantly dissipated. How long this process is to endure depends chiefly on the size of the contracting mass, as small bodies radiate heat much faster than large ones. The moon seems to be already thoroughly¹⁰⁰ refrigerated, while Jupiter and Saturn are very much hotter than the earth, as is shown by the tremendous atmospheric¹⁰¹ phenomena¹⁰² which occur on their surfaces. The sun, again, generates heat so rapidly, owing to his great energy of contraction, and loses it so slowly, owing to his great size, that his surface is always kept in a state of incandescence¹⁰³. His surface-temperature is estimated at some three million degrees of Fahrenheit¹⁰⁴, and a diminution¹⁰⁵ of his diameter far too small to be detected by the finest existing instruments would suffice to maintain the present supply of heat for more than fifty centuries. These facts point to a very long future during which the sun will continue to warm the earth and its companion planets, but at the same time they carry on their face the story of inevitable ultimate doom¹⁰⁶. If things continue to go on as they have all along gone on, the sun must by and by grow black and cold, and all life whatever throughout the solar system must come to an end. Long before this consummation, however, life will probably have become extinct through the refrigeration of each of the planets into a state like the present state of the moon, in which the atmosphere and oceans have disappeared from the surface. No doubt the sun will continue to give out heat a long time after heat has ceased to be needed for the support of living organisms. For the final refrigeration of the sun will long be postponed¹⁰⁷ by the fate of the planets themselves. The separation of the planets from their parent solar mass seems to be after all but a temporary separation. So nicely balanced are they now in their orbits that they may well seem capable of rolling on in their present courses forever. But this is not the case. Two sets of circumstances are all the while striving, the one to drive the planets farther away from the sun, the other to draw them all into it. On the one hand, every body in our system which contains fluid matter has tides raised upon its surface by the attraction of neighbouring bodies. All the planets raise tides upon the surface of the sun and the periodicity of sun-spots (or solar cyclones) depends upon this fact. These tidal waves act as a drag or brake upon the rotation of the sun, somewhat diminishing its rapidity. But, in conformity¹⁰⁸ with a principle of mechanics well known to astronomers¹⁰⁹, though not familiar to the general reader, all the motion of rotation thus lost by the sun is added to the planets in the shape of annual motion of revolution, and thus their orbits all tend to enlarge — they all tend to recede⁷⁸ somewhat from the sun. But this state of things, though long-enduring enough, is after all only temporary, and will at any rate come to an end when the sun and planets have become solid. Meanwhile another set of circumstances is all the time tending to bring the planets nearer to the sun, and in the long run must gain the mastery. The space through which the planets move is filled with a kind of matter which serves as a medium for the transmission of heat and light, and this kind of matter, though different in some respects from ordinary ponderable matter, is yet like it in exerting friction¹¹⁰. This friction is almost infinitely¹¹¹ little, yet it has a wellnigh infinite length of time to work in, and during all this wellnigh infinite length of time it is slowly eating up the momentum¹¹² of the planets and diminishing their ability to maintain their distances from the sun. Hence in course of time the planets will all fall into the sun, one after another, so that the solar system will end, as it began, by consisting of a single mass of matter.

But this is by no means the end of the story. When two bodies rush together, each parts with some of its energy of motion, and this lost energy of motion reappears as heat. In the concussion¹¹³ of two cosmical bodies, like the sun and the earth, an enormous quantity of motion is thus converted into heat. Now heat, when not allowed to radiate, or when generated faster than it can be radiated, is transformed into motion of expansion. Hence the shock of sun and planet would at once result in the vaporization of both bodies; and there can be no doubt that by the time the sun has absorbed the outermost¹¹⁴ of his attendant planets, he will have resumed something like his original nebulous condition. He will have been dilated¹¹⁵ into a huge mass of vapour, and will have become fit for a new process of contraction and for a new production of life-bearing planets.

We are now, however, confronted by an interesting but difficult question. Throughout all this grand past and future career of the solar system which we have just briefly¹¹⁶ traced, we have been witnessing a most prodigal¹¹⁷ dissipation of energy in the shape of radiant heat. At the outset we had an enormous quantity of what is called “energy of position,” that is, the outer parts of our primitive nebula had a very long distance through which to travel towards one another in the slow process of concentration; and this distance was the measure of the quantity of work possible to our system. As the particles of our nebula drew nearer and nearer together, the energy of position continually lost reappeared continually as heat, of which the greater part was radiated off, but of which a certain amount was retained. All the gigantic amount of work achieved in the geologic¹¹⁸ development of our earth and its companion planets, and in the development of life wherever life may exist in our system, has been the product of this retained heat. At the present day the same wasteful¹¹⁹ process is going on. Each moment the sun’s particles are losing energy of position as they draw closer and closer together, and the heat into which this lost energy is metamorphosed is poured out most prodigally¹²⁰ in every direction. Let us consider for a moment how little of it gets used in our system. The earth’s orbit is a nearly circular figure more than five hundred million miles in circumference¹²¹, while only eight thousand miles of this path are at any one time occupied by the earth’s mass. Through these eight thousand miles the sun’s radiated energy is doing work, but through the remainder of the five hundred million it is idle and wasted. But the case is far more striking when we reflect that it is not in the plane of the earth’s orbit only that the sun’s radiance is being poured out. It is not an affair of a circle, but of a sphere. In order to utilize¹²² all the solar rays, we should need to have an immense number of earths arranged so as to touch each other, forming a hollow sphere around the sun, with the present radius¹²³ of the earth’s orbit. We may well believe Professor Tyndall, therefore, when he tells us that all the solar radiance we receive is less than a two-billionth part of what is sent flying through the desert regions of space. Some of the immense residue¹²⁴ of course hits other planets stationed in the way of it, and is utilized¹²⁵ upon their surfaces; but the planets, all put together, stop so little of the total quantity that our startling illustration is not materially altered by taking them into the account. Now this two-billionth part of the solar radiance poured out from moment to moment suffices to blow every wind, to raise every cloud, to drive every engine, to build up the tissue of every plant, to sustain the activity of every animal, including man, upon the surface of our vast and stately globe. Considering the wondrous richness and variety of the terrestrial life wrought out by the few sunbeams which we catch in our career through space, we may well pause overwhelmed and stupefied at the thought of the incalculable possibilities of existence which are thrown away with the potent¹²⁶ actinism that darts¹²⁷ unceasingly into the unfathomed abysms of immensity. Where it goes to or what becomes of it, no one of us can surmise¹²⁸.

Now when, in the remote future, our sun is reduced to vapour by the impact of the several planets upon his surface, the resulting nebulous mass must be a very insignificant¹²⁹ affair compared with the nebulous mass with which we started. In order to make a second nebula equal in size and potential energy to the first one, all the energy of position at first existing should have been retained in some form or other. But nearly all of it has been lost, and only an insignificant fraction remains¹³⁰ with which to endow a new system. In order to reproduce, in future ages, anything like that cosmical development which is now going on in the solar system, aid must be sought from without. We must endeavour to frame some valid¹³¹ hypothesis as to the relation of our solar system to other systems.

Thus far our view has been confined to the career of a single star — our sun — with the tiny, easily-cooling balls which it has cast off in the course of its development. Thus far, too, our inferences have been very secure, for we have been dealing¹³² with a circumscribed¹³³ group of phenomena, the beginning and end of which have been brought pretty well within the compass of our imagination. It is quite another thing to deal with the actual or probable career of the stars in general, inasmuch as we do not even know how many stars there are, which form parts of a common system, or what. are their precise dynamic relations to one another. Nevertheless we have knowledge of a few facts which may support some cautious inferences. All the stars which we can see are undoubtedly¹³⁴ bound together by relations of gravitation. No doubt our sun attracts all the other stars within our ken³³, and is reciprocally attracted by them. The stars, too, lie mostly in or around one great plane, as is the case with the members of the solar system. Moreover, the stars are shown by the spectroscope to consist of chemical elements identical with those which are found in the solar system. Such facts as these make it probable that the career of other stars, when adequately inquired into, would be found to be like that of our own sun. Observation daily enhances this probability, for our study of the sidereal¹³⁵ universe is continually showing us stars in all stages of development. We find irregular nebulae, for example; we find spiral and spheroidal nebulae; we find stars which have got beyond the nebulous stage, but are still at a whiter heat than our sun; and we also find many stars which yield the same sort of spectrum¹³⁶ as our sun. The inference seems forced upon us that the same process of concentration which has gone on in the case of our solar nebula has been going on in the case of other nebulae. The history of the sun is but a type of the history of stars in general. And when we consider that all other visible stars and nebulae are cooling and contracting bodies, like our sun, to what other conclusion could we very well come? When we look at Sirius, for instance, we do not see him surrounded by planets, for at such a distance no planet could be visible, even Sirius himself, though fourteen times larger than our sun, appearing only as a “twinkling little star.” But a comparative survey of the heavens assures us that Sirius can hardly have arrived at his present stage of concentration without detaching, planet-forming rings, for there is no reason for supposing that mechanical laws out there are at all different from what they are in our own system. And the same kind of inference must apply to all the matured stars which we see in the heavens.

When we duly take all these things into the account, the case of our solar system will appear as only one of a thousand cases of evolution and dissolution with which the heavens furnish us. Other stars, like our sun, have undoubtedly started as vaporous masses, and have thrown off planets in contracting. The inference may seem a bold one, but it after all involves no other assumption than that of the continuity of natural phenomena. It is not likely, therefore, that the solar system will forever be left to itself. Stars which strongly gravitate toward each other, while moving through a perennially¹³⁷ resisting medium, must in time be drawn¹³⁸ together. The collision of our extinct sun with one of the Pleiades, after this manner, would very likely suffice to generate even a grander nebula than the one with which we started. Possibly the entire galactic system may, in an inconceivably remote future, remodel¹³⁹ itself in this way; and possibly the nebula from which our own group of planets has been formed may have owed its origin to the disintegration¹⁴⁰ of systems which had accomplished¹⁴¹ their career in the depths of the bygone eternity¹⁴².

When the problem is extended to these huge dimensions, the prospect¹⁴³ of an ultimate cessation of cosmical work is indefinitely postponed, but at the same time it becomes impossible for us to deal very securely with the questions we have raised. The magnitudes and periods we have introduced are so nearly infinite as to baffle speculation itself: One point, however, we seem dimly to discern. Supposing the stellar universe not to be absolutely infinite in extent, we may hold that the day of doom, so often postponed, must come at last. The concentration of matter and dissipation of energy, so often checked, must in the end prevail, so that, as the final outcome of things, the entire universe will be reduced to a single enormous ball, dead and frozen, solid and black, its potential energy of motion having been all transformed into heat and radiated away. Such a conclusion has been suggested by Sir William Thomson, and it is quite forcibly stated by the authors of “The Unseen Universe.” They remind us that “if there be any one form of energy less readily or less completely transformable than the others, and if transformations¹⁴⁴ constantly go on, more and more of the whole energy of the universe will inevitably sink into this lower grade as time advances.” Now radiant heat, as we have seen, is such a lower grade of energy. “At each transformation¹⁴⁵ of heat-energy into work, a large portion is degraded, while only a small portion is transformed into work. So that while it is very easy to change all of our mechanical or useful energy into heat, it is only possible to transform a portion of this heat-energy back again into work. After each change, too, the heat becomes more and more dissipated or degraded, and less and less available for any future transformation. In other words,” our authors continue, “the tendency of heat is towards equalization; heat is par¹ excellence¹⁴⁶ the communist of our universe, and it will no doubt ultimately bring the system to an end. . . . . It is absolutely certain that life, so far as it is physical, depends essentially¹⁴⁷ upon transformations of energy; it is also absolutely certain that age after age the possibility of such transformations is becoming less and less; and, so far as we yet know, the final state of the present universe must be an aggregation¹⁴⁸ (into one mass) of all the matter it contains, i. e. the potential energy gone, and a practically useless state of kinetic¹⁴⁹ energy, i. e. uniform temperature throughout that mass.” Thus our authors conclude that the visible universe began in time and will in time come to an end; and they add that under the physical conditions of such a universe “immortality¹⁵⁰ is impossible.”

Concerning the latter inference we shall by and by have something to say. Meanwhile this whole speculation as to the final cessation of cosmical work seems to me — as it does to my friend, Professor Clifford3 — by no means trustworthy. The conditions of the problem so far transcend¹⁵² our grasp that any such speculation must remain an unverifiable guess. I do not go with Professor Clifford in doubting whether the laws of mechanics are absolutely the same throughout eternity; I cannot quite reconcile such a doubt with faith in the principle of continuity. But it does seem to me needful, before we conclude that radiated energy is absolutely and forever wasted, that we should find out what becomes of it. What we call radiant heat is simply transverse wave-motion, propagated with enormous velocity¹⁵³ through an ocean of subtle ethereal matter which bathes the atoms of all visible or palpable bodies and fills the whole of space, extending beyond the remotest star which the telescope can reach. Whether there are any bounds at all to this ethereal ocean, or whether it is as infinite as space itself, we cannot surmise. If it be limited, the possible dispersion of radiant energy is limited by its extent. Heat and light cannot travel through emptiness. If the ether is bounded by surrounding emptiness, then a ray of heat, on arriving at this limiting emptiness, would be reflected back as surely as a ball is sent back when thrown against a solid wall. If this be the case, it will not affect our conclusions concerning such a tiny region of space as is occupied by the solar system, but it will seriously modify Sir William Thomson’s suggestion as to the fate of the universe as a whole. The radiance thrown away by the sun is indeed lost so far as the future of our system is concerned, but not a single unit of it is lost from the universe. Sooner or later, reflected back in all directions, it must do work in one quarter or another, so that ultimate stagnation¹⁵⁴ be comes impossible. It is true that no such return of radiant energy has been detected in our corner of the world; but we have not yet so far disentangled all the force-relations of the universe that we are entitled to regard such a return as impossible. This is one way of escape from the consummation of things depicted¹⁵⁶ by our authors. Another way of escape is equally available, if we suppose that while the ether is without bounds the stellar universe also extends to infinity¹⁵⁷. For in this case the reproduction of nebulous masses fit for generating new systems of worlds must go on through space that is endless, and consequently the process can never come to an end and can never have had a beginning. We have, therefore, three alternatives: either the visible universe is finite, while the ether is infinite; or both are finite; or both are infinite. Only on the first supposition, I think, do we get a universe which began in time and must end in time. Between such stupendous alternatives we have no grounds for choosing. But it would seem that the third, whether strictly¹⁵⁸ true or not, best represents the state of the case relatively to our feeble capacity of comprehension. Whether absolutely infinite or not, the dimensions of the universe must be taken as practically infinite, so far as human thought is concerned. They immeasurably transcend the capabilities¹⁵⁹ of any gauge¹⁶⁰ we can bring to bear on them. Accordingly all that we are really entitled to hold, as the outcome of sound speculation, is the conception of innumerable systems of worlds concentrating out of nebulous masses, and then rushing together and dissolving into similar masses, as bubbles unite and break up — now here, now there — in their play on the surface of a pool, and to this tremendous series of events we can assign neither a beginning nor an end.

3 Fortnightly Review, April, 1875.

We must now make some more explicit¹⁶¹ mention of the ether which carries through space the rays of heat and light. In closest connection with the visible stellar universe, the vicissitudes¹⁶² of which we have briefly traced, the all-pervading¹⁶³ ether constitutes a sort of unseen world remarkable¹⁶⁴ enough from any point of view, but to which the theory of our authors ascribes capacities hitherto unsuspected by science. The very existence of an ocean of ether enveloping¹⁶⁵ the molecules¹⁶⁷ of material bodies has been doubted or denied by many eminent physicists, though of course none have called in question the necessity for some interstellar medium for the transmission of thermal¹⁶⁸ and luminous¹⁶⁹ vibrations¹⁷⁰. This scepticism has been, I think, partially¹⁷² justified¹⁷³ by the many difficulties encompassing¹⁷⁴ the conception, into which, however, we need not here enter. That light and heat cannot be conveyed by any of the ordinary sensible forms of matter is unquestionable. None of the forms of sensible matter can be imagined sufficiently¹⁷⁵ elastic¹⁷⁶ to propagate wave-motion at the rate of one hundred and eighty-eight thousand miles per second. Yet a ray of light is a series of waves, and implies some substance in which the waves occur. The substance required is one which seems to possess strangely contradictory¹⁷⁷ properties. It is commonly regarded as an “ether” or infinitely rare substance; but, as Professor Jevons observes, we might as well regard it as an infinitely solid “adamant.” “Sir John Herschel has calculated the amount of force which may be supposed, according to the undulatory theory of light, to be exerted at each point in space, and finds it to be 1,148,000,000,000 times the elastic force of ordinary air at the earth’s surface, so that the pressure of the ether upon a square inch of surface must be about 17,000,000,000,000, or seventeen billions of pounds.”4 Yet at the same time the resistance offered by the ether to the planetary motions is too minute to be appreciable¹⁷⁸. “All our ordinary notions,” says Professor Jevons, “must be laid aside in contemplating¹⁷⁹ such an hypothesis; yet [it is] no more than the observed phenomena of light and heat force us to accept. We cannot deny even the strange suggestion of Dr. Young, that there may be independent worlds, some possibly existing in different parts of space, but others perhaps pervading each other, unseen and unknown, in the same space. For if we are bound to admit the conception of this adamantine firmament¹⁸⁰, it is equally easy to admit a plurality of such.”

4 Jevons’s Principles of Science, Vol. II. p. 145. The figures, which in the English system of numeration read as seventeen billions, would in the American system read as seventeen trillions.

The ether, therefore, is unlike any of the forms of matter which we can weigh and measure. In some respects it resembles a fluid, in some respects a solid. It is both hard and elastic to an almost inconceivable degree. It fills all material bodies like a sea in which the atoms of the material bodies are as islands, and it occupies the whole of what we call empty space. It is so sensitive that a disturbance¹⁸¹ in any part of it causes a “tremour which is felt on the surface of countless worlds.” Our old experiences of matter give us no account of any substance like this; yet the undulatory theory of light obliges us to admit such a substance, and that theory is as well established as the theory of gravitation. Obviously we have here an enlargement of our experience of matter. The analysis of the phenomena of light and radiant heat has brought us into mental relations with matter in a different state from any in which we previously¹⁸² knew it. For the supposition that the ether may be something essentially different from matter is contradicted by all the terms we have used in describing it. Strange and contradictory as its properties may seem, are they any more strange than the properties of a gas would seem if we were for the first time to discover a gas after heretofore knowing nothing but solids and liquids? I think not; and the conclusion implied by our authors seems to me eminently¹⁸³ probable, that in the so-called ether we have simply a state of matter more primitive than what we know as the gaseous¹⁸⁴ state. Indeed, the conceptions of matter now current, and inherited from barbarous ages, are likely enough to be crude in the extreme. It is not strange that the study of such subtle agencies as heat and light should oblige us to modify them; and it will not be strange if the study of electricity should entail¹⁸⁵ still further revision of our ideas.

We are now brought to one of the profoundest speculations of modern times, the vortex-atom theory of Helmholtz and Thomson, in which the evolution of ordinary matter from ether is plainly indicated. The reader first needs to know what vortex-motion is; and this has been so beautifully explained by Professor Clifford, that I quote his description entire: “Imagine a ring of india-rubber, made by joining together the ends of a cylindrical¹⁸⁶ piece (like a lead-pencil before it is cut), to be put upon a round stick which it will just fit with a little stretching. Let the stick be now pulled through the ring while the latter is kept in its place by being pulled the other way on the outside. The india-rubber has then what is called vortex-motion. Before the ends were joined together, while it was straight, it might have been made to turn around without changing position, by rolling it between the hands. Just the same motion of rotation it has on the stick, only that the ends are now joined together. All the inside surface of the ring is going one way, namely, the way the stick is pulled; and all the outside is going the other way. Such a vortex-ring is made by the smoker¹⁸⁷ who purses his lips into a round hole and sends out a puff¹⁸⁸ of smoke. The outside of the ring is kept back by the friction of his lips while the inside is going forwards; thus a rotation is set up all round the smoke-ring as it travels out into the air.” In these cases, and in others as we commonly find it, vortex-motion owes its origin to friction and is after a while brought to an end by friction. But in 1858 the equations of motion of an incompressible frictionless¹⁸⁹ fluid were first successfully solved by Helmholtz, and among other things he proved that, though vortex-motion could not be originated in such a fluid, yet supposing it once to exist, it would exist to all eternity and could not be diminished by any mechanical action whatever. A vortex-ring, for example, in such a fluid, would forever preserve its own rotation, and would thus forever retain its peculiar¹⁹⁰ individuality, being, as it were, marked off from its neighbour vortex-rings. Upon this mechanical truth Sir William Thomson based his wonderfully suggestive theory of the constitution of matter. That which is permanent or indestructible in matter is the ultimate homogeneous atom; and this is probably all that is permanent, since chemists now almost unanimously hold that so-called elementary molecules are not really simple, but owe their sensible differences to the various groupings of an ultimate atom which is alike for all. Relatively to our powers of comprehension the atom endures eternally; that is, it retains forever unalterable its definite mass and its definite rate of vibration¹⁷¹. Now this is just what a vortex-ring would do in an incompressible frictionless fluid. Thus the startling question is suggested, Why may not the ultimate atoms of matter be vortex-rings forever existing in such a frictionless fluid filling the whole of space? Such a hypothesis is not less brilliant than Huyghens’s conjectural¹⁹¹ identification of light with undulatory motion; and it is moreover a legitimate¹⁹² hypothesis, since it can be brought to the test of verification. Sir William Thomson has shown that it explains a great many of the physical properties of matter: it remains to be seen whether it can explain them all.

Of course the ether which conveys thermal and luminous undulations is not the frictionless fluid postulated¹⁹³ by Sir William Thomson. The most conspicuous¹⁹⁴ property of the ether is its enormous elasticity¹⁹⁵, a property which we should not find in a frictionless fluid. “To account for such elasticity,” says Professor Clifford (whose exposition of the subject is still more lucid¹⁹⁶ than that of our authors), “it has to be supposed that even where there are no material molecules the universal fluid is full of vortex-motion, but that the vortices are smaller and more closely packed than those of [ordinary] matter, forming altogether a more finely grained structure. So that the difference between matter and ether is reduced to a mere difference in the size and arrangement of the component¹⁹⁷ vortex-rings. Now, whatever may turn out to be the ultimate nature of the ether and of molecules, we know that to some extent at least they obey the same dynamic laws, and that they act upon one another in accordance with these laws. Until, therefore, it is absolutely disproved, it must remain the simplest and most probable assumption that they are finally made of the same stuff, that the material molecule¹⁶⁶ is some kind of knot or coagulation¹⁹⁸ of ether.”5

5 Fortnightly Review, June, 1875, p. 784.

Another interesting consequence of Sir William Thomson’s pregnant hypothesis is that the absolute hardness which has been attributed to material atoms from the time of Lucretius downward may be dispensed¹⁹⁹ with. Somewhat in the same way that a loosely suspended chain becomes rigid²⁰⁰ with rapid rotation, the hardness and elasticity of the vortex-atom are explained as due to the swift rotary²⁰¹ motion of a soft and yielding fluid. So that the vortex-atom is really indivisible, not by reason of its hardness or solidity, but by reason of the indestructibleness of its motion.

Supposing, now, that we adopt provisionally the vortex theory — the great power of which is well shown by the consideration just mentioned — we must not forget that it is absolutely essential to the indestructibleness of the material atom that the universal fluid in which it has an existence as a vortex-ring should be entirely²⁰² destitute²⁰³ of friction. Once admit even the most infinitesimal amount of friction, while retaining the conception of vortex-motion in a universal fluid, and the whole case is so far altered that the material atom can no longer be regarded as absolutely indestructible, but only as indefinitely enduring. It may have been generated, in bygone eternity, by a natural process of evolution, and in future eternity may come to an end. Relatively to our powers of comprehension the practical difference is perhaps not great. Scientifically speaking, Helmholtz and Thomson are as well entitled to reason upon the assumption of a perfectly²⁰⁴ frictionless fluid as geometers in general are entitled to assume perfect lines without breadth and perfect surfaces without thickness. Perfect lines and surfaces do not exist within the region of our experience; yet the conclusions of geometry are none the less true ideally, though in any particular concrete instance they are only approximately realized. Just so with the conception of a frictionless fluid. So far as experience goes, such a thing has no more real existence than a line without breadth; and hence an atomic theory based upon such an assumption may be as true ideally as any of the theorems of Euclid, but it can give only an approximatively true account of the actual universe. These considerations do not at all affect the scientific value of the theory; but they will modify the tenour of such transcendental inferences as may be drawn from it regarding, the probable origin and destiny of the universe.

The conclusions reached in the first part of this paper, while we were dealing only with gross visible matter, may have seemed bold enough; but they are far surpassed by the inference which our authors draw from the vortex theory as they interpret it. Our authors exhibit various reasons, more or less sound, for attributing to the primordial²⁰⁵ fluid some slight amount of friction; and in support of this view they adduce Le Sage’s explanation of gravitation as a differential result of pressure, and Struve’s theory of the partial absorption of light-rays by the ether — questions with which our present purpose does not require us to meddle²⁰⁶. Apart from such questions it is every way probable that the primary assumption of Helmholtz and Thomson is only an approximation to the truth. But if we accredit²⁰⁷ the primordial fluid with even an infinitesimal amount of friction, then we are required to conceive of the visible universe as developed from the invisible and as destined²⁰⁸ to return into the invisible. The vortex-atom, produced by infinitesimal friction operating through wellnigh infinite time, is to be ultimately abolished by the agency which produced it. In the words of our authors, “If the visible universe be developed from an invisible which is not a perfect fluid, then the argument deduced by Sir William Thomson in favour of the eternity of ordinary matter disappears, since this eternity depends upon the perfect fluidity of the invisible. In fine, if we suppose the material universe to be composed of a series of vortex-rings developed from an invisible universe which is not a perfect fluid, it will be ephemeral, just as the smoke-ring which we develop from air, or that which we develop from water, is ephemeral, the only difference being in duration, these lasting²⁰⁹ only for a few seconds, and the others it may be for billions of years.” Thus, as our authors suppose that “the available energy of the visible universe will ultimately be appropriated by the invisible,” they go on to imagine, “at least as a possibility, that the separate existence of the visible universe will share the same fate, so that we shall have no huge, useless, inert²¹⁰ mass existing in after ages to remind the passer-by of a form of energy and a species of matter that is long since out of date and functionally²¹¹ effete²¹². Why should not the universe bury its dead out of sight?”

In one respect perhaps no more stupendous subject of contemplation than this has ever been offered to the mind of man. In comparison with the length of time thus required to efface²¹³ the tiny individual atom, the entire cosmical career of our solar system, or even that of the whole starry²¹⁴ galaxy²¹⁵, shrinks into utter nothingness. Whether we shall adopt the conclusion suggested must depend on the extent of our speculative audacity²¹⁶. We have seen wherein its probability consists, but in reasoning upon such a scale we may fitly be cautious and modest in accepting inferences, and our authors, we may be sure, would be the first to recommend such modesty²¹⁷ and caution. Even at the dimensions to which our theorizing has here grown, we may for instance discern the possible alternative of a simultaneous or rhythmically²¹⁸ successive generation and destruction of vortex-atoms which would go far to modify the conclusion just suggested. But here we must pause for a moment, reserving for a second paper the weightier thoughts as to futurity which our authors have sought to enwrap in these sublime²¹⁹ physical speculations.
PART SECOND.

UP to this point, however remote from ordinary every-day thoughts may be the region of speculation which we have been called upon to traverse, we have still kept within the limits of legitimate scientific hypothesis. Though we have ventured for a goodly distance into the unknown, we have not yet been required to abandon our base of operations in the known. Of the views presented in the preceding paper, some are wellnigh certainly established, some are probable, some have a sort of plausibility²²⁰, others — to which we have refrained from giving assent²²¹ — may possibly be true; but none are irretrievably beyond the jurisdiction²²² of scientific tests. No suggestion has so far been broached²²³ which a very little further increase of our scientific knowledge may not show to be either eminently probable or eminently improbable. We have kept pretty clear of mere subjective²²⁴ guesses, such as men may wrangle²²⁵ about forever without coming to any conclusion. The theory of the nebular origin of our planetary system has come to command the assent of all persons qualified²²⁶ to appreciate the evidence on which it is based; and the more immediate⁹⁴ conclusions which we have drawn from that theory are only such as are commonly drawn by astronomers and physicists. The doctrine of an intermolecular and interstellar ether is wrapped up in the well-established undulatory theory of light. Such is by no means the case with Sir William Thomson’s vortex-atom theory, which to-day is in somewhat the same condition as the undulatory theory of Huyghens two centuries ago. This, however, is none the less a hypothesis truly scientific in conception, and in the speculations to which it leads us we are still sure of dealing with views that admit at least of definite expression and treatment. In other words, though our study of the visible universe has led us to the recognition of a kind of unseen world underlying²²⁸ the world of things that are seen, yet concerning the economy of this unseen world we have not been led to entertain any hypothesis that has not its possible justification²²⁹ in our experiences of visible phenomena.

We are now called upon, following in the wake of our esteemed²³⁰ authors, to venture on a different sort of exploration, in which we must cut loose altogether from our moorings in the world of which we have definite experience. We are invited to entertain suggestions concerning the peculiar economy of the invisible portion of the universe which we have no means of subjecting to any sort of test of probability, either experimental or deductive. These suggestions are, therefore, not to be regarded as properly scientific; but, with this word of caution, we may proceed to show what they are.

Compared with the life and death of cosmical systems which we have heretofore contemplated²³¹, the life and death of individuals of the human race may perhaps seem a small matter; yet because we are ourselves the men who live and die, the small event is of vastly greater interest to us than the grand series of events of which it is part and parcel. It is natural that we should be more interested in the ultimate fate of humanity than in the fate of a world which is of no account to us save as our present dwelling-place. Whether the human soul is to come to an end or not is to us a more important question than whether the visible universe, with its matter and energy, is to be absorbed in an invisible ether. It is indeed only because we are interested in the former question that we are so curious about the latter. If we could dissociate ourselves from the material universe, our habitat, we should probably speculate much less about its past and future. We care very little what becomes of the black ball of the earth, after all life has vanished from its surface; or, if we care at all about it, it is only because our thoughts about the career of the earth are necessarily mixed up with our thoughts about life. Hence in considering the probable ultimate destiny of the physical universe, our innermost purpose must be to know what is to become of all this rich and wonderful life of which the physical universe is the theatre. Has it all been developed, apparently at almost infinite waste of effort, only to be abolished again before it has attained²³² to completeness, or does it contain or shelter some indestructible element which having drawn sustenance²³³ for a while from the senseless turmoil²³⁴ of physical phenomena shall still survive their final decay? This question is closely connected with the time-honoured question of the meaning, purpose, or tendency of the world. In the career of the world is life an end, or a means toward an end, or only an incidental phenomenon in which we can discover no meaning? Contemporary theologians seem generally to believe that one necessary result of modern scientific inquiry must be the destruction of the belief in immortal¹⁵¹ life, since against every thoroughgoing expounder²³⁵ of scientific knowledge they seek to hurl²³⁶ the charge of “materialism²³⁷.” Their doubts, however, are not shared by our authors, thorough men of science as they are, though their mode of dealing with the question may not be such as we can well adopt. While upholding the doctrine of evolution, and all the so-called “materialistic²³⁸” views of modern science, they not only regard the hypothesis of a future life as admissible, but they even go so far as to propound²³⁹ a physical theory as to the nature of existence after death. Let us see what this physical theory is.

As far as the visible universe is concerned, we do not find in it any evidence of immortality or of permanence of any sort, unless it be in the sum of potential and kinetic energies on the persistency²⁴⁰ of which depends our principle of continuity. In ordinary language “the stars in their courses” serve as symbols of permanence, yet we have found reason to regard them as but temporary phenomena. So, in the language of our authors, “if we take the individual man, we find that he lives his short tale of years, and that then the visible machinery²⁴¹ which connects him with the past, as well as that which enables him to act in the present, falls into ruin and is brought to an end. If any germ or potentiality remains, it is certainly not connected with the visible order of things.” In like manner our race is pretty sure to come to an end long before the destruction of the planet from which it now gets its sustenance. And in our authors opinion even the universe will by and by become “old and effete, no less truly than the individual: it is a glorious garment this visible universe, but not an immortal one; we must look elsewhere if we are to be clothed with immortality as with a garment.”

It is at this point that our authors call attention to “the apparently wasteful character of the arrangements of the visible universe.” The fact is one which we have already sufficiently described, but we shall do well to quote the words in which our authors recur²⁴² to it: “All but a very small portion of the sun’s heat goes day by day into what we call empty space, and it is only this very small remainder that is made use of by the various planets for purposes of their own. Can anything be more perplexing than this seemingly frightful²⁴³ expenditure²⁴⁴ of the very life and essence of the system? That this vast store of high-class energy should be doing nothing but travelling outwards²⁴⁵ in space at the rate of 188,000 miles per second is hardly conceivable, especially when the result of it is the inevitable destruction of the visible universe.”

Pursuing this teleological²⁴⁶ argument, it is suggested that perhaps this apparent waste of energy is “only an arrangement in virtue²⁴⁷ of which our universe keeps up a memory of the past at the expense of the present, inasmuch as all memory consists in an investiture of present resources in order to keep a hold upon the past.” Recourse is had to the ingenious argument in which Mr. Babbage showed that “if we had power to follow and detect the minutest effects of any disturbance, each particle of existing matter must be a register of all that has happened. The track of every canoe, of every vessel²⁴⁸ that has yet disturbed the surface of the ocean, whether impelled²⁴⁹ by manual force or elemental power, remains forever registered in the future movement of all succeeding particles which may occupy its place. The furrow²⁵⁰ which is left is, indeed, instantly filled up by the closing waters; but they draw after them other and larger portions of the surrounding element, and these again, once moved, communicate motion to others in endless succession.” In like manner, “the air itself is one vast library, on whose pages are forever written all that man has ever said or even whispered. There in their mutable but unerring characters, mixed with the earliest as well as the latest sighs of mortality, stand forever recorded vows²⁵¹ unredeemed, promises unfulfilled, perpetuating²⁵² in the united movements of each particle the testimony²⁵³ of man’s changeful will.”6 In some such way as this, records of every movement that takes place in the world are each moment transmitted, with the speed of light, through the invisible ocean of ether with which the world is surrounded. Even the molecular²²⁷ displacements²⁵⁴ which occur in our brains when we feel and think are thus propagated in their effects into the unseen world. The world of ether is thus regarded by our authors as in some sort the obverse or complement²⁵⁵ of the world of sensible matter, so that whatever energy is dissipated in the one is by the same act accumulated in the other. It is like the negative plate in photography, where light answers to shadow and shadow to light. Or, still better, it is like the case of an equation in which whatever quantity you take from one side is added to the other with a contrary sign, while the relation of equality remains undisturbed. Thus, it will be noticed, from the ingenious and subtle, but quite defensible suggestion of Mr. Babbage, a leap is made to an assumption which cannot be defended scientifically, but only teleologically²⁵⁶. It is one thing to say that every movement in the visible world transmits a record of itself to the surrounding ether, in such a way that from the undulation of the ether a sufficiently powerful intelligence might infer the character of the generating movement in the visible world. It is quite another thing to say that the ether is organized in such a complex and delicate way as to be like a negative image or counterpart of the world of sensible matter. The latter view is no doubt ingenious, but it is gratuitous²⁵⁷. It is sustained not by scientific analogy, but by the desire to find some assignable use for the energy which is constantly escaping from visible matter into invisible ether. The moment we ask how do we know that this energy is not really wasted, or that it is not put to some use wholly undiscoverable by human intelligence, this assumption of an organized ether is at once seen to be groundless. It belongs not to the region of science, but to that of pure mythology.

6 Babbage, Ninth Bridgewater Treatise²⁵⁸, p. 115; Jevons, Principles of Science, Vol. II. p. 455.

In justice to our authors, however, it should be remembered that this assumption is put forth not as something scientifically probable, but as something which for aught we know to the contrary may possibly be true. This, to be sure, we need not deny; nor if we once allow this prodigious²⁵⁹ leap of inference, shall we find much difficulty in reaching the famous conclusion that “thought conceived to affect the matter of another universe simultaneously²⁶⁰ with this may explain a future state.” This proposition, quaintly²⁶¹ couched in an anagram, like the discoveries of old astronomers, was published last year in “Nature,” as containing the gist³² of the forthcoming book. On the negative-image hypothesis it is not hard to see how thought is conceived to affect the seen and the unseen worlds simultaneously. Every act of consciousness is accompanied by molecular displacements in the brain, and these are of course responded to by movements in the ethereal world. Thus as a series of conscious states build up a continuous memory in strict accordance with physical laws of motion,7 so a correlative memory is simultaneously built up in the ethereal world out of the ethereal correlatives of the molecular displacements which go on in our brains. And as there is a continual transfer of energy from the visible world to the ether, the extinction²⁶² of vital energy which we call death must coincide in some way with the awakening²⁶³ of vital energy in the correlative world; so that the darkening of consciousness here is coincident with its dawning there. In this way death is for the individual but a transfer from one physical state of existence to another; and so, on the largest scale, the death or final loss of energy by the whole visible universe has its counterpart in the acquirement of a maximum of life by the correlative unseen world.

There seems to be a certain sort of rigorous logical consistency²⁶⁴ in this daring speculation; but really the propositions of which it consists are so far from answering to anything within the domain²⁶⁵ of human experience that we are unable to tell whether any one of them logically follows from its predecessor²⁶⁶ or not. It is evident that we are quite out of the region of scientific tests, and to whatever view our authors may urge we can only languidly assent that it is out of our power to disprove it.

7 See my Outlines of Cosmic Philosophy, Vol. II. pp. 142-148.

The essential weakness of such a theory as this lies in the fact that it is thoroughly materialistic in character. It is currently assumed that the doctrine of a life after death cannot be defended on materialistic grounds, but this is altogether too hasty an assumption. Our authors, indeed, are not philosophical²⁶⁷ materialists, like Dr. Priestley — who nevertheless believed in a future life — but one of the primary doctrines²⁶⁸ of materialism lies at the bottom of their argument. Materialism holds for one thing that consciousness is a product of a peculiar organization of matter, and for another thing that consciousness cannot survive the disorganization of the material body with which it is associated. As held by philosophical materialists, like Buchner and Moleschott, these two opinions are strictly consistent with each other; nay²⁶⁹, the latter seems to be the inevitable inference from the former, though Priestley did not so regard it. Now our authors very properly refuse to commit themselves to the opinion that mind is the product of matter, but their argument nevertheless implies that some sort of material vehicle is necessary for the continuance of mind in a future state of existence. This material vehicle they seek to supply in the theory which connects by invisible bonds of transmitted energy the perishable²⁷⁰ material body with its counterpart in the world of ether. The materialism of the argument is indeed partly veiled by the terminology in which this counterpart is called a “spiritual body,” but in this novel use or abuse of scriptural language there seems to me to be a strange confusion of ideas. Bear in mind that the “invisible universe” into which energy is constantly passing is simply the luminiferous ether, which our authors, to suit the requirements of their hypothesis, have gratuitously²⁷¹ endowed with a complexity²⁷² and variety of structure analogous²⁷³ to that of the visible world of matter. Their language is not always quite so precise as one could desire, for while they sometimes speak of the ether itself as the “unseen universe,” they sometimes allude²⁷⁴ to a primordial medium yet subtler in constitution and presumably more immaterial. Herein lies the confusion. Why should the luminiferous ether, or any primordial medium in which it may have been generated, be regarded as in any way “spiritual”? Great physicists, like less trained thinkers, are sometimes liable to be unconsciously influenced by old associations of ideas which, ostensibly repudiated²⁷⁵, still lurk²⁷⁶ under cover of the words we use. I fear that the old associations which led the ancients to describe the soul as a breath or a shadow, and which account for the etymologies²⁷⁷ of such words as “ghost” and “spirit,” have had something to do with this spiritualization of the interstellar ether. Some share may also have been contributed by the Platonic²⁷⁸ notion of the “grossness” or “bruteness” of tangible²⁸⁰ matter — a notion which has survived in Christian²⁸¹ theology, and which educated men of the present day have by no means universally outgrown²⁸². Save for some such old associations as these, why should it be supposed that matter becomes “spriritualized” as it diminishes in apparent substantiality? Why should matter be pronounced respectable in the inverse²⁸³ ratio of its density²⁸⁴ or ponderability? Why is a diamond any more chargeable with “grossness” than a cubic centimetre of hydrogen? Obviously such fancies are purely²⁸⁵ of mythologic²⁸⁶ parentage. Now the luminiferous ether, upon which our authors make such extensive demands, may be physically²⁸⁷ “ethereal” enough, in spite of the enormous elasticity which leads Professor Jevons to characterize it as “adamantine”; but most assuredly we have not the slightest reason for speaking of it as “immaterial” or “spiritual.” Though we are unable to weigh it in the balance, we at least know it as a transmitter of undulatory movements, the size and shape of which we can accurately measure. Its force-relations with ponderable matter are not only universally and incessantly maintained, but they have that precisely²⁸⁸ quantitative²⁸⁹ character which implies an essential identity between the innermost natures of the two substances. We have seen reason for thinking it probable that ether and ordinary matter are alike composed of vortex-rings in a quasi-frictionless fluid; but whatever be the fate of this subtle hypothesis, we may be sure that no theory will ever be entertained in which the analysis of ether shall require different symbols from that of ordinary matter. In our authors’ theory, therefore, the putting on of immortality is in no wise the passage from a material to a spiritual state. It is the passage from one kind of materially conditioned state to another. The theory thus appeals directly to our experiences of the behaviour of matter; and in deriving²⁹⁰ so little support as it does from these experiences, it remains an essentially weak speculation, whatever we may think of its ingenuity. For so long as we are asked to accept conclusions drawn from our experiences of the material world, we are justified in demanding something more than mere unconditioned possibility. We require some positive evidence, be it ever so little in amount; and no theory which cannot furnish such positive evidence is likely to carry to our minds much practical conviction.

This is what I meant by saying that the great weakness of the hypothesis here criticized lies in its materialistic character. In contrast with this we shall presently see that the assertion of a future life which is not materially conditioned, though unsupported by any item of experience whatever, may nevertheless be an impregnable assertion. But first I would conclude the foregoing criticism by ruling out altogether the sense in which our authors use the expression “Unseen Universe.” Scientific inference, however remote, is connected by such insensible gradations with ordinary perception, that one may well question the propriety²⁹¹ of applying the term “unseen” to that which is presented to “the mind’s eye” as inevitable matter of inference. It is true that we cannot see the ocean of ether in which visible matter floats; but there are many other invisible things which yet we do not regard as part of the “unseen world.” I do not see the air which I am now breathing within the four walls of my study, yet its existence is sufficiently a matter of sense-perception as it fills my lungs and fans my cheek. The atoms which compose a drop of water are not only invisible, but cannot in any way be made the objects of sense-perception; yet by proper inferences from their behaviour we can single them out for measurement, so that Sir William Thomson can tell us that if the drop of water were magnified to the size of the earth, the constituent²⁹² atoms would be larger than peas, but not so large as billiard-balls. If we do not see such atoms with our eyes, we have one adequate reason in their tiny dimensions, though there are further reasons than this. It would be hard to say why the luminiferous ether should be relegated²⁹³ to the “unseen world” any more than the material atom. Whatever we know as possessing resistance and extension, whatever we can subject to mathematical processes of measurement, we also conceive as existing in such shape that, with appropriate eyes and under proper visual conditions, we MIGHT see it, and we are not entitled to draw any line of demarcation between such an object of inference and others which may be made objects of sense-perception. To set apart the ether as constituting an “unseen universe” is therefore illegitimate and confusing. It introduces a distinction where there is none, and obscures the fact that both invisible ether and visible matter form but one grand universe in which the sum of energy remains constant, though the order of its distribution endlessly varies.

Very different would be the logical position of a theory which should assume the existence of an “Unseen World” entirely spiritual in constitution, and in which material conditions like those of the visible world should have neither place nor meaning. Such a world would not consist of ethers or gases or ghosts, but of purely psychical²⁹⁴ relations akin⁸² to such as constitute thoughts and feelings when our minds are least solicited²⁹⁵ by sense-perceptions. In thus marking off the “Unseen World” from the objective universe of which we have knowledge, our line of demarcation would at least be drawn in the right place. The distinction between psychical and material phenomena is a distinction of a different order from all other distinctions known to philosophy, and it immeasurably transcends²⁹⁶ all others. The progress of modern discovery has in no respect weakened the force of Descartes’s remark, that between that of which the differential attribute is Thought and that of which the differential attribute is Extension, there can be no similarity, no community of nature whatever. By no scientific cunning of experiment or deduction²⁹⁷ can Thought be weighed or measured or in any way assimilated to such things as may be made the actual or possible objects of sense-perception. Modern discovery, so far from bridging over the chasm²⁹⁸ between Mind and Matter, tends rather to exhibit the distinction between them as absolute. It has, indeed, been rendered highly probable that every act of consciousness is accompanied by a molecular motion in the cells and fibres of the brain; and materialists have found great comfort in this fact, while theologians and persons of little faith have been very much frightened by it. But since no one ever pretended that thought can go on, under the conditions of the present life, without a brain, one finds it rather hard to sympathize either with the self-congratulations of Dr. Buchner’s disciples8 or with the terrors of their opponents. But what has been less commonly remarked is the fact that when the thought and the molecular movement thus occur simultaneously, in no scientific sense is the thought the product of the molecular movement. The sun-derived energy of motion latent in the food we eat is variously transformed within the organism, until some of it appears as the motion of the molecules of a little globule of nerve-matter in the brain. In a rough way we might thus say that the chemical energy of the food indirectly²⁹⁹ produces the motion of these little nerve-molecules. But does this motion of nerve-molecules now produce a thought or state of consciousness? By no means. It simply produces some other motion of nerve-molecules, and this in turn produces motion of contraction or expansion in some muscle, or becomes transformed into the chemical energy of some secreting³⁰⁰ gland³⁰¹. At no point in the whole circuit does a unit of motion disappear as motion to reappear as a unit of consciousness. The physical process is complete in itself, and the thought does not enter into it. All that we can say is, that the occurrence of the thought is simultaneous with that part of the physical process which consists of a molecular movement in the brain.9 To be sure, the thought is always there when summoned, but it stands outside the dynamic circuit, as something utterly³⁰² alien from and incomparable with the events which summon it. No doubt, as Professor Tyndall observes, if we knew exhaustively the physical state of the brain, “the corresponding thought or feeling might be inferred; or, given the thought or feeling, the corresponding state of the brain might be inferred. But how inferred? It would be at bottom not a case of logical inference at all, but of empirical association. You may reply that many of the inferences of science are of this character; the inference, for example, that an electric current of a given direction will deflect³⁰³ a magnetic needle in a definite way; but the cases differ in this, that the passage from the current to the needle, if not demonstrable, is thinkable, and that we entertain no doubt as to the final mechanical solution of the problem. But the passage from the physics of the brain to the corresponding facts of consciousness is unthinkable. Granted that a definite thought and a definite molecular action in the brain occur simultaneously; we do not possess the intellectual organ, nor apparently any rudiment³⁰⁴ of the organ, which would enable us to pass by a process of reasoning from the one to the other. They appear together, but we do not know why.”10

8 The Nation once wittily³⁰⁵ described these people as “people who believe that they are going to die like the beasts, and who congratulate themselves that they are going to die like the beasts.”

9 For a fuller exposition of this point, see my Outlines of Cosmic Philosophy, Vol. II. pp. 436-445.

10 Fragments of Science, p. 119.

An unseen world consisting of purely psychical or spiritual phenomena would accordingly be demarcated by an absolute gulf³⁰⁶ from what we call the material universe, but would not necessarily be discontinuous with the psychical phenomena which we find manifested in connection with the world of matter. The transfer of matter, or physical energy, or anything else that is quantitatively³⁰⁷ measurable, into such an unseen world, may be set down as impossible, by reason of the very definition of such a world. Any hypothesis which should assume such a transfer would involve a contradiction in terms. But the hypothesis of a survival of present psychical phenomena in such a world, after being denuded³⁰⁸ of material conditions, is not in itself absurd or self-contradictory, though it may be impossible to support it by any arguments drawn from the domain of human experience. Such is the shape which it seems to me that, in the present state of philosophy, the hypothesis of a future life must assume. We have nothing to say to gross materialistic notions of ghosts and bogies, and spirits that upset tables and whisper to ignorant vulgar women the wonderful information that you once had an aunt Susan. The unseen world imagined in our hypothesis is not connected with the present material universe by any such “invisible bonds” as would allow Bacon and Addison to come to Boston and write the silliest twaddle in the most ungrammatical English before a roomful of people who have never learned how to test what they are pleased to call the “evidence of their senses.” Our hypothesis is expressly framed so as to exclude all intercourse³⁰⁹ whatever between the unseen world of spirit unconditioned by matter and the present world of spirit conditioned by matter in which all our experiences have been gathered. The hypothesis being framed in such a way, the question is, What has philosophy to say to it? Can we, by searching our experiences, find any reason for adopting such an hypothesis? Or, on the other hand, supposing we can find no such reason, would the total failure of experimental evidence justify³¹⁰ us in rejecting it?

The question is so important that I will restate it. I have imagined a world made up of psychical phenomena, freed from the material conditions under which alone we know such phenomena. Can we adduce any proof of the possibility of such a world? Or if we cannot, does our failure raise the slightest presumption³¹¹ that such a world is impossible?

The reply to the first clause of the question is sufficiently obvious. We have no experience whatever of psychical phenomena save as manifested in connection with material phenomena. We know of Mind only as a group of activities which are never exhibited to us except through the medium of motions of matter. In all our experience we have never encountered such activities save in connection with certain very complicated groupings of highly mobile material particles into aggregates³¹² which we call living organisms. And we have never found them manifested to a very conspicuous extent save in connection with some of those specially⁴⁷ organized aggregates which have vertebrate skeletons and mammary glands³¹³. Nay, more, when we survey the net results of our experience up to the present time, we find indisputable evidence that in the past history of the visible universe psychical phenomena have only begun to be manifested in connection with certain complex aggregates of material phenomena. As these material aggregates have age by age become more complex in structure, more complex psychical phenomena have been exhibited. The development of Mind has from the outset been associated with the development of Matter. And to-day, though none of us has any knowledge of the end of psychical phenomena in his own case, yet from all the marks by which we recognize such phenomena in our fellow-creatures, whether brute²⁷⁹ or human, we are taught that when certain material processes have been gradually or suddenly brought to an end, psychical phenomena are no longer manifested. From first to last, therefore, our appeal to experience gets but one response. We have not the faintest shadow of evidence wherewith to make it seem probable that Mind can exist except in connection with a material body. Viewed from this standpoint of terrestrial experience, there is no more reason for supposing that consciousness survives the dissolution of the brain than for supposing that the pungent³¹⁴ flavour of table-salt survives its decomposition³¹⁵ into metallic³¹⁶ sodium³¹⁷ and gaseous chlorine.

Our answer from this side is thus unequivocal enough. Indeed, so uniform has been the teaching of experience in this respect that even in their attempts to depict¹⁵⁵ a life after death, men have always found themselves obliged to have recourse to materialistic symbols. To the mind of a savage the future world is a mere reproduction of the present, with its everlasting³¹⁸ huntings and fightings. The early Christians³¹⁹ looked forward to a renovation³²⁰ of the earth and the bodily resurrection from Sheol of the righteous. The pictures of hell and purgatory³²¹, and even of paradise, in Dante’s great poem, are so intensely materialistic as to seem grotesque in this more spiritual age. But even to-day the popular conceptions of heaven are by no means freed from the notion of matter; and persons of high culture, who realize the inadequacy³²² of these popular conceptions, are wont³²³ to avoid the difficulty by refraining from putting their hopes and beliefs into any definite or describable form. Not unfrequently one sees a smile raised at the assumption of knowledge or insight by preachers who describe in eloquent³²⁴ terms the joys of a future state; yet the smile does not necessarily imply any scepticism as to the abstract probability of the soul’s survival. The scepticism is aimed at the character of the description rather than at the reality of the thing described. It implies a tacit agreement, among cultivated people, that the unseen world must be purely spiritual in constitution. The agreement is not habitually³²⁵ expressed in definite formulas, for the reason that no mental image of a purely spiritual world can be formed. Much stress is commonly laid upon the recognition of friends in a future life; and however deep a meaning may be given to the phrase “the love of God,” one does not easily realize that a heavenly existence could be worth the longing³⁰ that is felt for it, if it were to afford no further scope for the pure and tender household affections which give to the present life its powerful though indefinable charm. Yet the recognition of friends in a purely spiritual world is something of which we can frame no conception whatever. We may look with unspeakable reverence³²⁶ on the features of wife or child, less because of their physical beauty than because of the beauty of soul to which they give expression, but to imagine the perception of soul by soul apart from the material structure and activities in which soul is manifested, is something utterly beyond our power. Nay, even when we try to represent to ourselves the psychical activity of any single soul by itself as continuing without the aid of the physical machinery of sensation, we get into unmanageable difficulties. A great part of the contents of our minds consists of sensuous³²⁷ (chiefly visual) images, and though we may imagine reflection to go on without further images supplied by vision or hearing, touch or taste or smell, yet we cannot well see how fresh experiences could be gained in such a state. The reader, if he require further illustrations, can easily follow out this line of thought. Enough has no doubt been said to convince him that our hypothesis of the survival of conscious activity apart from material conditions is not only utterly unsupported by any evidence that can be gathered from the world of which we have experience, but is utterly and hopelessly inconceivable.

It is inconceivable BECAUSE it is entirely without foundation in experience. Our powers of conception are closely determined³²⁸ by the limits of our experience. When a proposition, or combination of ideas, is suggested, for which there has never been any precedent³²⁹ in human experience, we find it to be UNTHINKABLE — the ideas will not combine. The proposition remains one which we may utter and defend, and perhaps vituperate our neighbours for not accepting, but it remains none the less an unthinkable proposition. It takes terms which severally have meanings and puts them together into a phrase which has no meaning.11 Now when we try to combine the idea of the continuance of conscious activity with the idea of the entire cessation of material conditions, and thereby³³⁰ to assert the existence of a purely spiritual world, we find that we have made an unthinkable proposition. We may defend our hypothesis as passionately³³¹ as we like, but when we strive coolly to realize it in thought we find ourselves baulked at every step.

11 See my Outlines of Cosmic Philosophy, Vol. I. pp. 64-67.

But now we have to ask, How much does this inconceivability signify? In most cases, when we say that a statement is inconceivable, we practically declare it to be untrue; when we say that a statement is without warrant in experience, we plainly indicate that we consider it unworthy of our acceptance. This is legitimate in the majority of cases with which we have to deal in the course of life, because experience, and the capacities of thought called out and limited by experience, are our only guides in the conduct of life. But every one will admit that our experience is not infinite, and that our capacity of conception is not coextensive with the possibilities of existence. It is not only possible, but in the very highest degree probable, that there are many things in heaven, if not on earth, which are undreamed of in our philosophy. Since our ability to conceive anything is limited by the extent of our experience, and since human experience is very far from being infinite, it follows that there may be, and in all probability is, an immense region of existence in every way as real as the region which we know, yet concerning which we cannot form the faintest rudiment of a conception. Any hypothesis relating to such a region of existence is not only not disproved by the total failure of evidence in its favour, but the total failure of evidence does not raise even the slightest prima facie presumption against its validity.

These considerations apply with great force to the hypothesis of an unseen world in which psychical phenomena persist in the absence of material conditions. It is true, on the one hand, that we can bring up no scientific evidence in support of such an hypothesis. But on the other hand it is equally true that in the very nature of things no such evidence could be expected to be forthcoming: even were there such evidence in abundance, it could not be accessible to us. The existence of a single soul, or congeries of psychical phenomena, unaccompanied by a material body, would be evidence sufficient to demonstrate the hypothesis. But in the nature of things, even were there a million such souls round about us, we could not become aware of the existence of one of them, for we have no organ or faculty³³² for the perception of soul apart from the material structure and activities in which it has been manifested throughout the whole course of our experience. Even our own self-consciousness involves the consciousness of ourselves as partly material bodies. These considerations show that our hypothesis is very different from the ordinary hypotheses with which science deals. The entire absence of testimony does not raise a negative presumption except in cases where testimony is accessible. In the hypotheses with which scientific men are occupied, testimony is always accessible; and if we do not find any, the presumption is raised that there is none. When Dr. Bastian tells us that he has found living organisms to be generated in sealed flasks³³³ from which all living germs had been excluded, we demand the evidence for his assertion. The testimony of facts is in this case hard to elicit, and only skilful³³⁴ reasoners can properly estimate its worth. But still it is all accessible. With more or less labour it can be got at; and if we find that Dr. Bastian has produced no evidence save such as may equally well receive a different interpretation³³⁵ from that which he has given it, we rightly feel that a strong presumption has been raised against his hypothesis. It is a case in which we are entitled to expect to find the favouring facts if there are any, and so long as we do not find such, we are justified in doubting their existence. So when our authors propound the hypothesis of an unseen universe consisting of phenomena which occur in the interstellar ether, or even in some primordial fluid with which the ether has physical relations, we are entitled to demand their proofs. It is not enough to tell us that we cannot disprove such a theory. The burden of proof lies with them. The interstellar ether is something concerning the physical properties of which we have some knowledge; and surely, if all the things are going on which they suppose in a medium so closely related to ordinary matter, there ought to be some traceable indications of the fact. At least, until the contrary can be shown, we must refuse to believe that all the testimony in a case like this is utterly inaccessible³³⁶; and accordingly, so long as none is found, especially so long as none is even alleged³³⁷, we feel that a presumption is raised against their theory.

These illustrations will show, by sheer contrast, how different it is with the hypothesis of an unseen world that is purely spiritual. The testimony in such a case must, under the conditions of the present life, be forever inaccessible. It lies wholly outside the range of experience. However abundant it may be, we cannot expect to meet with it. And accordingly our failure to produce it does not raise even the slightest presumption against our theory. When conceived in this way, the belief in a future life is without scientific support; but at the same time it is placed beyond the need of scientific support and beyond the range of scientific criticism. It is a belief which no imaginable future advance in physical discovery can in any way impugn³³⁸. It is a belief which is in no sense irrational³³⁹, and which may be logically entertained without in the least affecting our scientific habit of mind or influencing our scientific conclusions.

To take a brief illustration: we have alluded³⁴⁰ to the fact that in the history of our present world the development of mental phenomena has gone on hand in hand with the development of organic life, while at the same time we have found it impossible to explain mental phenomena as in any sense the product of material phenomena. Now there is another side to all this. The great lesson which Berkeley taught mankind was that what we call material phenomena are really the products of consciousness co-operating with some Unknown Power (not material) existing beyond consciousness. We do very well to speak of “matter” in common parlance³⁴¹, but all that the word really means is a group of qualities which have no existence apart from our minds. Modern philosophers have quite generally accepted this conclusion, and every attempt to overturn Berkeley’s reasoning has hitherto resulted in complete and disastrous³⁴² failure. In admitting this, we do not admit the conclusion of Absolute Idealism, that nothing exists outside of consciousness. What we admit as existing independently of our own consciousness is the Power that causes in us those conscious states which we call the perception of material qualities. We have no reason for regarding this Power as in itself material: indeed, we cannot do so, since by the theory material qualities have no existence apart from our minds. I have elsewhere sought to show that less difficulty is involved in regarding this Power outside of us as quasi-psychical, or in some measure similar to the mental part of ourselves; and I have gone on to conclude that this Power may be identical with what men have, in all times and by the aid of various imperfect symbols, endeavoured to apprehend³⁴³ as Deity³⁴⁴.12 We are thus led to a view of things not very unlike the views entertained by Spinoza and Berkeley. We are led to the inference that what we call the material universe is but the manifestation of infinite Deity to our finite minds. Obviously, on this view, Matter — the only thing to which materialists concede real existence — is simply an orderly phantasmagoria; and God and the Soul — which materialists regard as mere fictions of the imagination — are the only conceptions that answer to real existences.

12 See my Outlines of Cosmic Philosophy, Part I. Chap. IV.; Part III. Chaps. III., IV.

In the foregoing paragraph I have been setting down opinions with which I am prepared to agree, and which are not in conflict with anything that our study of the development of the objective world has taught us. In so far as that study may be supposed to bear on the question of a future life, two conclusions are open to us. First we may say that since the phenomena of mind appear and run their course along with certain specialized³⁴⁵ groups of material phenomena, so, too, they must disappear when these specialized groups are broken up. Or, in other words, we may say that every living person is an organized whole; consciousness is something which pertains³⁴⁶ to this organized whole, as music belongs to the harp³⁴⁷ that is entire; but when the harp is broken it is silent, and when the organized whole of personality falls to pieces consciousness ceases forever. To many well-disciplined minds this conclusion seems irresistible³⁴⁸; and doubtless it would be a sound one — a good Baconian conclusion — if we were to admit, with the materialists, that the possibilities of existence are limited by our tiny and ephemeral experience.

But now, supposing some Platonic speculator were to come along and insist upon our leaving room for an alternative conclusion; suppose he were to urge upon us that all this process of material development, with the discovery of which our patient study has been rewarded, may be but the temporary manifestation of relations otherwise unknown between ourselves and the infinite Deity; suppose he were to argue that psychical qualities may be inherent in a spiritual substance which under certain conditions becomes incarnated³⁴⁹ in matter, to wear it as a perishable garment for a brief season, but presently to cast it off and enter upon the freedom of a larger existence; — what reply should we be bound to make, bearing in mind that the possibilities of existence are in no wise limited by our experience? Obviously we should be bound to admit that in sound philosophy this conclusion is just as likely to be true as the other. We should, indeed, warn him not to call on us to help him to establish it by scientific arguments; and we should remind him that he must not make illicit³⁵⁰ use of his extra-experiential hypotheses by bringing them into the treatment of scientific questions that lie within the range of experience. In science, for example, we make no use of the conception of a “spiritual substance” (or of a “material substance” either), because we can get along sufficiently well by dealing solely³⁵¹ with qualities. But with this general understanding we should feel bound to concede the impregnableness of his main position.

I have supposed this theory only as an illustration, not as a theory which I am prepared to adopt. My present purpose is not to treat as an advocate the question of a future life, but to endeavour to point out what conditions should be observed in treating the question philosophically³⁵². It seems to me that a great deal is gained when we have distinctly set before us what are the peculiar conditions of proof in the case of such transcendental questions. We have gained a great deal when we have learned how thoroughly impotent, how truly irrelevant³⁵³, is physical investigation³⁵⁴ in the presence of such a question. If we get not much positive satisfaction for our unquiet yearnings, we occupy at any rate a sounder philosophic position when we recognize the limits within which our conclusions, whether positive or negative, are valid.

It seems not improbable that Mr. Mill may have had in mind something like the foregoing considerations when he suggested that there is no reason why one should not entertain the belief in a future life if the belief be necessary to one’s spiritual comfort. Perhaps no suggestion in Mr. Mill’s richly suggestive posthumous³⁵⁶ work has been more generally condemned³⁵⁷ as unphilosophical, on the ground that in matters of belief we must be guided, not by our likes and dislikes, but by the evidence that is accessible. The objection is certainly a sound one so far as it relates to scientific questions where evidence is accessible. To hesitate to adopt a well-supported theory because of some vague preference for a different view is in scientific matters the one unpardonable sin — a sin which has been only too often committed. Even in matters which lie beyond the range of experience, where evidence is inaccessible, desire is not to be regarded as by itself an adequate basis for belief. But it seems to me that Mr. Mill showed a deeper knowledge of the limitations of scientific method than his critics, when he thus hinted at the possibility of entertaining a belief not amenable³⁵⁸ to scientific tests. The hypothesis of a purely spiritual unseen world, as above described, is entirely removed from the jurisdiction of physical inquiry, and can only be judged on general considerations of what has been called “moral probability”; and considerations of this sort are likely, in the future as in the past, to possess different values for different minds. He who, on such considerations, entertains a belief in a future life may not demand that his sceptical neighbour shall be convinced by the same considerations; but his neighbour is at the same time estopped from stigmatizing³⁵⁹ his belief as unphilosophical.

The consideration which must influence most minds in their attitude toward this question, is the craving³⁶⁰, almost universally felt, for some teleological solution to the problem of existence. Why we are here now is a question of even profounder interest than whether we are to live hereafter. Unfortunately its solution carries us no less completely beyond the range of experience! The belief that all things are working together for some good end is the most essential expression of religious faith: of all intellectual propositions it is the one most closely related to that emotional yearning³⁵⁵ for a higher and better life which is the sum and substance of religion. Yet all the treatises³⁶¹ on natural theology that have ever been written have barely succeeded in establishing a low degree of scientific probability for this belief. In spite of the eight Bridgewater Treatises, and the “Ninth” beside, dysteleology still holds full half the field as against teleology³⁶². Most of this difficulty, however, results from the crude anthropomorphic views which theologians have held concerning God. Once admitting that the Divine attributes may be (as they must be) incommensurably greater than human attributes, our faith that all things are working together for good may remain unimpugned.

To many minds such a faith will seem incompatible with belief in the ultimate destruction of sentiency amid the general doom of the material universe. A good end can have no meaning to us save in relation to consciousness that distinguishes and knows the good from the evil. There could be no better illustration of how we are hemmed³⁶³ in than the very inadequacy of the words with which we try to discuss this subject. Such words have all gained their meanings from human experience, and hence of necessity carry anthropomorphic implications. But we cannot help this. We must think with the symbols with which experience has furnished us; and when we so think, there does seem to be little that is even intellectually satisfying in the awful picture which science shows us, of giant worlds concentrating out of nebulous vapour, developing with prodigious waste of energy into theatres of all that is grand and sacred in spiritual endeavour, clashing and exploding again into dead vapour-balls, only to renew the same toilful process without end — a senseless bubble-play of Titan forces, with life, love, and aspiration brought forth only to be extinguished. The human mind, however “scientific” its training, must often recoil³⁶⁴ from the conclusion that this is all; and there are moments when one passionately feels that this cannot be all. On warm June mornings in green country lanes, with sweet pine-odours wafted³⁶⁵ in the breeze which sighs through the branches, and cloud-shadows flitting over far-off blue mountains, while little birds sing their love-songs, and golden-haired children weave garlands of wild roses; or when in the solemn twilight³⁶⁶ we listen to wondrous harmonies of Beethoven and Chopin that stir the heart like voices from an unseen world; at such times one feels that the profoundest answer which science can give to our questionings is but a superficial answer after all. At these moments, when the world seems fullest of beauty, one feels most strongly that it is but the harbinger of something else — that the ceaseless play of phenomena is no mere sport of Titans, but an orderly scene, with its reason for existing, its

“One divine far-off event
To which the whole creation moves.”

Difficult as it is to disentangle the elements of reasoning that enter into these complex groups of feeling, one may still see, I think, that it is speculative interest in the world, rather than anxious interest in self, that predominates. The desire for immortality in its lowest phase is merely the outcome of the repugnance³⁶⁷ we feel toward thinking of the final cessation of vigorous vital activity. Such a feeling is naturally strong with healthy people. But in the mood which I have above tried to depict, this feeling, or any other which is merely self-regarding, is lost sight of in the feeling which associates a future life with some solution of the burdensome problem of existence. Had we but faith enough to lighten the burden of this problem, the inferior question would perhaps be less absorbing. Could we but know that our present lives are working together toward some good end, even an end in no wise anthropomorphic, it would be of less consequence whether we were individually to endure. To the dog under the knife of the experimenter, the world is a world of pure evil; yet could the poor beast but understand the alleviation³⁶⁸ of human suffering to which he is contributing, he would be forced to own that this is not quite true; and if he were also a heroic or Christian dog, the thought would perhaps take away from death its sting. The analogy may be a crude one; but the reasonableness of the universe is at least as far above our comprehension as the purposes of man surpass the understanding of the dog. Believing, however, though as a simple act of trust, that the end will crown the work, we may rise superior to the question which has here concerned us, and exclaim, in the supreme language of faith, “Though He slay³⁶⁹ me, yet will I trust in Him!”

July, 1875.

1 par   

n.标准，票面价值，平均数量；adj.票面的，平常的，标准的

参考例句：

• Sales of nylon have been below par in recent years.近年来尼龙织品的销售额一直不及以往。
• I don't think his ability is on a par with yours.我认为他的能力不能与你的能力相媲美。

2 wayfarer   

n.旅人

参考例句：

• You are the solitary wayfarer in this deserted street.在这冷寂的街上，你是孤独的行人。
• The thirsty wayfarer was glad to find a fresh spring near the road.口渴的徒步旅行者很高兴在路边找到新鲜的泉水。

3 wondrous   

adj.令人惊奇的，奇妙的；adv.惊人地；异乎寻常地；令人惊叹地

参考例句：

• The internal structure of the Department is wondrous to behold.看一下国务院的内部结构是很有意思的。
• We were driven across this wondrous vast land of lakes and forests.我们乘车穿越这片有着湖泊及森林的广袤而神奇的土地。

4 elicit   

v.引出,抽出,引起

参考例句：

• It was designed to elicit the best thinking within the government. 机构的设置是为了在政府内部集思广益。
• Don't try to elicit business secrets from me. I won't tell you anything. 你休想从我这里套问出我们的商业机密, 我什么都不会告诉你的。

5 bungled   

v.搞糟，完不成( bungle的过去式和过去分词 )；笨手笨脚地做；失败；完不成

参考例句：

• They bungled the job. 他们把活儿搞糟了。
• John bungled the job. 约翰把事情搞糟了。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

6 considerably   

adv.极大地；相当大地；在很大程度上

参考例句：

• The economic situation has changed considerably.经济形势已发生了相当大的变化。
• The gap has narrowed considerably.分歧大大缩小了。

7 inquiry   

n.打听，询问，调查，查问

参考例句：

• Many parents have been pressing for an inquiry into the problem.许多家长迫切要求调查这个问题。
• The field of inquiry has narrowed down to five persons.调查的范围已经缩小到只剩5个人了。

8 scanty   

adj.缺乏的，仅有的，节省的，狭小的，不够的

参考例句：

• There is scanty evidence to support their accusations.他们的指控证据不足。
• The rainfall was rather scanty this month.这个月的雨量不足。

9 speculation   

n.思索，沉思；猜测；投机

参考例句：

• Her mind is occupied with speculation.她的头脑忙于思考。
• There is widespread speculation that he is going to resign.人们普遍推测他要辞职。

10 terminology   

n.术语；专有名词

参考例句：

• He particularly criticized the terminology in the document.他特别批评了文件中使用的术语。
• The article uses rather specialized musical terminology.这篇文章用了相当专业的音乐术语。

11 dint   

n.由于，靠；凹坑

参考例句：

• He succeeded by dint of hard work.他靠苦干获得成功。
• He reached the top by dint of great effort.他费了很大的劲终于爬到了顶。

12 arduous   

adj.艰苦的，费力的，陡峭的

参考例句：

• We must have patience in doing arduous work.我们做艰苦的工作要有耐性。
• The task was more arduous than he had calculated.这项任务比他所估计的要艰巨得多。

13 linguistic   

adj.语言的，语言学的

参考例句：

• She is pursuing her linguistic researches.她在从事语言学的研究。
• The ability to write is a supreme test of linguistic competence.写作能力是对语言能力的最高形式的测试。

14 accurately   

adv.准确地，精确地

参考例句：

• It is hard to hit the ball accurately.准确地击中球很难。
• Now scientists can forecast the weather accurately.现在科学家们能准确地预报天气。

15 inaccurate   

adj.错误的，不正确的，不准确的

参考例句：

• The book is both inaccurate and exaggerated.这本书不但不准确，而且夸大其词。
• She never knows the right time because her watch is inaccurate.她从来不知道准确的时间因为她的表不准。

16 primitive   

adj.原始的；简单的；n.原(始)人，原始事物

参考例句：

• It is a primitive instinct to flee a place of danger.逃离危险的地方是一种原始本能。
• His book describes the march of the civilization of a primitive society.他的著作描述了一个原始社会的开化过程。

17 enchanted   

adj. 被施魔法的，陶醉的，入迷的 动词enchant的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• She was enchanted by the flowers you sent her. 她非常喜欢你送给她的花。
• He was enchanted by the idea. 他为这个主意而欣喜若狂。

18 quaint   

adj.古雅的，离奇有趣的，奇怪的

参考例句：

• There were many small lanes in the quaint village.在这古香古色的村庄里，有很多小巷。
• They still keep some quaint old customs.他们仍然保留着一些稀奇古怪的旧风俗。

19 savage   

adj.野蛮的；凶恶的，残暴的；n.未开化的人

参考例句：

• The poor man received a savage beating from the thugs.那可怜的人遭到暴徒的痛打。
• He has a savage temper.他脾气粗暴。

20 wrought   

v.引起；以…原料制作；运转；adj.制造的

参考例句：

• Events in Paris wrought a change in British opinion towards France and Germany.巴黎发生的事件改变了英国对法国和德国的看法。
• It's a walking stick with a gold head wrought in the form of a flower.那是一个金质花形包头的拐杖。

21 grotesque   

adj.怪诞的，丑陋的；n.怪诞的图案，怪人（物）

参考例句：

• His face has a grotesque appearance.他的面部表情十分怪。
• Her account of the incident was a grotesque distortion of the truth.她对这件事的陈述是荒诞地歪曲了事实。

22 implicated   

adj.密切关联的；牵涉其中的

参考例句：

• These groups are very strongly implicated in the violence. 这些组织与这起暴力事件有着极大的关联。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Having the stolen goods in his possession implicated him in the robbery. 因藏有赃物使他涉有偷盗的嫌疑。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

23 ethical   

adj.伦理的，道德的，合乎道德的

参考例句：

• It is necessary to get the youth to have a high ethical concept.必须使青年具有高度的道德观念。
• It was a debate which aroused fervent ethical arguments.那是一场引发强烈的伦理道德争论的辩论。

24 amend   

vt.修改，修订，改进；n.[pl.]赔罪，赔偿

参考例句：

• The teacher advised him to amend his way of living.老师劝他改变生活方式。
• You must amend your pronunciation.你必须改正你的发音。

25 atheist   

n.无神论者

参考例句：

• She was an atheist but now she says she's seen the light.她本来是个无神论者，可是现在她说自己的信仰改变了。
• He is admittedly an atheist.他被公认是位无神论者。

26 civilized   

a.有教养的，文雅的

参考例句：

• Racism is abhorrent to a civilized society. 文明社会憎恶种族主义。
• rising crime in our so-called civilized societies 在我们所谓文明社会中日益增多的犯罪行为

27 antagonists   

对立[对抗] 者，对手，敌手( antagonist的名词复数 )； 对抗肌； 对抗药

参考例句：

• The cavalier defeated all the antagonists. 那位骑士打败了所有的敌手。
• The result was the entire reconstruction of the navies of both the antagonists. 双方的海军就从这场斗争里获得了根本的改造。

28 reconciliation   

n.和解，和谐，一致

参考例句：

• He was taken up with the reconciliation of husband and wife.他忙于做夫妻间的调解工作。
• Their handshake appeared to be a gesture of reconciliation.他们的握手似乎是和解的表示。

29 curiously   

adv.有求知欲地；好问地；奇特地

参考例句：

• He looked curiously at the people.他好奇地看着那些人。
• He took long stealthy strides. His hands were curiously cold.他迈着悄没声息的大步。他的双手出奇地冷。

30 longing   

n.（for）渴望

参考例句：

• Hearing the tune again sent waves of longing through her.再次听到那首曲子使她胸中充满了渴望。
• His heart burned with longing for revenge.他心中燃烧着急欲复仇的怒火。

31 aspiration   

n.志向，志趣抱负；渴望；(语)送气音；吸出

参考例句：

• Man's aspiration should be as lofty as the stars.人的志气应当象天上的星星那么高。
• Young Addison had a strong aspiration to be an inventor.年幼的爱迪生渴望成为一名发明家。

32 gist   

n.要旨；梗概

参考例句：

• Can you give me the gist of this report?你能告诉我这个报告的要点吗？
• He is quick in grasping the gist of a book.他敏于了解书的要点。

33 ken   

n.视野，知识领域

参考例句：

• Such things are beyond my ken.我可不懂这些事。
• Abstract words are beyond the ken of children.抽象的言辞超出小孩所理解的范围.

34 perennial   

adj.终年的；长久的

参考例句：

• I wonder at her perennial youthfulness.我对她青春常驻感到惊讶。
• There's a perennial shortage of teachers with science qualifications.有理科教学资格的老师一直都很短缺。

35 apparently   

adv.显然地；表面上，似乎

参考例句：

• An apparently blind alley leads suddenly into an open space.山穷水尽，豁然开朗。
• He was apparently much surprised at the news.他对那个消息显然感到十分惊异。

36 consigned   

v.把…置于（令人不快的境地）( consign的过去式和过去分词 )；把…托付给；把…托人代售；丟弃

参考例句：

• I consigned her letter to the waste basket. 我把她的信丢进了废纸篓。
• The father consigned the child to his sister's care. 那位父亲把孩子托付给他妹妹照看。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

37 limbo   

n.地狱的边缘；监狱

参考例句：

• His life seemed stuck in limbo and he could not go forward and he could not go back.他的生活好像陷入了不知所措的境地，进退两难。
• I didn't know whether my family was alive or dead.I felt as if I was in limbo.我不知道家人是生是死，感觉自己茫然无措。

38 mythology   

n.神话，神话学，神话集

参考例句：

• In Greek mythology,Zeus was the ruler of Gods and men.在希腊神话中，宙斯是众神和人类的统治者。
• He is the hero of Greek mythology.他是希腊民间传说中的英雄。

39 distinguished   

adj.卓越的，杰出的，著名的

参考例句：

• Elephants are distinguished from other animals by their long noses.大象以其长长的鼻子显示出与其他动物的不同。
• A banquet was given in honor of the distinguished guests.宴会是为了向贵宾们致敬而举行的。

40 random   

adj.随机的；任意的；n.偶然的(或随便的)行动

参考例句：

• The list is arranged in a random order.名单排列不分先后。
• On random inspection the meat was found to be bad.经抽查，发现肉变质了。

41 riddle   

n.谜，谜语，粗筛；vt.解谜，给…出谜，筛，检查，鉴定，非难，充满于；vi.出谜

参考例句：

• The riddle couldn't be solved by the child.这个谜语孩子猜不出来。
• Her disappearance is a complete riddle.她的失踪完全是一个谜。

42 riddles   

n.谜（语）( riddle的名词复数 )；猜不透的难题，难解之谜

参考例句：

• Few riddles collected from oral tradition, however, have all six parts. 但是据收集的情况看，口头流传的谜语很少具有这完整的六部分。 来自英汉非文学 - 民俗
• But first, you'd better see if you can answer riddles. 但是你首先最好想想你会不会猜谜语。 来自辞典例句

43 unravelled   

解开，拆散，散开( unravel的过去式和过去分词 )； 阐明； 澄清； 弄清楚

参考例句：

• I unravelled the string and wound it into a ball. 我把绳子解开并绕成一个球。
• The legal tangle was never really unravelled. 这起法律纠葛从来没有真正解决。

44 indefatigable   

adj.不知疲倦的，不屈不挠的

参考例句：

• His indefatigable spirit helped him to cope with his illness.他不屈不挠的精神帮助他对抗病魔。
• He was indefatigable in his lectures on the aesthetics of love.在讲授关于爱情的美学时，他是不知疲倦的。

45 secondly   

adv.第二，其次

参考例句：

• Secondly,use your own head and present your point of view.第二，动脑筋提出自己的见解。
• Secondly it is necessary to define the applied load.其次，需要确定所作用的载荷。

46 latitude   

n.纬度，行动或言论的自由(范围)，(pl.)地区

参考例句：

• The latitude of the island is 20 degrees south.该岛的纬度是南纬20度。
• The two cities are at approximately the same latitude.这两个城市差不多位于同一纬度上。

47 specially   

adv.特定地；特殊地；明确地

参考例句：

• They are specially packaged so that they stack easily.它们经过特别包装以便于堆放。
• The machine was designed specially for demolishing old buildings.这种机器是专为拆毁旧楼房而设计的。

48 speculative   

adj.思索性的，暝想性的，推理的

参考例句：

• Much of our information is speculative.我们的许多信息是带推测性的。
• The report is highly speculative and should be ignored.那个报道推测的成分很大，不应理会。

49 unlimited   

adj.无限的，不受控制的，无条件的

参考例句：

• They flew over the unlimited reaches of the Arctic.他们飞过了茫茫无边的北极上空。
• There is no safety in unlimited technological hubris.在技术方面自以为是会很危险。

50 formerly   

adv.从前，以前

参考例句：

• We now enjoy these comforts of which formerly we had only heard.我们现在享受到了过去只是听说过的那些舒适条件。
• This boat was formerly used on the rivers of China.这船从前航行在中国内河里。

51 secular   

n.牧师，凡人；adj.世俗的，现世的，不朽的

参考例句：

• We live in an increasingly secular society.我们生活在一个日益非宗教的社会。
• Britain is a plural society in which the secular predominates.英国是个世俗主导的多元社会。

52 contraction   

n.缩略词，缩写式，害病

参考例句：

• The contraction of this muscle raises the lower arm.肌肉的收缩使前臂抬起。
• The forces of expansion are balanced by forces of contraction.扩张力和收缩力相互平衡。

53 catastrophe   

n.大灾难，大祸

参考例句：

• I owe it to you that I survived the catastrophe.亏得你我才大难不死。
• This is a catastrophe beyond human control.这是一场人类无法控制的灾难。

54 inevitably   

adv.不可避免地；必然发生地

参考例句：

• In the way you go on,you are inevitably coming apart.照你们这样下去，毫无疑问是会散伙的。
• Technological changes will inevitably lead to unemployment.技术变革必然会导致失业。

55 countless   

adj.无数的，多得不计其数的

参考例句：

• In the war countless innocent people lost their lives.在这场战争中无数无辜的人丧失了性命。
• I've told you countless times.我已经告诉你无数遍了。

56 pervaded   

v.遍及，弥漫( pervade的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• A retrospective influence pervaded the whole performance. 怀旧的影响弥漫了整个演出。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The air is pervaded by a smell [smoking]. 空气中弥散着一种气味[烟味]。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

57 unity   

n.团结，联合，统一；和睦，协调

参考例句：

• When we speak of unity,we do not mean unprincipled peace.所谓团结，并非一团和气。
• We must strengthen our unity in the face of powerful enemies.大敌当前，我们必须加强团结。

58 manifestation   

n.表现形式；表明；现象

参考例句：

• Her smile is a manifestation of joy.她的微笑是她快乐的表现。
• What we call mass is only another manifestation of energy.我们称之为质量的东西只是能量的另一种表现形态。

59 incompatible   

adj.不相容的，不协调的，不相配的

参考例句：

• His plan is incompatible with my intent.他的计划与我的意图不相符。
• Speed and safety are not necessarily incompatible.速度和安全未必不相容。

60 deities   

n.神，女神( deity的名词复数 )；神祗；神灵；神明

参考例句：

• Zeus and Aphrodite were ancient Greek deities. 宙斯和阿佛洛狄是古希腊的神。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Taoist Wang hesitated occasionally about these transactions for fearof offending the deities. 道士也有过犹豫，怕这样会得罪了神。 来自汉英文学 - 现代散文

61 mythologies   

神话学( mythology的名词复数 )； 神话（总称）； 虚构的事实； 错误的观点

参考例句：

• a study of the religions and mythologies of ancient Rome 关于古罗马的宗教和神话的研究
• This realization is enshrined in "Mythologies." 这一看法见诸于他的《神话集》一书。

62 abstaining   

戒（尤指酒），戒除( abstain的现在分词 )； 弃权（不投票）

参考例句：

• Abstaining from killing, from taking what is not given, & from illicIt'sex. 诸比丘！远离杀生，远离不与取，于爱欲远离邪行。
• Abstaining from arguments was also linked to an unusual daily cortisol pattern. 压抑争吵也造成每日异常的皮质醇波动。

63 philosophic   

adj.哲学的，贤明的

参考例句：

• It was a most philosophic and jesuitical motorman.这是个十分善辩且狡猾的司机。
• The Irish are a philosophic as well as a practical race.爱尔兰人是既重实际又善于思想的民族。

64 haphazard   

adj.无计划的，随意的，杂乱无章的

参考例句：

• The town grew in a haphazard way.这城镇无计划地随意发展。
• He regrerted his haphazard remarks.他悔不该随口说出那些评论话。

65 proceeding   

n.行动，进行，(pl.)会议录，学报

参考例句：

• This train is now proceeding from Paris to London.这次列车从巴黎开往伦敦。
• The work is proceeding briskly.工作很有生气地进展着。

66 inevitable   

adj.不可避免的，必然发生的

参考例句：

• Mary was wearing her inevitable large hat.玛丽戴着她总是戴的那顶大帽子。
• The defeat had inevitable consequences for British policy.战败对英国政策不可避免地产生了影响。

67 datum   

n.资料；数据；已知数

参考例句：

• The author has taught foreigners Chinese manyand gathered rich language and datum.作者长期从事对外汉语教学，积累了丰富的语言资料。
• Every theory,datum,or fact is generated by purpose.任何理论，资料、事实都来自于一定的目的。

68 induction   

n.感应，感应现象

参考例句：

• His induction as a teacher was a turning point in his life.他就任教师工作是他一生的转折点。
• The magnetic signals are sensed by induction coils.磁信号由感应线圈所检测。

69 unwilling   

adj.不情愿的

参考例句：

• The natives were unwilling to be bent by colonial power.土著居民不愿受殖民势力的摆布。
• His tightfisted employer was unwilling to give him a raise.他那吝啬的雇主不肯给他加薪。

70 supreme   

adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的

参考例句：

• It was the supreme moment in his life.那是他一生中最重要的时刻。
• He handed up the indictment to the supreme court.他把起诉书送交最高法院。

71 outlet   

n.出口/路；销路；批发商店；通风口；发泄

参考例句：

• The outlet of a water pipe was blocked.水管的出水口堵住了。
• Running is a good outlet for his energy.跑步是他发泄过剩精力的好方法。

72 joint   

adj.联合的，共同的；n.关节，接合处；v.连接，贴合

参考例句：

• I had a bad fall,which put my shoulder out of joint.我重重地摔了一跤，肩膀脫臼了。
• We wrote a letter in joint names.我们联名写了封信。

73 eminent   

adj.显赫的，杰出的，有名的，优良的

参考例句：

• We are expecting the arrival of an eminent scientist.我们正期待一位著名科学家的来访。
• He is an eminent citizen of China.他是一个杰出的中国公民。

74 physicists   

物理学家( physicist的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• For many particle physicists, however, it was a year of frustration. 对于许多粒子物理学家来说，这是受挫折的一年。 来自英汉非文学 - 科技
• Physicists seek rules or patterns to provide a framework. 物理学家寻求用法则或图式来构成一个框架。

75 ingenuity   

n.别出心裁；善于发明创造

参考例句：

• The boy showed ingenuity in making toys.那个小男孩做玩具很有创造力。
• I admire your ingenuity and perseverance.我钦佩你的别出心裁和毅力。

76 subtlety   

n.微妙，敏锐，精巧；微妙之处，细微的区别

参考例句：

• He has shown enormous strength,great intelligence and great subtlety.他表现出充沛的精力、极大的智慧和高度的灵活性。
• The subtlety of his remarks was unnoticed by most of his audience.大多数听众都没有觉察到他讲话的微妙之处。

77 conjecture   

n./v.推测，猜测

参考例句：

• She felt it no use to conjecture his motives.她觉得猜想他的动机是没有用的。
• This conjecture is not supported by any real evidence.这种推测未被任何确切的证据所证实。

78 recede   

vi.退(去)，渐渐远去；向后倾斜，缩进

参考例句：

• The colleges would recede in importance.大学的重要性会降低。
• He saw that the dirty water had begun to recede.他发现那污浊的水开始往下退了。

79 forth   

adv.向前；向外，往外

参考例句：

• The wind moved the trees gently back and forth.风吹得树轻轻地来回摇晃。
• He gave forth a series of works in rapid succession.他很快连续发表了一系列的作品。

80 speculations   

n.投机买卖( speculation的名词复数 )；思考；投机活动；推断

参考例句：

• Your speculations were all quite close to the truth. 你的揣测都很接近于事实。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》
• This possibility gives rise to interesting speculations. 这种可能性引起了有趣的推测。 来自《用法词典》

81 doctrine   

n.教义；主义；学说

参考例句：

• He was impelled to proclaim his doctrine.他不得不宣扬他的教义。
• The council met to consider changes to doctrine.宗教议会开会考虑更改教义。

82 akin   

adj.同族的，类似的

参考例句：

• She painted flowers and birds pictures akin to those of earlier feminine painters.她画一些同早期女画家类似的花鸟画。
• Listening to his life story is akin to reading a good adventure novel.听他的人生故事犹如阅读一本精彩的冒险小说。

83 nebula   

n.星云，喷雾剂

参考例句：

• A powerful telescope can resolve a nebula into stars.一架高性能的望远镜能从星云中分辨出星球来。
• A nebula is really a discrete mass of innumerous stars.一团星云实际上是无数星体不连续的集合体。

84 astronomer   

n.天文学家

参考例句：

• A new star attracted the notice of the astronomer.新发现的一颗星引起了那位天文学家的注意。
• He is reputed to have been a good astronomer.他以一个优秀的天文学者闻名于世。

85 flattened   

[医]（水）平扁的，弄平的

参考例句：

• She flattened her nose and lips against the window. 她把鼻子和嘴唇紧贴着窗户。
• I flattened myself against the wall to let them pass. 我身体紧靠着墙让他们通过。

86 accounting   

n.会计，会计学，借贷对照表

参考例句：

• A job fell vacant in the accounting department.财会部出现了一个空缺。
• There's an accounting error in this entry.这笔账目里有差错。

87 distended   

v.（使）膨胀，肿胀( distend的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• starving children with huge distended bellies 鼓着浮肿肚子的挨饿儿童
• The balloon was distended. 气球已膨胀。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

88 diffused   

散布的，普及的，扩散的

参考例句：

• A drop of milk diffused in the water. 一滴牛奶在水中扩散开来。
• Gases and liquids diffused. 气体和液体慢慢混合了。

89 Neptune   

n.海王星

参考例句：

• Neptune is the furthest planet from the sun.海王星是离太阳最远的行星。
• Neptune turned out to be a dynamic,stormy world.海王星原来是个有生气、多风暴的世界。

90 relatively   

adv.比较...地，相对地

参考例句：

• The rabbit is a relatively recent introduction in Australia.兔子是相对较新引入澳大利亚的物种。
• The operation was relatively painless.手术相对来说不痛。

91 rotation   

n.旋转；循环，轮流

参考例句：

• Crop rotation helps prevent soil erosion.农作物轮作有助于防止水土流失。
• The workers in this workshop do day and night shifts in weekly rotation.这个车间的工人上白班和上夜班每周轮换一次。

92 breach   

n.违反，不履行；破裂；vt.冲破，攻破

参考例句：

• We won't have any breach of discipline.我们不允许任何破坏纪律的现象。
• He was sued for breach of contract.他因不履行合同而被起诉。

93 coalesced   

v.联合，合并( coalesce的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The puddles had coalesced into a small stream. 地面上水洼子里的水汇流成了一条小溪。
• The views of party leaders coalesced to form a coherent policy. 党的领导人的各种观点已统一为一致的政策。 来自辞典例句

94 immediate   

adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的

参考例句：

• His immediate neighbours felt it their duty to call.他的近邻认为他们有责任去拜访。
• We declared ourselves for the immediate convocation of the meeting.我们主张立即召开这个会议。

95 abort   

v.使流产，堕胎；中止；中止(工作、计划等)

参考例句：

• The captain instructed them to abort the mission.上尉指示他们中止执行任务。
• With this button the user can abort the audio sequence.用户可以用该按钮终止音频序列。

96 Saturn   

n.农神，土星

参考例句：

• Astronomers used to ask why only Saturn has rings.天文学家们过去一直感到奇怪，为什么只有土星有光环。
• These comparisons suggested that Saturn is made of lighter materials.这些比较告诉我们，土星由较轻的物质构成。

97 mere   

adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过

参考例句：

• That is a mere repetition of what you said before.那不过是重复了你以前讲的话。
• It's a mere waste of time waiting any longer.再等下去纯粹是浪费时间。

98 mutual   

adj.相互的，彼此的；共同的，共有的

参考例句：

• We must pull together for mutual interest.我们必须为相互的利益而通力合作。
• Mutual interests tied us together.相互的利害关系把我们联系在一起。

99 incessantly   

ad.不停地

参考例句：

• The machines roar incessantly during the hours of daylight. 机器在白天隆隆地响个不停。
• It rained incessantly for the whole two weeks. 雨不间断地下了整整两个星期。

100 thoroughly   

adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地

参考例句：

• The soil must be thoroughly turned over before planting.一定要先把土地深翻一遍再下种。
• The soldiers have been thoroughly instructed in the care of their weapons.士兵们都系统地接受过保护武器的训练。

101 atmospheric   

adj.大气的，空气的；大气层的；大气所引起的

参考例句：

• Sea surface temperatures and atmospheric circulation are strongly coupled.海洋表面温度与大气环流是密切相关的。
• Clouds return radiant energy to the surface primarily via the atmospheric window.云主要通过大气窗区向地表辐射能量。

102 phenomena   

n.现象

参考例句：

• Ade couldn't relate the phenomena with any theory he knew.艾德无法用他所知道的任何理论来解释这种现象。
• The object of these experiments was to find the connection,if any,between the two phenomena.这些实验的目的就是探索这两种现象之间的联系，如果存在着任何联系的话。

103 incandescence   

n.白热，炽热；白炽

参考例句：

• A fine wire is heated electrically to incandescence in an electric lamp. 灯丝在电灯中电加时成白炽状态。 来自辞典例句
• A fine wire heated electrically to incandescence in an electric lamp. 电灯光亮来自白热的灯丝。 来自互联网

104 Fahrenheit   

n./adj.华氏温度；华氏温度计(的)

参考例句：

• He was asked for the boiling point of water in Fahrenheit.他被问到水的沸点是华氏多少度。
• The thermometer reads 80 degrees Fahrenheit.寒暑表指出华氏80度。

105 diminution   

n.减少；变小

参考例句：

• They hope for a small diminution in taxes.他们希望捐税能稍有减少。
• He experienced no diminution of his physical strength.他并未感觉体力衰落。

106 doom   

n.厄运，劫数；v.注定，命定

参考例句：

• The report on our economic situation is full of doom and gloom.这份关于我们经济状况的报告充满了令人绝望和沮丧的调子。
• The dictator met his doom after ten years of rule.独裁者统治了十年终于完蛋了。

107 postponed   

vt.& vi.延期，缓办，（使）延迟vt.把…放在次要地位；[语]把…放在后面（或句尾）vi.（疟疾等）延缓发作（或复发）

参考例句：

• The trial was postponed indefinitely. 审讯无限期延迟。
• The game has already been postponed three times. 这场比赛已经三度延期了。

108 conformity   

n.一致，遵从，顺从

参考例句：

• Was his action in conformity with the law?他的行动是否合法？
• The plan was made in conformity with his views.计划仍按他的意见制定。

109 astronomers   

n.天文学者，天文学家( astronomer的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Astronomers can accurately foretell the date,time,and length of future eclipses. 天文学家能精确地预告未来日食月食的日期、时刻和时长。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Astronomers used to ask why only Saturn has rings. 天文学家们过去一直感到奇怪，为什么只有土星有光环。 来自《简明英汉词典》

110 friction   

n.摩擦，摩擦力

参考例句：

• When Joan returned to work,the friction between them increased.琼回来工作后，他们之间的摩擦加剧了。
• Friction acts on moving bodies and brings them to a stop.摩擦力作用于运动着的物体，并使其停止。

111 infinitely   

adv.无限地，无穷地

参考例句：

• There is an infinitely bright future ahead of us.我们有无限光明的前途。
• The universe is infinitely large.宇宙是无限大的。

112 momentum   

n.动力，冲力，势头；动量

参考例句：

• We exploit the energy and momentum conservation laws in this way.我们就是这样利用能量和动量守恒定律的。
• The law of momentum conservation could supplant Newton's third law.动量守恒定律可以取代牛顿第三定律。

113 concussion   

n.脑震荡；震动

参考例句：

• He was carried off the field with slight concussion.他因轻微脑震荡给抬离了现场。
• She suffers from brain concussion.她得了脑震荡。

114 outermost   

adj.最外面的，远离中心的

参考例句：

• He fired and hit the outermost ring of the target.他开枪射中了靶子的最外一环。
• The outermost electron is shielded from the nucleus.原子核对最外层电子的作用受到屏蔽。

115 dilated   

adj.加宽的，扩大的v.（使某物）扩大，膨胀，张大( dilate的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• Her eyes dilated with fear. 她吓得瞪大了眼睛。
• The cat dilated its eyes. 猫瞪大了双眼。 来自《简明英汉词典》

116 briefly   

adv.简单地，简短地

参考例句：

• I want to touch briefly on another aspect of the problem.我想简单地谈一下这个问题的另一方面。
• He was kidnapped and briefly detained by a terrorist group.他被一个恐怖组织绑架并短暂拘禁。

117 prodigal   

adj.浪费的，挥霍的，放荡的

参考例句：

• He has been prodigal of the money left by his parents.他已挥霍掉他父母留下的钱。
• The country has been prodigal of its forests.这个国家的森林正受过度的采伐。

118 geologic   

adj.地质的

参考例句：

• The Red Sea is a geologic continuation of the valley.红海就是一个峡谷在地质上的继续发展。
• Delineation of channels is the first step of geologic evaluation.勾划河道的轮廓是地质解译的第一步。

119 wasteful   

adj.（造成）浪费的，挥霍的

参考例句：

• It is a shame to be so wasteful.这样浪费太可惜了。
• Duties have been reassigned to avoid wasteful duplication of work.为避免重复劳动浪费资源，任务已经重新分派。

120 prodigally   

adv.浪费地，丰饶地

参考例句：

• He wasted money prodigally. 他挥霍浪费金钱。 来自互联网
• We are still prodigally rich compared to others. 和别人相比，我们仍然很富有。 来自互联网

121 circumference   

n.圆周，周长，圆周线

参考例句：

• It's a mile round the circumference of the field.运动场周长一英里。
• The diameter and the circumference of a circle correlate.圆的直径与圆周有相互关系。

122 utilize   

vt.使用，利用

参考例句：

• The cook will utilize the leftover ham bone to make soup.厨师要用吃剩的猪腿骨做汤。
• You must utilize all available resources.你必须利用一切可以得到的资源。

123 radius   

n.半径，半径范围；有效航程，范围，界限

参考例句：

• He has visited every shop within a radius of two miles.周围两英里以内的店铺他都去过。
• We are measuring the radius of the circle.我们正在测量圆的半径。

124 residue   

n.残余，剩余，残渣

参考例句：

• Mary scraped the residue of food from the plates before putting them under water.玛丽在把盘子放入水之前先刮去上面的食物残渣。
• Pesticide persistence beyond the critical period for control leads to residue problems.农药一旦超过控制的临界期，就会导致残留问题。

125 utilized   

v.利用，使用( utilize的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• In the19th century waterpower was widely utilized to generate electricity. 在19世纪人们大规模使用水力来发电。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The empty building can be utilized for city storage. 可以利用那栋空建筑物作城市的仓库。 来自《简明英汉词典》

126 potent   

adj.强有力的，有权势的；有效力的

参考例句：

• The medicine had a potent effect on your disease.这药物对你的病疗效很大。
• We must account of his potent influence.我们必须考虑他的强有力的影响。

127 darts   

n.掷飞镖游戏；飞镖( dart的名词复数 )；急驰，飞奔v.投掷，投射( dart的第三人称单数 )；向前冲，飞奔

参考例句：

• His darts trophy takes pride of place on the mantelpiece. 他将掷镖奖杯放在壁炉顶上最显著的地方。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• I never saw so many darts in a bodice! 我从没见过紧身胸衣上纳了这么多的缝褶！ 来自《简明英汉词典》

128 surmise   

v./n.猜想，推测

参考例句：

• It turned out that my surmise was correct.结果表明我的推测没有错。
• I surmise that he will take the job.我推测他会接受这份工作。

129 insignificant   

adj.无关紧要的，可忽略的，无意义的

参考例句：

• In winter the effect was found to be insignificant.在冬季，这种作用是不明显的。
• This problem was insignificant compared to others she faced.这一问题与她面临的其他问题比较起来算不得什么。

130 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。

131 valid   

adj.有确实根据的；有效的；正当的，合法的

参考例句：

• His claim to own the house is valid.他主张对此屋的所有权有效。
• Do you have valid reasons for your absence?你的缺席有正当理由吗？

132 dealing   

n.经商方法，待人态度

参考例句：

• This store has an excellent reputation for fair dealing.该商店因买卖公道而享有极高的声誉。
• His fair dealing earned our confidence.他的诚实的行为获得我们的信任。

133 circumscribed   

adj.[医]局限的：受限制或限于有限空间的v.在…周围划线( circumscribe的过去式和过去分词 )；划定…范围；限制；限定

参考例句：

• The power of the monarchy was circumscribed by the new law. 君主统治的权力受到了新法律的制约。
• His activities have been severely circumscribed since his illness. 自生病以来他的行动一直受到严格的限制。 来自《简明英汉词典》

134 undoubtedly   

adv.确实地，无疑地

参考例句：

• It is undoubtedly she who has said that.这话明明是她说的。
• He is undoubtedly the pride of China.毫无疑问他是中国的骄傲。

135 sidereal   

adj.恒星的

参考例句：

• The sidereal year is not used to construct a calendar. 恒星年不用于编制年历。
• A sidereal day is about 4 minutes shorter than a solar day.一个恒星日比一个太阳日大约短4分钟。

136 spectrum   

n.谱，光谱，频谱；范围，幅度，系列

参考例句：

• This is a kind of atomic spectrum.这是一种原子光谱。
• We have known much of the constitution of the solar spectrum.关于太阳光谱的构成，我们已了解不少。

137 perennially   

adv.经常出现地；长期地；持久地；永久地

参考例句：

• He perennially does business abroad. 他常年在国外做生意。 来自辞典例句
• We want to know what is perennially new about the world. 我们想知道世上什么东西永远是新的。 来自互联网

138 drawn   

v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的

参考例句：

• All the characters in the story are drawn from life.故事中的所有人物都取材于生活。
• Her gaze was drawn irresistibly to the scene outside.她的目光禁不住被外面的风景所吸引。

139 remodel   

v.改造，改型，改变

参考例句：

• Workmen were hired to remodel and enlarge the farm buildings.雇用了工人来改造和扩建农场建筑。
• I'll remodel the downstairs bedroom first.我先要装修楼下那间房间。

140 disintegration   

n.分散，解体

参考例句：

• This defeat led to the disintegration of the empire.这次战败道致了帝国的瓦解。
• The incident has hastened the disintegration of the club.这一事件加速了该俱乐部的解体。

141 accomplished   

adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的

参考例句：

• Thanks to your help,we accomplished the task ahead of schedule.亏得你们帮忙,我们才提前完成了任务。
• Removal of excess heat is accomplished by means of a radiator.通过散热器完成多余热量的排出。

142 eternity   

n.不朽，来世；永恒，无穷

参考例句：

• The dull play seemed to last an eternity.这场乏味的剧似乎演个没完没了。
• Finally,Ying Tai and Shan Bo could be together for all of eternity.英台和山伯终能双宿双飞，永世相随。

143 prospect   

n.前景，前途；景色，视野

参考例句：

• This state of things holds out a cheerful prospect.事态呈现出可喜的前景。
• The prospect became more evident.前景变得更加明朗了。

144 transformations   

n.变化( transformation的名词复数 )；转换；转换；变换

参考例句：

• Energy transformations go on constantly, all about us. 在我们周围，能量始终在不停地转换着。 来自辞典例句
• On the average, such transformations balance out. 平均起来，这种转化可以互相抵消。 来自辞典例句

145 transformation   

n.变化；改造；转变

参考例句：

• Going to college brought about a dramatic transformation in her outlook.上大学使她的观念发生了巨大的变化。
• He was struggling to make the transformation from single man to responsible husband.他正在努力使自己由单身汉变为可靠的丈夫。

146 excellence   

n.优秀，杰出，(pl.)优点，美德

参考例句：

• His art has reached a high degree of excellence.他的艺术已达到炉火纯青的地步。
• My performance is far below excellence.我的表演离优秀还差得远呢。

147 essentially   

adv.本质上，实质上，基本上

参考例句：

• Really great men are essentially modest.真正的伟人大都很谦虚。
• She is an essentially selfish person.她本质上是个自私自利的人。

148 aggregation   

n.聚合，组合；凝聚

参考例句：

• A high polymer is a very large aggregation of units.一个高聚物是许多单元的非常大的组合。
• Moreover,aggregation influences the outcome of chemical disinfection of viruses.此外，聚集作用还会影响化学消毒的效果。

149 kinetic   

adj.运动的；动力学的

参考例句：

• There exist many sources of energy both potential and kinetic.存在着许多势能和动能的能源。
• The kinetic theory of gases is the best known example.气体动力学理论就是最有名的例子。

150 immortality   

n.不死，不朽

参考例句：

• belief in the immortality of the soul 灵魂不灭的信念
• It was like having immortality while you were still alive. 仿佛是当你仍然活着的时候就得到了永生。

151 immortal   

adj.不朽的；永生的，不死的；神的

参考例句：

• The wild cocoa tree is effectively immortal.野生可可树实际上是不会死的。
• The heroes of the people are immortal!人民英雄永垂不朽！

152 transcend   

vt.超出，超越(理性等)的范围

参考例句：

• We can't transcend the limitations of the ego.我们无法超越自我的局限性。
• Everyone knows that the speed of airplanes transcend that of ships.人人都知道飞机的速度快于轮船的速度。

153 velocity   

n.速度，速率

参考例句：

• Einstein's theory links energy with mass and velocity of light.爱因斯坦的理论把能量同质量和光速联系起来。
• The velocity of light is about 300000 kilometres per second.光速约为每秒300000公里。

154 stagnation   

n. 停滞

参考例句：

• Poor economic policies led to a long period of stagnation and decline. 糟糕的经济政策道致了长时间的经济萧条和下滑。
• Motion is absolute while stagnation is relative. 运动是绝对的，而静止是相对的。

155 depict   

vt.描画，描绘；描写，描述

参考例句：

• I don't care to see plays or films that depict murders or violence.我不喜欢看描写谋杀或暴力的戏剧或电影。
• Children's books often depict farmyard animals as gentle,lovable creatures.儿童图书常常把农场的动物描写得温和而可爱。

156 depicted   

描绘，描画( depict的过去式和过去分词 )； 描述

参考例句：

• Other animals were depicted on the periphery of the group. 其他动物在群像的外围加以修饰。
• They depicted the thrilling situation to us in great detail. 他们向我们详细地描述了那激动人心的场面。

157 infinity   

n.无限，无穷，大量

参考例句：

• It is impossible to count up to infinity.不可能数到无穷大。
• Theoretically,a line can extend into infinity.从理论上来说直线可以无限地延伸。

158 strictly   

adv.严厉地，严格地；严密地

参考例句：

• His doctor is dieting him strictly.他的医生严格规定他的饮食。
• The guests were seated strictly in order of precedence.客人严格按照地位高低就座。

159 capabilities   

n.能力( capability的名词复数 )；可能；容量；[复数]潜在能力

参考例句：

• He was somewhat pompous and had a high opinion of his own capabilities. 他有点自大，自视甚高。 来自辞典例句
• Some programmers use tabs to break complex product capabilities into smaller chunks. 一些程序员认为，标签可以将复杂的功能分为每个窗格一组简单的功能。 来自About Face 3交互设计精髓

160 gauge   

v.精确计量；估计；n.标准度量；计量器

参考例句：

• Can you gauge what her reaction is likely to be?你能揣测她的反应可能是什么吗？
• It's difficult to gauge one's character.要判断一个人的品格是很困难的。

161 explicit   

adj.详述的，明确的；坦率的；显然的

参考例句：

• She was quite explicit about why she left.她对自己离去的原因直言不讳。
• He avoids the explicit answer to us.他避免给我们明确的回答。

162 vicissitudes   

n.变迁，世事变化；变迁兴衰( vicissitude的名词复数 )；盛衰兴废

参考例句：

• He experienced several great social vicissitudes in his life. 他一生中经历了几次大的社会变迁。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• A man used to vicissitudes is not easily dejected. 饱经沧桑，不易沮丧。 来自《简明英汉词典》

163 pervading   

v.遍及，弥漫( pervade的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• an all-pervading sense of gloom 无处不在的沮丧感
• a pervading mood of fear 普遍的恐惧情绪

164 remarkable   

adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的

参考例句：

• She has made remarkable headway in her writing skills.她在写作技巧方面有了长足进步。
• These cars are remarkable for the quietness of their engines.这些汽车因发动机没有噪音而不同凡响。

165 enveloping   

v.包围，笼罩，包住( envelop的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• Always the eyes watching you and the voice enveloping you. 那眼睛总是死死盯着你，那声音总是紧紧围着你。 来自英汉文学
• The only barrier was a mosquito net, enveloping the entire bed. 唯一的障碍是那顶蚊帐罩住整个床。 来自辞典例句

166 molecule   

n.分子，克分子

参考例句：

• A molecule of water is made up of two atoms of hygrogen and one atom of oxygen.一个水分子是由P妈̬f婘̬ 妈̬成的。
• This gives us the structural formula of the molecule.这种方式给出了分子的结构式。

167 molecules   

分子( molecule的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The structure of molecules can be seen under an electron microscope. 分子的结构可在电子显微镜下观察到。
• Inside the reactor the large molecules are cracked into smaller molecules. 在反应堆里，大分子裂变为小分子。

168 thermal   

adj.热的，由热造成的；保暖的

参考例句：

• They will build another thermal power station.他们要另外建一座热能发电站。
• Volcanic activity has created thermal springs and boiling mud pools.火山活动产生了温泉和沸腾的泥浆池。

169 luminous   

adj.发光的，发亮的；光明的；明白易懂的；有启发的

参考例句：

• There are luminous knobs on all the doors in my house.我家所有门上都安有夜光把手。
• Most clocks and watches in this shop are in luminous paint.这家商店出售的大多数钟表都涂了发光漆。

170 vibrations   

n.摆动( vibration的名词复数 )；震动；感受；（偏离平衡位置的）一次性往复振动

参考例句：

• We could feel the vibrations from the trucks passing outside. 我们可以感到外面卡车经过时的颤动。
• I am drawn to that girl; I get good vibrations from her. 我被那女孩吸引住了，她使我产生良好的感觉。 来自《简明英汉词典》

171 vibration   

n.颤动，振动；摆动

参考例句：

• There is so much vibration on a ship that one cannot write.船上的震动大得使人无法书写。
• The vibration of the window woke me up.窗子的震动把我惊醒了。

172 partially   

adv.部分地，从某些方面讲

参考例句：

• The door was partially concealed by the drapes.门有一部分被门帘遮住了。
• The police managed to restore calm and the curfew was partially lifted.警方设法恢复了平静，宵禁部分解除。

173 justified   

a.正当的，有理的

参考例句：

• She felt fully justified in asking for her money back. 她认为有充分的理由要求退款。
• The prisoner has certainly justified his claims by his actions. 那个囚犯确实已用自己的行动表明他的要求是正当的。

174 encompassing   

v.围绕( encompass的现在分词 )；包围；包含；包括

参考例句：

• Being too large and all-encompassing is a common defect among state-owned enterprises. 过分追求大而全，是国企的一大通病。 来自互联网
• Our services are: all-encompassing, love justice and high quality. 我们的服务目标是：全方位、真情义、高质量。 来自互联网

175 sufficiently   

adv.足够地，充分地

参考例句：

• It turned out he had not insured the house sufficiently.原来他没有给房屋投足保险。
• The new policy was sufficiently elastic to accommodate both views.新政策充分灵活地适用两种观点。

176 elastic   

n.橡皮圈，松紧带；adj.有弹性的；灵活的

参考例句：

• Rubber is an elastic material.橡胶是一种弹性材料。
• These regulations are elastic.这些规定是有弹性的。

177 contradictory   

adj.反驳的，反对的，抗辩的；n.正反对，矛盾对立

参考例句：

• The argument is internally contradictory.论据本身自相矛盾。
• What he said was self-contradictory.他讲话前后不符。

178 appreciable   

adj.明显的，可见的，可估量的，可觉察的

参考例句：

• There is no appreciable distinction between the twins.在这对孪生子之间看不出有什么明显的差别。
• We bought an appreciable piece of property.我们买下的资产有增值的潜力。

179 contemplating   

深思，细想，仔细考虑( contemplate的现在分词 )； 注视，凝视； 考虑接受（发生某事的可能性）； 深思熟虑，沉思，苦思冥想

参考例句：

• You're too young to be contemplating retirement. 你考虑退休还太年轻。
• She stood contemplating the painting. 她站在那儿凝视那幅图画。

180 firmament   

n.苍穹；最高层

参考例句：

• There are no stars in the firmament.天空没有一颗星星。
• He was rich,and a rising star in the political firmament.他十分富有，并且是政治高层一颗冉冉升起的新星。

181 disturbance   

n.动乱，骚动；打扰，干扰；(身心)失调

参考例句：

• He is suffering an emotional disturbance.他的情绪受到了困扰。
• You can work in here without any disturbance.在这儿你可不受任何干扰地工作。

182 previously   

adv.以前，先前（地）

参考例句：

• The bicycle tyre blew out at a previously damaged point.自行车胎在以前损坏过的地方又爆开了。
• Let me digress for a moment and explain what had happened previously.让我岔开一会儿，解释原先发生了什么。

183 eminently   

adv.突出地；显著地；不寻常地

参考例句：

• She seems eminently suitable for the job. 她看来非常适合这个工作。
• It was an eminently respectable boarding school. 这是所非常好的寄宿学校。 来自《简明英汉词典》

184 gaseous   

adj.气体的，气态的

参考例句：

• Air whether in the gaseous or liquid state is a fluid.空气，无论是气态的或是液态的，都是一种流体。
• Freon exists both in liquid and gaseous states.氟利昂有液态和气态两种形态。

185 entail   

vt.使承担，使成为必要，需要

参考例句：

• Such a decision would entail a huge political risk.这样的决定势必带来巨大的政治风险。
• This job would entail your learning how to use a computer.这工作将需要你学会怎样用计算机。

186 cylindrical   

adj.圆筒形的

参考例句：

• huge cylindrical gas tanks 巨大的圆柱形贮气罐
• Beer cans are cylindrical. 啤酒罐子是圆筒形的。

187 smoker   

n.吸烟者，吸烟车厢，吸烟室

参考例句：

• His wife dislikes him to be a smoker.他妻子不喜欢他当烟民。
• He is a moderate smoker.他是一个有节制的烟民。

188 puff   

n.一口(气)；一阵(风)；v.喷气，喘气

参考例句：

• He took a puff at his cigarette.他吸了一口香烟。
• They tried their best to puff the book they published.他们尽力吹捧他们出版的书。

189 frictionless   

adj.没有摩擦力的

参考例句：

• The suspension of the mirrors must be very frictionless, but strongly damped. 反射镜的悬挂既要无摩擦，但又要有强阻尼。
• There is a frictionless hinge at C. C点是无摩擦铰。

190 peculiar   

adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的

参考例句：

• He walks in a peculiar fashion.他走路的样子很奇特。
• He looked at me with a very peculiar expression.他用一种很奇怪的表情看着我。

191 conjectural   

adj.推测的

参考例句：

• There is something undeniably conjectural about such claims.这类声明中有些东西绝对是凭空臆测。
• As regarded its origin there were various explanations,all of which must necessarily have been conjectural.至于其来源，则有着种种解释，当然都是些臆测。

192 legitimate   

adj.合法的，合理的，合乎逻辑的；v.使合法

参考例句：

• Sickness is a legitimate reason for asking for leave.生病是请假的一个正当的理由。
• That's a perfectly legitimate fear.怀有这种恐惧完全在情理之中。

193 postulated   

v.假定，假设( postulate的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• They postulated a 500-year lifespan for a plastic container. 他们假定塑料容器的寿命为500年。
• Freud postulated that we all have a death instinct as well as a life instinct. 弗洛伊德曾假定我们所有人都有生存本能和死亡本能。 来自辞典例句

194 conspicuous   

adj.明眼的，惹人注目的；炫耀的，摆阔气的

参考例句：

• It is conspicuous that smoking is harmful to health.很明显，抽烟对健康有害。
• Its colouring makes it highly conspicuous.它的色彩使它非常惹人注目。

195 elasticity   

n.弹性，伸缩力

参考例句：

• The skin eventually loses its elasticity.皮肤最终会失去弹性。
• Every sort of spring has a definite elasticity.每一种弹簧都有一定的弹性。

196 lucid   

adj.明白易懂的，清晰的，头脑清楚的

参考例句：

• His explanation was lucid and to the point.他的解释扼要易懂。
• He wasn't very lucid,he didn't quite know where he was.他神志不是很清醒，不太知道自己在哪里。

197 component   

n.组成部分，成分，元件；adj.组成的，合成的

参考例句：

• Each component is carefully checked before assembly.每个零件在装配前都经过仔细检查。
• Blade and handle are the component parts of a knife.刀身和刀柄是一把刀的组成部分。

198 coagulation   

n.凝固；凝结物

参考例句：

• Blood becomes stickier to help coagulation in case of a cut.割伤的时候，血液会变得更为黏稠以助于凝结。
• Man has been intrigued with blood coagulation.人类一直对血凝感兴趣。

199 dispensed   

v.分配( dispense的过去式和过去分词 )；施与；配（药）

参考例句：

• Not a single one of these conditions can be dispensed with. 这些条件缺一不可。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• They dispensed new clothes to the children in the orphanage. 他们把新衣服发给孤儿院的小孩们。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

200 rigid   

adj.严格的，死板的；刚硬的，僵硬的

参考例句：

• She became as rigid as adamant.她变得如顽石般的固执。
• The examination was so rigid that nearly all aspirants were ruled out.考试很严，几乎所有的考生都被淘汰了。

201 rotary   

adj.(运动等)旋转的；轮转的；转动的

参考例句：

• The central unit is a rotary drum.核心设备是一个旋转的滚筒。
• A rotary table helps to optimize the beam incidence angle.一张旋转的桌子有助于将光线影响之方式角最佳化。

202 entirely   

ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The fire was entirely caused by their neglect of duty. 那场火灾完全是由于他们失职而引起的。
• His life was entirely given up to the educational work. 他的一生统统献给了教育工作。

203 destitute   

adj.缺乏的；穷困的

参考例句：

• They were destitute of necessaries of life.他们缺少生活必需品。
• They are destitute of common sense.他们缺乏常识。

204 perfectly   

adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地

参考例句：

• The witnesses were each perfectly certain of what they said.证人们个个对自己所说的话十分肯定。
• Everything that we're doing is all perfectly above board.我们做的每件事情都是光明正大的。

205 primordial   

adj.原始的；最初的

参考例句：

• It is the primordial force that propels us forward.它是推动我们前进的原始动力。
• The Neanderthal Man is one of our primordial ancestors.的尼安德特人是我们的原始祖先之一.

206 meddle   

v.干预，干涉，插手

参考例句：

• I hope he doesn't try to meddle in my affairs.我希望他不来干预我的事情。
• Do not meddle in things that do not concern you.别参与和自己无关的事。

207 accredit   

vt.归功于，认为

参考例句：

• The president will accredit you as his assistant.董事长将任命你做他的助理。
• We accredit the invention of the electric light to Adison.我们把电灯的发明归功于爱迪生。

208 destined   

adj.命中注定的；(for)以…为目的地的

参考例句：

• It was destined that they would marry.他们结婚是缘分。
• The shipment is destined for America.这批货物将运往美国。

209 lasting   

adj.永久的，永恒的；vbl.持续，维持

参考例句：

• The lasting war debased the value of the dollar.持久的战争使美元贬值。
• We hope for a lasting settlement of all these troubles.我们希望这些纠纷能获得永久的解决。

210 inert   

adj.无活动能力的，惰性的；迟钝的

参考例句：

• Inert gas studies are providing valuable information about other planets,too.对惰性气体的研究，也提供了有关其它行星的有价值的资料。
• Elemental nitrogen is a very unreactive and inert material.元素氮是一个十分不活跃的惰性物质。

211 functionally   

adv.机能上地，官能地

参考例句：

• Objective To explore occlusion reconstruction by computer aided design (CAD) with functionally-generated pathway (FGP). 目的探索借助功能性？记录(functionally-generated pathway,FGP)技术进行口腔固定修复体计算机辅助设计(Computer aided Design,CAD)生理性建？的方法。 来自互联网
• In this respect, the proceeding was functionally similar to a comparative licensing adjudication. 在这一点上，手续在作用上即类似于比较许可证发放的裁断。 来自英汉非文学 - 行政法

212 effete   

adj.无生产力的，虚弱的

参考例句：

• People said the aristocracy was effete.人们说贵族阶级已是日薄西山了。
• During the ages,Greek civilization declined and became effete.在中世纪期间，希腊文明开始衰落直至衰败。

213 efface   

v.擦掉，抹去

参考例句：

• It takes many years to efface the unpleasant memories of a war.许多年后才能冲淡战争的不愉快记忆。
• He could not efface the impression from his mind.他不能把这个印象从心中抹去。

214 starry   

adj.星光照耀的, 闪亮的

参考例句：

• He looked at the starry heavens.他瞧着布满星星的天空。
• I like the starry winter sky.我喜欢这满天星斗的冬夜。

215 galaxy   

n.星系；银河系；一群(杰出或著名的人物)

参考例句：

• The earth is one of the planets in the Galaxy.地球是银河系中的星球之一。
• The company has a galaxy of talent.该公司拥有一批优秀的人才。

216 audacity   

n.大胆，卤莽，无礼

参考例句：

• He had the audacity to ask for an increase in salary.他竟然厚着脸皮要求增加薪水。
• He had the audacity to pick pockets in broad daylight.他竟敢在光天化日之下掏包。

217 modesty   

n.谦逊，虚心，端庄，稳重，羞怯，朴素

参考例句：

• Industry and modesty are the chief factors of his success.勤奋和谦虚是他成功的主要因素。
• As conceit makes one lag behind,so modesty helps one make progress.骄傲使人落后，谦虚使人进步。

218 rhythmically   

adv.有节奏地

参考例句：

• A pigeon strutted along the roof, cooing rhythmically. 一只鸽子沿着屋顶大摇大摆地走，有节奏地咕咕叫。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Exposures of rhythmically banded protore are common in the workings. 在工作面中常见有韵律条带“原矿石”。 来自辞典例句

219 sublime   

adj.崇高的，伟大的；极度的，不顾后果的

参考例句：

• We should take some time to enjoy the sublime beauty of nature.我们应该花些时间去欣赏大自然的壮丽景象。
• Olympic games play as an important arena to exhibit the sublime idea.奥运会，就是展示此崇高理念的重要舞台。

220 plausibility   

n. 似有道理, 能言善辩

参考例句：

• We can add further plausibility to the above argument. 我们可以在上述论据之外，再进一步增添一个合理的论据。
• Let us consider the charges she faces, and the legal plausibility of those charges. 让我们考虑一下她面临的指控以及这些指控在法律上的可信性。

221 assent   

v.批准，认可；n.批准，认可

参考例句：

• I cannot assent to what you ask.我不能应允你的要求。
• The new bill passed by Parliament has received Royal Assent.议会所通过的新方案已获国王批准。

222 jurisdiction   

n.司法权，审判权，管辖权，控制权

参考例句：

• It doesn't lie within my jurisdiction to set you free.我无权将你释放。
• Changzhou is under the jurisdiction of Jiangsu Province.常州隶属江苏省。

223 broached   

v.谈起( broach的过去式和过去分词 )；打开并开始用；用凿子扩大（或修光）；（在桶上）钻孔取液体

参考例句：

• She broached the subject of a picnic to her mother. 她向母亲提起野餐的问题。 来自辞典例句
• He broached the subject to the stranger. 他对陌生人提起那话题。 来自辞典例句

224 subjective   

a.主观(上)的，个人的

参考例句：

• The way they interpreted their past was highly subjective. 他们解释其过去的方式太主观。
• A literary critic should not be too subjective in his approach. 文学评论家的看法不应太主观。

225 wrangle   

vi.争吵

参考例句：

• I don't want to get into a wrangle with the committee.我不想同委员会发生争执。
• The two countries fell out in a bitter wrangle over imports.这两个国家在有关进口问题的激烈争吵中闹翻了。

226 qualified   

adj.合格的，有资格的，胜任的，有限制的

参考例句：

• He is qualified as a complete man of letters.他有资格当真正的文学家。
• We must note that we still lack qualified specialists.我们必须看到我们还缺乏有资质的专家。

227 molecular   

adj.分子的；克分子的

参考例句：

• The research will provide direct insight into molecular mechanisms.这项研究将使人能够直接地了解分子的机理。
• For the pressure to become zero, molecular bombardment must cease.当压强趋近于零时，分子的碰撞就停止了。

228 underlying   

adj.在下面的，含蓄的，潜在的

参考例句：

• The underlying theme of the novel is very serious.小说隐含的主题是十分严肃的。
• This word has its underlying meaning.这个单词有它潜在的含义。

229 justification   

n.正当的理由；辩解的理由

参考例句：

• There's no justification for dividing the company into smaller units. 没有理由把公司划分成小单位。
• In the young there is a justification for this feeling. 在年轻人中有这种感觉是有理由的。

230 esteemed   

adj.受人尊敬的v.尊敬( esteem的过去式和过去分词 )；敬重；认为；以为

参考例句：

• The art of conversation is highly esteemed in France. 在法国十分尊重谈话技巧。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• He esteemed that he understood what I had said. 他认为已经听懂我说的意思了。 来自《简明英汉词典》

231 contemplated   

adj. 预期的 动词contemplate的过去分词形式

参考例句：

• The doctor contemplated the difficult operation he had to perform. 医生仔细地考虑他所要做的棘手的手术。
• The government has contemplated reforming the entire tax system. 政府打算改革整个税收体制。

232 attained   

（通常经过努力）实现( attain的过去式和过去分词 )； 达到； 获得； 达到（某年龄、水平、状况）

参考例句：

• She has attained the degree of Master of Arts. 她已获得文学硕士学位。
• Lu Hsun attained a high position in the republic of letters. 鲁迅在文坛上获得崇高的地位。

233 sustenance   

n.食物，粮食；生活资料；生计

参考例句：

• We derive our sustenance from the land.我们从土地获取食物。
• The urban homeless are often in desperate need of sustenance.城市里无家可归的人极其需要食物来维持生命。

234 turmoil   

n.骚乱，混乱，动乱

参考例句：

• His mind was in such a turmoil that he couldn't get to sleep.内心的纷扰使他无法入睡。
• The robbery put the village in a turmoil.抢劫使全村陷入混乱。

235 expounder   

陈述者，说明者

参考例句：

236 hurl   

vt.猛投，力掷，声叫骂

参考例句：

• The best cure for unhappiness is to hurl yourself into your work.医治愁苦的最好办法就是全身心地投入工作。
• To hurl abuse is no way to fight.谩骂决不是战斗。

237 materialism   

n.［哲］唯物主义，唯物论；物质至上

参考例句：

• Idealism is opposite to materialism.唯心论和唯物论是对立的。
• Crass materialism causes people to forget spiritual values.极端唯物主义使人忘掉精神价值。

238 materialistic   

a.唯物主义的，物质享乐主义的

参考例句：

• She made him both soft and materialistic. 她把他变成女性化而又实际化。
• Materialistic dialectics is an important part of constituting Marxism. 唯物辩证法是马克思主义的重要组成部分。

239 propound   

v.提出

参考例句：

• Zoologist Eugene Morton has propounded a general theory of the vocal sounds that animals make.动物学家尤金·莫顿提出了一个有关动物发声的概括性理论。
• we propound the proposal for building up the financial safety area.我们提出了创建金融安全区的构想。

240 persistency   

n. 坚持(余辉, 时间常数)

参考例句：

• I was nettled by her persistency. 我被她的固执惹恼了。
• We should stick to and develop the heritage of persistency. 我们应坚持和发扬坚忍不拔的传统。

241 machinery   

n.(总称)机械，机器；机构

参考例句：

• Has the machinery been put up ready for the broadcast?广播器材安装完毕了吗？
• Machinery ought to be well maintained all the time.机器应该随时注意维护。

242 recur   

vi.复发，重现，再发生

参考例句：

• Economic crises recur periodically.经济危机周期性地发生。
• Of course,many problems recur at various periods.当然，有许多问题会在不同的时期反复提出。

243 frightful   

adj.可怕的；讨厌的

参考例句：

• How frightful to have a husband who snores!有一个发鼾声的丈夫多讨厌啊！
• We're having frightful weather these days.这几天天气坏极了。

244 expenditure   

n.(时间、劳力、金钱等)支出；使用，消耗

参考例句：

• The entry of all expenditure is necessary.有必要把一切开支入账。
• The monthly expenditure of our family is four hundred dollars altogether.我们一家的开销每月共计四百元。

245 outwards   

adj.外面的，公开的，向外的；adv.向外；n.外形

参考例句：

• Does this door open inwards or outwards?这门朝里开还是朝外开？
• In lapping up a fur,they always put the inner side outwards.卷毛皮时，他们总是让内层朝外。

246 teleological   

adj.目的论的

参考例句：

• Teleological method of interpretation is a very important legal science method. 而作为法学方法的目的解释亦是一种十分重要的法学方法。 来自互联网
• Can evolution evolve its own teleological purpose? 进化能进化自己的目的吗？ 来自互联网

247 virtue   

n.德行，美德；贞操；优点；功效，效力

参考例句：

• He was considered to be a paragon of virtue.他被认为是品德尽善尽美的典范。
• You need to decorate your mind with virtue.你应该用德行美化心灵。

248 vessel   

n.船舶；容器，器皿；管，导管，血管

参考例句：

• The vessel is fully loaded with cargo for Shanghai.这艘船满载货物驶往上海。
• You should put the water into a vessel.你应该把水装入容器中。

249 impelled   

v.推动、推进或敦促某人做某事( impel的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• He felt impelled to investigate further. 他觉得有必要作进一步调查。
• I feel impelled to express grave doubts about the project. 我觉得不得不对这项计划深表怀疑。 来自《简明英汉词典》

250 furrow   

n.沟；垄沟；轨迹；车辙；皱纹

参考例句：

• The tractor has make deep furrow in the loose sand.拖拉机在松软的沙土上留下了深深的车辙。
• Mei did not weep.She only bit her lips,and the furrow in her brow deepened.梅埋下头，她咬了咬嘴唇皮，额上的皱纹显得更深了。

251 vows   

誓言( vow的名词复数 )； 郑重宣布，许愿

参考例句：

• Matrimonial vows are to show the faithfulness of the new couple. 婚誓体现了新婚夫妇对婚姻的忠诚。
• The nun took strait vows. 那位修女立下严格的誓愿。

252 perpetuating   

perpetuate的现在进行式

参考例句：

• Revenge leads to a self-perpetuating cycle of violence. 怨怨相报会导致永不休止的暴力。
• It'set out to eradicate heresy, and ended by perpetuating it. 它的目的只是要根除异端邪说，结果却巩固了异端邪说。 来自英汉文学

253 testimony   

n.证词；见证，证明

参考例句：

• The testimony given by him is dubious.他所作的证据是可疑的。
• He was called in to bear testimony to what the police officer said.他被传入为警官所说的话作证。

254 displacements   

n.取代( displacement的名词复数 )；替代；移位；免职

参考例句：

• The laws of physics are symmetrical for translational displacements. 物理定律对平移是对称的。 来自辞典例句
• We encounter only displacements of the first type. 我们只遇到第一类的驱替。 来自辞典例句

255 complement   

n.补足物，船上的定员；补语；vt.补充，补足

参考例句：

• The two suggestions complement each other.这两条建议相互补充。
• They oppose each other also complement each other.它们相辅相成。

256 teleologically   

adj.目的论的

参考例句：

• Teleological method of interpretation is a very important legal science method. 而作为法学方法的目的解释亦是一种十分重要的法学方法。 来自互联网
• Can evolution evolve its own teleological purpose? 进化能进化自己的目的吗？ 来自互联网

257 gratuitous   

adj.无偿的，免费的；无缘无故的，不必要的

参考例句：

• His criticism is quite gratuitous.他的批评完全没有根据。
• There's too much crime and gratuitous violence on TV.电视里充斥着犯罪和无端的暴力。

258 treatise   

n.专著；(专题)论文

参考例句：

• The doctor wrote a treatise on alcoholism.那位医生写了一篇关于酗酒问题的论文。
• This is not a treatise on statistical theory.这不是一篇有关统计理论的论文。

259 prodigious   

adj.惊人的，奇妙的；异常的；巨大的；庞大的

参考例句：

• This business generates cash in prodigious amounts.这种业务收益丰厚。
• He impressed all who met him with his prodigious memory.他惊人的记忆力让所有见过他的人都印象深刻。

260 simultaneously   

adv.同时发生地，同时进行地

参考例句：

• The radar beam can track a number of targets almost simultaneously.雷达波几乎可以同时追着多个目标。
• The Windows allow a computer user to execute multiple programs simultaneously.Windows允许计算机用户同时运行多个程序。

261 quaintly   

adv.古怪离奇地

参考例句：

• "I don't see what that's got to do with it,'said the drummer quaintly. “我看不出这和你的事有什么联系，"杜洛埃说道，他感到莫名其妙。 来自英汉文学 - 嘉莉妹妹
• He is quaintly dressed, what a strange one he is. 他一身的奇装异服，真是另类！

262 extinction   

n.熄灭，消亡，消灭，灭绝，绝种

参考例句：

• The plant is now in danger of extinction.这种植物现在有绝种的危险。
• The island's way of life is doomed to extinction.这个岛上的生活方式注定要消失。

263 awakening   

n.觉醒，醒悟 adj.觉醒中的；唤醒的

参考例句：

• the awakening of interest in the environment 对环境产生的兴趣
• People are gradually awakening to their rights. 人们正逐渐意识到自己的权利。

264 consistency   

n.一贯性，前后一致，稳定性；(液体的)浓度

参考例句：

• Your behaviour lacks consistency.你的行为缺乏一贯性。
• We appreciate the consistency and stability in China and in Chinese politics.我们赞赏中国及其政策的连续性和稳定性。

265 domain   

n.(活动等)领域，范围；领地，势力范围

参考例句：

• This information should be in the public domain.这一消息应该为公众所知。
• This question comes into the domain of philosophy.这一问题属于哲学范畴。

266 predecessor   

n.前辈，前任

参考例句：

• It will share the fate of its predecessor.它将遭受与前者同样的命运。
• The new ambassador is more mature than his predecessor.新大使比他的前任更成熟一些。

267 philosophical   

adj.哲学家的，哲学上的，达观的

参考例句：

• The teacher couldn't answer the philosophical problem.老师不能解答这个哲学问题。
• She is very philosophical about her bad luck.她对自己的不幸看得很开。

268 doctrines   

n.教条( doctrine的名词复数 )；教义；学说；（政府政策的）正式声明

参考例句：

• To modern eyes, such doctrines appear harsh, even cruel. 从现代的角度看，这样的教义显得苛刻，甚至残酷。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• His doctrines have seduced many into error. 他的学说把许多人诱入歧途。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

269 nay   

adv.不；n.反对票，投反对票者

参考例句：

• He was grateful for and proud of his son's remarkable,nay,unique performance.他为儿子出色的，不，应该是独一无二的表演心怀感激和骄傲。
• Long essays,nay,whole books have been written on this.许多长篇大论的文章，不，应该说是整部整部的书都是关于这件事的。

270 perishable   

adj.（尤指食物）易腐的，易坏的

参考例句：

• Many fresh foods are highly perishable.许多新鲜食物都极易腐败。
• Fruits are perishable in transit.水果在运送时容易腐烂。

271 gratuitously   

平白

参考例句：

• They rebuild their houses for them gratuitously when they are ruined. 如果他们的房屋要坍了，就会有人替他们重盖，不要工资。 来自互联网
• He insulted us gratuitously. 他在毫无理由的情况下侮辱了我们。 来自互联网

272 complexity   

n.复杂(性)，复杂的事物

参考例句：

• Only now did he understand the full complexity of the problem.直到现在他才明白这一问题的全部复杂性。
• The complexity of the road map puzzled me.错综复杂的公路图把我搞糊涂了。

273 analogous   

adj.相似的；类似的

参考例句：

• The two situations are roughly analogous.两种情況大致相似。
• The company is in a position closely analogous to that of its main rival.该公司与主要竞争对手的处境极为相似。

274 allude   

v.提及，暗指

参考例句：

• Many passages in Scripture allude to this concept.圣经中有许多经文间接地提到这样的概念。
• She also alluded to her rival's past marital troubles.她还影射了对手过去的婚姻问题。

275 repudiated   

v.（正式地）否认( repudiate的过去式和过去分词 )；拒绝接受；拒绝与…往来；拒不履行（法律义务）

参考例句：

• All slanders and libels should be repudiated. 一切诬蔑不实之词，应予推倒。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• The Prime Minister has repudiated racist remarks made by a member of the Conservative Party. 首相已经驳斥了一个保守党成员的种族主义言论。 来自辞典例句

276 lurk   

n.潜伏，潜行；v.潜藏，潜伏，埋伏

参考例句：

• Dangers lurk in the path of wilderness.在这条荒野的小路上隐伏着危险。
• He thought he saw someone lurking above the chamber during the address.他觉得自己看见有人在演讲时潜藏在会议厅顶上。

277 etymologies   

n.词源学，词源说明( etymology的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• This dictionary does not give etymologies. 这部词典不介绍词源。 来自辞典例句
• Dictionaries are still good for obscure usages and etymologies. 字典依然擅长于不常用的用法和词源。 来自互联网

278 platonic   

adj.精神的；柏拉图（哲学）的

参考例句：

• Their friendship is based on platonic love.他们的友情是基于柏拉图式的爱情。
• Can Platonic love really exist in real life?柏拉图式的爱情，在现实世界里到底可能吗？

279 brute   

n.野兽，兽性

参考例句：

• The aggressor troops are not many degrees removed from the brute.侵略军简直象一群野兽。
• That dog is a dangerous brute.It bites people.那条狗是危险的畜牲，它咬人。

280 tangible   

adj.有形的，可触摸的，确凿的，实际的

参考例句：

• The policy has not yet brought any tangible benefits.这项政策还没有带来任何实质性的好处。
• There is no tangible proof.没有确凿的证据。

281 Christian   

adj.基督教徒的；n.基督教徒

参考例句：

• They always addressed each other by their Christian name.他们总是以教名互相称呼。
• His mother is a sincere Christian.他母亲是个虔诚的基督教徒。

282 outgrown   

长[发展] 得超过（某物）的范围( outgrow的过去分词 )； 长[发展]得不能再要（某物）； 长得比…快； 生长速度超过

参考例句：

• She's already outgrown her school uniform. 她已经长得连校服都不能穿了。
• The boy has outgrown his clothes. 这男孩已长得穿不下他的衣服了。

283 inverse   

adj.相反的，倒转的，反转的；n.相反之物；v.倒转

参考例句：

• Evil is the inverse of good.恶是善的反面。
• When the direct approach failed he tried the inverse.当直接方法失败时，他尝试相反的做法。

284 density   

n.密集，密度，浓度

参考例句：

• The population density of that country is 685 per square mile.那个国家的人口密度为每平方英里685人。
• The region has a very high population density.该地区的人口密度很高。

285 purely   

adv.纯粹地，完全地

参考例句：

• I helped him purely and simply out of friendship.我帮他纯粹是出于友情。
• This disproves the theory that children are purely imitative.这证明认为儿童只会单纯地模仿的理论是站不住脚的。

286 mythologic   

神话学的，神话的，虚构的

参考例句：

287 physically   

adj.物质上，体格上，身体上，按自然规律

参考例句：

• He was out of sorts physically,as well as disordered mentally.他浑身不舒服，心绪也很乱。
• Every time I think about it I feel physically sick.一想起那件事我就感到极恶心。

288 precisely   

adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地

参考例句：

• It's precisely that sort of slick sales-talk that I mistrust.我不相信的正是那种油腔滑调的推销宣传。
• The man adjusted very precisely.那个人调得很准。

289 quantitative   

adj.数量的，定量的

参考例句：

• He said it was only a quantitative difference.他说这仅仅是数量上的差别。
• We need to do some quantitative analysis of the drugs.我们对药物要进行定量分析。

290 deriving   

v.得到( derive的现在分词 )；（从…中）得到获得；源于；（从…中）提取

参考例句：

• I anticipate deriving much instruction from the lecture. 我期望从这演讲中获得很多教益。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• He anticipated his deriving much instruction from the lecture. 他期望从这次演讲中得到很多教益。 来自辞典例句

291 propriety   

n.正当行为；正当；适当

参考例句：

• We hesitated at the propriety of the method.我们对这种办法是否适用拿不定主意。
• The sensitive matter was handled with great propriety.这件机密的事处理得极为适当。

292 constituent   

n.选民；成分，组分；adj.组成的，构成的

参考例句：

• Sugar is the main constituent of candy.食糖是糖果的主要成分。
• Fibre is a natural constituent of a healthy diet.纤维是健康饮食的天然组成部分。

293 relegated   

v.使降级( relegate的过去式和过去分词 )；使降职；转移；把…归类

参考例句：

• She was then relegated to the role of assistant. 随后她被降级做助手了。
• I think that should be relegated to the garbage can of history. 我认为应该把它扔进历史的垃圾箱。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

294 psychical   

adj.有关特异功能现象的；有关特异功能官能的；灵魂的；心灵的

参考例句：

• Conclusion: The Liuhe-lottery does harm to people, s psychical health and should be for bidden. 结论：“六合彩”赌博有害人们心理卫生，应予以严禁。 来自互联网

295 solicited   

v.恳求( solicit的过去式和过去分词 )；（指娼妇）拉客；索求；征求

参考例句：

• He's already solicited their support on health care reform. 他已就医疗改革问题请求他们的支持。 来自辞典例句
• We solicited ideas from Princeton University graduates and under graduates. 我们从普林斯顿大学的毕业生与大学生中征求意见。 来自辞典例句

296 transcends   

超出或超越（经验、信念、描写能力等）的范围( transcend的第三人称单数 )； 优于或胜过…

参考例句：

• The chemical dilution technique transcends most of the difficulties. 化学稀释法能克服大部分困难。
• The genius of Shakespeare transcends that of all other English poets. 莎士比亚的才华胜过所有的其他英国诗人。

297 deduction   

n.减除，扣除，减除额；推论，推理，演绎

参考例句：

• No deduction in pay is made for absence due to illness.因病请假不扣工资。
• His deduction led him to the correct conclusion.他的推断使他得出正确的结论。

298 chasm   

n.深坑，断层，裂口，大分岐，利害冲突

参考例句：

• There's a chasm between rich and poor in that society.那社会中存在着贫富差距。
• A huge chasm gaped before them.他们面前有个巨大的裂痕。

299 indirectly   

adv.间接地，不直接了当地

参考例句：

• I heard the news indirectly.这消息我是间接听来的。
• They were approached indirectly through an intermediary.通过一位中间人，他们进行了间接接触。

300 secreting   

v.（尤指动物或植物器官）分泌( secrete的现在分词 )；隐匿，隐藏

参考例句：

• It is also an endocrine gland secreting at least two important hormones. 它也是一种内分泌腺，至少分泌二种重要的激素。 来自辞典例句
• And some calcite-secreting organisms also add magnesium to the mix. 有些分泌方解石的生物，会在分泌物中加入镁。 来自互联网

301 gland   

n.腺体，(机)密封压盖，填料盖

参考例句：

• This is a snake's poison gland.这就是蛇的毒腺。
• Her mother has an underactive adrenal gland.她的母亲肾上腺机能不全。

302 utterly   

adv.完全地，绝对地

参考例句：

• Utterly devoted to the people,he gave his life in saving his patients.他忠于人民，把毕生精力用于挽救患者的生命。
• I was utterly ravished by the way she smiled.她的微笑使我完全陶醉了。

303 deflect   

v.(使)偏斜，(使)偏离，(使)转向

参考例句：

• Never let a little problem deflect you.决不要因一点小问题就半途而废。
• They decided to deflect from the original plan.他们决定改变原计划。

304 rudiment   

n.初步；初级；基本原理

参考例句：

• The rudiment with the capitalism,new developing citizens stratum appeared in the society in the ming dynasty.伴随着资本主义的萌芽，明代社会出现了新兴的市民阶层。
• It do not take me long to pick up the rudiment of the language.我没有费多少时间就学会了这一语言的初步知识。

305 wittily   

机智地，机敏地

参考例句：

• They have just been pulling our legs very wittily. 他们不过是跟我们开个非常诙谐的玩笑罢了。
• The tale wittily explores the interaction and tension between reality and imagination. 这篇故事机智地探讨了现实和想象之间的联系和对立。

306 gulf   

n.海湾；深渊，鸿沟；分歧，隔阂

参考例句：

• The gulf between the two leaders cannot be bridged.两位领导人之间的鸿沟难以跨越。
• There is a gulf between the two cities.这两座城市间有个海湾。

307 quantitatively   

adv.数量上

参考例句：

• With the ease, radiation detectors can be used semi-quantitatively in the field. 使用射线探测器可以很方便地进行野外半定量测定。 来自辞典例句
• In other words, you are to analyze them quantitatively and qualitatively. 换句话说，你们要对它们进行量和质的分析。 来自辞典例句

308 denuded   

adj.[医]变光的，裸露的v.使赤裸( denude的过去式和过去分词 )；剥光覆盖物

参考例句：

• hillsides denuded of trees 光秃秃没有树的山坡
• In such areas we see villages denuded of young people. 在这些地区，我们在村子里根本看不到年轻人。 来自辞典例句

309 intercourse   

n.性交；交流，交往，交际

参考例句：

• The magazine becomes a cultural medium of intercourse between the two peoples.该杂志成为两民族间文化交流的媒介。
• There was close intercourse between them.他们过往很密。

310 justify   

vt.证明…正当(或有理)，为…辩护

参考例句：

• He tried to justify his absence with lame excuses.他想用站不住脚的借口为自己的缺席辩解。
• Can you justify your rude behavior to me?你能向我证明你的粗野行为是有道理的吗？

311 presumption   

n.推测，可能性，冒昧，放肆，[法律]推定

参考例句：

• Please pardon my presumption in writing to you.请原谅我很冒昧地写信给你。
• I don't think that's a false presumption.我认为那并不是错误的推测。

312 aggregates   

数( aggregate的名词复数 )； 总计； 骨料； 集料（可成混凝土或修路等用的）

参考例句：

• Snowflakes are loose aggregates of ice crystals. 雪花是冰晶的松散凝结。
• Our airplanes based in Europe should be included in the aggregates. 我们驻欧飞机应包括在总数内。

313 glands   

n.腺( gland的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• a snake's poison glands 蛇的毒腺
• the sebaceous glands in the skin 皮脂腺

314 pungent   

adj.（气味、味道）刺激性的，辛辣的；尖锐的

参考例句：

• The article is written in a pungent style.文章写得泼辣。
• Its pungent smell can choke terrorists and force them out of their hideouts.它的刺激性气味会令恐怖分子窒息，迫使他们从藏身地点逃脱出来。

315 decomposition   

n. 分解, 腐烂, 崩溃

参考例句：

• It is said that the magnetite was formed by a chemical process called thermal decomposition. 据说这枚陨星是在热分解的化学过程中形成的。
• The dehydration process leads to fairly extensive decomposition of the product. 脱水过程会导致产物相当程度的分解。

316 metallic   

adj.金属的；金属制的；含金属的；产金属的；像金属的

参考例句：

• A sharp metallic note coming from the outside frightened me.外面传来尖锐铿锵的声音吓了我一跳。
• He picked up a metallic ring last night.昨夜他捡了一个金属戒指。

317 sodium   

n.（化）钠

参考例句：

• Out over the town the sodium lights were lit.在外面，全城的钠光灯都亮了。
• Common salt is a compound of sodium and chlorine.食盐是钠和氯的复合物。

318 everlasting   

adj.永恒的，持久的，无止境的

参考例句：

• These tyres are advertised as being everlasting.广告上说轮胎持久耐用。
• He believes in everlasting life after death.他相信死后有不朽的生命。

319 Christians   

n.基督教徒( Christian的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Christians of all denominations attended the conference. 基督教所有教派的人都出席了这次会议。
• His novel about Jesus caused a furore among Christians. 他关于耶稣的小说激起了基督教徒的公愤。

320 renovation   

n.革新，整修

参考例句：

• The cinema will reopen next week after the renovation.电影院修缮后，将于下星期开业。
• The building has undergone major renovation.这座大楼已进行大整修。

321 purgatory   

n.炼狱；苦难；adj.净化的，清洗的

参考例句：

• Every step of the last three miles was purgatory.最后3英里时每一步都像是受罪。
• Marriage,with peace,is this world's paradise;with strife,this world's purgatory.和谐的婚姻是尘世的乐园，不和谐的婚姻则是人生的炼狱。

322 inadequacy   

n.无法胜任，信心不足

参考例句：

• the inadequacy of our resources 我们的资源的贫乏
• The failure is due to the inadequacy of preparations. 这次失败是由于准备不足造成的。

323 wont   

adj.习惯于；v.习惯；n.习惯

参考例句：

• He was wont to say that children are lazy.他常常说小孩子们懒惰。
• It is his wont to get up early.早起是他的习惯。

324 eloquent   

adj.雄辩的，口才流利的；明白显示出的

参考例句：

• He was so eloquent that he cut down the finest orator.他能言善辩，胜过最好的演说家。
• These ruins are an eloquent reminder of the horrors of war.这些废墟形象地提醒人们不要忘记战争的恐怖。

325 habitually   

ad.习惯地，通常地

参考例句：

• The pain of the disease caused him habitually to furrow his brow. 病痛使他习惯性地紧皱眉头。
• Habitually obedient to John, I came up to his chair. 我已经习惯于服从约翰，我来到他的椅子跟前。

326 reverence   

n.敬畏，尊敬，尊严；Reverence:对某些基督教神职人员的尊称；v.尊敬，敬畏，崇敬

参考例句：

• He was a bishop who was held in reverence by all.他是一位被大家都尊敬的主教。
• We reverence tradition but will not be fettered by it.我们尊重传统，但不被传统所束缚。

327 sensuous   

adj.激发美感的；感官的，感觉上的

参考例句：

• Don't get the idea that value of music is commensurate with its sensuous appeal.不要以为音乐的价值与其美的感染力相等。
• The flowers that wreathed his parlor stifled him with their sensuous perfume.包围著客厅的花以其刺激人的香味使他窒息。

328 determined   

adj.坚定的；有决心的

参考例句：

• I have determined on going to Tibet after graduation.我已决定毕业后去西藏。
• He determined to view the rooms behind the office.他决定查看一下办公室后面的房间。

329 precedent   

n.先例，前例；惯例；adj.在前的，在先的

参考例句：

• Is there a precedent for what you want me to do?你要我做的事有前例可援吗？
• This is a wonderful achievement without precedent in Chinese history.这是中国历史上亘古未有的奇绩。

330 thereby   

adv.因此，从而

参考例句：

• I have never been to that city,,ereby I don't know much about it.我从未去过那座城市，因此对它不怎么熟悉。
• He became a British citizen,thereby gaining the right to vote.他成了英国公民，因而得到了投票权。

331 passionately   

ad.热烈地，激烈地

参考例句：

• She could hate as passionately as she could love. 她能恨得咬牙切齿，也能爱得一往情深。
• He was passionately addicted to pop music. 他酷爱流行音乐。

332 faculty   

n.才能；学院，系；(学院或系的)全体教学人员

参考例句：

• He has a great faculty for learning foreign languages.他有学习外语的天赋。
• He has the faculty of saying the right thing at the right time.他有在恰当的时候说恰当的话的才智。

333 flasks   

n.瓶，长颈瓶， 烧瓶( flask的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The juggler juggled three flasks. 这个玩杂耍的人可同时抛接三个瓶子。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The meat in all of the open flasks putrefied. 所有开口瓶中的肉都腐烂了。 来自辞典例句

334 skilful   

(=skillful)adj.灵巧的，熟练的

参考例句：

• The more you practise,the more skilful you'll become.练习的次数越多，熟练的程度越高。
• He's not very skilful with his chopsticks.他用筷子不大熟练。

335 interpretation   

n.解释，说明，描述；艺术处理

参考例句：

• His statement admits of one interpretation only.他的话只有一种解释。
• Analysis and interpretation is a very personal thing.分析与说明是个很主观的事情。

336 inaccessible   

adj.达不到的，难接近的

参考例句：

• This novel seems to me among the most inaccessible.这本书对我来说是最难懂的小说之一。
• The top of Mount Everest is the most inaccessible place in the world.珠穆朗玛峰是世界上最难到达的地方。

337 alleged   

a.被指控的，嫌疑的

参考例句：

• It was alleged that he had taken bribes while in office. 他被指称在任时收受贿赂。
• alleged irregularities in the election campaign 被指称竞选运动中的不正当行为

338 impugn   

v.指责，对…表示怀疑

参考例句：

• Nobody can impugn his ability.没有人对他的能力表示怀疑。
• The Secretary's letter questions my veracity and impugns my motives.部长的来信怀疑我的诚实，质疑我的动机。

339 irrational   

adj.无理性的，失去理性的

参考例句：

• After taking the drug she became completely irrational.她在吸毒后变得完全失去了理性。
• There are also signs of irrational exuberance among some investors.在某些投资者中是存在非理性繁荣的征象的。

340 alluded   

提及，暗指( allude的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• In your remarks you alluded to a certain sinister design. 在你的谈话中，你提到了某个阴谋。
• She also alluded to her rival's past marital troubles. 她还影射了对手过去的婚姻问题。

341 parlance   

n.说法；语调

参考例句：

• The term "meta directory" came into industry parlance two years ago.两年前，商业界开始用“元目录”这个术语。
• The phrase is common diplomatic parlance for spying.这种说法是指代间谍行为的常用外交辞令。

342 disastrous   

adj.灾难性的，造成灾害的；极坏的，很糟的

参考例句：

• The heavy rainstorm caused a disastrous flood.暴雨成灾。
• Her investment had disastrous consequences.She lost everything she owned.她的投资结果很惨，血本无归。

343 apprehend   

vt.理解，领悟，逮捕，拘捕，忧虑

参考例句：

• I apprehend no worsening of the situation.我不担心局势会恶化。
• Police have not apprehended her killer.警察还未抓获谋杀她的凶手。

344 deity   

n.神，神性；被奉若神明的人(或物)

参考例句：

• Many animals were seen as the manifestation of a deity.许多动物被看作神的化身。
• The deity was hidden in the deepest recesses of the temple.神藏在庙宇壁龛的最深处。

345 specialized   

adj.专门的，专业化的

参考例句：

• There are many specialized agencies in the United Nations.联合国有许多专门机构。
• These tools are very specialized.这些是专用工具。

346 pertains   

关于( pertain的第三人称单数 )； 有关； 存在； 适用

参考例句：

• When one manages upward, none of these clear and unambiguous symbols pertains. 当一个人由下而上地管理时，这些明确无误的信号就全都不复存在了。
• Her conduct hardly pertains to a lady. 她的行为与女士身份不太相符。

347 harp   

n.竖琴；天琴座

参考例句：

• She swept her fingers over the strings of the harp.她用手指划过竖琴的琴弦。
• He played an Irish melody on the harp.他用竖琴演奏了一首爱尔兰曲调。

348 irresistible   

adj.非常诱人的，无法拒绝的，无法抗拒的

参考例句：

• The wheel of history rolls forward with an irresistible force.历史车轮滚滚向前，势不可挡。
• She saw an irresistible skirt in the store window.她看见商店的橱窗里有一条叫人着迷的裙子。

349 incarnated   

v.赋予（思想、精神等）以人的形体( incarnate的过去式和过去分词 )；使人格化；体现；使具体化

参考例句：

• Dickens incarnated hypocrisy in his Uriah Heep. 狄更斯把虚伪体现在他塑造的人物赖亚·赫普身上。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• His ideals were incarnated in his music. 他的理想具体地体现在他的音乐中。 来自辞典例句

350 illicit   

adj.非法的，禁止的，不正当的

参考例句：

• He had an illicit association with Jane.他和简曾有过不正当关系。
• Seizures of illicit drugs have increased by 30% this year.今年违禁药品的扣押增长了30%。

351 solely   

adv.仅仅，唯一地

参考例句：

• Success should not be measured solely by educational achievement.成功与否不应只用学业成绩来衡量。
• The town depends almost solely on the tourist trade.这座城市几乎完全靠旅游业维持。

352 philosophically   

adv.哲学上；富有哲理性地；贤明地；冷静地

参考例句：

• He added philosophically that one should adapt oneself to the changed conditions. 他富于哲理地补充说，一个人应该适应变化了的情况。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Harry took his rejection philosophically. 哈里达观地看待自己被拒的事。 来自《简明英汉词典》

353 irrelevant   

adj.不恰当的，无关系的，不相干的

参考例句：

• That is completely irrelevant to the subject under discussion.这跟讨论的主题完全不相关。
• A question about arithmetic is irrelevant in a music lesson.在音乐课上，一个数学的问题是风马牛不相及的。

354 investigation   

n.调查，调查研究

参考例句：

• In an investigation,a new fact became known, which told against him.在调查中新发现了一件对他不利的事实。
• He drew the conclusion by building on his own investigation.他根据自己的调查研究作出结论。

355 yearning   

a.渴望的；向往的；怀念的

参考例句：

• a yearning for a quiet life 对宁静生活的向往
• He felt a great yearning after his old job. 他对过去的工作有一种强烈的渴想。

356 posthumous   

adj.遗腹的；父亡后出生的；死后的，身后的

参考例句：

• He received a posthumous award for bravery.他表现勇敢，死后受到了嘉奖。
• The legendary actor received a posthumous achievement award.这位传奇男星在过世后获得终身成就奖的肯定。

357 condemned   

adj. 被责难的, 被宣告有罪的 动词condemn的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• He condemned the hypocrisy of those politicians who do one thing and say another. 他谴责了那些说一套做一套的政客的虚伪。
• The policy has been condemned as a regressive step. 这项政策被认为是一种倒退而受到谴责。

358 amenable   

adj.经得起检验的；顺从的；对负有义务的

参考例句：

• His scientific discoveries are amenable to the laws of physics.他在科学上的发现经得起物理定律的检验。
• He is amenable to counsel.他这人听劝。

359 stigmatizing   

v.使受耻辱，指责，污辱( stigmatize的现在分词 )

参考例句：

• Laing regards the concept of mental illness as both unscientific and stigmatizing. 菜恩认为精神病的概念是不科学的和诬蔑性的。 来自辞典例句
• The existing social benefits are considered to be stigmatizing and repressive. 现存的社会福利被指责为是无价值的、残暴的。 来自互联网

360 craving   

n.渴望,热望

参考例句：

• a craving for chocolate 非常想吃巧克力
• She skipped normal meals to satisfy her craving for chocolate and crisps. 她不吃正餐，以便满足自己吃巧克力和炸薯片的渴望。

361 treatises   

n.专题著作，专题论文，专著( treatise的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Many treatises in different languages have been published on pigeons. 关于鸽类的著作，用各种文字写的很多。 来自辞典例句
• Many other treatises incorporated the new rigor. 许多其它的专题论文体现了新的严密性。 来自辞典例句

362 teleology   

n.目的论

参考例句：

• Kant identifies with this view deeply,but he believes teleology finally.康德深以这一观点为是，但他最终相信目的论。
• In general it's hard to do without teleology when we're thinking about ethics,justice,and moral argument.当我们思考伦理、正义和道德时，一般很难不用到目的论。

363 hemmed   

缝…的褶边( hem的过去式和过去分词 )； 包围

参考例句：

• He hemmed and hawed but wouldn't say anything definite. 他总是哼儿哈儿的，就是不说句痛快话。
• The soldiers were hemmed in on all sides. 士兵们被四面包围了。

364 recoil   

vi.退却，退缩，畏缩

参考例句：

• Most people would recoil at the sight of the snake.许多人看见蛇都会向后退缩。
• Revenge may recoil upon the person who takes it.报复者常会受到报应。

365 wafted   

v.吹送，飘送，（使）浮动( waft的过去式和过去分词 )

参考例句：

• The sound of their voices wafted across the lake. 他们的声音飘过湖面传到了另一边。
• A delicious smell of freshly baked bread wafted across the garden. 花园中飘过一股刚出炉面包的香味。 来自《简明英汉词典》

366 twilight   

n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期

参考例句：

• Twilight merged into darkness.夕阳的光辉融于黑暗中。
• Twilight was sweet with the smell of lilac and freshly turned earth.薄暮充满紫丁香和新翻耕的泥土的香味。

367 repugnance   

n.嫌恶

参考例句：

• He fought down a feelings of repugnance.他抑制住了厌恶感。
• She had a repugnance to the person with whom she spoke.她看不惯这个和她谈话的人。

368 alleviation   

n. 减轻，缓和，解痛物

参考例句：

• These were the circumstances and the hopes which gradually brought alleviation to Sir Thomas's pain. 这些情况及其希望逐渐缓解了托马斯爵士的痛苦。
• The cost reduction achieved in this way will benefit patients and the society in burden alleviation. 集中招标采购降低的采购成本要让利于患者，减轻社会负担。 来自英汉 - 翻译样例 - 口语

369 slay   

v.杀死，宰杀，杀戮

参考例句：

• He intended to slay his father's murderer.他意图杀死杀父仇人。
• She has ordered me to slay you.她命令我把你杀了。