Abstract
SOME months ago, shortly after I had resigned my office of Judge of the High Court, I was expressing to a friend my fear of the effect of having no compulsory occupation, when he said, by way of consolation, “Never mind, ‘for Satan finds some mischief still for idle hands to do.’” You may possibly in the course of this evening think he was right. I have chosen a title for my lecture which may not fully convey to your minds the scope of the views which I am going to submit to you. I propose to adduce some arguments to show that “antagonism,” a word generally used to signify something disagreeable, pervades all things; that it is not the baneful thing which many consider it; that it produces at least quite as much good as evil; but that, whatever be its effect, my theory—call it, if you will, speculation—is that it is a necessity of existence, and of the organism of the universe so far as we understand it; that motion and life cannot go on without it; that it is not a mere casual adjunct of Nature, but that without it there would be no Nature, at all events as we conceive it; that it is inevitably associated with unorganized matter, with organized matter, and with sentient beings.
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Antagonism 1 . Nature 37, 617–622 (1888). https://doi.org/10.1038/037617b0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/037617b0