FROM THE RIGHT REV. C. J. ELLICOTT, D.D., Lord Bishop

                                                                      of Gloucester and Bristol.
                                                              Palace, Gloucester, 21st Nov. 1876.

     MY DEAR SIR—Will you kindly pardon a great liberty? I have quoted in a forthcoming charge a remarkable    expression of yours that atoms are "manufactured articles." Could you in your kindness give me the proper title   and reference to the paper and the page? I am now, alas, far from libraries, and have, in matters scientific   especially, to ask the aid of others. Will you excuse me asking this further question?

     Are you, as a scientific man, able to accept the statement that is often made on the theological side, viz. that the    creation of the sun posterior to light involves no serious difficulty,—the creation of light being the establishment of   the primal vibrations, generally; the creation of the sun, the primal formation of an origin, whence vibrations would   be propagated earthward?

     My own mind,—far from a scientific one,—is not clear on this point. I surmise, then, that the scientific mind might   not only not be clear as to the explanation, but equitably bound to say that it was no explanation at all. Excuse the   trouble I am giving you, for the truth's sake, and believe me, very faithfully yours,

                                                            C. J. GLOUCESTER AND BRISTOL.

Maxwell replied as follows by return of post:—

11 Scroope Terrace, Cambridge,
22d Nov. 1876.

     MY LORD BISHOP—The comparison of atoms or of molecules to "manufactured articles," was originally made    by Sir J. F. D. Herschel in his "Preliminary Discourse on the Study of Natural Philosophy," Art. 28, p. 38 (ed.  1851, Longmans).

     I send you by book post several papers in which I have directed attention to certain kinds of equality among all   molecules of the same substance, and to the bearing of this fact on speculations as to their origin.

     The comparison to "manufactured articles" was criticised (I think in a letter to Nature) by Mr. C. J. Monro    [Nature, x. 481, 15th October 1874], and the latter part of the Encyc. Brit., Article "Atom," is intended to meet    this criticism, which points out that in some cases the uniformity among manufactured articles is evidence of want   of power in the manufacturer to adapt each article to its special use.

     What I thought of was not so much that uniformity of result which is due to uniformity in the process of formation,    as a uniformity intended and accomplished by the same wisdom and power of which uniformity, accuracy,   symmetry, consistency, and continuity of plan are as important attributes as the contrivance of the special utility of    each individual thing.

     With respect to your second question, there is a statement printed in most commentaries that the fact of light being   created before the sun is in striking agreement with the last results of science (I quote from memory).

     I have often wished to ascertain the date of the original appearance of this statement, as this would be the only    way of finding what "last result of science" it referred to. It is certainly older than the time when any notions of the    undulatory theory became prevalent among men of science or commentators.

     If it were necessary to provide an interpretation of the text in accordanee with the science of 1876 (which may not   agree with that of 1896), it would be very tempting to [394] say that the light of the first day means the   all-embracing æther, the vehicle of radiation, and not actual light, whether from the sun or from any other source.
     But I cannot suppose that this was the very idea meant to be conveyed by the original author of the book to those   for whom he was writing. He tells us of a previous darkness. Both light and darkness imply a being who can see if    there is light, but not if it is dark, and the words are always understood so. That light and darkness are terms    relative to the creature only is recognised in Ps. cxxxix. 12.

     As a mere matter of conjectural cosmogony, however, we naturally suppose those things most primeval which we   find least subject to change.

     Now the æther or material substance which fills all the interspace between world and world, without a gap or flaw   of 1/100000 inch anywhere, and which probably penetrates through all grosser matters is the largest, most uniform    and apparently most permanent object we know, and we are therefore inclined to suppose that it existed before   the formation of the systems of gross matter which now exist within it, just as we suppose the sea older than the   individual fishes in it.

     But I should be very sorry if an interpretation founded on a most conjectural scientific hypothesis were to get    fastened to the text in Genesis, even if by so doing it got rid of the old statement of the commentators which has    long ceased to be intelligible. The rate of change of scientific hypothesis is naturally much more rapid than that of   Biblical interpretations, so that if an interpretation is founded on such an hypothesis, it may help to keep the   hypothesis above ground long after it ought to be buried and forgotten.

     At the same time I think that each individual man should do all he can to impress his own mind with the extent, the    order, and the unity of the universe, and should carry these ideas with him as he reads such passages as the 1st  Chap. of the Ep. to Colossians (see Lightfoot on Colossians, p. 182), just as enlarged conceptions of the extent   [395] and unity of the world of life may be of service to us in reading Psalm viii.; Heb. ii. 6, etc. Believe me, yours   faithfully,

                                                                       J. CLERK MAXWELL.