{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_46476/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_46476","id":"gutenberg_46476","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/46476","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","God (Christianity)"],"text":"John Fiske's Writings.\n\n\n =MYTHS AND MYTH-MAKERS=: Old Tales and Superstitions interpreted by\n Comparative Mythology. 12mo, $2.00.\n\n =OUTLINES OF COSMIC PHILOSOPHY.= Based on the Doctrines of Evolution,\n with Criticisms on the Positive Philosophy. In two volumes, 8vo, $6.00.\n\n =THE UNSEEN WORLD=, and other Essays. 12mo, $2.00.\n\n =EXCURSIONS OF AN EVOLUTIONIST.= 12mo, $2.00.\n\n =DARWINISM=, and other Essays. 12mo, $2.00.\n\n =THE DESTINY OF MAN=, viewed in the Light of His Origin. 16mo, $1.00.\n\n =THE IDEA OF GOD=, as affected by Modern Knowledge. A Sequel to \"The\n Destiny of Man.\" 16mo, $1.00.\n\n\n[asterism] _For sale by all Booksellers. Sent by mail, post-paid, on\nreceipt of price, by the Publishers_,\n\n    HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO., BOSTON.\n\n =AMERICAN POLITICAL IDEAS=, viewed from the Stand-point of Universal\n History. 12mo, $1.00. HARPER & BROTHERS, New York.\n\n\n    THE IDEA OF GOD AS AFFECTED\n    BY MODERN KNOWLEDGE\n\n    [Illustration; Decorative symbol]\n\n    BY JOHN FISKE\n\n    [Illustration; Decorative panel]\n\n    BOSTON AND NEW YORK\n    HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY\n    The Riverside Press, Cambridge\n    1886\n\n\n    Copyright, 1885,\n    BY JOHN FISKE.\n\n    _All rights reserved._\n\n\n    _The Riverside Press, Cambridge_:\n    Electrotyped and Printed by H. O. Houghton & Co.\n\n\n    To\n\n    MY WIFE,\n\n    IN REMEMBRANCE OF THE SWEET SUNDAY MORNING\n    UNDER THE APPLE-TREE ON THE HILLSIDE,\n    WHEN WE TWO SAT LOOKING DOWN INTO FAIRY WOODLAND PATHS,\n    AND TALKED OF THE THINGS\n    SINCE WRITTEN IN THIS LITTLE BOOK,\n    I now dedicate it.\n\n           *       *       *       *       *\n\n    +Arghyrion kai chrysion ouch hyparchei\n    moi; ho de ech\u00f4, touto soi did\u00f4mi.+\n\n\n\n\n  PREFACE\n\n\nWhen asked to give a second address before the Concord School of\nPhilosophy, I gladly accepted the invitation, as affording a proper\noccasion for saying certain things which I had for some time wished to\nsay about theism. My address was designed to introduce the discussion\nof the question whether pantheism is the legitimate outcome of modern\nscience. It seemed to me that the object might best be attained by\npassing in review the various modifications which the idea of God\nhas undergone in the past, and pointing out the shape in which it is\nlikely to survive the rapid growth of modern knowledge, and especially\nthe establishment of that great doctrine of evolution which is fast\nobliging us to revise our opinions upon all subjects whatsoever.\nHaving thus in the text outlined the idea of God most likely to be\nconceived by minds trained in the doctrine of evolution, I left it for\nfurther discussion to decide whether the term \"pantheism\" can properly\nbe applied to such a conception. While much enlightenment may be got\nfrom carefully describing the substance of a philosophic doctrine,\nvery little can be gained by merely affixing to it a label; and I\ncould not but feel that my argument would be simply encumbered by the\nintroduction of any question of nomenclature involving such a vague and\nuninstructive epithet as \"pantheism.\" Such epithets are often regarded\nwith favour and freely used, as seeming to obviate the necessity for\nthat kind of labour to which most people are most averse,--the labour\nof sustained and accurate thinking. People are too apt to make such\ngeneral terms do duty in place of a careful examination of facts, and\nare thus sometimes led to strange conclusions. When, for example, they\nhave heard somebody called an \"agnostic,\" they at once think they know\nall about him; whereas they have very likely learned nothing that is\nof the slightest value in characterizing his opinions or his mental\nattitude. A term that can be applied at once to a Comte, a Mansel, and\na Huxley is obviously of little use in the matter of definition. But,\nit may be asked, in spite of their world-wide differences, do not these\nthree thinkers agree in holding that nothing can be known about the\nnature of God? Perhaps so,--one cannot answer even this plain question\nwith an unqualified yes; but, granting that they fully agree in this\nassertion of ignorance, nevertheless, in their philosophic attitudes\nwith regard to this ignorance, in the use they severally make of the\nassertion, in the way it determines their inferences about all manner\nof other things, the differences are so vast that nothing but mental\nconfusion can come from a terminology which would content itself\nby applying to all three the common epithet \"agnostic.\" The case is\nsimilar with such a word as \"pantheism,\" which has been familiarly\napplied to so many utterly diverse systems of thought that it is\nvery hard to tell just what it means. It has been equally applied to\nthe doctrine of \"the Hindu philosophers of the orthodox Brahmanical\nschools,\" who \"hold that all finite existence is an illusion, and life\nmere vexation and mistake, a blunder or sorry jest of the Absolute;\"\nand to the doctrine of the Stoics, who \"went to the other extreme,\nand held that the universe was the product of perfect reason and in\nan absolute sense good.\" (Pollock's \"Spinoza,\" p. 356.) In recent\ntimes it has been commonly used as a vituperative epithet, and hurled\nindiscriminately at such unpopular opinions as do not seem to call\nfor so heavy a missile as the more cruel term \"atheism.\" The writer\nwho sets forth in plain scientific language a physical theory of the\nuniverse is liable to be scowled at and called an atheist; but, when\nthe very same ideas are presented in the form of oracular apophthegm or\npoetic rhapsody, the author is more gently described as \"tinctured with\npantheism.\"\n\nBut out of the chaos of vagueness in which this unhappy word has been\nimmersed it is perhaps still possible to extract something like a\ndefinite meaning. In the broadest sense there are three possible ways\nin which we may contemplate the universe.\n\n_First_, we may regard the world of phenomena as sufficient unto\nitself, and deny that it needs to be referred to any underlying and\nall-comprehensive unity. Nothing has an ultimate origin or destiny;\nthere is no dramatic tendency in the succession of events, nor any\nultimate law to which everything must be referred; there is no\nreasonableness in the universe save that with which human fancy\nunwarrantably endows it; the events of the world have no orderly\nprogression like the scenes of a well-constructed plot, but in the\nmanner of their coming and going they constitute simply what Chauncey\nWright so aptly called \"cosmical weather;\" they drift and eddy about in\nan utterly blind and irrational manner, though now and then evolving,\nas if by accident, temporary combinations which have to us a rational\nappearance. This is Atheism, pure and unqualified. It recognizes no\nOmnipresent Energy.\n\n_Secondly_, we may hold that the world of phenomena is utterly\nunintelligible unless referred to an underlying and all-comprehensive\nunity. All things are manifestations of an Omnipresent Energy which\ncannot be in any imaginable sense personal or anthropomorphic; out\nfrom this eternal source of phenomena all individualities proceed, and\ninto it they must all ultimately return and be absorbed; the events\nof the world have an orderly progression, but not toward any goal\nrecognizable by us; in the process of evolution there is nothing that\nfrom any point of view can be called teleological; the beginning and\nend of things--that which is Alpha and Omega--is merely an inscrutable\nessence, a formless void. Such a view as this may properly be called\nPantheism. It recognizes an Omnipresent Energy, but virtually\nidentifies it with the totality of things.\n\n_Thirdly_, we may hold that the world of phenomena is intelligible\nonly when regarded as the multiform manifestation of an Omnipresent\nEnergy that is in some way--albeit in a way quite above our finite\ncomprehension--anthropomorphic or quasi-personal. There is a\ntrue objective reasonableness in the universe; its events have\nan orderly progression, and, so far as those events are brought\nsufficiently within our ken for us to generalize them exhaustively,\ntheir progression is toward a goal that is recognizable by human\nintelligence; \"the process of evolution is itself the working out of\na mighty Teleology of which our finite understandings can fathom but\nthe scantiest rudiments\" (\"Cosmic Philosophy,\" vol. ii. p. 406); it is\nindeed but imperfectly that we can describe the dramatic tendency in\nthe succession of events, but we can see enough to assure us of the\nfundamental fact that there is such a tendency; and this tendency is\nthe objective aspect of that which, when regarded on its subjective\nside, we call Purpose. Such a theory of things is Theism. It recognizes\nan Omnipresent Energy, which is none other than the living God.\n\nIt is this theistic doctrine which I hold myself, and which in the\npresent essay I have sought to exhibit as the legitimate outcome\nof modern scientific thought. I was glad to have such an excellent\noccasion for returning to the subject as the invitation from Concord\ngave me, because in a former attempt to expound the same doctrine I\ndo not seem to have succeeded in making myself understood. In my\n\"Outlines of Cosmic Philosophy,\" published in 1874, I endeavoured to\nset forth a theory of theism identical with that which is set forth\nin the present essay. But an acute and learned friend, writing under\nthe pseudonym of \"Physicus,\" in his \"Candid Examination of Theism\"\n(London, 1878), thus criticizes my theory: In it, he says, \"while I am\nable to discern the elements which I think may properly be regarded as\ncommon to Theism and to Atheism, I am not able to discern any single\nelement that is specifically distinctive of Theism\" (p. 145). The\nreason for the inability of \"Physicus\" to discern any such specifically\ndistinctive element is that he misunderstands me as proposing to\ndivest the theistic idea of every shred of anthropomorphism, while\nstill calling it a theistic idea. This, he thinks, would be an utterly\nillegitimate proceeding, and I quite agree with him. In similar wise my\nfriend Mr. Frederick Pollock, in his admirable work on Spinoza (London,\n1880), observes that \"Mr. Fiske's doctrine excludes the belief in a\nso-called Personal God, and the particular forms of religious emotion\ndependent on it\" (p. 356). If the first part of this sentence stood\nalone, I might pause to inquire how much latitude of meaning may be\nconveyed in the expression \"so-called;\" is it meant that I exclude the\nbelief in a Personal God as it was held by Augustine and Paley, or as\nit was held by Clement and Schleiermacher, or both? But the second\nclause of the sentence seems to furnish the answer; it seems to imply\nthat I would practically do away with Theism altogether.\n\nSuch a serious misstatement of my position, made in perfect good faith\nby two thinkers so conspicuous for ability and candour, shows that,\nin spite of all the elaborate care with which the case was stated in\n\"Cosmic Philosophy,\" some further explanation is needed. It is true\nthat there are expressions in that work which, taken singly and by\nthemselves, might seem to imply a total rejection of theism. Such\nexpressions occur chiefly in the chapter entitled \"Anthropomorphic\nTheism,\" where great pains are taken to show the inadequacy of\nthe Paley argument from design, and to point out the insuperable\ndifficulties in which we are entangled by the conception of a Personal\nGod as it is held by the great majority of modern theologians\nwho have derived it from Plato and Augustine. In the succeeding\nchapters, however, it is expressly argued that the total elimination\nof anthropomorphism from the idea of God is impossible. There are\nsome who, recognizing that the ideas of Personality and Infinity are\nunthinkable in combination, seek to escape the difficulty by speaking\nof God as the \"Infinite Power;\" that is, instead of a symbol derived\nfrom our notion of human consciousness, they employ a symbol derived\nfrom our notion of force in general. For many philosophic purposes the\ndevice is eminently useful; but it should not be forgotten that, while\nthe form of our experience of Personality does not allow us to conceive\nit as infinite, it is equally true that the form of our experience\nof Force does not allow us to conceive it as infinite, since we know\nforce only as antagonized by other force. Since, moreover, our notion\nof force is purely a generalization from our subjective sensations of\neffort overcoming resistance, there is scarcely less anthropomorphism\nlurking in the phrase \"Infinite Power\" than in the phrase \"Infinite\nPerson.\" Now in \"Cosmic Philosophy\" I argue that the presence of God\nis the one all-pervading fact of life, from which there is no escape;\nthat while in the deepest sense the nature of Deity is unknowable by\nfinite Man, nevertheless the exigencies of our thinking oblige us to\nsymbolize that nature in some form that has a real meaning for us; and\nthat we cannot symbolize that nature as in any wise physical, but are\nbound to symbolize it as in some way psychical. I do not here repeat\nthe arguments, but simply state the conclusions. The final conclusion\n(vol. ii. p. 449) is that we must not say that \"God is Force,\" since\nsuch a phrase inevitably calls up those pantheistic notions of blind\nnecessity, which it is my express desire to avoid; but, always bearing\nin mind the symbolic character of the words, we may say that \"God is\nSpirit.\" How my belief in the personality of God could be more strongly\nexpressed without entirely deserting the language of modern philosophy\nand taking refuge in pure mythology, I am unable to see.\n\nThere are two points in the present essay which I hope will serve to\ndefine more completely the kind of theism which I have tried to present\nas compatible with the doctrine of evolution. One is the historic\ncontrast between anthropomorphic and cosmic theism regarded in their\nmodes of genesis, and especially as exemplified within the Christian\nchurch in the very different methods and results of Augustine on the\none hand and Athanasius on the other. The view which I have ventured\nto designate as \"cosmic theism\" is no invention of mine; in its most\nessential features it has been entertained by some of the profoundest\nthinkers of Christendom in ancient and modern times, from Clement of\nAlexandria to Lessing and Goethe and Schleiermacher. The other point is\nthe teleological inference drawn from the argument of my first Concord\naddress on \"The Destiny of Man, viewed in the Light of his Origin.\"\n\nWhen that address was published, a year ago, I was surprised to find it\nquite commonly regarded as indicating some radical change of attitude\non my part,--a \"conversion,\" perhaps, from one set of opinions to\nanother. Inasmuch as the argument in the \"Destiny of Man\" was based\nin every one of its parts upon arguments already published in \"Cosmic\nPhilosophy\" (1874), and in the \"Unseen World\" (1876), I naturally could\nnot understand why the later book should impress people so differently\nfrom the earlier ones. It presently appeared, however, that none of\nmy friends who had studied the earlier books had detected any such\nchange of attitude; it was only people who knew little or nothing\nabout me, or else the newspapers. Whence the inference seemed obvious\nthat many readers of the \"Destiny of Man\" must have contrasted it, not\nwith my earlier books which they had not read, but with some vague and\ndistorted notion about my views which had grown up (Heaven knows how or\nwhy!) through the medium of \"the press;\" and thus there might have been\nproduced the impression that those views had undergone a radical change.\n\nIt would be little to my credit, however, had my views of the\ndoctrine of evolution and its implications undergone no development\nor enlargement since the publication of \"Cosmic Philosophy.\" To carry\nsuch a subject about in one's mind for ten years, without having\nany new thoughts about it, would hardly be a proof of fitness for\nphilosophizing. I have for some time been aware of a shortcoming\nin the earlier work, which it is the purpose of these two Concord\naddresses in some measure to remedy. That shortcoming was an imperfect\nappreciation of the goal toward which the process of evolution is\ntending, and a consequent failure to state adequately how the doctrine\nof evolution must affect our estimate of Man's place in Nature. Nothing\nof fundamental importance in \"Cosmic Philosophy\" needed changing, but\na new chapter needed to be written, in order to show how the doctrine\nof evolution, by exhibiting the development of the highest spiritual\nhuman qualities as the goal toward which God's creative work has from\nthe outset been tending, replaces Man in his old position of headship\nin the universe, even as in the days of Dante and Aquinas. That which\nthe pre-Copernican astronomy naively thought to do by placing the home\nof Man in the centre of the physical universe, the Darwinian biology\nprofoundly accomplishes by exhibiting Man as the terminal fact in that\nstupendous process of evolution whereby things have come to be what\nthey are. In the deepest sense it is as true as it ever was held to be,\nthat the world was made for Man, and that the bringing forth in him of\nthose qualities which we call highest and holiest is the final cause\nof creation. The arguments upon which this conclusion rests, as they\nare set forth in the \"Destiny of Man\" and epitomized in the concluding\nsection of the present essay, may all be found in \"Cosmic Philosophy;\"\nbut I failed to sum them up there and indicate the conclusion, almost\nwithin reach, which I had not quite clearly seized. When, after long\nhovering in the background of consciousness, it suddenly flashed\nupon me two years ago, it came with such vividness as to seem like a\nrevelation.\n\nThis conclusion as to the implications of the doctrine of evolution\nconcerning Man's place in Nature supplies the element wanting in the\ntheistic theory set forth in \"Cosmic Philosophy,\"--the teleological\nelement. It is profoundly true that a theory of things may seem\ntheistic or atheistic in virtue of what it says of Man, no less than\nin virtue of what it says of God. The craving for a final cause is so\ndeeply rooted in human nature that no doctrine of theism which fails to\nsatisfy it can seem other than lame and ineffective. In writing \"Cosmic\nPhilosophy\" I fully realized this when, in the midst of the argument\nagainst Paley's form of theism, I said that \"the process of evolution\nis itself the working out of a mighty Teleology of which our finite\nunderstandings can fathom but the scantiest rudiments.\" Nevertheless,\nwhile the whole momentum of my thought carried me to the conviction\nthat it must be so, I was not yet able to indicate _how_ it is so, and\nI accordingly left the subject with this brief and inadequate hint.\nCould the point have been worked out then and there, I think it would\nhave left no doubt in the minds of \"Physicus\" and Mr. Pollock as to the\ntrue character of Cosmic Theism.\n\nBut hold, cries the scientific inquirer, what in the world are you\ndoing? Are we again to resuscitate the phantom Teleology, which we had\nsupposed at last safely buried between cross-roads and pinned down with\na stake? Was not Bacon right in characterizing \"final causes\" as vestal\nvirgins, so barren has their study proved? And has not Huxley, with\nyet keener sarcasm, designated them the _hetair\u00e6_ of philosophy, so\noften have they led men astray? Very true. I do not wish to take back a\nsingle word of all that I have said in my chapter on \"Anthropomorphic\nTheism\" in condemnation of the teleological method and the peculiar\ntheistic doctrines upon which it rests. As a means of investigation\nit is absolutely worthless. Nay, it is worse than worthless; it is\ntreacherous, it is debauching to the intellect. But that is no reason\nwhy, when a distinct dramatic tendency in the events of the universe\nappears as the _result_ of purely scientific investigation, we should\nrefuse to recognize it. It is the object of the \"Destiny of Man\"\nto prove that there is such a dramatic tendency; and while such a\ntendency cannot be regarded as indicative of purpose in the limited\nanthropomorphic sense, it is still, as I said before, the objective\naspect of that which, when regarded on its subjective side, we call\nPurpose. There is a reasonableness in the universe such as to indicate\nthat the Infinite Power of which it is the multiform manifestation is\npsychical, though it is impossible to ascribe to Him any of the limited\npsychical attributes which we know, or to argue from the ways of Man to\nthe ways of God. For, as St. Paul reminds us, \"who hath known the mind\nof the Lord, or who hath been his counsellor?\"\n\nIt is in this sense that I accept Mr. Spencer's doctrine of the\nUnknowable. How far my interpretation agrees with his own I do not\nundertake to say. On such an abstruse matter it is best that one should\nsimply speak for one's self. But in his recent essay on \"Retrogressive\nReligion\" he uses expressions which imply a doctrine of theism\nessentially similar to that here maintained. The \"infinite and eternal\nEnergy from which all things proceed,\" and which is the same power that\n\"in ourselves wells up under the form of consciousness,\" is certainly\nthe power which is here recognized as God. The term \"Unknowable\" I have\ncarefully refrained from using; it does not occur in the text of this\nessay. It describes only one aspect of Deity, but it has been seized\nupon by shallow writers of every school, treated as if fully synonymous\nwith Deity, and made the theme of the most dismal twaddle that the\nworld has been deluged with since the days of medi\u00e6val scholasticism.\nThe latest instance is the wretched positivist rubbish which Mr.\nFrederic Harrison has mistaken for criticism, and to which it is almost\na pity that Mr. Spencer should have felt called upon to waste his\nvaluable time in replying. That which Mr. Spencer throughout all his\nworks regards as the All-Being, the Power of which \"our lives, alike\nphysical and mental, in common with all the activities, organic and\ninorganic, amid which we live, are but the workings,\"--this omnipresent\nPower it pleases Mr. Harrison to call the \"All-Nothingness,\" to\ndescribe it as \"a logical formula begotten in controversy, dwelling\napart from man and the world\" (whatever all that may mean), and to\nimagine its worshippers as thus addressing it in prayer, \"O _x_^n,\nlove us, help us, make us one with thee!\" If Mr. Harrison's aim were\nto understand, rather than to misrepresent, the religious attitude\nwhich goes with such a conception of Deity as Mr. Spencer's, he could\nnowhere find it more happily expressed than in these wonderful lines of\nGoethe:--\n\n    \"Weltseele, komm, uns zu durchdringen!\n    Dann mit dem Weltgeist selbst zu ringen\n          Wird unsrer Kr\u00e4fte Hochberuf.\n    Theilnehmend f\u00fchren gute Geister,\n    Gelinde leitend, h\u00f6chste Meister,\n          Zu dem der alles schafft und schuf.\"\n\nMr. Harrison is enabled to perform his antics simply because he happens\nto have such a word as \"Unknowable\" to play with. Yet the word which\nhas been put to such unseemly uses is, when properly understood, of the\nhighest value in theistic philosophy. That Deity _per se_ is not only\nunknown but unknowable is a truth which Mr. Spencer has illustrated\nwith all the resources of that psychologic analysis of which he is\nincomparably the greatest master the world has ever seen; but it is not\na truth which originated with him, or the demonstration of which is\ntantamount, as Mr. Harrison would have us believe, to the destruction\nof all religion. Among all the Christian theologians that have lived,\nthere are few higher names than Athanasius, who also regarded Deity\n_per se_ as unknowable, being revealed to mankind only through\nincarnation in Christ. It is not as failing to recognize its value\nthat I have refrained in this essay from using the term \"Unknowable;\"\nit is because so many false and stupid inferences have been drawn\nfrom Mr. Spencer's use of the word that it seemed worth while to show\nhow a doctrine essentially similar to his might be expounded without\nintroducing it. For further elucidation I will simply repeat in this\nconnection what I wrote long ago: \"It is enough to remind the reader\nthat Deity is unknowable just in so far as it is not manifested to\nconsciousness through the phenomenal world,--knowable just in so\nfar as it is thus manifested: unknowable in so far as infinite and\nabsolute,--knowable in the order of its phenomenal manifestations;\nknowable, in a symbolic way, as the Power which is disclosed in every\nthrob of the mighty rhythmic life of the universe; knowable as the\neternal Source of a Moral Law which is implicated with each action\nof our lives, and in obedience to which lies our only guaranty of\nthe happiness which is incorruptible, and which neither inevitable\nmisfortune nor unmerited obloquy can take away. Thus, though we may\nnot by searching find out God, though we may not compass infinitude\nor attain to absolute knowledge, we may at least know all that it\nconcerns us to know, as intelligent and responsible beings. They who\nseek to know more than this, to transcend the conditions under which\nalone is knowledge possible, are, in Goethe's profound language, as\nwise as little children who, when they have looked into a mirror, turn\nit around to see what is behind it.\" (\"Cosmic Philosophy,\" vol. ii. p.\n470.)\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nThe present essay must be regarded as a sequel to the \"Destiny of\nMan,\"--so much so that the force of the argument in the concluding\nsection can hardly be appreciated without reference to the other\nbook. The two books, taken together, contain the bare outlines of a\ntheory of religion which I earnestly hope at some future time to state\nelaborately in a work on the true nature of Christianity. Some such\nscheme had begun vaguely to dawn upon my mind when I was fourteen years\nold, and thought in the language of the rigid Calvinistic orthodoxy\nthen prevalent in New England. After many and extensive changes of\nopinion, the idea assumed definite shape in the autumn of 1869, when\nI conceived the plan of a book to be entitled \"Jesus of Nazareth and\nthe Founding of Christianity,\"--a work intended to deal on the one\nhand with the natural genesis of the complex aggregate of beliefs and\naspirations known as Christianity, and on the other hand with the\nmetamorphoses which are being wrought in this aggregate by modern\nknowledge and modern theories of the universe. Such a book, involving a\ntreatment both historical and philosophical, requires long and varied\npreparation; and I have always regarded my other books, published from\ntime to time, as simply wayside studies preliminary to the undertaking\nof this complicated and difficult task. While thus habitually shaping\nmy work with reference to this cherished idea, I have written some\nthings which are in a special sense related to it. The rude outlines of\na very small portion of the historical treatment are contained in the\nessays on \"The Jesus of History,\" and \"The Christ of Dogma,\" published\nin the volume entitled \"The Unseen World, and Other Essays.\" The\noutlines of the philosophical treatment are partially set forth in the\n\"Destiny of Man\" and in the present work.\n\nIt amused me to see that almost every review of the \"Destiny of Man\"\ntook pains to state that it was my Concord address \"rewritten and\nexpanded.\" Such trifles help one to understand the helter-skelter way\nin which more important things get said and believed. The \"Destiny of\nMan\" was printed exactly as it was delivered at Concord, without the\naddition, or subtraction, or alteration of a single word. The case is\nthe same with the present work.\n\n PETERSHAM, _September 6, 1885_.\n\n\n\n\n  CONTENTS.\n\n\n  _I. Difficulty of expressing the Idea of God so\n  that it can be readily understood_                  _35_\n  _II. The Rapid Growth of Modern Knowledge_          _46_\n\n  _III. Sources of the Theistic Idea_                 _62_\n\n  _IV. Development of Monotheism_                     _72_\n\n  _V. The Idea of God as immanent in the World_       _81_\n\n  _VI. The Idea of God as remote from the World_      _87_\n\n  _VII. Conflict between the Two Ideas, commonly\n  misunderstood as a Conflict between Religion\n  and Science_                                        _97_\n\n  _VIII. Anthropomorphic Conceptions of God_         _111_\n\n  _IX. The Argument from Design_                     _118_\n\n  _X. Simile of the Watch replaced by Simile of\n  the Flower_                                        _128_\n\n  _XI. The Craving for a Final Cause_                _134_\n\n  _XII. Symbolic Conceptions_                        _140_\n\n  _XIII. The Eternal Source of Phenomena_            _144_\n\n  _XIV. The Power that makes for Righteousness_      _158_\n\n\n\n\n\n    THE IDEA OF GOD.\n\n\n\n\n  I.\n\n_Difficulty of expressing the Idea of God so that it can be readily\nunderstood._\n\n\nIn Goethe's great poem, while Faust is walking with Margaret at\neventide in the garden, she asks him questions about his religion. It\nis long since he has been shriven or attended mass; does he, then,\nbelieve in God?--a question easy to answer with a simple yes, were\nit not for the form in which it is put. The great scholar and subtle\nthinker, who has delved in the deepest mines of philosophy and come\nforth weary and heavy-laden with their boasted treasures, has framed a\nvery different conception of God from that entertained by the priest at\nthe confessional or the altar, and how is he to make this intelligible\nto the simple-minded girl that walks by his side? Who will make bold\nto declare that he can grasp an idea of such overwhelming vastness as\nthe idea of God, yet who that hath the feelings of a man can bring\nhimself to cast away a belief that is indispensable to the rational\nand healthful workings of the mind? So long as the tranquil dome of\nheaven is raised above our heads and the firm-set earth is spread forth\nbeneath our feet, while the everlasting stars course in their mighty\norbits and the lover gazes with ineffable tenderness into the eyes of\nher that loves him, so long, says Faust, must our hearts go out toward\nHim that upholds and comprises all. Name or describe as we may the\nSustainer of the world, the eternal fact remains there, far above our\ncomprehension, yet clearest and most real of all facts. To name and\ndescribe it, to bring it within the formulas of theory or creed, is\nbut to veil its glory as when the brightness of heaven is enshrouded\nin mist and smoke. This has a pleasant sound to Margaret's ears. It\nreminds her of what the parson sometimes says, though couched in very\ndifferent phrases; and yet she remains uneasy and unsatisfied. Her mind\nis benumbed by the presence of an idea confessedly too great to be\ngrasped. She feels the need of some concrete symbol that can be readily\napprehended; and she hopes that her lover has not been learning bad\nlessons from Mephistopheles.\n\nThe difficulty which here besets Margaret must doubtless have been\nfelt by every one when confronted with the thoughts by which the\nhighest human minds have endeavoured to disclose the hidden life of the\nuniverse and interpret its meaning. It is a difficulty which baffles\nmany, and they who surmount it are few indeed. Most people content\nthemselves through life with a set of concrete formulas concerning\nDeity, and vituperate as atheistic all conceptions which refuse to be\ncompressed within the narrow limits of their creed. For the great mass\nof men the idea of God is quite overlaid and obscured by innumerable\nsymbolic rites and doctrines that have grown up in the course of the\nlong historic development of religion. All such rites and doctrines had\na meaning once, beautiful and inspiring or terrible and forbidding, and\nmany of them still retain it. But whether meaningless or fraught with\nsignificance, men have wildly clung to them as shipwrecked mariners\ncling to the drifting spars that alone give promise of rescue from\nthreatening death. Such concrete symbols have in all ages been argued\nand fought for until they have come to seem the essentials of religion;\nand new moons and sabbaths, decrees of councils and articles of faith,\nhave usurped the place of the living God. In every age the theory or\ndiscovery--however profoundly theistic in its real import--which has\nthrown discredit upon such symbols has been stigmatized as subversive\nof religion, and its adherents have been reviled and persecuted. It\nis, of course, inevitable that this should be so. To the half-educated\nmind a theory of divine action couched in the form of a legend, in\nwhich God is depicted as entertaining human purposes and swayed by\nhuman passions, is not only intelligible, but impressive. It awakens\nemotion, it speaks to the heart, it threatens the sinner with wrath to\ncome or heals the wounded spirit with sweet whispers of consolation.\nHowever mythical the form in which it is presented, however literally\nfalse the statements of which it is composed, it seems profoundly\nreal and substantial. Just in so far as it is crudely concrete, just\nin so far as its terms can be vividly realized by the ordinary mind,\ndoes such a theological theory seem weighty and true. On the other\nhand, a theory of divine action which, discarding as far as possible\nthe aid of concrete symbols, attempts to include within its range\nthe endlessly complex operations that are forever going on throughout\nthe length and breadth of the knowable universe,--such a theory is to\nthe ordinary mind unintelligible. It awakens no emotion because it\nis not understood. Though it may be the nearest approximation to the\ntruth of which the human intellect is at the present moment capable,\nthough the statements of which it is composed may be firmly based upon\ndemonstrated facts in nature, it will nevertheless seem eminently\nunreal and uninteresting. The dullest peasant can understand you when\nyou tell him that honey is sweet, while a statement that the ratio\nof the circumference of a circle to its diameter may be expressed by\nthe formula +p+ = 3.14159 will sound as gibberish in his ears;\nyet the truth embodied in the latter statement is far more closely\nimplicated with every act of the peasant's life, if he only knew it,\nthan the truth expressed in the former. So the merest child may know\nenough to marvel at the Hebrew legend of the burning bush, but only\nthe ripest scholar can begin to understand the character of the mighty\nproblems with which Spinoza was grappling when he had so much to say\nabout _natura naturans_ and _natura naturata_.\n\nFor these reasons all attempts to study God as revealed in the workings\nof the visible universe, and to characterize the divine activity in\nterms derived from such study, have met with discouragement, if not\nwith obloquy. As substituting a less easily comprehensible formula for\none that is more easily comprehensible, they seem to be frittering\naway the idea of God, and reducing it to an empty abstraction. There\nis a further reason for the dread with which such studies are commonly\nregarded. The theories of divine action accepted as orthodox by the\nmen of any age have been bequeathed to them by their forefathers of an\nearlier age. They were originally framed with reference to assumed\nfacts of nature which advancing knowledge is continually discrediting\nand throwing aside. Each forward step in physical science obliges us to\ncontemplate the universe from a somewhat altered point of view, so that\nthe mutual relations of its parts keep changing as in an ever-shifting\nlandscape. The notions of the world and its Maker with which we started\nby and by prove meagre and unsatisfying; they no longer fit in with the\ngeneral scheme of our knowledge. Hence the men who are wedded to the\nold notions are quick to sound the alarm. They would fain deter us from\ntaking the forward step which carries us to a new standpoint. Beware of\nscience, they cry, lest with its dazzling discoveries and adventurous\nspeculations it rob us of our soul's comfort and leave us in a godless\nworld. Such in every age has been the cry of the more timid and halting\nspirits; and their fears have found apparent confirmation in the\nbehaviour of a very different class of thinkers. As there are those\nwho live in perpetual dread of the time when science shall banish God\nfrom the world, so, on the other hand, there are those who look forward\nwith longing to such a time, and in their impatience are continually\nstarting up and proclaiming that at last it has come. There are those\nwho have indeed learned a lesson from Mephistopheles, the \"spirit that\nforever denies.\" These are they that say in their hearts, \"There is\nno God,\" and \"congratulate themselves that they are going to die like\nthe beasts.\" Rushing into the holiest arcana of philosophy, even where\nangels fear to tread, they lay hold of each new discovery in science\nthat modifies our view of the universe, and herald it as a crowning\nvictory for the materialists,--a victory which is ushering in the happy\nday when atheism is to be the creed of all men. It is in view of such\nphilosophizers that the astronomer, the chemist, or the anatomist,\nwhose aim is the dispassionate examination of evidence and the\nunbiased study of phenomena, may fitly utter the prayer, \"Lord, save me\nfrom my friends!\"\n\nThus through age after age has it fared with men's discoveries in\nscience, and with their thoughts about God and the soul. It was so\nin the days of Galileo and Newton, and we have found it to be so in\nthe days of Darwin and Spencer. The theologian exclaims, if planets\nare held in place by gravitation and tangential momentum, and if the\nhighest forms of life have been developed by natural selection and\ndirect adaptation, then the universe is swayed by blind forces, and\nnothing is left for God to do: how impious and terrible the thought!\nEven so, echoes the favourite atheist, the Lamettrie or B\u00fcchner of\nthe day; the universe, it seems, has always got on without a God, and\naccordingly there is none: how noble and cheering the thought! And as\nthus age after age they wrangle, with their eyes turned away from the\nlight, the world goes on to larger and larger knowledge in spite of\nthem, and does not lose its faith, for all these darkeners of counsel\nmay say. As in the roaring loom of Time the endless web of events is\nwoven, each strand shall make more and more clearly visible the living\ngarment of God.\n\n\n\n\n  II.\n\n_The Rapid Growth of Modern Knowledge._\n\n\nAt no time since men have dwelt upon the earth have their notions about\nthe universe undergone so great a change as in the century of which we\nare now approaching the end. Never before has knowledge increased so\nrapidly; never before has philosophical speculation been so actively\nconducted, or its results so widely diffused. It is a characteristic\nof organic evolution that numerous progressive tendencies, for a long\ntime inconspicuous, now and then unite to bring about a striking and\napparently sudden change; or a set of forces, quietly accumulating\nin one direction, at length unlock some new reservoir of force and\nabruptly inaugurate a new series of phenomena, as when water rises in\na tank until its overflow sets whirling a system of toothed wheels.\nIt may be that Nature makes no leaps, but in this way she now and then\nmakes very long strides. It is in this way that the course of organic\ndevelopment is marked here and there by memorable epochs, which seem\nto open new chapters in the history of the universe. There was such\nan epoch when the common ancestor of ascidian and amphioxus first\nshowed rudimentary traces of a vertebral column. There was such an\nepoch when the air-bladder of early amphibians began to do duty as a\nlung. Greatest of all, since the epoch, still hidden from our ken,\nwhen organic life began upon the surface of the globe, was the birth\nof that new era when, through a wondrous change in the direction of\nthe working of natural selection, Humanity appeared upon the scene.\nIn the career of the human race we can likewise point to periods in\nwhich it has become apparent that an immense stride was taken. Such a\nperiod marks the dawning of human history, when after countless ages\nof desultory tribal warfare men succeeded in uniting into comparatively\nstable political societies, and through the medium of written language\nbegan handing down to posterity the record of their thoughts and\ndeeds. Since that morning twilight of history there has been no era\nso strongly marked, no change so swift or so far-reaching in the\nconditions of human life, as that which began with the great maritime\ndiscoveries of the fifteenth century and is approaching its culmination\nto-day. In its earlier stages this modern era was signalized by\nsporadic achievements of the human intellect, great in themselves and\nleading to such stupendous results as the boldest dared not dream of.\nSuch achievements were the invention of printing, the telescope and\nmicroscope, the geometry of Descartes, the astronomy of Newton, the\nphysics of Huyghens, the physiology of Harvey. Man's senses were thus\nindefinitely enlarged as his means of registration were perfected; he\nbecame capable of extending physical inferences from the earth to the\nheavens; and he made his first acquaintance with that luminiferous\nether which was by and by to reveal the intimate structure of matter in\nregions far beyond the power of the microscope to penetrate.\n\nIt is only within the present century that the vastness of the changes\nthus beginning to be wrought has become apparent. The scientific\nachievements of the human intellect no longer occur sporadically: they\nfollow one upon another, like the organized and systematic conquests\nof a resistless army. Each new discovery becomes at once a powerful\nimplement in the hands of innumerable workers, and each year wins over\nfresh regions of the universe from the unknown to the known. Our own\ngeneration has become so wonted to this unresting march of discovery\nthat we already take it as quite a matter of course. Our minds become\neasily deadened to its real import, and the examples we cite in\nillustration of it have an air of triteness. We scarcely need to be\nreminded that all the advances made in locomotion, from the days of\nNebuchadnezzar to those of Andrew Jackson, were as nothing compared to\nthe change that has been wrought within a few years by the introduction\nof railroads. In these times, when Puck has fulfilled his boast and put\na girdle about the earth in forty minutes, we are not yet perhaps in\ndanger of forgetting that a century has not elapsed since he who caught\nthe lightning upon his kite was laid in the grave. Yet the lesson of\nthese facts, as well as of the grandmother's spinning-wheel that stands\nby the parlour fireside, is well to bear in mind. The change therein\nexemplified since Penelope plied her distaff is far less than that\nwhich has occurred within the memory of living men. The developments\nof machinery, which have worked such wonders, have greatly altered the\npolitical conditions of human society, so that a huge republic like\nthe United States is now as snug and compact and easily manageable\nas the tiny republic of Switzerland in the eighteenth century. The\nnumber of men that can live upon a given area of the earth's surface\nhas been multiplied manifold, and while the mass of human life has thus\nincreased its value has been at the same time enhanced.\n\nIn these various applications of physical theory to the industrial\narts, countless minds, of a class that formerly were not reached\nby scientific reasoning at all, are now brought into daily contact\nwith complex and subtle operations of matter, and their habits of\nthought are thus notably modified. Meanwhile, in the higher regions\nof chemistry and molecular physics the progress has been such that\nno description can do it justice. When we reflect that a fourth\ngeneration has barely had time to appear on the scene since Priestley\ndiscovered that there was such a thing as oxygen, we stand awestruck\nbefore the stupendous pile of chemical science which has been reared\nin this brief interval. Our knowledge thus gained of the molecular\nand atomic structure of matter has been alone sufficient to remodel\nour conceptions of the universe from beginning to end. The case of\nmolecular physics is equally striking. The theory of the conservation\nof energy, and the discovery that light, heat, electricity, and\nmagnetism are differently conditioned modes of undulatory motion\ntransformable each into the other, are not yet fifty years old. In\nphysical astronomy we remained until 1839 confined within the limits of\nthe solar system, and even here the Newtonian theory had not yet won\nits crowning triumph in the discovery of the planet Neptune. To-day\nwe not only measure the distances and movements of many stars, but by\nmeans of spectrum analysis are able to tell what they are made of.\nIt is more than a century since the nebular hypothesis, by which we\nexplain the development of stellar systems, was first propounded by\nImmanuel Kant, but it is only within thirty years that it has been\ngenerally adopted by astronomers; and among the outward illustrations\nof its essential soundness none is more remarkable than its surviving\nsuch an enlargement of our knowledge. Coming to the geologic study\nof the changes that have taken place on the earth's surface, it was\nin 1830 that Sir Charles Lyell published the book which first placed\nthis study upon a scientific basis. Cuvier's classification of past\nand present forms of animal life, which laid the foundations alike of\ncomparative anatomy and of pal\u00e6ontology, came but little earlier. The\ncell-doctrine of Schleiden and Schwann, prior to which modern biology\ncan hardly be said to have existed, dates from 1839; and it was only\nten years before that the scientific treatment of embryology began with\nVon Baer. At the present moment, twenty-six years have not elapsed\nsince the epoch-making work of Darwin first announced to the world the\ndiscovery of natural selection.\n\nIn the cycle of studies which are immediately concerned with the career\nof mankind, the rate of progress has been no less marvellous. The\nscientific study of human speech may be said to date from the flash\nof insight which led Friedrich Schlegel in 1808 to detect the kinship\nbetween the Aryan languages. From this beginning to the researches of\nFick and Ascoli in our own time, the quantity of achievement rivals\nanything the physical sciences can show. The study of comparative\nmythology, which has thrown such light upon the primitive thoughts\nof mankind, is still younger,--is still, indeed, in its infancy. The\napplication of the comparative method to the investigation of laws\nand customs, of political and ecclesiastical and industrial systems,\nhas been carried on scarcely thirty years; yet the results already\nobtained are obliging us to rewrite the history of mankind in all its\nstages. The great achievements of arch\u00e6ologists--the decipherment\nof Egyptian hieroglyphs and of cuneiform inscriptions in Assyria\nand Persia, the unearthing of ancient cities, the discovery and\nclassification of primeval implements and works of art in all quarters\nof the globe--belong almost entirely to the nineteenth century. These\ndiscoveries, which have well-nigh doubled for us the length of the\nhistoric period, have united with the quite modern revelations of\ngeology concerning the ancient glaciation of the temperate zones, to\ngive us an approximate idea of the age of the human race[1] and the\ncircumstances attending its diffusion over the earth. It has thus at\nlength become possible to obtain something like the outlines of a\ncomprehensive view of the history of the creation, from the earliest\nstages of condensation of our solar nebula down to the very time in\nwhich we live, and to infer from the characteristics of this past\nevolution some of the most general tendencies of the future.\n\nAll this accumulation of physical and historical knowledge has not\nfailed to react upon our study of the human mind itself. In books of\nlogic the score of centuries between Aristotle and Whately saw less\nadvance than the few years between Whately and Mill. In psychology the\nwork of Fechner and Wundt and Spencer belongs to the age in which we\nare now living. When to all this variety of achievement we add what has\nbeen done in the critical study of literature and art, of classical\nand Biblical philology, and of metaphysics and theology, illustrating\nfrom fresh points of view the history of the human mind, the sum total\nbecomes almost too vast to be comprehended. This century, which some\nhave called an age of iron, has been also an age of ideas, an era of\nseeking and finding the like of which was never known before. It is\nan epoch the grandeur of which dwarfs all others that can be named\nsince the beginning of the historic period, if not since Man first\nbecame distinctively human. In their mental habits, in their methods\nof inquiry, and in the data at their command, \"the men of the present\nday who have fully kept pace with the scientific movement are separated\nfrom the men whose education ended in 1830 by an immeasurably wider\ngulf than has ever before divided one progressive generation of men\nfrom their predecessors.\"[2] The intellectual development of the human\nrace has been suddenly, almost abruptly, raised to a higher plane\nthan that upon which it had proceeded from the days of the primitive\ntroglodyte to the days of our great-grandfathers. It is characteristic\nof this higher plane of development that the progress which until\nlately was so slow must henceforth be rapid. Men's minds are becoming\nmore flexible, the resistance to innovation is weakening, and our\nintellectual demands are multiplying while the means of satisfying\nthem are increasing. Vast as are the achievements we have just passed\nin review, the gaps in our knowledge are immense, and every problem\nthat is solved but opens a dozen new problems that await solution.\nUnder such circumstances there is no likelihood that the last word will\nsoon be said on any subject. In the eyes of the twenty-first century\nthe science of the nineteenth will doubtless seem very fragmentary\nand crude. But the men of that day, and of all future time, will no\ndoubt point back to the age just passing away as the opening of a\nnew dispensation, the dawning of an era in which the intellectual\ndevelopment of mankind was raised to a higher plane than that upon\nwhich it had hitherto proceeded.\n\nAs the inevitable result of the thronging discoveries just enumerated,\nwe find ourselves in the midst of a mighty revolution in human thought.\nTime-honoured creeds are losing their hold upon men; ancient symbols\nare shorn of their value; everything is called in question. The\ncontroversies of the day are not like those of former times. It is\nno longer a question of hermeneutics, no longer a struggle between\nabstruse dogmas of rival churches. Religion itself is called upon to\nshow why it should any longer claim our allegiance. There are those\nwho deny the existence of God. There are those who would explain\naway the human soul as a mere group of fleeting phenomena attendant\nupon the collocation of sundry particles of matter. And there are\nmany others who, without committing themselves to these positions of\nthe atheist and the materialist, have nevertheless come to regard\nreligion as practically ruled out from human affairs. No religious\ncreed that man has ever devised can be made to harmonize in all its\nfeatures with modern knowledge. All such creeds were constructed\nwith reference to theories of the universe which are now utterly and\nhopelessly discredited. How, then, it is asked, amid the general wreck\nof old beliefs, can we hope that the religious attitude in which from\ntime immemorial we have been wont to contemplate the universe can any\nlonger be maintained? Is not the belief in God perhaps a dream of the\nchildhood of our race, like the belief in elves and bogarts which once\nwas no less universal? and is not modern science fast destroying the\none as it has already destroyed the other?\n\nSuch are the questions which we daily hear asked, sometimes with\nflippant eagerness, but oftener with anxious dread. In view of them\nit is well worth while to examine the idea of God, as it has been\nentertained by mankind from the earliest ages, and as it is affected by\nthe knowledge of the universe which we have acquired in recent times.\nIf we find in that idea, as conceived by untaught thinkers in the\ntwilight of antiquity, an element that still survives the widest and\ndeepest generalizations of modern times, we have the strongest possible\nreason for believing that the idea is permanent and answers to an\nEternal Reality. It was to be expected that conceptions of Deity handed\ndown from primitive men should undergo serious modification. If it can\nbe shown that the essential element in these conceptions must survive\nthe enormous additions to our knowledge which have distinguished the\npresent age above all others since man became man, then we may believe\nthat it will endure so long as man endures; for it is not likely that\nit can ever be called upon to pass a severer ordeal.\n\nAll this will presently appear in a still stronger light, when we have\nset forth the common characteristic of the modifications which the idea\nof God has already undergone, and the nature of the opposition between\nthe old and the new knowledge with which we are now confronted. Upon\nthis discussion we have now to enter, and we shall find it leading\nus to the conclusion that throughout all possible advances in human\nknowledge, so far as we can see, the essential position of theism must\nremain unshaken.\n\n\n\n\n  III.\n\n_Sources of the Theistic Idea._\n\n\nOur argument may fitly begin with an inquiry into the sources of\nthe theistic idea and the shape which it has universally assumed\namong untutored men. The most primitive element which it contains\nis doubtless the notion of _dependence_ upon something outside of\nourselves. We are born into a world consisting of forces which sway\nour lives and over which we can exercise no control. The individual\nman can indeed make his volition count for a very little in modifying\nthe course of events, but this end necessitates strict and unceasing\nobedience to powers that cannot be tampered with. To the behaviour of\nthese external powers our actions must be adapted under penalty of\ndeath. And upon grounds no less firm than those on which we believe in\nany externality whatever, we recognize that these forces antedated our\nbirth and will endure after we have disappeared from the scene. No one\nsupposes that he makes the world for himself, so that it is born and\ndies with him. Every one perforce contemplates the world as something\nexisting independently of himself, as something into which he has\ncome, and from which he is to go; and for his coming and his going, as\nwell as for what he does while part of the world, he is dependent upon\nsomething that is not himself.\n\nBetween ancient and modern man, as between the child and the adult,\nthere can be no essential difference in the recognition of this\nfundamental fact of life. The primitive man could not, indeed, state\nthe case in this generalized form, any more than a young child could\nstate it, but the facts which the statement covers were as real to him\nas they are to us.[A] The primitive man knew nothing of a world, in\nthe modern sense of the word. The conception of that vast consensus of\nforces which we call the world or universe is a somewhat late result of\nculture; it was reached only through ages of experience and reflection.\nSuch an idea lay beyond the horizon of the primitive man. But while\nhe knew not the world, he knew bits and pieces of it; or, to vary the\nexpression, he had his little world, chaotic and fragmentary enough,\nbut full of dread reality for him. He knew what it was to deal from\nbirth until death with powers far mightier than himself. To explain\nthese powers, to make their actions in any wise intelligible, he had\nbut one available resource; and this was so obvious that he could not\nfail to employ it. The only source of action of which he knew anything,\nsince it was the only source which lay within himself, was the human\nwill;[3] and in this respect, after all, the philosophy of the primeval\nsavage was not so very far removed from that of the modern scientific\nthinker. The primitive man could see that his own actions were prompted\nby desire and guided by intelligence, and he supposed the same to\nbe the case with the sun and the wind, the frost and the lightning.\nAll the forces of outward nature, so far as they came into visible\ncontact with his life, he personified as great beings which were to be\ncontended with or placated. This primeval philosophy, once universal\namong men, has lasted far into the historic period, and it is only\nslowly and bit by bit that it has been outgrown by the most highly\ncivilized races. Indeed the half-civilized majority of mankind have by\nno means as yet cast it aside, and among savage tribes we may still see\nit persisting in all its original crudity. In the mythologies of all\npeoples, of the Greeks and Hindus and Norsemen, as well as of the North\nAmerican Indians and the dwellers in the South Sea islands, we find\nthe sun personified as an archer or wanderer, the clouds as gigantic\nbirds, the tempest as a devouring dragon; and the tales of gods and\nheroes, as well as of trolls and fairies, are made up of scattered and\ndistorted fragments of nature-myths, of which the primitive meaning had\nlong been forgotten when the ingenuity of modern scholarship laid it\nbare.[4]\n\n  [A] See note A at the end of the volume.\n\nIn all this personification of physical phenomena our prehistoric\nancestors were greatly assisted by that theory of ghosts which was\nperhaps the earliest speculative effort of the human mind. Travellers\nhave now and then reported the existence of races of men quite\ndestitute of religion, or of what the observer has learned to recognize\nas religion; but no one has ever discovered a race of men devoid of\na belief in ghosts. The mass of crude inference which makes up the\nsavage's philosophy of nature is largely based upon the hypothesis\nthat every man has _another self_, a double, or wraith, or ghost.\nThis \"hypothesis of the _other self_, which serves to account for\nthe savage's wanderings during sleep in strange lands and among\nstrange people, serves also to account for the presence in his dreams\nof parents, comrades, or enemies, known to be dead and buried. The\nother self of the dreamer meets and converses with the other selves\nof his dead brethren, joins with them in the hunt, or sits down with\nthem to the wild cannibal banquet. Thus arises the belief in an\never-present world of ghosts, a belief which the entire experience of\nuncivilized man goes to strengthen and expand.\"[5] Countless tales and\nsuperstitions of savage races show that the hypothesis of the other\nself is used to explain the phenomena of hysteria and epilepsy, of\nshadows, of echoes, and even of the reflection of face and gestures in\nstill water. It is not only men, moreover, who are provided with other\nselves. Dumb beasts and plants, stone hatchets and arrows, articles of\nclothing and food, all have their ghosts;[6] and when the dead chief is\nburied, his wives and servants, his dogs and horses, are slain to keep\nhim company, and weapons and trinkets are placed in his tomb to be used\nin the spirit-land. Burial-places of primitive men, ages before the\ndawn of history, bear testimony to the immense antiquity of this savage\nphilosophy. From this wholesale belief in ghosts to the interpretation\nof the wind or the lightning as a person animated by an indwelling soul\nand endowed with quasi-human passions and purposes, the step is not a\nlong one. The latter notion grows almost inevitably out of the former,\nso that all races of men without exception have entertained it. That\nthe mighty power which uproots trees and drives the storm-clouds across\nthe sky should resemble a human soul is to the savage an unavoidable\ninference. \"If the fire burns down his hut, it is because the fire is\na person with a soul, and is angry with him, and needs to be coaxed\ninto a kindlier mood by means of prayer or sacrifice.\" He has no\nalternative but to regard fire-soul as something akin to human-soul;\nhis philosophy makes no distinction between the human ghost and the\nelemental demon or deity.\n\nIt was in accordance with this primitive theory of things that the\nearliest form of religious worship was developed. In all races of men,\nso far as can be determined, this was the worship of ancestors.[7]\nThe other self of the dead chieftain continued after death to watch\nover the interests of the tribe, to defend it against the attacks of\nenemies, to reward brave warriors, and to punish traitors and cowards.\nHis favour must be propitiated with ceremonies like those in which\na subject does homage to a living ruler. If offended by neglect or\nirreverent treatment, defeat in battle, damage by flood or fire,\nvisitations of famine or pestilence, were interpreted as marks of his\nanger. Thus the spirits animating the forces of nature were often\nidentified with the ghosts of ancestors, and mythology is filled with\ntraces of the confusion. In the Vedic religion the _pitris_, or\n\"fathers,\" live in the sky along with Yama, the original _pitri_ of\nmankind: they are very busy with the weather; they send down rain to\nrefresh the thirsty earth, or anon parch the fields till the crops\nperish of drought; and they rush along in the roaring tempest, like the\nweird host of the wild huntsman Wodan. To the ancient Greek the blue\nsky Uranos was the father of gods and men, and throughout antiquity\nthis mingling of ancestor-worship with nature-worship was general.\nWith the systematic development of ethnic religions, in some instances\nancestor-worship remained dominant, as with the Chinese, the Japanese,\nand the Romans; in others, a polytheism based upon nature-worship\nacquired supremacy, as with the Hindus and Greeks, and our own Teutonic\nforefathers. The great divinities of the Hellenic pantheon are all\npersonifications of physical phenomena. At a comparatively late date\nthe Roman adopted these divinities and paid to them a fashionable\nand literary homage, but his solemn and heartfelt rites were those\nwith which he worshipped the _lares_ and _penates_ in the privacy of\nhis home. His hospitable treatment of the gods of a vanquished people\nwas the symptom of a commingling of the various local religions of\nantiquity which insured their mutual destruction and prepared the way\nfor their absorption into a far grander and truer system.[8]\n\n\n\n\n  IV.\n\n_Development of Monotheism._\n\n\nSuch an allusion to the Romans, in an exposition like the present\none, is not without its significance. It was partly through political\ncircumstances that a truly theistic idea was developed out of the\nchaotic and fragmentary ghost theories and nature-worship of the\nprimeval world. To the framing of the vastest of all possible\nconceptions, the idea of God, man came but slowly. This nature-worship\nand ancestor-worship of early times was scarcely theism. In their\nrecognition of man's utter dependence upon something outside of himself\nwhich yet was not wholly unlike himself, these primitive religions\ncontained the essential germ out of which theism was to grow; but it is\na long way from the propitiation of ghosts and the adoration of the\nrising sun to the worship of the infinite and eternal God, the maker\nof heaven and earth, in whom we live, and move, and have our being.\nBefore men could arrive at such a conception, it was necessary for\nthem to obtain some integral idea of the heaven and the earth; it was\nnecessary for them to frame, however inadequately, the conception of\na physical universe. Such a conception had been reached by civilized\npeoples before the Christian era, and by the Greeks a remarkable\nbeginning had been made in the generalization and interpretation of\nphysical phenomena. The intellectual atmosphere of Alexandria, for two\ncenturies before and three centuries after the time of Christ, was\nmore modern than anything that followed down to the days of Bacon and\nDescartes; and all the leaders of Greek thought since Anaxagoras had\nbeen virtually or avowedly monotheists. As the phenomena of nature\nwere generalized, the deities or superhuman beings regarded as their\nsources were likewise generalized, until the conception of nature as a\nwhole gave rise to the conception of a single Deity as the author and\nruler of nature; and in accordance with the order of its genesis, this\nnotion of Deity was still the notion of a Being possessed of psychical\nattributes, and in some way like unto Man.\n\nBut there was another cause, besides scientific generalization, which\nled men's minds toward monotheism. The conception of tutelar deities,\nwhich was the most prominent practical feature of ancestor-worship,\nwas directly affected by the political development of the peoples of\nantiquity. As tribes were consolidated into nations, the tutelar gods\nof the tribes became generalized, or the god of some leading tribe\ncame to supersede his fellows, until the result was a single national\ndeity, at first regarded as the greatest among gods, afterwards as the\nonly God. The most striking instance of this method of development is\nafforded by the Hebrew conception of Jehovah. The most primitive form\nof Hebrew religion discernible in the Old Testament is a fetichism, or\nvery crude polytheism, in which ancestor-worship becomes more prominent\nthan nature-worship. At first the _teraphim_, or tutelar household\ndeities, play an important part, but nature-gods, such as Baal, and\nMoloch, and Astarte, are extensively worshipped. It is the plural\n_elohim_ who create the earth, and whose sons visit the daughters of\nantediluvian men. The tutelar deity, Jehovah, is originally thought\nof as one of the _elohim_, then as chief among _elohim_, and Lord of\nthe hosts of heaven. Through his favour his chosen prophet overcomes\nthe prophets of Baal, he is greater than the deities of neighbouring\npeoples, he is the only true god, and thus finally he is thought of\nas the only God, and his name becomes the symbol of monotheism. The\nJews have always been one of the most highly-gifted races in the\nworld. In antiquity they developed an intense sentiment of nationality,\nand for earnestness and depth of ethical feeling they surpassed all\nother peoples. The conception of Jehovah set forth in the writings of\nthe prophets was the loftiest conception of deity anywhere attained\nbefore the time of Christ; in ethical value it immeasurably surpassed\nanything to be found in the pantheon of the Greeks and Romans. It was\nnatural that such a conception of deity should be adopted throughout\nthe Roman world. At the beginning of the Christian era the classic\npolytheism had well-nigh lost its hold upon men's minds; its value had\nbecome chiefly literary, as a mere collection of pretty stories; it\nhad begun its descent into the humble realm of folk-lore. For want of\nanything better people had recourse to elaborate Eastern ceremonials,\nor contented themselves with the time-honoured domestic worship of the\n_lares_ and _penates_. Yet their minds were ripe for some kind of\nmonotheism, and in order that the Jewish conception should come to be\ngenerally adopted, it was only necessary that it should be freed from\nits limitations of nationality, and that Jehovah should be set forth\nas Sustainer of the universe and Father of all mankind. This was done\nby Jesus and Paul. The theory of divine action implied throughout the\ngospels and the epistles was the first complete monotheism attained\nby mankind, or at least by that portion of it from which our modern\ncivilization has descended. Here for the first time we have the idea\nof God dissociated from the limiting circumstances with which it had\nbeen entangled in all the ethnic religions of antiquity. Individual\nthinkers here and there had already, doubtless, reached an equally\ntrue conception, as was shown by Kleanthes in his sublime hymn to\nZeus;[9] but it was now for the first time set forth in such wise as\nto win assent from the common folk as well as the philosophers, and to\nmake its way into the hearts of all men. Its acceptance was hastened,\nand its hold upon mankind immeasurably strengthened, by the divinely\nbeautiful ethical teaching in which Jesus couched it,--that teaching,\nso often misunderstood yet so profoundly true, which heralded the time\nwhen Man shall have thrown off the burden of his bestial inheritance\nand strife and sorrow shall cease from the earth.[10]\n\nWe shall presently see that in its fundamental features the theism of\nJesus and Paul was so true that it must endure as long as man endures.\nChanges of statement may alter the outward appearance of it, but the\nkernel of truth will remain the same forever. But the shifting body of\nreligious doctrine known as Christianity has at various times contained\nmuch that is unknown to this pure theism, and much that has shown\nitself to be ephemeral in its hold upon men. The change from polytheism\nto monotheism could not be thoroughly accomplished all at once. As\nChristianity spread over the Roman world it became encrusted with pagan\nnotions and observances, and a similar process went on during the\nconversion of the Teutonic barbarians. Yuletide and Easter and other\nchurch holidays were directly adopted from the old nature-worship; the\nadoration of tutelar household deities survived in the homage paid to\npatron saints; and the worship of the Berecynthian Mother was continued\nin that of the Virgin Mary.[11] Even the name _God_, applied to the\nDeity throughout Teutonic Christendom, seems to be neither more nor\nless than _Wodan_, the personification of the storm-wind, the supreme\ndivinity of our pagan forefathers.[B]\n\n  [B] See note B. at the end of the volume.\n\nThat Christianity should thus have retained names and symbols and\nrites belonging to heathen antiquity was inevitable. The system of\nChristian theism was the work of some of the loftiest minds that have\never appeared upon the earth; but it was adopted by millions of men\nand women, of all degrees of knowledge and ignorance, of keenness\nand dullness, of spirituality and grossness, and these brought to it\ntheir various inherited notions and habits of thought. In all its\nages, therefore, Christian theism has meant one thing to one person,\nand another thing to another. While the highest Christian minds have\nalways been monotheistic, the multitude have outgrown polytheism but\nslowly; and even the monotheism of the highest minds has been coloured\nby notions ultimately derived from the primeval ghost-world which have\ninterfered with its purity, and have seriously hampered men in their\nsearch after truth.\n\nIn illustration of this point we have now to notice two strongly\ncontrasted views of the divine nature which have been held by Christian\ntheists, and to observe their bearings upon the scientific thought of\nmodern times.\n\n\n\n\n  V.\n\n_The Idea of God as immanent in the World._\n\n\nWe have seen that since the primitive savage philosophy did not\ndistinguish between the human ghost and the elemental demon or\ndeity, the religion of antiquity was an inextricable tangle of\nancestor-worship with nature-worship. Nevertheless, among some\npeoples the one, among others the other, became predominant. I think\nit can hardly be an accidental coincidence that nature-worship\npredominated with the Greeks and Hindus, the only peoples of antiquity\nwho accomplished anything in the exact sciences, or in metaphysics.\nThe capacity for abstract thinking which led the Hindu to originate\nalgebra, and the Greek to originate geometry, and both to attempt\nelaborate scientific theories of the universe,--this same capacity\nrevealed itself in the manner in which they deified the powers of\nnature. They were able to imagine the indwelling spirit of the sun or\nthe storm without help from the conception of an individual ghost. Such\nbeing the general capacity of the people, we can readily understand\nhow, when it came to monotheism, their most eminent thinkers should\nhave been able to frame the conception of God acting in and through\nthe powers of nature, without the aid of any grossly anthropomorphic\nsymbolism. In this connection it is interesting to observe the\ncharacteristics of the idea of God as conceived by the three greatest\nfathers of the Greek church, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, and\nAthanasius. The philosophy of these profound and vigorous thinkers\nwas in large measure derived from the Stoics. They regarded Deity as\nimmanent in the universe, and eternally operating through natural laws.\nIn their view God is not a localizable personality, remote from the\nworld, and acting upon it only by means of occasional portent and\nprodigy; nor is the world a lifeless machine blindly working after\nsome preordained method, and only feeling the presence of God in so\nfar as he now and then sees fit to interfere with its normal course\nof procedure. On the contrary, God is the ever-present life of the\nworld; it is through him that all things exist from moment to moment,\nand the natural sequence of events is a perpetual revelation of the\ndivine wisdom and goodness. In accordance with this fundamental view,\nClement, for example, repudiated the Gnostic theory of the vileness\nof matter, condemned asceticism, and regarded the world as hallowed\nby the presence of indwelling Deity. Knowing no distinction \"between\nwhat man discovers and what God reveals,\" he explained Christianity\nas a natural development from the earlier religious thought of\nmankind. It was essential to his idea of the divine perfection that\nthe past should contain within itself all the germs of the future;\nand accordingly he attached but slight value to tales of miracle, and\nlooked upon salvation as the normal ripening of the higher spiritual\nqualities of man \"under the guidance of immanent Deity.\" The views of\nClement's disciple Origen are much like those of his master. Athanasius\nventured much farther into the bewildering regions of metaphysics.\nYet in his doctrine of the Trinity, by which he overcame the visible\ntendency toward polytheism in the theories of Arius, and averted the\nthreatened danger of a compromise between Christianity and Paganism,\nhe proceeded upon the lines which Clement had marked out. In his very\nsuggestive work on \"The Continuity of Christian Thought,\" Professor\nAlexander Allen thus sets forth the Athanasian point of view: \"In\nthe formula of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, as three distinct and\ncoequal members in the one divine essence, there was the recognition\nand the reconciliation of the philosophical schools which had divided\nthe ancient world. In the idea of the eternal Father the Oriental\nmind recognized what it liked to call the profound abyss of being,\nthat which lies back of all phenomena, the hidden mystery which lends\nawe to human minds seeking to know the divine. In the doctrine of the\neternal Son revealing the Father, immanent in nature and humanity as\nthe life and light shining through all created things, the divine\nreason in which the human reason shares, there was the recognition\nof the truth after which Plato and Aristotle and the Stoics were\nstruggling,--the tie which binds the creation to God in the closest\norganic relationship. In the doctrine of the Holy Spirit the church\nguarded against any pantheistic confusion of God with the world by\nupholding the life of the manifested Deity as essentially ethical or\nspiritual, revealing itself in humanity in its highest form, only in so\nfar as humanity recognized its calling and through the Spirit entered\ninto communion with the Father and the Son.\"\n\nGreat as was the service which these views of Athanasius rendered in\nthe fourth century of our era, they are scarcely to be regarded as a\npermanent or essential feature of Christian theism. The metaphysic in\nwhich they are couched is alien to the metaphysic of our time, yet\nthrough this vast difference it is all the more instructive to note\nhow closely Athanasius approaches the confines of modern scientific\nthought, simply through his fundamental conception of God as the\nindwelling life of the universe. We shall be still more forcibly struck\nwith this similarity when we come to consider the character impressed\nupon our idea of God by the modern doctrine of evolution.\n\n\n\n\n  VI.\n\n_The Idea of God as remote from the World._\n\n\nBut this Greek conception of divine immanence did not find favour with\nthe Latin-speaking world. There a very different notion prevailed,\nthe origin of which may be traced to the mental habits attending\nthe primitive ancestor-worship. Out of materials furnished by the\nghost-world a crude kind of monotheism could be reached by simply\ncarrying back the thought to a single ghost-deity as the original\nancestor of all the others. Some barbarous races have gone as far as\nthis, as for example the Zulus, who have developed the doctrine of\ndivine ancestors so far as to recognize a first ancestor, the Great\nFather, Unkulunkulu, who created the world.[12] The kind of theism\nreached by this process of thought differs essentially from the theism\nreached through the medium of nature-worship. For whereas in the latter\ncase the god of the sky or the sea is regarded as a mysterious spirit\nacting in and through the phenomena, in the former case the phenomena\nare regarded as coerced into activity by some power existing outside\nof them, and this power is conceived as manlike in the crudest sense,\nhaving been originally thought of as the ghost of some man who once\nlived upon the earth. In the monotheism which is reached by thinking\nalong these lines of inference, the universe is conceived as an inert\nlifeless machine, impelled by blind forces which have been set acting\nfrom without; and God is conceived as existing apart from the world in\nsolitary inaccessible majesty,--\"an absentee God,\" as Carlyle says,\n\"sitting idle ever since the first Sabbath, at the outside of his\nuniverse, and 'seeing it go.'\" This conception demands less of the\nintellect than the conception of God as immanent in the universe.\nIt requires less grasp of mind and less width of experience, and it\nhas accordingly been much the more common conception. The idea of the\nindwelling God is an attempt to reach out toward the reality, and as\nsuch it taxes the powers of the finite mind. The idea of God external\nto the universe is a symbol which in no wise approaches the reality,\nand for that very reason it does not tax the mental powers; there is an\naspect of finality about it, in which the ordinary mind rests content\nand complains of whatever seeks to disturb its repose.\n\nI must not be understood as ignoring the fact that this lower species\nof theism has been entertained by some of the loftiest minds of\nour race, both in ancient and in modern times. When once such an\never-present conception as the idea of God has become intertwined with\nthe whole body of the thoughts of mankind, it is very difficult for the\nmost powerful and subtle intelligence to change the form it has taken.\nIt has become so far organized into the texture of the mind that it\nabides there unconsciously, like our fundamental axioms about number\nand magnitude; it sways our thought hither and thither without our\nknowing it. The two forms of theism here contrasted have slowly grown\nup under the myriad unassignable influences that in antiquity caused\nnature-worship to predominate among some people and ancestor-worship\namong others; they have coloured all the philosophizing that has\nbeen done for more than twenty centuries; and it is seldom that a\nthinker educated under the one form ever comes to adopt the other\nand habitually employ it, save under the mighty influence of modern\nscience, the tendency of which, as we shall presently see, is all in\none direction.\n\nAmong ancient thinkers the view of Deity as remote from the world\nprevailed with the followers of Epikuros, who held that the immortal\ngods could not be supposed to trouble themselves about the paltry\naffairs of men, but lived a blessed life of their own, undisturbed\nin the far-off empyrean. This left the world quite under the sway of\nblind forces, and thus we find it depicted in the marvellous poem of\nLucretius, one of the loftiest monuments of Latin genius. It is to\nall appearance an atheistic world, albeit the author was perhaps more\nprofoundly religious in spirit than any other Roman that ever lived,\nsave Augustine; yet to his immediate scientific purpose this atheism\nwas no drawback. When we are investigating natural phenomena, with\nintent to explain them scientifically, our proper task is simply to\nascertain the physical conditions under which they occur, and the less\nwe meddle with metaphysics or theology the better. As Laplace said, the\nmathematician, in solving his equations, does not need \"the hypothesis\nof God.\"[13] To the scientific investigator, as such, the forces of\nnature are doubtless blind, like the _x_ and _y_ in algebra, but this\nis only so long as he contents himself with describing their modes of\noperation; when he undertakes to explain them philosophically, as we\nshall see, he can in no wise dispense with his theistic hypothesis. The\nLucretian philosophy, therefore, admirable as a scientific co\u00f6rdination\nof such facts about the physical universe as were then known, goes but\nvery little way as a philosophy. It is interesting to note that this\natheism followed directly from that species of theism which placed God\noutside of his universe. We shall find the case of modern atheism to\nbe quite similar. As soon as this crude and misleading conception of\nGod is refuted, as the whole progress of scientific knowledge tends\nto refute it, the modern atheist or positivist falls back upon his\nuniverse of blind forces and contents himself with it, while zealously\nshouting from the housetops that this is the whole story.\n\nTo one familiar with Christian ideas, the notion that Man is too\ninsignificant a creature to be worth the notice of Deity seems at\nonce pathetic and grotesque. In the view of Plato, by which all\nChristendom has been powerfully influenced, there is profound pathos.\nThe wickedness and misery of the world wrought so strongly upon Plato's\nkeen sympathies and delicate moral sense that he came to conclusions\nalmost as gloomy as those of the Buddhist who regards existence as\nan evil. In the Timaios he depicts the material world as essentially\nvile; he is unable to think of the pure and holy Deity as manifested\nin it, and he accordingly separates the Creator from his creation by\nthe whole breadth of infinitude. This view passed on to the Gnostics,\nfor whom the puzzling problem of philosophy was how to explain the\naction of the spiritual God upon the material universe. Sometimes the\ninterval was bridged by mediating \u00e6ons or emanations partly spiritual\nand partly material; sometimes the world was held to be the work of\nthe devil, and in no sense divine.[14] The Greek fathers under the lead\nof Clement, espousing the higher theism, kept clear of this torrent of\nGnostic thought; but upon Augustine it fell with full force, and he was\ncarried away with it. In his earlier writings Augustine showed himself\nnot incapable of comprehending the views of Clement and Athanasius; but\nhis intense feeling of man's wickedness dragged him irresistibly in\nthe opposite direction. In his doctrine of original sin, he represents\nhumanity as cut off from all relationship with God, who is depicted\nas a crudely anthropomorphic Being far removed from the universe and\naccessible only through the mediating offices of an organized church.\nCompared with the thoughts of the Greek fathers this was a barbaric\nconception, but it was suited alike to the lower grade of culture\nin western Europe, and to the Latin political genius, which in the\ndecline of the Empire was already occupying itself with its great and\nbeneficent work of constructing an imperial Church. For these reasons\nthe Augustinian theology prevailed, and in the Dark Ages which followed\nit became so deeply inwrought into the innermost fibres of Latin\nChristianity that it remains dominant to-day alike in Catholic and\nProtestant churches. With few exceptions every child born of Christian\nparents in western Europe or in America grows up with an idea of God\nthe outlines of which were engraven upon men's minds by Augustine\nfifteen centuries ago. Nay, more, it is hardly too much to say that\nthree fourths of the body of doctrine currently known as Christianity,\nunwarranted by Scripture and never dreamed of by Christ or his\napostles, first took coherent shape in the writings of this mighty\nRoman, who was separated from the apostolic age by an interval of time\nlike that which separates us from the invention of printing and the\ndiscovery of America. The idea of God upon which all this Augustinian\ndoctrine is based is the idea of a Being actuated by human passions\nand purposes, localizable in space and utterly remote from that\ninert machine, the universe in which we live, and upon which He acts\nintermittently through the suspension of what are called natural laws.\nSo deeply has this conception penetrated the thought of Christendom\nthat we continually find it at the bottom of the speculations and\narguments of men who would warmly repudiate it as thus stated in its\nnaked outlines. It dominates the reasonings alike of believers and\nskeptics, of theists and atheists; it underlies at once the objections\nraised by orthodoxy against each new step in science and the assaults\nmade by materialism upon every religious conception of the world; and\nthus it is chiefly responsible for that complicated misunderstanding\nwhich, by a lamentable confusion of thought, is commonly called \"the\nconflict between religion and science.\"\n\n\n\n\n  VII.\n\n_Conflict between the Two Ideas, commonly misunderstood as a Conflict\nbetween Religion and Science._\n\n\nIn illustration of the mischief that has been wrought by the\nAugustinian conception of Deity, we may cite the theological objections\nurged against the Newtonian theory of gravitation and the Darwinian\ntheory of natural selection. Leibnitz, who as a mathematician but\nlittle inferior to Newton himself might have been expected to be easily\nconvinced of the truth of the theory of gravitation, was nevertheless\ndeterred by theological scruples from accepting it. It appeared to him\nthat it substituted the action of physical forces for the direct action\nof the Deity. Now the fallacy of this argument of Leibnitz is easy to\ndetect. It lies in a metaphysical misconception of the meaning of the\nword \"force.\" \"Force\" is implicitly regarded as a sort of entity or\nd\u00e6mon which has a mode of action distinguishable from that of Deity;\notherwise it is meaningless to speak of substituting the one for the\nother. But such a personification of \"force\" is a remnant of barbaric\nthought, in no wise sanctioned by physical science. When astronomy\nspeaks of two planets as attracting each other with a \"force\" which\nvaries directly as their masses and inversely as the squares of their\ndistances apart, it simply uses the phrase as a convenient metaphor by\nwhich to describe the manner in which the observed movements of the two\nbodies occur. It explains that in presence of each other the two bodies\nare observed to change their positions in a certain specified way,\nand this is all that it means. This is all that a strictly scientific\nhypothesis can possibly allege, and this is all that observation can\npossibly prove. Whatever goes beyond this and imagines or asserts a\nkind of \"pull\" between the two bodies, is not science, but metaphysics.\nAn atheistic metaphysics may imagine such a \"pull,\" and may interpret\nit as the action of something that is not Deity, but such a conclusion\ncan find no support in the scientific theorem, which is simply a\ngeneralized description of phenomena. The general considerations\nupon which the belief in the existence and direct action of Deity is\notherwise founded are in no wise disturbed by the establishment of any\nsuch scientific theorem. We are still perfectly free to maintain that\nit is the direct action of Deity which is manifested in the planetary\nmovements; having done nothing more with our Newtonian hypothesis than\nto construct a happy formula for expressing the mode or order of the\nmanifestation. We may have learned something new concerning the manner\nof divine action; we certainly have not \"substituted\" any other kind\nof action for it. And what is thus obvious in this simple astronomical\nexample is equally true in principle in every case whatever in which\none set of phenomena is interpreted by reference to another set. In no\ncase whatever can science use the words \"force\" or \"cause\" except as\nmetaphorically descriptive of some observed or observable sequence of\nphenomena. And consequently at no imaginable future time, so long as\nthe essential conditions of human thinking are maintained, can science\neven attempt to substitute the action of any other power for the direct\naction of Deity. The theological objection urged by Leibnitz against\nNewton was repeated word for word by Agassiz in his comments upon\nDarwin. He regarded it as a fatal objection to the Darwinian theory\nthat it appeared to substitute the action of physical forces for the\ncreative action of Deity. The fallacy here is precisely the same as in\nLeibnitz's argument. Mr. Darwin has convinced us that the existence of\nhighly complicated organisms is the result of an infinitely diversified\naggregate of circumstances so minute as severally to seem trivial or\naccidental; yet the consistent theist will always occupy an impregnable\nposition in maintaining that the entire series in each and every one of\nits incidents is an immediate manifestation of the creative action of\nGod.\n\nIn this connection it is worth while to state explicitly what is the\ntrue province of scientific explanation. Is it not obvious that since a\nphilosophical theism must regard divine power as the immediate source\nof all phenomena alike, therefore science cannot properly explain any\nparticular group of phenomena by a direct reference to the action of\nDeity? Such a reference is not an explanation, since it adds nothing\nto our previous knowledge either of the phenomena or of the manner of\ndivine action. The business of science is simply to ascertain in what\nmanner phenomena coexist with each other or follow each other, and\nthe only kind of explanation with which it can properly deal is that\nwhich refers one set of phenomena to another set. In pursuing this, its\nlegitimate business, science does not touch on the province of theology\nin any way, and there is no conceivable occasion for any conflict\nbetween the two. From this and the previous considerations taken\ntogether it follows not only that such explanations as are contained\nin the Newtonian and Darwinian theories are entirely consistent with\ntheism, but also that they are the only kind of explanations with\nwhich science can properly concern itself at all. To say that complex\norganisms were directly created by the Deity is to make an assertion\nwhich, however true in a theistic sense, is utterly barren. It is of no\nprofit to theism, which must be taken for granted before the assertion\ncan be made; and it is of no profit to science, which must still ask\nits question, \"How?\"[15]\n\nWe are now prepared to see that the theological objection urged\nagainst the Newtonian and Darwinian theories has its roots in that\nimperfect kind of theism which Augustine did so much to fasten\nupon the western world. Obviously if Leibnitz and Agassiz had been\neducated in that higher theism shared by Clement and Athanasius in\nancient times with Spinoza and Goethe in later days,--if they had been\naccustomed to conceive of God as immanent in the universe and eternally\ncreative,--then the argument which they urged with so much feeling\nwould never have occurred to them. By no possibility could such an\nargument have entered their minds. To conceive of \"physical forces\" as\npowers of which the action could in any wise be \"substituted\" for the\naction of Deity would in such case have been absolutely impossible.\nSuch a conception involves the idea of God as remote from the world\nand acting upon it from outside. The whole notion of what theological\nwriters are fond of calling \"secondary causes\" involves such an idea\nof God. The higher or Athanasian theism knows nothing of secondary\ncauses in a world where every event flows directly from the eternal\nFirst Cause. It knows nothing of physical forces save as immediate\nmanifestations of the omnipresent creative power of God. In the\npersonification of physical forces, and the implied contrast between\ntheir action and that of Deity, there is something very like a survival\nof the habits of thought which characterized ancient polytheism.\nWhat are these personified forces but little gods who are supposed\nto be invading the sacred domain of the ruler Zeus? When one speaks\nof substituting the action of Gravitation for the direct action of\nDeity, does there not hover somewhere in the dim background of the\nconception a vague spectre of Gravitation in the guise of a rebellious\nTitan? Doubtless it would not be easy to bring any one to acknowledge\nsuch a charge, but the unseen and unacknowledged part of a fallacy\nis just that which is most persistent and mischievous. It is not so\nmany generations, after all, since our ancestors were barbarians and\npolytheists; and fragments of their barbaric thinking are continually\nintruding unawares into the midst of our lately-acquired scientific\nculture. In most philosophical discussions a great deal of loose\nphraseology is used, in order to find the proper connotations of which\nwe must go back to primitive and untutored ages. Such is eminently the\ncase with the phrases in which the forces of nature are personified and\ndescribed as something else than manifestations of omnipresent Deity.\n\nThis subject is of such immense importance that I must illustrate\nit from yet another point of view. We must observe the manner in\nwhich, along with the progress of scientific discovery, theological\narguments have come to be permeated by the strange assumption that\nthe greater part of the universe is godless. Here again we must go\nback for a moment to the primeval world and observe how behind every\nphysical phenomenon there were supposed to be quasi-human passions\nand a quasi-human will. Now the phenomena which were first arranged\nand systematized in men's thoughts, and thus made the subject of\nsomething like scientific generalization, were the simplest, the\nmost accessible, and the most manageable phenomena; and from these\nthe conception of a quasi-human will soonest faded away. There are\nsavages who believe that hatchets and kettles have souls, but men\nunquestionably outgrew such a belief as this long before they outgrew\nthe belief that there are ghost-like deities in the tempest, or in\nthe sun and moon. After many ages of culture, men ceased to regard\nthe familiar and regularly-recurring phenomena of nature as immediate\nresults of volition, and reserved this primeval explanation for\nunusual or terrible phenomena, such as comets and eclipses, or famines\nand plagues. As the result of these habits of thought, in course of\ntime, Nature seemed to be divided into two antithetical provinces. On\nthe one hand, there were the phenomena that occurred with a simple\nregularity which seemed to exclude the idea of capricious volition;\nand these were supposed to constitute the realm of natural law. On\nthe other hand, there were the complex and irregular phenomena in\nwhich the presence of law could not so easily be detected; and these\nwere supposed to constitute the realm of immediate divine action.\nThis antithesis has forever haunted the minds of men imbued with the\nlower or Augustinian theism; and such have made up the larger part of\nthe Christian world. It has tended to make the theologians hostile to\nscience and the men of science hostile to theology. For as scientific\ngeneralization has steadily extended the region of natural law, the\nregion which theology has assigned to divine action has steadily\ndiminished. Every discovery in science has stripped off territory from\nthe latter province and added it to the former. Every such discovery\nhas accordingly been promulgated and established in the teeth of\nbitter and violent opposition on the part of theologians. A desperate\nfight it has been for some centuries, in which science has won every\ndisputed position, while theology, untaught by perennial defeat, still\nvaliantly defends the little corner that is left it. Still as of old\nthe ordinary theologian rests his case upon the assumption of disorder,\ncaprice, and miraculous interference with the course of nature. He\nnaively asks, \"If plants and animals have been naturally originated,\nif the world as a whole has been evolved and not manufactured, and if\nhuman actions conform to law, what is there left for God to do? If not\nformally repudiated, is he not thrust back into the past eternity, as\nan ultimate source of things, which is postulated for form's sake, but\nmight as well, for all practical purposes, be omitted?\"[16]\n\nThe scientific inquirer may reply that the difficulty is one which\ntheology has created for itself. It is certainly not science that has\nrelegated the creative activity of God to some nameless moment in the\nbygone eternity and left him without occupation in the present world.\nIt is not science that is responsible for the mischievous distinction\nbetween divine action and natural law. That distinction is historically\nderived from a loose habit of philosophizing characteristic of ignorant\nages, and was bequeathed to modern times by the theology of the Latin\nchurch. Small blame to the atheist who, starting upon such a basis,\nthinks he can interpret the universe without the idea of God! He is but\ndoing as well as he knows how, with the materials given him. One has\nonly, however, to adopt the higher theism of Clement and Athanasius,\nand this alleged antagonism between science and theology, by which so\nmany hearts have been saddened, so many minds darkened, vanishes at\nonce and forever. \"Once really adopt the conception of an ever-present\nGod, without whom not a sparrow falls to the ground, and it becomes\nself-evident that the law of gravitation is but an expression of a\nparticular mode of divine action. And what is thus true of one law\nis true of all laws.\"[17] The thinker in whose mind divine action is\nthus identified with orderly action, and to whom a really irregular\nphenomenon would seem like a manifestation of sheer diabolism, foresees\nin every possible extension of knowledge a fresh confirmation of his\nfaith in God. From his point of view there can be no antagonism between\nour duty as inquirers and our duty as worshippers. To him no part\nof the universe is godless. In the swaying to and fro of molecules\nand the ceaseless pulsations of ether, in the secular shiftings of\nplanetary orbits, in the busy work of frost and raindrop, in the\nmysterious sprouting of the seed, in the everlasting tale of death and\nlife renewed, in the dawning of the babe's intelligence, in the varied\ndeeds of men from age to age, he finds that which awakens the soul to\nreverential awe; and each act of scientific explanation but reveals an\nopening through which shines the glory of the Eternal Majesty.\n\n\n\n\nVIII.\n\n_Anthropomorphic Conceptions of God._\n\n\nBetween the two ideas of God which we have exhibited in such striking\ncontrast, there is nevertheless one point of resemblance; and this\npoint is fundamental, since it is the point in virtue of which both\nare entitled to be called theistic ideas. In both there is presumed\nto be a likeness of some sort between God and Man. In both there is\nan element of anthropomorphism. Even upon this their common ground,\nhowever, there is a wide difference between the two conceptions. In\nthe one the anthropomorphic element is gross, in the other it is\nrefined and subtle. The difference is so far-reaching that some years\nago I proposed to mark it by contrasting these two conceptions of God\nas Anthropomorphic Theism and Cosmic Theism. For the doctrine which\nrepresents God as immanent in the universe and revealing himself in\nthe orderly succession of events, the name Cosmic Theism is eminently\nappropriate: but it is not intended by the antithetic nomenclature\nto convey the impression that in cosmic theism there is nothing\nanthropomorphic.[18] A theory which should regard the Human Soul as\nalien and isolated in the universe, without any links uniting it\nwith the eternal source of existence, would not be theism at all. It\nwould be Atheism, which on its metaphysical side is \"the denial of\nanything psychical in the universe outside of human consciousness.\"\nIt is far enough from any such doctrine to the cosmic theism of\nClement and Origen, of Spinoza and Lessing and Schleiermacher. The\ndifference, however, between this cosmic conception of God and the\nanthropomorphic conception held by Tertullian and Augustine, Calvin\nand Voltaire and Paley, is sufficiently great to be described as a\ncontrast. The explanation of the difference must be sought far back\nin the historic genesis of the two conceptions. Cosmic theism, as we\nhave seen, was reached through nature-worship with its notion of vast\nelemental spirits indwelling in physical phenomena. Anthropomorphic\ntheism is descended from the notion of tutelar deities which was\npart of the primitive ancestor-worship. In the process by which men\nattained to cosmic theism, physical generalization was the chief\nagency at work; but into anthropomorphic theism, as we have seen,\nthere entered conceptions derived from men's political thinking. For\nsuch a people as the Romans, who could deify Imperator Augustus in\njust the same way that the Japanese have deified their Mikado, it was\nnatural, and easy to conceive of God as a monarch enthroned in the\nheavens and surrounded by a court of ministering angels. Such was the\npopular conception in the early ages of Christianity, and such it has\ndoubtless remained with the mass of uninstructed people even to this\nday. The very grotesqueness of the idea, as it appears to the mind of\na philosopher, is an index of the ease with which it satisfies the\nmind of an uneducated man. Many persons, no doubt, have entertained\nthis idea of God without ever giving it very definite shape, and many\nhave recognized it as in great measure symbolic: yet nothing can be\nmore certain than that untold thousands have conceived it in its\nfull intensity of anthropomorphism. Alike in sermons and theological\ntreatises, in stately poetry and in every-day talk, the Deity has\nbeen depicted as pleased or angry, as repenting of his own acts, as\nsoothed by adulation and quick to wreak vengeance upon silly people\nfor blasphemous remarks. In those curious bills of expenses for the\nmedi\u00e6val miracle-plays, along with charges of twopence for keeping up a\n\"fyre at hell mouthe,\" we find such items as a shilling for a purple\ncoat for God. In one of these plays an angel who has just witnessed\nthe crucifixion comes rushing into Heaven, crying, \"Wake up, almighty\nFather! Here are those beggarly Jews killing your son, and you asleep\nhere like a drunkard!\" \"Devil take me if I knew anything about it!\" is\nthe drowsy reply. Not the slightest irreverence was intended in these\nmiracle-plays, which were the only dramatic performances tolerated\nby the medi\u00e6val church, for the sake of their wholesome educational\ninfluence upon the common people. In the light of such facts, one sees\nthat the representations of the Deity as an old man of august presence,\nwith flowing hair and beard, by the early modern painters, must have\nmeant to all save the highest minds much more than a mere symbol. Until\none's thoughts have become accustomed to range far and wide over the\nuniverse it is doubtless impossible to frame a conception of Deity that\nis not grossly anthropomorphic. I remember distinctly the conception\nwhich I had formed when five years of age. I imagined a narrow office\njust over the zenith, with a tall standing-desk running lengthwise,\nupon which lay several open ledgers bound in coarse leather. There\nwas no roof over this office, and the walls rose scarcely five feet\nfrom the floor, so that a person standing at the desk could look out\nupon the whole world. There were two persons at the desk, and one of\nthem--a tall, slender man, of aquiline features, wearing spectacles,\nwith a pen in his hand and another behind his ear--was God. The other,\nwhose appearance I do not distinctly recall, was an attendant angel.\nBoth were diligently watching the deeds of men and recording them in\nthe ledgers. To my infant mind this picture was not grotesque, but\nineffably solemn, and the fact that all my words and acts were thus\nwritten down, to confront me at the day of judgment, seemed naturally a\nmatter of grave concern.\n\nIf we could cross-question all the men and women we know, and\nstill more all the children, we should probably find that, even in\nthis enlightened age, the conceptions of Deity current throughout\nthe civilized world contain much that is in the crudest sense\nanthropomorphic. Such, at any rate, seems to be the character of the\nconceptions with which we start in life. With those whose studies\nlead them to ponder upon the subject in the light of enlarged\nexperience, these conceptions become greatly modified. They lose their\nanthropomorphic definiteness, they grow vague by reason of their\nexpansion, they become recognized as largely symbolic, but they never\nquite lose all traces of their primitive form. Indeed, as I said a\nmoment ago, they cannot do so. The utter demolition of anthropomorphism\nwould be the demolition of theism. We have now to see what traces of\nits primitive form the idea of God can retain, in the light of our\nmodern knowledge of the universe.\n\n\n\n\n  IX.\n\n_The Argument from Design._\n\n\nThe most highly refined and scientific form of anthropomorphic theism\nis that which we are accustomed to associate with Paley and the authors\nof the Bridgewater treatises. It is not peculiar to Christianity,\nsince it has been held by pagans and unbelievers as firmly as by the\ndevoutest members of the church. The argument from design is as old as\nSokrates, and was relied on by Voltaire and the English deists of the\neighteenth century no less than by Dr. Chalmers and Sir Charles Bell.\nUpon this theory the universe is supposed to have been created by a\nBeing possessed of intelligence and volition essentially similar to the\nintelligence and volition of Man. This Being is actuated by a desire\nfor the good of his creatures, and in pursuance thereof entertains\npurposes and adapts means to ends with consummate ingenuity. The\nprocess by which the world was created was analogous to manufacture, as\nbeing the work of an intelligent artist operating upon unintelligent\nmaterials objectively existing. It is in accordance with this theory\nthat books on natural theology, as well as those text-books of science\nwhich deem it edifying to introduce theological reflections where they\nhave no proper place, are fond of speaking of the \"Divine Architect\" or\nthe \"Great Designer.\"\n\nThis theory, which is still commonly held, was in high favour during\nthe earlier part of the present century. In view of the great and\nsudden advances which physical knowledge was making, it seemed well\nworth while to consecrate science to the service of theology; and\nat the same time, in emphasizing the argument from design, theology\nadopted the methods of science. The attempt to discover evidences\nof beneficent purpose in the structure of the eye and ear, in the\ndistribution of plants and animals over the earth's surface, in the\nshapes of the planetary orbits and the inclinations of their axes, or\nin any other of the innumerable arrangements of nature, was an attempt\nat true induction; and high praise is due to the able men who have\ndevoted their energies to reinforcing the argument. By far the greater\npart of the evidence was naturally drawn from the organic world, which\nbegan to be comprehensively studied in the mutual relations of all its\nparts in the time of Lamarck and Cuvier. The organic world is full of\nunspeakably beautiful and wonderful adaptations between organisms and\ntheir environments, as well as between the various parts of the same\norganism. The unmistakable end of these adaptations is the welfare\nof the animal or plant; they conduce to length and completeness of\nlife, to the permanence and prosperity of the species. For some time,\ntherefore, the arguments of natural theology seemed to be victorious\nalong the whole line. The same kind of reasoning was pushed farther\nand farther to explain the classification and morphology of plants and\nanimals; until the climax was reached in Agassiz's remarkable \"Essay\non Classification,\" published in 1859, in which every organic form was\nnot only regarded as a concrete thought of the Creator interpretable\nby the human mind, but this kind of explanation was expressly urged as\na substitute for inquiries into the physical causes whereby such forms\nmight have been originated.\n\nIn its best days, however, there was a serious weakness in the argument\nfrom design, which was ably pointed out by Mr. Mill, in an essay\nwherein he accords much more weight to the general argument than could\nnow by any possibility be granted it. Its fault was the familiar\nlogical weakness of proving too much. The very success of the argument\nin showing the world to have been the work of an intelligent Designer\nmade it impossible to suppose that Creator to be at once omnipotent\nand absolutely benevolent. For nothing can be clearer than that Nature\nis full of cruelty and maladaptation. In every part of the animal\nworld we find implements of torture surpassing in devilish ingenuity\nanything that was ever seen in the dungeons of the Inquisition. We\nare introduced to a scene of incessant and universal strife, of which\nit is not apparent on the surface that the outcome is the good or\nthe happiness of anything that is sentient. In pre-Darwinian times,\nbefore we had gone below the surface, no such outcome was discernible.\nOften, indeed, we find the higher life wantonly sacrificed to the\nlower, as instanced by the myriads of parasites apparently created for\nno other purpose than to prey upon creatures better than themselves.\nSuch considerations bring up, with renewed emphasis, the everlasting\nproblem of the origin of evil. If the Creator of such a world is\nomnipotent he cannot be actuated solely by a desire for the welfare of\nhis creatures, but must have other ends in view to which this is in\nsome measure subordinated. Or if he is absolutely benevolent, then he\ncannot be omnipotent, but there is something in the nature of things\nwhich sets limits to his creative power. This dilemma is as old as\nhuman thinking, and it still remains a stumbling-block in the way of\nany theory of the universe that can possibly be devised. But it is an\nobstacle especially formidable to any kind of anthropomorphic theism.\nFor the only avenue of escape is the assumption of an inscrutable\nmystery which would contain the solution of the problem if the human\nintellect could only penetrate so far; and the more closely we invite a\ncomparison between divine and human methods of working, the more do we\nclose up that only outlet.\n\nThe practical solution oftenest adopted has been that which sacrifices\nthe Creator's omnipotence in favour of his benevolence. In the noblest\nof the purely Aryan religions--that of which the sacred literature\nis contained in the Zendavesta--the evil spirit Ahriman exists\nindependently of the will of the good Ormuzd, and is accountable for\nall the sin in the world, but in the fullness of time he is to be bound\nin chains and shorn of his power for mischief.[19] This theory has\npassed into Christendom in the form of Manich\u00e6ism; but its essential\nfeatures have been adopted by orthodox Christianity, which at the same\ntime has tried to grasp the other horn of the dilemma and save the\nomnipotence of the Deity by paying him what Mr. Mill calls the doubtful\ncompliment of making him the creator of the devil. By this device the\nessential polytheism of the conception is thinly veiled. The confusion\nof thought has been persistently blinked by the popular mind; but among\nthe profoundest thinkers of the Aryan race there have been two who\nhave explicitly adopted the solution which limits the Creator's power.\nOne of these was Plato, who held that God's perfect goodness has been\npartially thwarted by the intractableness of the materials he has had\nto work with. This theory was carried to extremes by those Gnostics\nwho believed that God's work consisted in redeeming a world originally\ncreated by the devil, and in orthodox Christianity it gave rise to the\nAugustinian doctrine of total depravity, and the \"philosophy of the\nplan of salvation\" founded thereon. The other great thinker who adopted\na similar solution was Leibnitz. In his famous theory of optimism the\nworld is by no means represented as perfect; it is only the best of all\npossible worlds, the best the Creator could make out of the materials\nat hand. In recent times Mr. Mill shows a marked preference for this\nview, and one of the foremost religious teachers now living, Dr.\nMartineau, falls into a parallel line of thinking in his suggestion\nthat the primary qualities of matter constitute a \"datum objective to\nGod,\" who, \"in shaping the orbits out of immensity, and determining\nseasons out of eternity, could but follow the laws of curvature,\nmeasure, and proportion.\"[20]\n\nBut indeed it is not necessary to refer to the problem of evil in\norder to show that the argument from design cannot prove the existence\nof an omnipotent and benevolent Designer. It is not omnipotence that\ncontrives and plans and adapts means to ends. These are the methods of\nfinite intelligence; they imply the overcoming of obstacles; and to\nascribe them to omnipotence is to combine words that severally possess\nmeanings into a phrase that has no meaning. \"God said, Let there be\nlight: and there was light.\" In this noble description of creative\nomnipotence one would search in vain for any hint of contrivance. The\nmost the argument from design could legitimately hope to accomplish\nwas to make it seem probable that the universe was wrought into its\npresent shape by an intelligent and benevolent Being immeasurably\nsuperior to Man, but far from infinite in power and resources. Such an\nargument hardly rises to the level of true theism.[21]\n\n\n\n\n  X.\n\n_Simile of the Watch replaced by Simile of the Flower._\n\n\nIt was in its own chosen stronghold that this once famous argument\nwas destined to meet its doom. It was in the adaptations of the\norganic world, in the manifold harmonies between living creatures\nand surrounding circumstances, that it had seemed to find its chief\nsupport; and now came the Darwinian theory of natural selection, and\nin the twinkling of an eye knocked all this support from under it.\nIt is not that the organism and its environment have been adapted to\neach other by an exercise of creative intelligence, but it is that\nthe organism is necessarily fitted to the environment because in the\nperennial slaughter that has gone on from the beginning only the\nfittest have survived. Or, as it has been otherwise expressed, \"the\nearth is suited to its inhabitants because it has produced them, and\nonly such as suit it live.\" In the struggle for existence no individual\npeculiarity, however slight, that tends to the preservation of life\nis neglected. It is unerringly seized upon and propagated by natural\nselection, and from the cumulative action of such slight causes have\ncome the beautiful adaptations of which the organic world is full. The\ndemonstration of this point, through the labours of a whole generation\nof naturalists, has been one of the most notable achievements of modern\nscience, and to the theistic arguments of Paley and the Bridgewater\ntreatises it has dealt destruction.\n\nBut the Darwinian theory of natural selection does not stand alone. It\nis part of a greater whole. It is the most conspicuous portion of that\ndoctrine of evolution in which all the results hitherto attained by\nthe great modern scientific movement are codified, and which Herbert\nSpencer had already begun to set forth in its main outlines before\nthe Darwinian theory had been made known to the world. This doctrine\nof evolution so far extends the range of our vision through past and\nfuture time as entirely to alter our conception of the universe. Our\ngrandfathers, in common with all preceding generations of men, could\nand did suppose that at some particular moment in the past eternity\nthe world was created in very much the shape which it has at present.\nBut our modern knowledge does not allow us to suppose anything of the\nsort. We can carry back our thoughts through a long succession of\ngreat epochs, some of them many millions of years in duration, in each\nof which the innumerable forms of life that covered the earth were\nvery different from what they were in all the others, and in even the\nnearest of which they were notably different from what they are now.\nWe can go back still farther to the eras when the earth was a whirling\nball of vapour, or when it formed an equatorial belt upon a sun two\nhundred million miles in diameter, or when the sun itself was but a\ngiant nebula from which as yet no planet had been born. And through all\nthe vast sweep of time, from the simple primeval vapour down to the\nmultifarious world we know to-day, we see the various forms of Nature\ncoming into existence one after the other in accordance with laws\nof which we are already beginning to trace the character and scope.\nPaley's simile of the watch is no longer applicable to such a world as\nthis. It must be replaced by the simile of the flower. The universe is\nnot a machine, but an organism, with an indwelling principle of life.\nIt was not made, but it has grown.\n\nThat such a change in our conception of the universe marks the greatest\nrevolution that has ever taken place in human thinking need scarcely\nbe said. But even in this statement we have not quite revealed the\ndepth of the change. Not only has modern science made it clear that the\nvaried forms of Nature which make up the universe have arisen through a\nprocess of evolution, but it has also made it clear that what we call\nthe laws of Nature have been evolved through the self-same process.\nThe axiom of the persistence of force, upon which all modern science\nhas come to rest, involves as a necessary corollary the persistence of\nthe relations between forces; so that, starting with the persistence\nof force and the primary qualities of matter, it can be shown that all\nthose uniformities of coexistence and succession which we call natural\nlaws have arisen one after the other in connection with the forms which\nhave afforded the occasions for their manifestation. The all-pervading\nharmony of Nature is thus itself a natural product, and the last inch\nof ground is cut away from under the theologians who suppose the\nuniverse to have come into existence through a supernatural process of\nmanufacture at the hands of a Creator outside of itself.\n\n\n\n\nXI.\n\n_The Craving for a Final Cause._\n\n\nIt appears, then, that the idea of God as remote from the world is not\nlikely to survive the revolution in thought which the rapid increase\nof modern knowledge has inaugurated. The knell of anthropomorphic or\nAugustinian theism has already sounded. This conclusion need not,\nhowever, disturb us when we consider how imperfect a form of theism\nthis is which mankind is now outgrowing. To get rid of the appearance\nof antagonism between science and religion will of itself be one of the\ngreatest benefits ever conferred upon the human race. It will forward\nscience and purify religion, and it will go far toward increasing\nkindness and mutual helpfulness among men. Since such happy results\nare likely to follow the general adoption of the cosmic or Athanasian\nform of theism, in place of the other form, it becomes us to observe\nmore specifically the manner in which this higher theism stands related\nto our modern knowledge.\n\nTo every form of theism, as I have already urged, an anthropomorphic\nelement is indispensable. It is quite true, on the one hand, that\nto ascribe what we know as human personality to the infinite Deity\nstraightway lands us in a contradiction, since personality without\nlimits is inconceivable. But on the other hand, it is no less true\nthat the total elimination of anthropomorphism from the idea of God\nabolishes the idea itself. This difficulty need not dishearten us, for\nit is no more than we must expect to encounter on the threshold of such\na problem as the one before us. We do not approach the question in\nthe spirit of those natural theologians who were so ready with their\nexplanations of the divine purposes. We are aware that \"we see as\nthrough a glass darkly,\" and we do not expect to \"think God's thoughts\nafter him\" save in the crudest symbolic fashion. In dealing with the\nInfinite we are confessedly treating of that which transcends our\npowers of conception. Our ability to frame ideas is strictly limited by\nexperience, and our experience does not furnish the materials for the\nidea of a personality which is not narrowly hemmed in by the inexorable\nbarriers of circumstance. We therefore cannot conceive such an idea.\nBut it does not follow that there is no reality answering to what such\nan idea would be if it could be conceived. The test of inconceivability\nis only applicable to the world of phenomena from which our experience\nis gathered. It fails when applied to that which lies behind phenomena.\nI do not hold for this reason that we are justified in using such an\nexpression as \"infinite personality\" in a philosophical inquiry where\nclearness of thought and speech is above all things desirable. But I\ndo hold, most emphatically, that we are not debarred from ascribing\na quasi-psychical nature to the Deity simply because we can frame no\nproper conception of such a nature as absolute and infinite.\n\nThe point is of vital importance to theism. As Kant has well said,\n\"the conception of God involves not merely a blindly operating Nature\nas the eternal root of things, but a Supreme Being that shall be the\nauthor of all things by free and understanding action; and it is this\nconception which alone has any interest for us.\" It will be observed\nthat Kant says nothing here about \"contrivance.\" By the phrase \"free\nand understanding action\" he doubtless means much the same that is here\nmeant by ascribing to God a quasi-psychical nature. And thus alone, he\nsays, can we feel any interest in theism. The thought goes deep, yet\nis plain enough to every one. The teleological instinct in Man cannot\nbe suppressed or ignored. The human soul shrinks from the thought\nthat it is without kith or kin in all this wide universe. Our reason\ndemands that there shall be a reasonableness in the constitution of\nthings. This demand is a fact in our psychical nature as positive and\nirrepressible as our acceptance of geometrical axioms and our rejection\nof whatever controverts such axioms. No ingenuity of argument can bring\nus to believe that the infinite Sustainer of the universe will \"put\nus to permanent intellectual confusion.\" There is in every earnest\nthinker a craving after a final cause; and this craving can no more be\nextinguished than our belief in objective reality. Nothing can persuade\nus that the universe is a farrago of nonsense. Our belief in what we\ncall the evidence of our senses is less strong than our faith that in\nthe orderly sequence of events there is a meaning which our minds could\nfathom were they only vast enough. Doubtless in our own age, of which\nit is a most healthful symptom that it questions everything, there are\nmany who, through inability to assign the grounds for such a faith,\nhave persuaded themselves that it must be a mere superstition which\nought not to be cherished; but it is not likely that any one of these\nhas ever really succeeded in ridding himself of it.\n\nAccording to Mr. Spencer, the only ultimate test of reality is\npersistence, and the only measure of validity among our primary beliefs\nis the success with which they resist all efforts to change them. Let\nus see, then, how it is with the belief in the essential reasonableness\nof the universe. Does this belief answer to any outward reality? Is\nthere, in the scheme of things, aught that justifies Man in claiming\nkinship of any sort with the God that is immanent in the world?\n\nThe difficulty in answering such questions has its root in the\nimpossibility of framing a representative conception of Deity; but it\nis a difficulty which may, for all practical purposes, be surmounted by\nthe aid of a symbolic conception.\n\n\n\n\nXII.\n\n_Symbolic Conceptions._\n\n\nObserve the meaning of this distinction. Of any simple object which\ncan be grasped in a single act of perception, such as a knife or a\nbook, an egg or an orange, a circle or a triangle, you can frame a\nconception which almost or quite exactly _represents_ the object.\nThe picture or visual image in your mind when the orange is present\nto the senses is almost exactly reproduced when it is absent. The\ndistinction between the two lies chiefly in the relative vividness of\nthe former as contrasted with the relative faintness of the latter.\nBut as the objects of thought increase in size and in complexity of\ndetail, the case soon comes to be very different. You cannot frame\na truly representative conception of the town in which you live,\nhowever familiar you may be with its streets and houses, its parks and\ntrees, and the looks and demeanour of the townsmen; it is impossible\nto embrace so many details in a single mental picture. The mind must\nrange to and fro among the phenomena in order to represent the town\nin a series of conceptions. But practically what you have in mind\nwhen you speak of the town is a fragmentary conception in which some\nportion of the object is represented, while you are well aware that\nwith sufficient pains a series of mental pictures could be formed\nwhich would approximately correspond to the object. That is to say,\nthis fragmentary conception stands in your mind as a _symbol_ of\nthe town. To some extent the conception is representative, but to a\ngreat degree it is symbolic. With a further increase in the size and\ncomplexity of the objects of thought, our conceptions gradually lose\ntheir representative character, and at length become purely symbolic.\nNo one can form a mental picture that answers even approximately to the\nearth. Even a homogeneous ball eight thousand miles in diameter is too\nvast an object to be conceived otherwise than symbolically, and much\nmore is this true of the ball upon which we live, with all its endless\nmultiformity of detail. We imagine a globe and clothe it with a few\nterrestrial attributes, and in our minds this fragmentary notion does\nduty as a symbol of the earth.\n\nThe case becomes still more striking when we have to deal with\nconceptions of the universe, of cosmic forces such as light and heat,\nor of the stupendous secular changes which modern science calls us to\ncontemplate. Here our conceptions cannot even pretend to represent\nthe objects; they are as purely symbolic as the algebraic equations\nwhereby the geometer expresses the shapes of curves. Yet so long as\nthere are means of verification at our command, we can reason as safely\nwith these symbolic conceptions as if they were truly representative.\nThe geometer can at any moment translate his equation into an actual\ncurve, and thereby test the results of his reasoning; and the case is\nsimilar with the undulatory theory of light, the chemist's conception\nof atomicity, and other vast stretches of thought which in recent times\nhave revolutionized our knowledge of Nature. The danger in the use of\nsymbolic conceptions is the danger of framing illegitimate symbols\nthat answer to nothing in heaven or earth, as has happened first and\nlast with so many short-lived theories in science and in metaphysics.\nForewarned of this danger, and therefore--I hope--forearmed against it,\nlet us see what a scientific philosophy has to say about the Power that\nis manifested in and through the universe.\n\n\n\n\nXIII.\n\n_The Eternal Source of Phenomena._\n\n\nWe have seen that before men could arrive at the idea of God, before\nout of the old crude and fragmentary polytheisms there could be\ndeveloped a pure and coherent theism, it was necessary that physical\ngeneralization should have advanced far enough to enable them, however\nimperfectly, to reason about the universe as a whole. It was a faint\nglimpse of the unity of Nature that first led men to the conception\nof the unity of God, and as their knowledge of the phenomenal fact\nbecomes clearer, so must their grasp upon the noumenal truth behind it\nbecome firmer. Now the whole tendency of modern science is to impress\nupon us ever more forcibly the truth that the entire knowable universe\nis an immense unit, animated throughout all its parts by a single\nprinciple of life. This conclusion, which was long ago borne in upon\nthe minds of prophetic thinkers, like Spinoza and Goethe, through\ntheir keen appreciation of the significance of the physical harmonies\nknown to them, has during the last fifty years received something like\na demonstration in detail. It is since Goethe's death, for example,\nthat it has been proved that the Newtonian law of gravitation extends\nto the bodies which used to be called fixed stars. That such was the\ncase was already much more than probable, but so lately as 1835 there\nwere to be found writers on science, such as Comte, who denied that\nit could ever be proved. But a still more impressive illustration\nof the unity of Nature is furnished by the luminiferous ether, when\nconsidered in connection with the discovery of the correlation of\nforces. The fathomless abysses of space can no longer be talked of as\nempty; they are filled with a wonderful substance, unlike any of the\nforms of matter which we can weigh and measure. A cosmic jelly almost\ninfinitely hard and elastic, it offers at the same time no appreciable\nresistance to the movements of the heavenly bodies. It is so sensitive\nthat a shock in any part of it causes a \"tremour which is felt on\nthe surface of countless worlds.\" Radiating in every direction, from\nmillions of centric points, run shivers of undulation manifested in\nendless metamorphosis as heat, or light, or actinism, as magnetism or\nelectricity. Crossing one another in every imaginable way, as if all\nspace were crowded with a mesh-work of nerve-threads, these motions\ngo on forever in a harmony that nothing disturbs. Thus every part of\nthe universe shares in the life of all the other parts, as when in the\nsolar atmosphere, pulsating at its temperature of a million degrees\nFahrenheit, a slight breeze instantly sways the needles in every\ncompass-box on the face of the earth.\n\nStill further striking confirmation is found in the marvellous\ndisclosures of spectrum analysis. To whatever part of the heavens we\nturn the telescope, armed with this new addition to our senses, we find\nthe same chemical elements with which the present century has made us\nfamiliar upon the surface of the earth. From the distant worlds of\nArcturus and the Pleiades, whence the swift ray of light takes many\nyears to reach us, it brings the story of the hydrogen and oxygen, the\nvapour of iron or sodium, which set it in motion. Thus in all parts\nof the universe that have fallen within our ken we find a unity of\nchemical composition. Nebul\u00e6, stars, and planets are all made of the\nsame materials, and on every side we behold them in different stages\nof development, worlds in the making: here an irregular nebula such as\nour solar system once was, there a nebula whose rotation has at length\nwrought it into spheroidal form; here and there stars of varied colours\nmarking different eras in chemical evolution; now planets still partly\nincandescent like Saturn and Jupiter, then planets like Mars and the\nearth, with cool atmospheres and solid continents and vast oceans of\nwater; and lastly such bodies as the moon, vapourless, rigid, and cold\nin death.\n\nStill nearer do we come toward realizing the unity of Nature when we\nrecollect that the law of evolution is not only the same for all these\nvarious worlds, but is also the same throughout all other orders of\nphenomena. Not only in the development of cosmical bodies, including\nthe earth, but also in the development of life upon the earth's surface\nand in the special development of those complex manifestations of life\nknown as human societies, the most general and fundamental features of\nthe process are the same, so that it has been found possible to express\nthem in a single universal formula. And what is most striking of all,\nthis notable formula, under which Herbert Spencer has succeeded in\ngeneralizing the phenomena of universal evolution, was derived from\nthe formula under which Von Baer in 1829 first generalized the mode of\ndevelopment of organisms from their embryos. That a law of evolution\nfirst partially detected among the phenomena of the organic world\nshould thereafter not only be found applicable to all other orders of\nphenomena, but should find in this application its first complete and\ncoherent statement, is a fact of wondrous and startling significance.\nIt means that the universe as a whole is thrilling in every fibre with\nLife,--not, indeed, life in the usual restricted sense, but life in\na general sense. The distinction, once deemed absolute, between the\nliving and the not-living is converted into a relative distinction; and\nLife as manifested in the organism is seen to be only a specialized\nform of the Universal Life.\n\nThe conception of matter as dead or inert belongs, indeed, to an order\nof thought that modern knowledge has entirely outgrown. If the study\nof physics has taught us anything, it is that nowhere in Nature is\ninertness or quiescence to be found. All is quivering with energy.\nFrom particle to particle without cessation the movement passes on,\nreappearing from moment to moment under myriad Protean forms, while\nthe rearrangements of particles incidental to the movement constitute\nthe qualitative differences among things. Now in the language of\nphysics all motions of matter are manifestations of force, to which\nwe can assign neither beginning nor end. Matter is indestructible,\nmotion is continuous, and beneath both these universal truths lies\nthe fundamental truth that force is persistent. The farthest reach in\nscience that has ever been made was made when it was proved by Herbert\nSpencer that the law of universal evolution is a necessary consequence\nof the persistence of force. It has shown us that all the myriad\nphenomena of the universe, all its weird and subtle changes, in all\ntheir minuteness from moment to moment, in all their vastness from age\nto age, are the manifestations of a single animating principle that is\nboth infinite and eternal.\n\nBy what name, then, shall we call this animating principle of the\nuniverse, this eternal source of phenomena? Using the ordinary language\nof physics, we have just been calling it Force, but such a term in no\nwise enlightens us. Taken by itself it is meaningless; it acquires\nits meaning only from the relations in which it is used. It is a mere\nsymbol, like the algebraic expression which stands for a curve. Of\nwhat, then, is it the symbol?\n\nThe words which we use are so enwrapped in atmospheres of subtle\nassociations that they are liable to sway the direction of our thoughts\nin ways of which we are often unconscious. It is highly desirable\nthat physics should have a word as thoroughly abstract, as utterly\nemptied of all connotations of personality, as possible, so that it\nmay be used like a mathematical symbol. Such a word is Force. But what\nwe are now dealing with is by no means a scientific abstraction. It\nis the most concrete and solid of realities, the one Reality which\nunderlies all appearances, and from the presence of which we can never\nescape. Suppose, then, that we translate our abstract terminology into\nsomething that is more concrete. Instead of the force which persists,\nlet us speak of the Power which is always and everywhere manifested\nin phenomena. Our question, then, becomes, What is this infinite and\neternal Power like? What kind of language shall we use in describing\nit? Can we regard it as in any wise \"material,\" or can we speak of its\nuniversal and ceaseless activity as in any wise the working of a \"blind\nnecessity\"? For here, at length, we have penetrated to the innermost\nkernel of the problem; and upon the answer must depend our mental\nattitude toward the mystery of existence.\n\nThe answer is that we cannot regard the infinite and eternal Power as\nin any wise \"material,\" nor can we attribute its workings to \"blind\nnecessity.\" The eternal source of phenomena is the source of what we\nsee and hear and touch; it is the source of what we call matter, but\nit cannot itself be material. Matter is but the generalized name we\ngive to those modifications which we refer immediately to an unknown\nsomething outside of ourselves. It was long ago shown that all the\nqualities of matter are what the mind makes them, and have no existence\nas such apart from the mind. In the deepest sense all that we really\nknow is mind, and as Clifford would say, what we call the material\nuniverse is simply an imperfect picture in our minds of a real universe\nof mind-stuff.[22] Our own mind we know directly; our neighbour's mind\nwe know by inference; that which is external to both is a Power hidden\nfrom sense, which causes states of consciousness that are similar\nin both. Such states of consciousness we call material qualities,\nand matter is nothing but the sum of such qualities. To speak of the\nhidden Power itself as \"material\" is therefore not merely to state\nwhat is untrue,--it is to talk nonsense. We are bound to conceive\nof the Eternal Reality in terms of the only reality that we know,\nor else refrain from conceiving it under any form whatever. But the\nlatter alternative is clearly impossible.[23] We might as well try to\nescape from the air in which we breathe as to expel from consciousness\nthe Power which is manifested throughout what we call the material\nuniverse. But the only conclusion we can consistently hold is that this\nis the very same power \"which in ourselves wells up under the form of\nconsciousness.\"\n\nIn the nature-worship of primitive men, beneath all the crudities of\nthought by which it was overlaid and obscured, there was thus after\nall an essential germ of truth which modern philosophy is constrained\nto recognize and reiterate. As the unity of Nature has come to be\ndemonstrated, innumerable finite powers, once conceived as psychical\nand deified, have been generalized into a single infinite Power that\nis still thought of as psychical. From the crudest polytheism we have\nthus, by a slow evolution, arrived at pure monotheism,--the recognition\nof the eternal God indwelling in the universe, in whom we live and move\nand have our being.\n\nBut in thus conceiving of God as psychical, as a Being with whom the\nhuman soul in the deepest sense owns kinship, we must beware of too\ncarelessly ascribing to Him those specialized psychical attributes\ncharacteristic of humanity, which one and all imply limitation and\nweakness. We must not forget the warning of the prophet Isaiah: \"My\nthoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith\nthe Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my\nways higher than your ways, and my thoughts than your thoughts.\"\nOmniscience, for example, has been ascribed to God in every system of\ntheism; yet the psychical nature to which all events, past, present,\nand future, can be always simultaneously present is clearly as far\nremoved from the limited and serial psychical nature of Man as the\nheavens are higher than the earth. We are not so presumptuous,\ntherefore, as to attempt, with some theologians of the anthropomorphic\nschool, to inquire minutely into the character of the divine decrees\nand purposes. But our task would be ill-performed were nothing more\nto be said about that craving after a final cause which we have seen\nto be an essential element in Man's religious nature. It remains to\nbe shown that there is a reasonableness in the universe, that in the\norderly sequence of events there is a meaning which appeals to our\nhuman intelligence. Without adopting Paley's method, which has been\nproved inadequate, we may nevertheless boldly aim at an object like\nthat at which Paley aimed. Caution is needed, since we are dealing with\na symbolic conception as to which the very point in question is whether\nthere is any reality that answers to it. The problem is a hard one, but\nhere we suddenly get powerful help from the doctrine of evolution, and\nespecially from that part of it known as the Darwinian theory.\n\n\n\n\n  XIV.\n\n_The Power that makes for Righteousness._\n\n\nAlthough it was the Darwinian theory of natural selection which\noverthrew the argument from design, yet--as I have argued in another\nplace--when thoroughly understood it will be found to replace as much\nteleology as it destroys.[24] Indeed, the doctrine of evolution, in\nall its chapters, has a certain teleological aspect, although it does\nnot employ those methods which in the hands of the champions of final\ncauses have been found so misleading. The doctrine of evolution does\nnot regard any given arrangement of things as scientifically explained\nwhen it is shown to subserve some good purpose, but it seeks its\nexplanation in such antecedent conditions as may have been competent to\nbring about the arrangement in question. Nevertheless, the doctrine\nof evolution is not only perpetually showing us the purposes which\nthe arrangements of Nature subserve, but throughout one large section\nof the ground which it covers it points to a discernible dramatic\ntendency, a clearly-marked progress of events toward a mighty goal.\nNow it especially concerns us to note that this large section is just\nthe one, and the only one, which our powers of imagination are able\nto compass. The astronomic story of the universe is altogether too\nvast for us to comprehend in such wise as to tell whether it shows any\ndramatic tendency or not.[25] But in the story of the evolution of life\nupon the surface of our earth, where alone we are able to compass the\nphenomena, we see all things working together, through countless ages\nof toil and trouble, toward one glorious consummation. It is therefore\na fair inference, though a bold one, that if our means of exploration\nwere such that we could compass the story of all the systems of worlds\nthat shine in the spacious firmament, we should be able to detect a\nsimilar meaning. At all events, the story which we can decipher is\nsufficiently impressive and consoling. It clothes our theistic belief\nwith moral significance, reveals the intense and solemn reality of\nreligion, and fills the heart with tidings of great joy.\n\nThe glorious consummation toward which organic evolution is tending\nis the production of the highest and most perfect psychical life.\nAlready the germs of this conclusion existed in the Darwinian theory\nas originally stated, though men were for a time too busy with other\naspects of the theory to pay due attention to them. In the natural\nselection of such individual peculiarities as conduce to the survival\nof the species, and in the evolution by this process of higher and\nhigher creatures endowed with capacities for a richer and more varied\nlife, there might have been seen a well-marked dramatic tendency,\ntoward the _d\u00e9nouement_ of which every one of the myriad little acts of\nlife and death during the entire series of geologic \u00e6ons was assisting.\nThe whole scheme was teleological, and each single act of natural\nselection had a teleological meaning. Herein lies the reason why the\ntheory so quickly destroyed that of Paley. It did not merely refute it,\nbut supplanted it with explanations which had the merit of being truly\nscientific, while at the same time they hit the mark at which natural\ntheology had unsuccessfully aimed.\n\nSuch was the case with the Darwinian theory as first announced. But\nsince it has been more fully studied in its application to the genesis\nof Man, a wonderful flood of light has been thrown upon the meaning of\nevolution, and there appears a reasonableness in the universe such as\nhad not appeared before. It has been shown that the genesis of Man was\ndue to a change in the direction of the working of natural selection,\nwhereby psychical variations were selected to the neglect of physical\nvariations. It has been shown that one chief result of this change\nwas the lengthening of infancy, whereby Man appeared on the scene as\na plastic creature capable of unlimited psychical progress. It has\nbeen shown that one chief result of the lengthening of infancy was the\norigination of the family and of human society endowed with rudimentary\nmoral ideas and moral sentiments. It has been shown that through\nthese co\u00f6perating processes the difference between Man and all lower\ncreatures has come to be a difference in kind transcending all other\ndifferences; that his appearance upon the earth marked the beginning\nof the final stage in the process of development, the last act in the\ngreat drama of creation; and that all the remaining work of evolution\nmust consist in the perfecting of the creature thus marvellously\nproduced. It has been further shown that the perfecting of Man\nconsists mainly in the ever-increasing predominance of the life of the\nsoul over the life of the body. And lastly, it has been shown that,\nwhereas the earlier stages of human progress have been characterized\nby a struggle for existence like that through which all lower forms of\nlife have been developed, nevertheless the action of natural selection\nupon Man is coming to an end, and his future development will be\naccomplished through the direct adaptation of his wonderfully plastic\nintelligence to the circumstances in which it is placed. Hence it has\nappeared that war and all forms of strife, having ceased to discharge\ntheir normal function, and having thus become unnecessary, will slowly\ndie out;[26] that the feelings and habits adapted to ages of strife\nwill ultimately perish from disuse; and that a stage of civilization\nwill be reached in which human sympathy shall be all in all, and the\nspirit of Christ shall reign supreme throughout the length and breadth\nof the earth.\n\nThese conclusions, with the grounds upon which they are based, have\nbeen succinctly set forth in my little book entitled \"The Destiny of\nMan viewed in the Light of his Origin.\" Startling as they may have\nseemed to some, they are no more so than many of the other truths which\nhave been brought home to us during this unprecedented age. They are\nthe fruit of a wide induction from the most vitally important facts\nwhich the doctrine of evolution has set forth; and they may fairly\nclaim recognition as an integral body of philosophic doctrine fit to\nstand the test of time. Here they are summarized as the final step in\nmy argument concerning the true nature of theism. They add new meanings\nto the idea of God, as it is affected by modern knowledge, while at the\nsame time they do but give articulate voice to time-honoured truths\nwhich it was feared the skepticism of our age might have rendered dumb\nand powerless. For if we express in its most concentrated form the\nmeaning of these conclusions regarding Man's origin and destiny, we\nfind that it affords the full justification of the fundamental ideas\nand sentiments which have animated religion at all times. We see Man\nstill the crown and glory of the universe and the chief object of\ndivine care, yet still the lame and halting creature, loaded with a\nbrute-inheritance of original sin, whose ultimate salvation is slowly\nto be achieved through ages of moral discipline. We see the chief\nagency which produced him--natural selection which always works through\nstrife--ceasing to operate upon him, so that, until human strife shall\nbe brought to an end, there goes on a struggle between his lower and\nhis higher impulses, in which the higher must finally conquer. And in\nall this we find the strongest imaginable incentive to right living,\nyet one that is still the same in principle with that set forth by the\ngreat Teacher who first brought men to the knowledge of the true God.\nAs to the conception of Deity, in the shape impressed upon it by our\nmodern knowledge, I believe I have now said enough to show that it is\nno empty formula or metaphysical abstraction which we would seek to\nsubstitute for the living God. The infinite and eternal Power that is\nmanifested in every pulsation of the universe is none other than the\nliving God. We may exhaust the resources of metaphysics in debating\nhow far his nature may fitly be expressed in terms applicable to the\npsychical nature of Man; such vain attempts will only serve to show\nhow we are dealing with a theme that must ever transcend our finite\npowers of conception. But of some things we may feel sure. Humanity is\nnot a mere local incident in an endless and aimless series of cosmical\nchanges. The events of the universe are not the work of chance,\nneither are they the outcome of blind necessity. Practically there\nis a purpose in the world whereof it is our highest duty to learn\nthe lesson, however well or ill we may fare in rendering a scientific\naccount of it. When from the dawn of life we see all things working\ntogether toward the evolution of the highest spiritual attributes of\nMan, we know, however the words may stumble in which we try to say\nit, that God is in the deepest sense a moral Being. The everlasting\nsource of phenomena is none other than the infinite Power that makes\nfor righteousness. Thou canst not by searching find Him out; yet put\nthy trust in Him, and against thee the gates of hell shall not prevail;\nfor there is neither wisdom nor understanding nor counsel against the\nEternal.\n\n\n\n\n  NOTES.\n\n\n  A.--MEDITATIONS OF A SAVAGE.\n\nIn the presence of the great mystery of existence, the thoughts of\nthe untutored savage are not always so very unlike those of civilized\nmen, as we may see from the following pathetic words of a Kafir, named\nSekese, in conversation with a French traveller, M. Arbrouseille, on\nthe subject of the Christian religion:--\n\n\"Your tidings,\" said this uncultivated barbarian, \"are what I want,\nand I was seeking before I knew you, as you shall hear and judge for\nyourself. Twelve years ago I went to feed my flocks; the weather was\nhazy. I sat down upon a rock and asked myself sorrowful questions; yes,\nsorrowful, because I was unable to answer them. Who has touched the\nstars with his hands--on what pillars do they rest, I asked myself.\nThe waters never weary, they know no other law than to flow without\nceasing from morning till night and from night till morning; but where\ndo they stop, and who makes them flow thus? The clouds also come and\ngo, and burst in water over the earth. Whence come they--who sends\nthem? The diviners certainly do not give us rain; for how could they\ndo it? and why do not I see them with my own eyes when they go up to\nheaven to fetch it? I cannot see the wind; but what is it? who brings\nit, makes it blow and roar and terrify us? Do I know how the corn\nsprouts? Yesterday there was not a blade in my field, to-day I returned\nto the field and found some; who can have given to the earth the\nwisdom and the power to produce it? Then I buried my head in both my\nhands.\"--Cited in PICTON, _Mystery of Matter_, p. 222.\n\n\n  B.--THE NAME _GOD_.\n\nNone of the dictionaries offer a satisfactory explanation of the word\n_God_. It was once commonly supposed to be related to the adjective\n_good_, but Grimm long ago showed that this connection is, to say\nthe least, very improbable. It has also been sought to identify it\nwith Persian _Khod\u00e2_, from Zend _qvadata_, Skr. _svadata_, Lat. _a se\ndatus_, in which the idea is that of self-existence; but this fanciful\netymology was exploded by Aufrecht. The arrant guesswork of Donaldson,\nwho would connect _God_ with +kalos+, and +theos+ with +tith\u00eami+ (New\nCratylus, p. 710), scarcely deserves mention in these days. Among the\nmore scientific philologists of our time, August Fick, in treating of\nthe \"Wortschatz der germanischen Spracheinheit,\" simply refers _God_\nto a primitive Teutonic _gutha_, and says no more about it. (Vergl.\nWoerterbuch der indogermanischen Sprachen, III. 107.) He is followed\nby Skeat (Etymological Dictionary, p. 238), who adds that there is\n\"no connection with _good_.\" Eduard M\u00fcller says: \"So bedenklich die\nzusammenstellung mit _good_, so fraglich ist doch auch noch die\nurverwandtschaft mit pers. _Khod\u00e2_ gott, oder skr. _g\u00fbdha_ mysterium,\noder skr. _guddha_ purus; Heyne: 'als sich verh\u00fcllender, unsichtbarer,\nvgl. skr. _guh_ f\u00fcr _gudh_ celare.'\" (Woerterbuch der englischen\nSprache, p. 456.)\n\nMax M\u00fcller has much more plausibly suggested that _God_ was formerly a\nheathen name for the Deity, which passed into Christian usage, like the\nLatin _Deus_. (Science of Language, 6th ed. II. 317.) Following this\nhint, I suggested, several years ago (North Amer. Review, Oct. 1869,\np. 354), that _God_ is probably identical with _Wodan_ or _Odin_, the\nname of the great Northern deity, the chief object of the worship of\nour forefathers. This relation of an initial _G_ to an initial _W_ is\na very common one; as for example _Guillaume_ and _William_, _guerre_\nand _war_, _guardian_ and _warden_, _guile_ and _wile_. The same thing\nis seen in Armorican _guasta_ and Ital. _guastare_, as compared with\nLat. _vastare_, Eng. _waste_; and in the Eng. _quick_, Goth. _quivs_,\nLat. _vivus_. In Erchempert's Historia Langobardorum, 11, Pertz, III.\n245, we find _Ludoguicus_ for _Ludovicus_. Not only is this relation\na common one, but there are plenty of specific instances of it in the\ncase of _Wodan_. In Germany we have the town names of _Godesberg_,\n_Gudenberg_, and _Godensholt_, all derived from _Wodan_. In the\nWestphalian dialect, _Wednesday_ (\"day of Wodan\") is called _Godenstag_\nor _Gunstag_; in Nether-Rhenish, _Gudenstag_; in Flemish, _Goenstag_.\nSee Thorpe, Northern Mythol. I. 229; Taylor, Words and Places, 323; and\ncf. Grimm, Gesch. der deutschen Sprache, 296. The Westphalian Saxons\nwrote both _Guodan_ and _Gudan_. _Odin_ was also called _Godin_ (Laing,\nHeimskringla, I. 74), and Paulus Diaconus tells us that the Lombards\npronounced _Wodan_ as _Guodan_. In view of such a convergence of\nproofs, I am surprised that attention was not long ago called to this\netymology.\n\nWodan was originally the storm-spirit or animating genius of the wind,\nanswering in many respects to the Greek Hermes and the Vedic Sarameyas.\nSee my Myths and Myth-makers, 19, 20, 32, 35, 67, 124, 204; and cf.\nMackay, Religious Development of the Greeks and Hebrews, i. 260-273.\n\n\n\n\n\n  REFERENCES.\n\n M. M., Myths and Myth-makers, 1872; C. P., Outlines of Cosmic\n Philosophy, 1874; U. W., The Unseen World, 1876; D., Darwinism and\n Other Essays, 1879; E. E., Excursions of an Evolutionist, 1884; D. M.,\n The Destiny of Man, 1884; A. P. I., American Political Ideas, 1885.\n\n\n[1] E. E. 56-77.\n\n[2] C. P. i. 230.\n\n[3] C. P. i. 157, 177-179.\n\n[4] M. M. 18-21, _et passim_.\n\n[5] M. M. 220.\n\n[6] M. M. 232.\n\n[7] M. M. 236; E. E. 251.\n\n[8] A. P. I. 78, 81.\n\n[9] U. W. 10.\n\n[10] D. M. 104-107.\n\n[11] E. E. 262.\n\n[12] M. M. 236.\n\n[13] C. P. ii. 383.\n\n[14] U. W. 118.\n\n[15] D. 5-8; C. P. ii. 283.\n\n[16, 17] C. P. ii. 428.\n\n[18] C. P. i. 183; ii. 449.\n\n[19] M. M. 122.\n\n[20] C. P. ii. 405.\n\n[21] C. P. ii. 381-410.\n\n[22] E. E. 327-336.\n\n[23] C. P. ii. 449.\n\n[24] D. M. 113; cf. C. P. ii. 406.\n\n[25] D. 103.\n\n[26] D. M. 77-95; A. P. I. 101-152.\n\n\n\n\n  IMPORTANT BOOKS\n\n  BY\n\n  JOHN FISKE.\n\n\n =OUTLINES OF COSMIC PHILOSOPHY=, based on the Doctrine of Evolution.\n With Criticisms on the Positive Philosophy. 2 vols. 8vo, pp. 465, 523,\n $6.00.\n\nMr. DARWIN, after reading this work, wrote as follows to Mr.\nFiske:--\n\n \"You must allow me to thank you for the very great interest with which\n I have at last slowly read the whole of your work.... I never in my\n life read so lucid an expositor (and therefore thinker) as you are;\n and I think that I understand nearly the whole, though perhaps less\n clearly about cosmic theism and causation than other parts. It is\n hopeless to attempt out of so much to specify what has interested me\n most, and probably you would not care to hear. It pleased me to find\n that here and there I had arrived, from my own crude thoughts, at some\n of the same conclusions with you, though I could seldom or never have\n given my reasons for such conclusions.\"\n\n This work of Mr. Fiske's may be not unfairly designated the most\n important contribution yet made by America to philosophical\n literature.... His theory of the influence of prolonged infancy\n upon social development (Part II., chap. xxii.) entitles Mr.\n Fiske's work to be considered a distinctly important contribution\n to the theory of the origin of species, and of the origin of man in\n particular.--_Academy_ (London).\n\n His most important suggestion, that of the influence of the long\n period of feeble adolescence upon man's social development, is, we\n think, a permanent contribution to the development theory.--_Nation_\n (New York).\n\n He recognizes Mr. Spencer as his teacher and guide; but he has moulded\n the doctrines of his master into a popular form, surrounded them\n with fresh and vivid illustrations, pointed out their bearing upon\n great practical questions of the day, and amply supplied the reader\n with materials for forming an intelligent judgment with respect\n to their merits. Mr. Fiske is himself a thinker of rare acuteness\n and depth; his affluent store of knowledge is exhibited on every\n page; and his mastery of expression is equal to his subtlety of\n speculation.--GEORGE RIPLEY, in _Tribune_ (New York).\n\n Mr. Fiske's work ... is the first important contribution made by\n America to the evolution philosophy, ... and is well worth the study\n of all who wish to see at once the entire scope and purport of the\n scientific dogmatism of the day.--_Saturday Review_ (London).\n\n The author asserts that a system of philosophy has been constructed,\n out of purely scientific materials, ... which opposes a direct\n negative to every one of the theorems of which Positivism is made\n up.--_Scotsman_ (Edinburgh).\n\n Mr. Fiske is not a mere compiler from Mr. Spencer's works, nor is\n he simply a popularizer of an abstruse theory. He works his way to\n the chief results of Mr. Spencer's argument with independence and\n self-reliance. In many places he has presented his master's doctrine\n in new aspects or carried it forward to new conclusions, while\n throughout he adds something to the original from which he draws by\n freshness of illustration and individuality of literary style.... It\n is curious to note the almost fierce persistence with which the author\n returns again and again to an attack on the doctrines of Comte....\n The most striking part of Mr. Fiske's social speculations is the\n hypothesis by which he proposes to bridge over the gulf which divides\n the merely gregarious and sympathetic brutes from morally constituted\n man (Part II., chap. xxii.).--JAMES SULLY, in _Examiner_\n (London).\n\n Mr. Fiske is a disciple who thinks for himself, and who has no\n hesitation, when necessary, in criticising him whom he acknowledges as\n master.... He is so thoroughly imbued with the philosophic spirit that\n his work merits a careful perusal; it has the especial attraction of\n being written in excellent temper and admirable English.--_Daily News_\n (London).\n\n Mr. Fiske's work shows a complete and independent mastery of the\n subject in all its bearings, together with a power of lucid and\n vigorous exposition unexcelled in any philosophical work with which we\n are acquainted.--_Daily Globe_ (Boston).\n\n It is our best American book on the evolution philosophy, and deserves\n to rank with the productions of the great English thinkers.--_Index_\n (Boston).\n\n\n =DARWINISM AND OTHER ESSAYS.= New Edition, enlarged. 12mo, pp. 283,\n $2.00.\n\nCONTENTS: Darwinism Verified; Mr. Mivart on Darwinism; Dr.\nBateman on Darwinism; Dr. B\u00fcchner on Darwinism; A Crumb for the \"Modern\nSymposium;\" Chauncey Wright; What is Inspiration? Modern Witchcraft;\nComte's Positive Philosophy; Mr. Buckle's Fallacies; Postscript on Mr.\nBuckle; The Races of the Danube; Liberal Education; University Reform;\nA Librarian's Work.\n\n If ever there was a spirit thoroughly invigorated by the \"joy of right\n understanding\" it is that of the author of these pieces. Even the\n reader catches something of his intellectual buoyancy, and is thus\n carried almost lightly through discussions which would be hard and\n dry in the hands of a less animated writer.... No less confident and\n serene than his acceptance of the utmost logical results of recent\n scientific discovery is Mr. Fiske's assurance that the foundations\n of spiritual truths, so called, cannot possibly be shaken thereby....\n Warm personal admiration and acute critical discernment could not\n well be blended in finer proportions than in the article on the\n lamented Mr. Wright.... The article on Mr. Buckle's Fallacies has\n one aspect more remarkable than all the rest. It was written and\n published when the \"History of Civilization\" was new,--that is to\n say, when the writer was nineteen years of age; and the years--almost\n nineteen more--which have elapsed since then have rather confirmed\n than detracted from its value as a piece of criticism. The judgment\n of posterity on the most ambitious book of its generation, and one of\n the most bewildering, was actually anticipated by a stripling, and its\n final rank assigned with singular fairness and precision. Scarcely\n even in the style is there a trace of immaturity.... The essay on the\n Races of the Danube forcibly suggests the idea that Mr. Fiske has\n qualities of mind, almost unused hitherto, which would make him an\n exceptionally valuable writer of history.--_Atlantic Monthly._\n\n The article on the Races of the Danube shows that Mr. Fiske has a\n special talent for history.--_Nation_ (New York).\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n =MYTHS AND MYTH-MAKERS=: Old Tales and Superstitions interpreted by\n Comparative Mythology. 12mo, pp. 251, $2.00.\n\nCONTENTS: The Origins of Folk-Lore; The Descent of Fire;\nWerewolves and Swan-Maidens; Light and Darkness; Myths of the Barbaric\nWorld; Juventus Mundi; The Primeval Ghost-World.\n\n Mr. Fiske has given us a book which is at once sensible and\n attractive, on a subject about which much is written that is crotchety\n or tedious.--W. R. S. RALSTON, in _Athen\u00e6um_ (London).\n\n This volume is not a text-book of scientific mythology. It contains\n seven essays crowded with quotations and examples, in the abundant\n use of which the writer's learning is not more conspicuous than his\n literary skill. Not everybody can shape and control such wealth of\n material.--_Christian Union_ (New York).\n\n He has, as we must admit, one qualification for attaining his object,\n in being completely master of his subject, and in knowing also how\n to treat it in an attractive manner.--FELIX LIEBRECHT, in\n _Academy_ (London).\n\n It is extremely interesting for its happy combination of psychologic\n analysis with a study of the primitive beliefs of mankind.... A\n perusal of this thorough work cannot be too strongly recommended to\n all who are interested in comparative mythology.--_Revue Critique_\n (Paris).\n\n Mr. Fiske is a master of perspicuous explanation.--_World_ (New York).\n\n Its weight of sense and its lucidity will extend Mr. Fiske's\n reputation as one of the clearest-minded, most conscientiously\n laborious and well-trained students in this country.--_Nation_ (New\n York).\n\n With the capacity for profound research and the power of critical\n consideration, he has a singular grace of style, and an art of clear\n and simple statement, which will not let the most indifferent refuse\n knowledge of the topics treated. In such a field as the discussion of\n old fables and superstitions affords, we have not only to admire Mr.\n Fiske for the charm of his manner, but for the justice and honesty of\n his method.--_Atlantic Monthly._\n\n It is both an amusing and instructive book, evincing large research,\n and giving its results in a lucid and attractive style.--E. P.\n WHIPPLE.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n=THE UNSEEN WORLD, AND OTHER ESSAYS.= 12mo, pp. 349, $2.00.\n\nCONTENTS: The Unseen World; The To-morrow of Death; The\nJesus of History; The Christ of Dogma; A Word about Miracles; Draper\non Science and Religion; Nathan the Wise; Historical Difficulties;\nThe Famine of 1770 in Bengal; Spain and the Netherlands; Longfellow's\nDante; Paine's St. Peter; A Philosophy of Art; Athenian and American\nLife.\n\n We think every one will remark, while examining this volume, the\n variety of subjects treated; and if anybody has formed an opinion that\n Mr. Fiske is a man who cares for nothing but myths and philosophy, he\n will find occasion to correct it. Many of these papers are critical\n reviews of important books widely different in their subjects; but\n to each study the writer seems to have brought, besides an excellent\n quality of discriminating judgment, full and fresh special knowledge,\n that enables him to supply much information on the subject, whatever\n it may be, that is not to be found in the volume he is noticing. To\n the knowledge, analytical power, and faculty of clear statement,\n that appear in all these papers, Mr. Fiske adds a just independence\n of thought that conciliates respectful consideration of his views,\n even when they are most at variance with the commonly accepted\n ones.--_Boston Advertiser._\n\n Of all the criticism and discussion called forth both in this country\n and in England by that remarkable little book, \"The Unseen Universe,\"\n Mr. John Fiske's \"Unseen World\" is at once the most profound, the most\n comprehensive, and the most lucid.... The mere statement of a thought\n in his perspicuous and translucent language gives it, in most cases, a\n new meaning and an added force.--_Appletons' Journal._\n\n They are all striking compositions, and deserving of a place in the\n fore rank of this kind of literature. It is not often that more robust\n and healthy reading can be found between the covers of a single\n volume.--_San Francisco Bulletin._\n\n The vigor, the earnestness, the honesty, and the freedom from cant and\n subtlety in his writing are exceedingly refreshing. He is a scholar, a\n critic, and a thinker of the first order.--_Christian Register._\n\n Mr. Fiske has won for himself a foremost place among American writers\n on physical science; and the present volume of essays bears testimony\n not only to his ability as a physicist, but to his versatility of mind\n and critical powers as well.--_Canadian Monthly._\n\n He is one of our foremost religious thinkers.--_Times_ (New York).\n\n The line of argument is so plain that all can follow it, and the style\n is wondrously charming.--_Index_ (Boston).\n\n Mr. John Fiske is a devoted student of Dante. The review of Mr.\n Longfellow's work is an admirable essay upon translating Dante,--an\n essay showing a very fine critical feeling and thorough knowledge of\n the subject.--_Transcript_ (Boston).\n\n He is a scholar profoundly versed in ancient and modern lore, a\n thinker familiar with all shades of thought, an observer who studies\n men as well as books, and withal a writer of the purest and most\n graphic English.--_Inter-Ocean_ (Chicago).\n\n He finely exposes the materialistic character of the book called the\n \"Unseen Universe,\" which has been so highly extolled by the \"Southern\n Cross\" and other papers.--_Advertiser_ (Maryborough, Australia).\n\n The book has a unity and charm in the clearness of the thought and\n the beauty of such a style as was perhaps never before brought to\n the illustration of the topics with which Mr. Fiske habitually\n deals. There is something better still in the admirable spirit of\n his writing; it is of all writing of its sort, probably, the most\n humane.... He has already achieved a place as wholly his own as it is\n eminent.--_Atlantic Monthly._\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n=EXCURSIONS OF AN EVOLUTIONIST.= 12mo, pp. 379, $2.00.\n\nCONTENTS: Europe before the Arrival of Man; The Arrival of Man in\nEurope; Our Aryan Forefathers; What we learn from Old Aryan Words; Was\nthere a Primeval Mother-Tongue? Sociology and Hero-Worship; Heroes of\nIndustry; The Causes of Persecution; The Origins of Protestantism; The\nTrue Lesson of Protestantism; Evolution and Religion; The Meaning of\nInfancy; A Universe of Mind-Stuff; In Memoriam: Charles Darwin.\n\n Among our thoughtful essayists there are none more brilliant than Mr.\n John Fiske. His pure style suits his clear thought. He does not write\n unless he has something to say; and when he does write he shows not\n only that he has thoroughly acquainted himself with the subject, but\n that he has to a rare degree the art of so massing his matter as to\n bring out the true value of the leading points in artistic relief. It\n is this perspective which makes his work such agreeable reading even\n on abstruse subjects, and has enabled him to play the same part in\n popularizing Spencer in this country that Littr\u00e9 performed for Comte\n in France, and Dumont for Bentham in England. The same qualities\n appear to good advantage in his new volume, which contains his later\n essays on his favorite subject of evolution.... They are well worth\n reperusal.--_The Nation_ (New York).\n\n These essays are all full of thought and worthy of preservation,\n while several of them are entitled to rank among the very best\n essays of American writers. For depth of thought, scholarship,\n literary taste, critical ability, and the power of clear and vigorous\n exposition _combined_, Mr. Fiske has no equal in this country and but\n few equals among European writers. He does not write on a subject\n until he has acquainted himself with it; and then he presents his\n thought, which often has the merit of originality, with a lucidness\n and attractiveness of style which make it easy to follow him in his\n treatment of even difficult topics. It is a pleasure to turn from\n our merely literary writers to the essays of Mr. Fiske, whose clear\n thought, discriminating judgment, and philosophic spirit, together\n with his fine taste and perspicuity of style, make his writings both\n instructive and entertaining.--_Index_ (Boston).\n\n The vividness and directness of the style is second only to the\n bracing and stimulating quality of the matter. This book comes\n nearer than anything we now think of among American publications to\n successfully popularizing the results of science without debilitating\n or misinterpreting the same. The first papers of the book particularly\n emulate the clearness of Huxley.... It compels assent to the dreaded\n \"new way of looking at things,\" but in such a way that when the\n assent is given the dread is all gone. It is a good book for the busy\n preacher on account of its wealth of facts, so arranged as to reveal\n the thought that lies back of each fact. Each conclusion suggests a\n lesson.--_Unity_ (Chicago).\n\n Mr. Fiske, under the above title, makes his excursions through the\n realms of science, and evolves \"evolution\" in a most admirable\n manner--physical and psychical--by the \"testimony of the rocks,\"\n and with wonderful wisdom explains the origin of matter and man so\n truthfully possible that it is accepted as exceedingly probable, if\n not certain, by the thoughtful reader. It is fascinating to read his\n proofs and speculations upon a subject grown so interesting, and the\n reader is disposed to apply the same term of praise upon his work as\n he bestowed upon Clifford: \"Such scientific exposition as this is as\n beautiful as poetry.\"--_Hartford Post._\n\n Mr. Fiske is the master of an extremely lucid and attractive literary\n style, and brings to all questions which he discusses the fruits of a\n very industrious reading and examination of authorities.... Whether\n one agrees with him or not one cannot fail to receive much instruction\n and definite intellectual impulse from the reading of this volume....\n While heartily dissenting from many of the views advanced in this\n book, we commend it to all students who care for the honest judgment\n of an honest man.--_Christian Union._\n\n\n =THE DESTINY OF MAN=, viewed in the Light of his Origin. 16mo, pp.\n 121, $1.00.\n\nCONTENTS: Man's Place in Nature as affected by the Copernican Theory;\nAs affected by Darwinism; On the Earth there will never be a Higher\nCreature than Man; The Origin of Infancy; The Dawning of Consciousness;\nLengthening of Infancy and Concomitant Increase of Brain Surface;\nChange in the Direction of the Working of Natural Selection; Growing\nPredominance of the Psychical Life; The Origins of Society and\nMorality; Improvableness of Man; Universal Warfare of Primeval Men;\nFirst checked by the Beginnings of Industrial Civilization; Methods of\nPolitical Development and Elimination of Warfare; End of the Working\nof Natural Selection upon Man; Throwing off the Brute-Inheritance; The\nMessage of Christianity; The Question as to a Future Life.\n\n Mr. Fiske has long held rank as one of the most profound and exact\n of American thinkers, and his little monograph will serve to extend\n that deserved fame among a class of readers who are not ordinarily\n interested in the literature of science. Mr. Fiske's book is, in\n a word, a plea for faith in the immortality of man, based on the\n doctrine of evolution. With a superb command of all the knowledge\n bearing upon the philosophy of Darwinism, to which he has himself been\n a noteworthy contributor, Mr. Fiske sums up in eloquent periods the\n process of evolutionary creation from the origin of infancy to the\n beginnings of industrial and political development which have made\n human society what it is to-day; and then, looking into the future, he\n foretells how natural selection, working on the lines already marked\n out, shall attain its perfect work. The whole argument, or rather\n exposition, is a marvel of condensation.--_Boston Traveller._\n\n Mr. Fiske has given us in his \"Destiny of Man\" a most attractive\n condensation of his views as expressed in his various other works. One\n is charmed by the directness and clearness of his style, his simple\n and pure English, and his evident knowledge of his subject.... Of one\n thing we may be sure, that none are leading us more surely or rapidly\n to the full truth than men like the author of this little book, who\n reverently study the works of God for the lessons which he would teach\n his children.--_Christian Union_ (New York).\n\n Professor Fiske is always interesting. His exposition, step by\n step, of the doctrine of evolution, is admirably adapted for those\n prejudiced against it to read--simple, pleasant, and clear, and\n expressly designed to disarm hostility by showing that it is by no\n means absolutely incompatible with accepted religious beliefs--at\n least, with their essential qualities.--_Overland Monthly_ (San\n Francisco).\n\n It is a remarkable contribution to the literature of religious\n thought.... It will prove that evolution is at least not\n irreverent.... It is packed full of learning and suggestion, in a\n style at once simple and beautiful, and is worth a dozen volumes of\n ordinary sermons.--_Philadelphia Press._\n\n This essay will and should attract wide attention, founded as it\n is upon modern science and marking the way in an advanced path in\n religio-scientific inquiry. Mr. Fiske is acknowledged one of the first\n of scientific thinkers, and his conclusions have more than the usual\n weight.--_Albany Journal._\n\n His little volume will be highly prized by those who enjoy seeing one\n of the most profound themes which can occupy the attention treated\n with eloquence and strength, with scientific insight and imaginative\n vigor.--_Buffalo Commercial Advertiser._\n\n The reverent spirit of the book, the wide range of illustrations, the\n remarkable lucidity of thought and style, and the noble eloquence\n that characterizes it, render this book one of striking value and\n interest.--_Salem Gazette._\n\n=THE IDEA OF GOD AS AFFECTED BY MODERN KNOWLEDGE.= 16mo, $1.00.\n\nThis essay is a sequel to \"The Destiny of Man.\" Its object is to show\nthat the indications of Science and Philosophy are theistic, not\natheistic; that while the idea of God has been greatly modified by\nmodern knowledge, it has not been lost or belittled, but magnified and\nilluminated. The essay is prefaced by a long Introduction of remarkable\ninterest, and the whole book is full of significance and charm for all\nthoughtful minds.\n\n  HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN & CO., PUBLISHERS, BOSTON.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\n  Transcriber's Notes\n\n  Variations in spelling and punctuation are as in the original, except\n  in cases of obvious typographical error.\n\n  Each chapter of the book begins and most end with a decorative panel.\n  These have not been referenced in this text.\n\n  Italics are represented thus _italic_ bold thus =bold= and Greek thus\n  +greek+.","title":"The Idea of God as Affected by Modern Knowledge","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":29881}