Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 2.djvu/458

 444 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

But while the affirmation of brotherhood will persist, and with it a religious philosophy to support it, we cannot ignore the steady growth of the scientific temper. From every field of investigation theology, with its supernatural causes, seems likely to be driven. The geologist finds no "flood," the biologist admits no special creation, the anthropologist ignores the "fall," the archaeologist discovers no Eden, the meteorologist records no prayer-won weather, the psychologist will not hear of witch- craft, the alienist ridicules "possession," the physician puts no faith in miraculous healing, the philologist needs no Babel, the historian discerns no divine guidance or special providence in national affairs, the sociologist will not avail himself of "divinely implanted conscience" or "conversion" in order to account for righteousness. Every investigator, whatever his faith, recognizes no supernatural intrusions in his own field, and, however perplexing the unexplained phenomena that still con- front him, he is confident that some day he will be able to explain them by natural causes. However much he grants to the supernatural elsewhere, he stubbornly resists every attempt to graft it upon his own particular science.

This unanimity is significant. Man's thirst for truth and order is such that he will not rest content till the vast web of cause and effect spread out in space and time be faithfully reflected in human consciousness. Unsightly breaks or balks in the fabric of knowledge, due to the intrusion of the pseudo-explanations of theology or metaphysics, will not always be tolerated. Less and less will certain stretches of phenomena be suffered to remain in the stone age of explanation ; and social religion, if

and destiny, Mr. Balfour says : "If it is to be in harmony with principles like these that the child is to be taught at the mother's knee and the young man is to build up the ideals of his life, then, unless I greatly mistake, it will be found that the inner dis- cord which exists, and which must gradually declare itself, between the emotions proper to naturalism and those which have actually grown up under the shadow of traditional convictions will at no distant date most unpleasantly translate itself into practice." The Foundations of Belief, p. 86.

This able book argues that " naturalism " is unfavorable to morality, therefore untrue. What is shown is that it is unsuitable for purposes of social control, therefore at present unsafe.