Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 16.djvu/282

268 is the obvious inference? Why, that religion has hitherto proved an insecure foundation for morals. Be there or be there not an indestructible core of truth in all religions, morality, according to Professor Smith, has been planted upon their perishable parts, their mutable elements, and has lost its hold upon men as these have passed away. A foundation that crumbles and permits its superstructure to fall is a bad foundation; and the real question forced upon us by Professor Smith's historical lessons is. Shall we continue to build the edifice of morals upon this unstable basis, or shall we seek a better and more enduring basis? Are the rules of conduct to be derived from what men know concerning this world, or what they conjecture concerning another? Or will it be maintained that morals can have no other possible foundation than that 'which history and experience have proved to be incapable of supporting it?

Professor Smith assumes that history will repeat itself. He draws a vivid picture of the extent and depth of the prevailing unbelief, and insists that it must be followed by the same perilous decline of morals as in former times.

But he here overlooks the altered condition of the question. He seems to have forgotten that the circumstances in this age are profoundly different from what they were in the former great periods of religious decadence. In those times, when a set of superstitions was worn out and discarded, the state of knowledge was not such as to prevent their re-ëntrance in new forms. But it is not so in this scientific age, when the doubt of traditions is due to an increasing knowledge of nature. The profound and widespread questioning that characterizes our time is charged upon science, which is a new factor in human affairs of modern growth, and in so far as it is connected with science it springs from allegiance to truth. The skepticism engendered by science is not a blind passion for sweeping things away, but everything is examined, that it may be proved what will stand. The active mind of the period is vigorously engaged in getting opinions off of their illusive traditional foundations, that they may rest upon their intrinsic merits and go for what they are honestly worth. Doubt does not lead to negation, but to construction. The search for principles, and trust in them when established, are becoming, through the influence of science, intellectual characteristics of the time. Morality has its principles; and right and wrong are grounded in the nature of things. Goldwin Smith goes for the sandy foundation of mythology and theology, which may lead to further moral collapses; while science is unweariedly laboring to avoid them by planting morality upon a basis that will be permanent.

It is significant that Professor Smith never refers to any element of truth in his religious foundation of morals. These foundations, however, consist of fear of fabulous gods, superstitious legends, and perishable dogmas, and he declares that now for the fourth time on a great scale they have rotted away. Morality has, therefore, not rested on any divine, immutable basis, but upon crude and transitory belief, mere human devices. But is it not a vicious system which plants morals upon a basis that can be carried away by the necessary progress of knowledge? And what more effectual way could be devised to subvert morality than to make it depend upon that which is not valued for its truth, and is liable to be discredited at every step of advancing intelligence? In short, what immorality can work such profound and far-reaching evil as to place the motives and rules of human conduct upon a false, factitious, and transitory basis?

From this point of view there is a fallacy in representing morality as based