Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 55.djvu/311

Rh How far is scientific method applicable to the investigation of the Bible? Is there any department of human knowledge to which scientific method of investigation is not applicable? If scientific method is what we defined it to be, that method of dealing with phenomena which reason declares and experience has shown to insure the greatest accuracy in results, then there is obviously no department of knowledge to which that method is not applicable, for it means simply the method which will bring us nearest to the truth. When we are dealing with the highest spiritual verities we use that method which will bring us nearest to the truth; we are bound to use it in the interest of truth! That does not mean that we are to look for material causes for spiritual phenomena; nor does it mean that those things which in their nature appeal to the sensibilities, or have to do with conduct, or require an exercise of faith, must, in order for us to find out the truth, be removed from the domain of sensibility, conduct, faith. That would be a most unscientific method of investigation. The very first canon of scientific method is that it be appropriate to the matter in hand. And so in investigating the truths which are distinctly taught in the Bible—truths which are of the nature of a revelation of God's will and which are designed to reach and affect the whole nature of man—to take no account of other faculties in a man besides his power of apprehending intellectually, and of reasoning logically, would be unscientific beyond hope of pardon.

But what I wish especially to consider is a different kind of investigation of the Bible—one not concerned with the truths taught in the Bible, but with the Bible itself, as a collection of writings that has come down to us from the past. What is the nature of these writings? Who are their authors? Are there any of them which have more than one author? Are there any which are compilations from several different sources? What is the age in which these works were written or compiled? All of those, and similar questions, are not only the appropriate but the necessary inquiries of a truth-loving mind. They will continue to be asked until they are satisfactorily answered. With reference to other writings, the persistence of such inquiries will depend, except in cases of pure curiosity, upon the importance of such writings to the world. On that principle there will be no cessation of inquiries concerning the Bible until they are, as I said, satisfactorily answered, for no other writings are to be compared, in their importance to the world, with the writings of the Bible. How can such answers be given? Where does competency to give answer lie? Does it lie in the authority of the Church? Not to lay any stress upon the fact, one way or the other, that the Church, except in certain localities, has never declared on