Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 8.djvu/451

Rh produces spiritual-mindedness, or that hope of a state of immortal holiness which has been the ideal of humanity in all ages.

All this dust about "the conflict" has been flung up by men of insufficient faith, who doubted the basis of their faith; or by men of insufficient science, who have mistaken theology or the Church for religion; or by unreasonable and wicked men, who have sought to pervert the teachings of science so as to silence the voice of conscience in themselves, or put God out of their thoughts, so that a sense of his eternal recognition of the eternal difference between right and wrong; might not overawe their spirits in the indulgence of the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life. It may be profitable to discriminate these; and, if badges and flags have become mixed in this fray, it may be well to readjust our ensigns, so that foes shall strike at only foes.

It is, first of all, necessary to settle distinctly what science is, as well as what it is not; and also, what religion is, as well as what it is not.

We can all afford to agree upon the definition rendered by the only man who has been found in twenty-two centuries to add anything important to the imperial science of logic. Sir William Hamilton defines science as "a complement of cognitions, having in point of form the character of logical perfection, and in point of matter the character of real truth." Under the focal heat of a definition like this, much that claims to be science will be consumed. It is the fashion to intimate, if not to assert, that it is much more easy to become scientific than to become religious; that in one case a man is dealing with the real, in the other with the ideal; in the one case with the comprehensible, in the other with the incomprehensible; in the one case with that which is certain and exact, and in the other case with that which at best is only probable and indefinite.

There can be no doubt, among thoughtful men, of the great value of both science and religion. A thinker who is worth listening to is always misunderstood if it be supposed that he means to disparage either. An attempt to determine the limits of religion is no disparagement thereof, because all the most religious men who are accustomed to think are engaged in striving to settle those limits, in order that they may have advantage of the whole territory of religion on the one hand, and on the other may not take that as belonging to religion which belongs to something else.

Now, if Sir William Hamilton's definition is to be taken, we shall perceive that he represents science in its quality, in its quantity, and in its form. Cognition of something is necessary for science. Then, (1) the knowledge of things known must be true; (2) that knowledge must be full, and (3) it must be accurate; it must be in such form as to be most readily and successfully used by the logical understanding for purposes of thought.