Page:The Religious Aspect of Philosophy (1885).djvu/255

230 existence of certain fools called atheists forces them to present in very pious language certain traditional proofs of his existence. No, surely not in this spirit would a rational God, if he exists, have us approach the question. But with at least as much coolness and clearness of head as we try to have when we toil over a problem in mathematics; with at least as merciless an analysis of all that is obscure and doubtful and contradictory in our own confused ideas as we should use in studying science; with at least as much eagerness in finding out the weakness and the uncertainty of men’s wavering and ill-trained judgments as we should bring to the examination of an important commercial investment, — with at least so much of caution, of diligence, and of doubt we should approach the rational study of the Highest. For what can insult God more than careless blundering? It is shameful that men should ever have treated this matter as if it were the aim of religious philosophy to have a store-house of formulated traditional answers ready wherewith to silence certain troublesome people called doubters. In these matters the truly philosophic doubt is no external opinion of this or that wayward person; this truly philosophic doubt is of the very essence of our thought. It is not to be “answered” or “silenced” by so and so much apologetic pleading. The doubt is inherent in the subject-matter as we must in the beginning regard the same. This doubt is to be accepted as it comes, and then to be developed in all its fullness and in all its intensity. For the truth of the matter is concealed in that doubt, as the fire is concealed in the