Page:Tolstoy - Essays and Letters.djvu/154

 138 ESSAYS AND LETIERS

future life ; and only in its theocratic attempts did it treat of arran^-enients for tlie welfare of society.

Modern pliilosophy, both HejrePs and Comte's, has at its root tlie State-social relipous conception of life. The pessimistic philosopliy of Schopenhauer and Hart- mann, wishing to free itself from Juda?o-religious cosmology, involuntarily adopted the religious basis of Buddhism.

Philosophy has always been, and will always be, simjdy the investigation of the consequences tliat result from the relation religion establishes between man and the universe, for until tliat relation is settled there is nothing on wliicli pliilosophy can work.

So also with positive science, in the restricted mean- ing of tlie word. Such science has always been, and will always be, merely the investigation and study of all such objects and phenomena, as in conse(]uence of a certain relation religion has sot up between man and the universe, appear to demand investigation.

Science always has been, and will be, not the study of ' ever}i;liing/ as scientists now naively suppose (that is impossible, for there are an incalculable quantity of objects that might be studied), but only of such things as religion selects in due order and according to their degree of importance, from among the incalculable quantity of objects, phenomena, and conditions, await- ing examination. And, therefore, science is not one and indivisible, but there are as many sciences as there are religions. Each religion selects a range of objects for investigation, and therefore the science of each different time and people inevitably bears the character of the religion from whose point of view it sees its objects.

Tlius pagan science, re-established at the Renaissance and now flourishing in our society under the title of Christian, always was, and continues to be, merely an investigation of all those conditions from which man may obtain the greatest welfare, and of all such phenomena as can be made to promote that end. Brah- man and Buddhist philosophic science was always merely