HARM02^IES OF SCIENCE AND RELIGION. 579 



Noi' yet that the thoughts of the dead may not be of the greatest help 

 to one who is studying tlie universe ; he may get from them sugges- 

 tions, theories which he may put to the test, and thus convert, in some 

 cases, into real knowledge. But there is a third way in which he may 

 treat them which makes books the very antithesis to reality, and the 

 knowledge of books the knowledge of a spurious universe. This is 

 when he contents himself with storing their contents in his mind, and 

 does not attempt to put them to any test, whether from superstitious 

 reverence or from an excessive pleasure in mere language. He may 

 show wonderful ability in thus assimilating books, wonderful reten- 

 tiveness, wonderful accuracy, wonderful acuteness ; nay, if he clearly 

 understands that he is only dealing with opinions, he may do good 

 service in that department, for opinions need collecting and classify- 

 ing as much as botanical specimens. But one often sees such collect- 

 ors mistaking opinions for truths, and depending for their views of 

 the universe entirely upon these opinions, which they accept implicitly 

 without testing them. Such men may be said to study, but not to 

 study the universe. 



There are other classes of men of whom much the same may be 

 said. The scientific school, when they recommend the study of Na- 

 ture, do not mean, for example, the mere collecting of facts, however 

 authentic. Nature with them is not a heap of phenomena, but laws 

 discerned in phenomena, and by a knowledge of Nature they mean a 

 just conception of laws much more than an ample store of information 

 about phenomena. Again, in an age like the present, when methods 

 of inquiry have been laid down and tested by large experience, they 

 do not dignify with the name of the study of Nature any investiga- 

 tion, however earnest or fresh, of the facts of the world, which does 

 not confoi-m to these methods, or show reason for not doing so. 



Knowledge of Nature understood in this sense, and obtained in 

 this way, is what we are now told is alone valuable what human 

 happiness depends on. And assuredly it deserves to be called in the 

 strictest sense theology. If God be the Ruler of the world, as the 

 orthodox theology teaches, the laws of Nature are the laws by which 

 he rules it. K you prefer the pantheistic view, they are the very 

 manifestations of the Divine Nature. In any case the knowledge of 

 Nature, if only it be properly sifted from the corrupting mixture of 

 mere opinion, is the knowledge of God. That there may be another 

 and deeper knowledge of God beyond it does not affect this fact. 



But is theology a mere synonym for science ? If so, the scientific 

 man may fairly say : " I need not concern myself with it ; I have already 

 a name for my pursuit which satisfies me ; it does not interest me to 

 hear that there is another name which also is appropriate." Is there 

 no special department of science which may be called theological, to 

 distinguish it from the other departments? It is this which so many 

 scientific men now deny. They say there is certainly such a special 



