SCIENCE AND THE LOGICIANS. 227 



But we have only to follow the reverend doctor a few pages, until 

 we find that hypotheses, so far from being extra-scientific, wholly 

 make up our science. He mounts Hamilton's definition for the pur- 

 pose of trampling upon scientific hypotheses. But, in his zeal for nar- 

 rowing the sphere of science, he arrives at the remarkable conclusion 

 that "all science is purely a classification of probabilities." He has 

 at length kicked the definition completely from under him, and 

 remounted a platform entirely composed of hypotheses. He, how- 

 ever, is careful not to say, " It is certain that there are no certainties." 

 Still he leaves us wholly in the dark as to where may be found 

 those " very few certainties " which it appears to him God has seen 

 fit to show us, " more for the purpose of furnishing the idea than for 

 any practical purpose." The God of the modern divine has still 

 about him a touch of the jealousy of the Zeus of ^fEschylus. He 

 would have chained to the rocks the modern seeker after hidden 

 knowledge, the invader of his own domain of certainties. 



We say that we are left completely in the dark as to where are 

 to be found those few certainties which God has seen fit to show us 

 as specimens. We are assured that they are not to be found in sci- 

 ence. This is only classified probabilities. The " imperial science of 

 logic " has been demolished with the rest. We wonder whether it is 

 because science embraces only real truth that it is uncertain or prob- 

 able, or is it owing to its methodical logical arrangement that it has 

 acquired this character ? He should remember that most people have 

 faculties called memories, that last them through several pages of 

 reading, and that there is a chance for mediate or remote contradic- 

 tions to be detected. 



Again, in his zeal to prove that all science and religion stand upon 

 the common basis of faith, he overleaps himself, and gives us as the 

 results of his logic, u Ex nihilo geometria fit." So I suppose we may- 

 be allowed to say likewise, "Ex nihilo rdigio fit." Is that what he 

 started out to prove ? No, it was only this very sensible proposition, 

 that " we can acquire no knowledge by our logical understanding with- 

 out faith in the laws of mental operations." This simply amounts to 

 saying that we cannot consistently believe in the products of think- 

 ing except we believe in faculties of thinking. We suppose that no 

 one doubts that. But believing that by no means involves the. as- 

 sumption that science or knowledge rests upon the same basis as 

 religious faith. It is a very different thing to believe in our own 

 experiences, feelings, sensations, observations, comparisons, memories, 

 representations, etc., and to believe in certain fundamental religious 

 dogmas, as, for example, " God is an infinite person." God is three 

 infinite persons. The second of these three infinite persons, which all 

 make one infinite person, is now sitting in heaven upon a throne on 

 the right hand of the first infinite person, neither of which has any 

 parts, but all three make one indivisible unity. Most men will con- 



