446 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



preaching a line parallel to the meridian at a distance of 1.5 V08. We 

 can show that the rotating line can cross the stationary line by making 

 it do so as on a watch-dial, and yet we can demonstrate that if it be 

 extended indetinitely it can never touch the stationary line, nor come 

 at the end even as near as eighteen inches to it. 



Here are two of the simplest human conceptions, "between which 

 we know that there is no contradiction, rendered absolutely irrecon- 

 cilable to the human intellect by "the introduction of the infinite. 

 There is no religion here. And yet there is no mystery in either 

 theology or religion moje mysterious than the mystery of the infinite, 

 which we may encounter whenever we attempt to set our watches to 

 the right time if they have run more than an hour wrong. 



Another error has been the occasion of this cry of '' conflict." It 

 is the confounding of "the Church" with "religion." This confusion 

 has led many an honest soul astray, and is the fallacy wherewith 

 shrewd sophists have been able to overthrow the faith of the ignorant. 

 If the Church and, in all my treatment of this topic, I must be un- 

 derstood as using "the Church," not as signifying "the holy Church 

 universal," but simply in the sense in Avliich antagonistic scientists 

 employ it if the Church and religion be the same, the whole argu- 

 ment must be given up, and it must be admitted that there is a con- 

 flict between religion and science, and that religion is in the wrong. 

 Churchmen are guilty of helping to strengthen, if indeed they are 

 not responsible for creating, this eri-or. It has at length been pre- 

 sented plumply to the world in the book of Prof. J. W. Draper, enti- 

 tled a " History of the Conflict between Religion and Science." The 

 title assumes that there is such a conflict. See how it will read with 

 synonyms substituted : " History of the Conflict between Loving 

 Obedience to God's Word and Intelligent Study of God^s TFbr^." 

 Does Dr. Draper believe there is such a conflict ? It is not to be 

 supposed that he does. How, then, did he come to give his book such 

 a title ? From a confusion of terms, as will be observed by the peru- 

 sal of three successive sentences in his preface; "The papacy repre- 

 sents the ideas and aspirations of two-thirds of the population of Eu- 

 rope. It insists on a political supremacy, .... loudly declaring 

 that it will accept no reconciliation with modern civilization. The 

 antagonism we thus witness between religion and science," etc. Now, 

 if " the papacy " and " religion " be synonymous terms, representing 

 equivalent ideas, Dr. Draper's book shows that all good men should 

 do what they can to extii-pate religion from the world ; but if they 

 are not and they are not then the book is founded on a most hurt- 

 ful fallacy, and must be widely mischievous. Their share of the re- 

 sponsibility for the harm done must fall to churchmen. 



No, these are not synonymous terms. " The Church " is not reli- 

 gion, and religion is not "the Church." There may be a churcli and 

 no religion; there may be religion and no church, as there may be an 



