A NEW PHASE OF AN OLD CONFLICT 54* 



A NEW PHASE OF AN OLD CONFLICT 



By LAUNCELOT W. ANDREWS 



DAVENPORT, I A. 



WHEN those among us were young, upon whom time has now 

 placed his silver stamp, the intellectual atmosphere was trem- 

 bling with the noise of a conflict in the clouds. It was called " The War- 

 fare of Science and Beligion." The dragon's teeth from which this 

 warfare sprang were sown with the first steps in organizing human 

 society. 



The social order is a machine and, like every machine, consists of 

 two functionally distinct elements, the static and the dynamic. In the 

 machine, the static element is the framework which correlates the other 

 parts and maintains stability, while the dynamic part is made up of the 

 moving parts which confer the capacity for change and, hence for 

 work. The static or conservative element in the social order is that 

 body of ethical or moral ideas and traditions which we denominate 

 religion, while the dynamic element is the summation of man's experi- 

 ence with nature, of his knowledge of phenomena, of his technical in- 

 formation, of his objective social history, things which, taken together, 

 we call science. 



From the earliest beginnings of science, onward, the scientists have 

 been the pioneers of society and have exhibited the characteristics of 

 pioneers, in their keen interest in the new, in their disregard of the old, 

 in their readiness to risk goods already in hand for better goods dimly 

 seen on the horizon, and their disesteem of tradition. One can easily 

 imagine that if the parts of a machine were conscious the moving mem- 

 bers would look upon the stationary stability of the frame with a certain 

 contempt and, resenting its restraint, might even regard it as a thing 

 superfluous, as an obstacle in the way of free movement. This has often 

 been the attitude of men of science. 



The religionists, on the other hand, conscious of their conservative 

 function, must regard themselves as the responsible custodians of an 

 inheritance threatened by every change and by every disturbance of 

 the social order, and must, on principle, oppose a new thing until it has 

 proved its value; by which time it is of course no longer new. So we 

 find, the scientist always trying to induce the people to do something 

 they have never done before, while the religionists are urging them to 

 keep out of danger and to return to a model of the past, that is, to 

 imitate the example set by the founders of the several sects. 



From this point of view there must always be a conflict between 

 science and religion, but a conflict only in the sense of an action and 



