CONCLUSION 351 



seems to me rather that the assertion challenges this kind 

 of discussion — to see how both realms of thought can 

 be associated independently with our existence. Having 

 seen something of the way in which the scientific realm 

 of thought has constituted itself out of a self-closed 

 cyclic scheme we are able to give a guarded assent. The 

 conflict will not be averted unless both sides confine 

 themselves to their proper domain; and a discussion 

 which enables us to reach a better understanding as to 

 the boundary should be a contribution towards a state 

 of peace. There is still plenty of opportunity for frontier 

 difficulties; a particular illustration will show this. 



A belief not by any means confined to the more 

 dogmatic adherents of religion is that there is a future 

 non-material existence in store for us. Heaven is no- 

 where in space, but it is in time. (All the meaning of 

 the belief is bound up with the word future; there is no 

 comfort in an assurance of bliss in some former state of 

 existence.) On the other hand the scientist declares that 

 time and space are a single continuum, and the modern 

 idea of a Heaven in time but not in space is in this 

 respect more at variance with science than the pre- 

 Copernican idea of a Heaven above our heads. The 

 question I am now putting is not whether the theologian 

 or the scientist is right, but which is trespassing on the 

 domain of the other? Cannot theology dispose of the 

 destinies of the human soul in a non-material way 

 without trespassing on the realm of science? Cannot 

 science assert its conclusions as to the geometry of the 

 space-time continuum without trespassing on the realm 

 of theology? According to the assertion above science 

 and theology can make what mistakes they please 

 provided that they make them in their own territory ; they 

 cannot quarrel if they keep to their own realms. But 



