784 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



in America and England, whose whole theology consists in Mr. Spen- 

 cer's religious conception, and who do not hesitate to avow the fact. 

 If Mr. Harrison will take the pains to visit them, he will see that, 

 even after all the old theological formulas have been given up, the 

 Unknowable can serve as the foundation of a worship, without being 

 reduced to the formula and symbol of x ". 



But these disciples of Spencer, by developing the religious conse- 

 quences of his doctrine, have made up for his silence on perhaps the 

 only point in which he exposes his flank to the attacks of Comtism. 

 Feeling that the flaw in the armor is revealed here, Mr. Harrison keeps 

 on reiterating the charge, and reproaching his adversary with having 

 forgotten that religion necessarily includes a moral discipline. We 

 believe it is inexact to assume that morals is an original element of 

 religion, but it incontestably, by the progress of ideas, has become an 

 essential one. In reducing religion to a sort of mystic contemplation, 

 Mr. Spencer has left out those moral sentiments and practical applica- 

 tions which, according to the just remark of Mr. Harrison, are the real 

 sphere of religious activity. Evolution confides to science the task of 

 formulating the laws of ethics, or, in more general terms, the princi- 

 ples of the true, the good, and the beautiful. But does Science, which 

 addresses itself exclusively to the reason, possess a sufiicient sanction 

 to guarantee, under all circumstances, the triumph of those laws over 

 the appetites or the passions of the individual, when once the com- 

 mandment of a divine revelator or the categorical imperative of Kan- 

 tian morals has been replaced by the simple suggestions of plain 

 interest ? It is, we believe, in sentiment, as Comte and his disciples 

 declare, that must be sought the mainsprings of duty, of devotion, of 

 the spirit of sacrifice, and of all the virtues which, perhaps, yet more 

 than mental progress, make up the grandeur of the individual and the 

 strength of societies. 



What is this sentiment, which, to attain its end completely, must 

 represent our deepest and most intense aspirations ? Worship of Hu- 

 manity, replies Mr. Harrison, following Comte. But humanity can not 

 isolate itself from Nature, and Nature itself is simply the phenomenal 

 manifestation of the Supreme Energy. Mr. Spencer has already said, 

 in his first studies of sociology, that nothing like humanity can remove, 

 save temporarily, the idea of a power of which humanity is the feeble 

 and fugitive product, a power which, under ever-changing manifesta- 

 tions, existed long before humanity, and which will continue to mani- 

 fest itself under other forms when humanity shall be no more. 



It remains to examine whether the contemplation of this power can 

 provoke in us sentiments that will practically affect our conduct. The 

 response can only be affirmative, provided we consent, with Mr. Spen- 

 cer, to regard the laws which reason discovers in the moral as well as 

 in the physical world as modes of the Unknowable. Comte has de- 

 fined religion as the state of spiritual unity resulting from the conver- 



