298 ESSAYS OF A BIOLOGIST 



because such radical thinkers have been for the most 

 part destructive, and so have not envisaged this par- 

 ticular side of the question. 



I hope I have been able to convince you that the 

 scientific manner of thinking can lay the foundation 

 for something constructive in religion. This great 

 problem, however, remains : what sort of form or 

 organization shall any such new-moulded religion 

 take on itself ? 



We have just decided that fixed and rigid dogma 

 is impossible, and that completeness is out of the 

 question. Yet humanity craves for certainty and 

 is not content to leave any factor out of the scheme 

 of things. 



To this we answer that it is here that real faith 

 enters. We cannot know the absolute, nor have 

 we discovered a goal for our efforts. But we have 

 discovered a unity embracing all that we know, 

 and a direction starting at the first moment to 

 which our reconstructive thought can penetrate, 

 continuing till to-day, and showing an acceleration 

 of speed on which we may raise our hopes for the 

 future. 



We do not know all. For instance, I have stud- 

 iously avoided ever mentioning the word immortality^ 

 since I believe that Science cannot yet profitably 

 discuss that question. But the discovery of unity 

 in all that has so far been studied gives us reasonable 

 faith that its wings will reach out to cover all that 



