THE RELIGION OF N A T U B E 



written these words : " It may be freely admitted 

 that no animal is self-conscious." 



It is never possible for anyone to please every- 

 body, least of all when he ventures upon the de- 

 batable ground of the relation of religion to sci- 

 ence. Extreme atheists, who do not wish to believe 

 that there can be a merciful God, and extreme 

 humanitarians, who are so consumed with pity for 

 animals as to refuse to believe that God can be 

 merciful to them in sparing them the self-con- 

 scious knowledge of their sufferings, are, of 

 course, irreconcilable. " Comical " and " amus- 

 ing " are the epithets applied by one humanitarian 

 journal to my earnest attempt to convey to my 

 readers the faith which enables me to look out upon 

 the world of wild nature as a scene of everchang- 

 ing interest without unhappiness. 



How far apart in creed may be the atheists, 

 whom the sufferings of men impel to deny the Cre- 

 ator, and the humanitarian, who insists that man, 

 made in the likeness of God, is more brutal than 

 the beasts, I cannot say : but if aught that I have 

 written enables some to study nature without deny- 

 ing or doubting God, I have done a good work; 

 and it was a great pleasure to me to find that in 

 the main basis, at any rate, of my argument I had 

 the support of Darwin's master mind. 



Next let me quote an extract from the writings 



[156] 



