254 AGNOSTICISM 



VII 



mental characteristic of the founder of positivism. 

 Faithfulness in disciples is an admirable quality 

 in itself; the pity is that it not unfrequently leads 

 to the imitation of the weaknesses as well as of 

 the strength of the master. It is only such 

 over-faithfulness which can account for a " strong 

 mind really saturated with the historical sense " 

 (p. 153) exhibiting the extraordinary forgetfulness 

 of the historical fact of the existence of David 

 Hume implied by the assertion that 



it would be difficult to name a single known agnostic who has 

 given to history anything like the amount of thought and study 

 which he brings to a knowledge of the physical world (p. 153). 



Whoso calls to mind what I may venture to 

 term the bright side of Christianity that ideal of 

 manhood, with its strength and its patience, its 

 justice and its pity for human frailty, its helpful- 

 ness to the extremity of self-sacrifice, its ethical 

 purity and nobility, which apostles have pictured, 

 in which armies of martyrs have placed their 

 unshakable faith, and whence obscure men and 

 women, like Catherine of Sienna and John Knox, 

 have derived the courage to rebuke popes and 

 kings is not likely to underrate the importance 

 of the Christian faith as a factor in human 

 history, or to doubt that if that faith should prove 

 to be incompatible with our knowledge, or neces- 

 sary want of knowledge, some other hypostasis of 

 men's hopes, genuine enough and worthy enough 



