THE GHOST OF RELIGION. 445 



rest on the same elements — belief in the Power which controls his 

 life, and grateful reverence for the Power so acknowledged. The 

 primitive man thought that Power to be the object of Nature affect- 

 ing Man. The cultured man knows that Power to be Humanity itself, 

 controlling and controlled by Nature according to natural law. The 

 transitional and perpetually changing creed of Theology has been an 

 interlude. Agnosticism has uttered its epilogue. But Agnosticism 

 is no more religion than differentiation or the nebular hypothesis is 

 religion. 



We have only to see what are the .elements and ends of religion 

 to recognize that we can not find it in the negative and the unknown. 

 In any reasonable use of language religion implies some kind of be- 

 lief in a Power outside ourselves, some kind of awe and gratitude felt 

 for that Power, some kind of influence exerted by it over our lives. 

 There are always in some sort these three elements — belief, worship, 

 conduct. A religion which gives us nothing in particular to believe, 

 nothing as an object of awe and gratitude, which has no special rela- 

 tion to human duty, is not a religion at all. It may be formula, a 

 generalization, a logical postulate ; but it is not a religion. The uni- 

 versal presence of the unknowable (or rather of the unknown) substra- 

 tum is not a religion. It is a logical postulate. You may call it, if 

 you please, the first axiom of science, a law of the human mind, or 

 perhaps better the universal postulate of philosophy. But try it by 

 every test which indicates religion and you will find it wanting. 



The points which the Unknowable has in common with the object 

 of any religion are very slight and superficial. As the universal sub- 

 stratum it has some analogy with other superhuman objects of worship. 

 But Force, Gravitation, Atom, Undulation, Vibration, and other 

 abstract notions have much the same kind of analogy, but nobody 

 ever dreamed of a religion of gravitation, or the worship of molecules. 

 The Unknowable has managed to get itself spelt with a capital U; 

 but Carlyle taught us to spell the Everlasting No with capitals also. 

 The Unknowable is no doubt mysterious, and Godhead is mysterious. 

 It certainly appeals to the sense of wonder, and the Trinity appeals to 

 the sense of wonder. It suggests vague and infinite extension, as does 

 the idea of deity : but then Time and Space equally suggest vague 

 and infinite extension. Yet no one but a delirious Kantist ever pro- 

 fessed that Time and Space were his religion. These seem all the 

 qualities which the Unknowable has in common with objects of wor- 

 ship — ubiquity, mystery, and immensity. But these qualities it shares 

 with some other postulates of thought. 



But try it by all the other recognized tests of religion. Religion 

 is not made up of wonder, or of a vague sense of immensity, unsatis- 

 fied yearning after infinity. Theology, seeking a refuge in the unin- 

 telligible, has no doubt accustomed this generation to imagine that a 

 yearning after infinity is the sum and substance of religion. But that 



