260 EVOLUTION AND DOGMA. 



majority of readers he is regarded as its chief ex- 

 ponent and defender. He, however, disclaims any- 

 thing like a creed, and declares that agnostics are 

 precluded from having one by the very nature of 

 their mental status. He prefers to regard Agnos- 

 ticism, not as a creed, but as "a method, the essence 

 of which lies in the rigorous application of a single 

 principle." " Positively," he informs us, " the prin- 

 ciple may be expressed : In matters of the intellect, 

 follow your reason as far as it will take you, with- 

 out regard to any other consideration. And nega- 

 tively: In matters of the intellect do not pretend 

 that conclusions are certain which are not demon- 

 strated or demonstrable. That I take to be the 

 agnostic faith, which, if a man keep whole and un- 

 defiled, he shall not be ashamed to look the universe 

 in the face, whatever the future may have in store 

 for him." 1 



The profession of faith of G. J. Romanes is more 

 explicit, at least in so far as it refers to God, and 

 gives us in a few words the views entertained by the 

 two leading classes of agnostics regarding the First 

 Cause, or the Absolute or Unconditioned. 



"By Agnosticism," asserts Romanes, "I under- 

 stand a theory of things which abstains from either 

 affirming or denying the existence of God. It thus 

 represents with regard to Theism a state of sus- 

 pended judgment; and all it undertakes to affirm is, 

 that upon existing evidence the being of God is un- 

 known. But the term Agnosticism is frequently 

 used in a widely different sense, as implying belief 



111 Science and Christian Tradition," p. 246. 



