VIIL 



ON THE FALLACIES OF TESTIMONY IN RELATION 

 TO THE SUPERNATURAL. 



^Contemporary Review^ January, 1876.] 



No one who has studied the history of science can fail to recog- 

 nize the fact, that the rate of its progress has been in great degree 

 commensurate with the degree oi freedom from any kind of pre- 

 possession with which scientific inquiry has been conducted. And 

 the chapters of Lord Bacon's *' Novum Organon," in which he 

 analyzes and classifies the prejudices that are apt to divert the 

 scientific inquirer from his single-minded pursuit of truth, have 

 rightly been accounted among the most valuable portions of that 

 immortal work. To use the felicitous language of Dr. Thomas 

 Brown, " the temple which Lord Bacon purified was not that of 

 " nature herself, but the temple of the mind ; in its innermost 

 "sanctuaries were the idols which he overthrew; and it was not 

 *' till these were removed, that truth would deign to unveil herself 

 "to adoration." 



Every one, again, who watches the course of educated thought 

 at the present time, must see that it is tending towards the exer- 

 cise of that trained and organized common sense which we call 

 " scientific method," on subjects to which it is legitimately applic- 

 able within the sphere of religious inquiry. Science has been 

 progressively, and in various ways, undermining the old " bases 

 of belief;" and men in almost every religious denomination, ani- 

 mated by no spirit but that of reverent loyalty to truth, are now 

 seriously asking themselves, whether the whole fabric of what is 



