MODERN SCIENCE AND PANTHEISM 93 



because of the doom that seems manifestly to await 

 all forms of actual energy. Besides, both immor- 

 tality and freedom must share in that general dis- 

 credit of everything unattested by experience which 

 the persistent and exclusive culture of empiricism 

 begets. 



In effect, while the empirical method ignores, 

 and must ignore, any supersensible Principle of 

 existence whatever, thus tending to a loose and 

 careless identification of the Absolute with the Sum 

 of Things, evolution and the principle of conserva- 

 tion have familiarised the modern mind with the 

 continuity, the uniformity, and the unity of Nature 

 in an overwhelming degree. In the absence of 

 a conviction upon independent grounds that the 

 Principle of existence is rational and personal, the 

 sciences of Nature can hardly fail, even upon a 

 somewhat considerate and scrutinising view, to con- 

 vey the impression that the Ground of Things is a 

 vast and shadowy Whole, which moves towards 

 some unknown destination ; sweeping forward, as 

 one of the leaders of modern science has said, 

 " regardless of consequences," unconcerned as to 

 the fate of man's world of effort and hope, which 

 looks so circumscribed and insignificant when viewed 

 from the outlook of sense only — from the vanish- 

 ing shore of Time, giving upon the boundless ex- 

 panses of Space. 



