II A More Scientific Temper 481 



natural science is absent : we fall short of the unchallengeable 

 unanimity of the Biologists on fundamentals. The experimental 

 method with its sure repetitions cannot be applied to our subject- 

 matter. But we have something like the observational method of 

 palaeontology and geographical distribution ; and in biology there 

 are still men who think that the large examination of varieties by 

 way of geography and the search of strata is as truly scientific, uses 

 as genuinely the logical method of difference, and is as fruitful in 

 sure conclusions as the quasi-chemical analysis of Mendelian labora- 

 tory work, of which last I desire to express my humble admiration. 

 Religion also has its observational work in the larger and possibly 

 more arduous manner. 



But the scientific work in religion makes its way through diffi- 

 culties and dangers. We are far from having found the formula of 

 its combination with the historical elements of our apologetic. It is 

 exposed, therefore, to a damaging fire not only from unspiritualist 

 psychology and pathology but also from the side of scholastic dogma. 

 It is hard to admit on equal terms a partner to the old undivided 

 rule of books and learning. With Charles Lamb, we cry in some 

 distress, "must knowledge come to me, if it come at all, by some 

 awkward experiment of intuition, and no longer by this familiar 

 process of reading 1 ?" and we are answered that the old process has an 

 imperishable value, only we have not yet made clear its connection 

 with other contributions. And all the work is young, liable to be 

 drawn into unprofitable excursions, side-tracked by self-deceit and 

 pretence ; and it fatally attracts, like the older mysticism, the 

 curiosity and the expository powers of those least in sympathy with 

 it, ready writers who, with all the air of extended research, have been 

 content with narrow grounds for induction. There is a danger, 

 besides, which accompanies even the most genuine work of this 

 science and must be provided against by all its serious students. 

 I mean the danger of unbalanced introspection both for individuals 

 and for societies; of a preoccupation comparable to our modern 

 social preoccupation with bodily health; of reflexion upon mental 

 states not accompanied by exercise and growth of the mental powers ; 

 the danger of contemplating will and neglecting work, of analysing 

 conviction and not criticising evidence. 



Still, in spite of dangers and mistakes, the work remains full of 

 hopeful indications, and, in the best examples 2 , it is truly scientific in 

 its determination to know the very truth, to tell what we think, not 



1 Essays of Elia, "New Year's Eve," p. 41 ; Ainger's edition. London, 1899. 



J Such an example is given in Baron F. von Hiigel's recently finished book, the result 

 Of thirty years' research : The Mystical Element of Relic/ion, OS studied in Saint Catherine 

 of Genoa and her Friends. London, 1908. 



D. 31 



