Man and Nature 93 



January 1903), from which I now make the 

 following appropriate extract : 



Looking at the loom of nature, the feeling 

 not of despair, but of what has been called 

 atheism, one ingredient of atheism, has 

 arisen : atheism never fully realised, and 

 wrongly so called recently it has been 

 called severe Theism, indeed ; for it is 

 joyful sometimes, interested and placid 

 always, exultant at the strange splendour of 

 the spectacle which its intellect has laid bare 

 to contemplation, satisfied with the per- 

 fection of the mechanism, content to be a 

 part of the self-generated organism, and 

 endeavouring to think that the feelings of 

 duty, of earnest effort, and of faithful 

 service, which conspicuously persist in spite 

 of all discouragement, are on this view 

 intelligible as well as instinctive, and sure 

 that nothing less than unrepining unfalter- 

 ing unswerving acquiescence is worthy of 

 our dignity as man. 



The above ' Confession of Faith,' then, is 

 very well ; for the man himself very well 



