INTRODUCTION 



30. In chapter iii., on " Cosmic Theism/' 

 Fiske begins by admitting that the conclusions 

 thus reached " would be very unsatisfactory if 

 we were obliged to rest in them as final." A 

 " positive attitude " is needful to satisfy the hu- 

 man mind. This positive attitude is first sug- 

 gested by the fact that the inscrutable Power 

 which we so far find as the basis of all Reality 

 is sharply distinguishable from the whole realm 

 of phenomena. Although known through its 

 manifestations only, it is known to be in itself 

 something beyond these manifestations, and is 

 inscrutable only because it is thus beyond. But 

 now, as Fiske insists, here for the time return- 

 ing decidedly to the position of Spencer in the 

 "First Principles," "what men have worshipped 

 from the earliest times has been not the Known, 

 but the Unknown." " Worship is ever the dark 

 side of the shield, of which knowledge is the 

 bright side." Meanwhile, it is to be noted that 

 we do not say that the World, that is, the sum 

 total of phenomena, is for us this Ultimate 

 Reality, since for us, in Fiske's opinion, the 

 Unknowable lies wholly beyond this world of 

 phenomena. Hence, as Fiske insists, the view 

 here in question is not Atheism, because Athe- 

 ism looks for nothing beyond the world itself, 

 viewed as a sum total of data. Nor is the doc- 

 trine Pantheism, for Pantheism identifies the 

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