INTRODUCTION 



related to his warm and childlike humanity. 

 Man was from the start, for him, the central 

 object of the universe, however much the Co- 

 pernican system and the theory of evolution 

 might seem to unite to dethrone man from his 

 ancient position of dignity. Meanwhile Fiske 

 combined in a remarkable way the great intel- 

 lectual plasticity which rendered him so good 

 a disciple, and the great fidelity which made 

 him so patient an expositor, with a very genu- 

 ine independence of inner experience and of 

 personal judgment which kept him, after all, 

 never the mere follower of another man. The 

 first .great result of this union of learning and 

 enthusiasm, of discipleship and spiritual inde- 

 pendence, was a work wherein, for the mo- 

 ment, the lover of human history seemed to 

 disappear behind the expositor of the doctrine 

 of evolution. The formulas, never slavishly re- 

 peated, but very patiently assimilated and very 

 faithfully although independently presented, — 

 the formulas, I say, of another man at once 

 aided Fiske to win his own spiritual free- 

 dom, and for the time held back the otherwise 

 so rapid growth of his own insight into the 

 problems of life in general, and of religion in 

 particular. But by the very writing of the 

 " Cosmic Philosophy " he set free the soul that 

 was far too strong to be bound by another 

 cxxxvi 



