COSMIC PHILOSOPHY 



to disappear. I use it as descriptive of that 

 less anthropomorphic phase of religious theory 

 into which the present more anthropomorphic 

 phase is likely to be slowly metamorphosed. 

 The conflict, as it presents itself to my mind, 

 is not between Christianity and any other em- 

 bodiment of religion or irreligion. The conflict 

 is between science and mythology, between 

 Cosmism and Anthropomorphism. The result 

 is, not the destruction of religion, but the sub- 

 stitution of a relatively adequate for a relatively 

 inadequate set of symbols. In the scientific 

 philosopher there may be as much of the real 

 essence of Christianity as there was in the clois- 

 tered monk who preceded him ; but he thinks 

 in the language of a man and not in the lan- 

 guage of a child. 



The critical attitude of our philosophy with 

 reference to the beliefs and the institutions 

 amid which we live has now been quite thor- 

 oughly defined both by what it is and by what 

 it is not. We may now, I think, safely affirm 

 that when Mr. Mivart accuses the Doctrine of 

 Evolution of tending toward the intellectual 

 and moral degradation of mankind and toward 

 the genesis of atrocities worse than those of 

 the Parisian Commune, he clearly shows that 

 he has not thoroughly comprehended the im- 

 plications of the doctrine. The conception of 

 evolution, which he adopts after a loose and 

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