230 COSMIC PHILOSOPHY. [vt. :l 



things lasted, there was but little room for scepticism. But 

 after a while the psychical environment had so far altered 

 as to he out of balance with this conception of the world. 

 The Coperniean revolution unseated INfan from his throne in 

 the centre of the universe, and advancing physical generali- 

 zation cast discredit upon the theory of providential govern- 

 ment, and so arose the long line of " infidels " from Bruno 

 and Vanini to Voltaire and Diderot. While, on the other 

 hand, the increasing power of monarchy, especially in France, 

 gradually undermined the moral independence of the Papacy, 

 converting it from an upholder of equity and a friend of the 

 people into an unscrupulous ally of regal usurpation and 

 iniquity; and thus arose the Great Schism, followed by the 

 Protestant revolt and the grand democratic movement which 

 culminated in the French Eevolution. Now what is all this 

 infidel rebellion against dogma and democratic rebellion 

 against authority, but the intellectual and moral turbulence 

 caused by the growing conviction that the psychical relations 

 comprised in the authorized conception of the world were 

 out of balance with the new aggregate of relations formed 

 by the discoveries of science and the altered requirements 

 of social existence ? And this painful attitude of the mind, 

 prompting men to fresh investigation of the order of nature 

 and to new social re-arrangements, is the stimulus to a new 

 and closer adaptation. 



Such is the function of scepticism in the community, and 

 such also is its function in the individual, A person, for 

 instance, is educated in an environment of Presbyterian 

 theology, accepting without question all the doctrines of 

 Calvinism. By and by his environment enlarges. Facts in 

 science or in history, methods of induction, canons of criti- 

 cism present themselves to his mind as things irreconcilable 

 with his old creed. Hence painful doubt, entailing efforts 

 to escape by modifying the creed to suit new mental 

 exigencies. Hence eager study and further enlargement of 



