184 SCIENCE REMAKING THE WORLD 



In religion, we are in danger of formulating some 

 specific line of conduct as essential to the result, and of 

 condemning those who do not adhere to it. This is the 

 essence of formalism. That there may be many lines of 

 approach to a given result, if that result be a general 

 condition, is a hard lesson for mankind to learn. 



If it is so difficult to get at the real factors of a simple 

 result in the laboratory, and still more difficult to inter- 

 pret the significance of factors when found, in what 

 condition must we be in reference to the immensely 

 more difficult and subtle problems which confront us in 

 social^ organization, government, education, and reli- 

 gion; especially when it is added that the vast majority 

 of those who have offered answers to these problems 

 have had no conception of the difficulties involved in 

 reaching absolute truth. It is evident that in the vast 

 problems which concern human welfare in general, we 

 are but groping our way, and that our answers as yet 

 are largely empirical. The proper effect of such 

 knowledge is not despair, but a receptive mind. In my 

 judgment, therefore, the diffusion of the scientific 

 spirit will make it more and more difficult for any one 

 with a nostrum to get a hearing. 



The prevailing belief among the untrained is that any 

 result may be explained by some single factor operating 

 as a cause. They seem to have no conception of the 

 fact that the cause of every result is made up of a com- 

 bination of interacting factors, often in numbers and 

 combinations that are absolutely bewildering to con- 

 template. An enthusiast discovers some one thing 

 which he regards, and which perhaps all unprejudiced 



