22 MODERN DIFFICULTIES 



ground, and have taken up an agnostic position towards 

 everything superphysical. Quoting Professor Ward 

 again, the philosophy which now controls the minds 

 of many physical scientists contends that *'so far as 

 knowledge extends all is law, and law ultimately and 

 most clearly to be formulated in terms of matter and 

 motion. Knowledge, it is now said, can never trans- 

 cend the phenomenal; concerning 'unknown and 

 hypothetical' existences beyond and beneath the phe- 

 nomenal, whether called Matter or Mind or God, 

 science will not dogmatize either by affir'ming or deny- 

 ing. . . . The eternities safely left aside, the relativities 

 become at once amenable to system." ^ 



It can be seen that naturaHsm in our day combines 

 agnosticism towards the superphysical with insistence 

 upon a purely mechanical method of interpreting all 

 knowable realities. It is desirable to reckon separately 

 with these two aspects of the system under considera- 

 tion. 



The name "agnostic" was coined by the late Thomas 

 Huxley. He says that agnosticism ''is not a creed, 

 but a method, the essence of which lies in the rigorous 

 appHcation of a single principle ... it is the great 

 principle of Descartes; it is the fundamental axiom 

 of modern science. Positively the principle may be 

 expressed: In matters of the intellect, follow your 

 reason as far as it will take you, without regard to any 



1 Jas. Ward, Naturalism and Agnosticism, p. 20. This work is 

 the most elaborate and important attack upon naturalism, and de- 

 mands careful study. Balfour's Foundations of Belief attacks the 

 philosophical basis of naturalism. 



