114 Trans. Acad. Sci. of St. Louis. 



been one tremendous step taken in advance, and on this I 

 wish to lay great emphasis. All the leading writers will 

 have their opinions on this phase of the subject. They will 

 take their stand as to the relation between the God-concep- 

 tion and conscience, and undertake to define themselves as to 

 what extent at this point there is dependence or independ- 

 ence. 



But the fact I wish to call your attention to is this : So 

 far as I am aware, among this whole array of eminent scholars 

 whose works I have listed before you, I doubt if there are 

 more than four or five exceptions to my statement : that in 

 case they found their conclusions seemingly in conflict with 

 some part of the Bible, they would not still calmly hold on 

 to their conclusions all the same. It would be done perhaps 

 in reverence, but it would be done nevertheless. The excep- 

 tions, if any, would be men who took up the problem as 

 clergymen and not as men of science. Ethics is no longer 

 treated as a department of biblical criticism or of doctrinal 

 theology. We shall appreciate how much this signifies when 

 we recall the fact that the existence of conscience was long 

 used as one of the natural *' evidences " for the existence of 

 God. To analyze it meant digging at the roots of theism. 

 But ethical science has now practically won its freedom from 

 the conventional authority of doctrinal religion or the church. 

 In substance it implies that the scholar in ethics now feels 

 that, like yourselves, he has a body of facts to deal with and 

 interpret, that he has to handle his subject as a science and 

 to accept whatever conclusions may come from his study. 



If the great movement of evolution had accomplished 

 nothing more than this in the department of ethics in the last 

 forty years, it would have done a stupendous piece of work. 



When, however, it comes to the subtle problem as to the 

 relation between ethics and religion as such, it would perhaps 

 surprise you to know how many of the scholars who are 

 entirely free from the authority of any conventional theology, 

 still recognize a close tie between the God-conception and 

 conscience. They may qualify it by speaking of it as a 

 *' cosmic" relationship instead of a God-relationship, but 



