July 28, 1922] 



SCIENCE 



91 



carpets on which we can voyage whither we 

 will. Their truth is the deepest truth, that of 

 vague human longings. When we are told that 

 Kubla Khan a stately pleasure dome decreed, 

 "where Alph the sacred river ran, through cav- 

 erns measureless to man, down to a sunless 

 sea," we do not feel obliged to consult a list 

 of Tartar rulers, or locate the sources of the 

 river Alph, or consider the geological forma- 

 tion of limestone caverns. Few will be dis- 

 turbed by the question of what particular spe- 

 cies of wood louse secreted the honey dew, or the 

 probable number of bacteria occurring per 

 cubic centimeter in fresh milk of Paradise. 

 When the scientific rumor reaches the poet that 

 Nature is so careful of the type, so careless of 

 the single life, he will find many who will share 

 his impulse to kneel down upon "the great 

 world's altar stairs that slope thro' darkness 

 up to God." The truth of human fears, disap- 

 pointments and aspirations is indeed the 

 supreme truth, being made as we are, and is 

 likely to remain so. All other truth no matter 

 how true is in comparison dust and chaff, ex- 

 cept for the few who owing to their highly 

 exceptional temperament crave proofs and pre- 

 cision, at least in some naiTow segment of 

 life's circle. 



Religion shares with poetry and romance the 

 appeal to man's natural and deep longings and 

 spontaneous inclinations. Indeed, among the 

 many definitions of religion none is perhaps 

 better than that of Santayana, to whom it 

 seems to be poetry sometimes mistaking itself 

 for science. Religion has concerned itself, at 

 least during historic times, with those terrors, 

 awes, obligations and aspirations which rest on 

 a belief in supernatural beings, good and bad. 

 It has to do with our vivid fears in a world of 

 sad mischance; with the hopes, restraints and 

 sacred duties which might in some way offset 

 life's incalculable tragedies. The poetic ele- 

 ments in religion are accompanied by more or 

 less definitely formulated beliefs about man's 

 origin and nature and the workings of the 

 things about him. These convictions are com- 

 monly of ancient and untraceable genesis, 

 although they may finally be very logically and 

 precisely stated by a Saint Thomas or a Calvin 

 and foi-m a part of a closely concatenated 



philosophical system. One may not, however, 

 take the same liberties with religious beliefs 

 as he may with the fancies of the poet. The 

 adherents of a particular religious creed are 

 not free to pick and choose, and reject what 

 comes to seem improbable. The "truth" once 

 delivered stands, for it depends largely on the 

 form of its original delivery. It is the word 

 of the Most High or of some prophet inspired 

 by him. At least this has seemed inevitable to 

 a great majority of Christians and their leaders 

 since the founding of their faith. Religion 

 therefore makes a double appeal, that of poetry 

 and of divinely certified truth about all the 

 great concerns of life. It meets questions about 

 our origin, duty and possible fates, without 

 any call for painful critical thinking, suspen- 

 sion of judgment and dubious, ever-to-be- 

 revised, theories and hypotheses. 



II 



These preliminary reflections have been nec- 

 essary in order to introduce the scientist to 

 himself. He is quite as prone as others to 

 take himself for granted and not realize what 

 an altogether astonishing and even grotesque 

 mystery he and his doings constitute. He, like 

 the poets, philosophers, theologians and artists, 

 belongs to the small and precious group of per- 

 sistent wonderers. He is a questioner, a dis- 

 coverer, a pointer-out. He like them gives 

 meaning to things that would otherwise pass 

 unnoticed. But there is something inhuman in 

 his methods and aims. He craves a meticulous 

 precision of observation, measurement and 

 statement quite alien to the other teachers of 

 men. He exhibits an almost shocking insensi- 

 bility to the cherished motives of belief. He 

 does not ask whether what he looks for is right 

 or wi-ong, beautiful or ugly, useful or futile, 

 comforting or distressing. He only asks 

 whether what he finds is an instance of some- 

 thing really happening. He persistently car- 

 ries his analysis as far as he can and scrupu- 

 lously sets down just what he has seen and the 

 inferences he may make or suspect. Moreover 

 he interests himself in what appears to the 

 overwhelming mass of mankind as stupid 

 trifles which promise neither pleasure nor proflt. 

 What difference can it possibly make whether 



