62 HAS SCIENCE DISCOVERED GOD? 



not inflexibly obey some definite law of motion; all we 

 can say of it is that there is a probability, amounting 

 almost to a certainty, that it will occupy a certain 

 realm at a certain time under certain given conditions. 

 Perhaps, in the final analysis, our electrons within the 

 atom, our molecules in a gas, our populations covered 

 by life insurance, all obey as their only fixed law the 

 law of probability. These, which have sometimes 

 been called the laws of uncertainty, may possibly be 

 the only certain things in physical theory. 



I stated at the beginning that my subject would be 

 restricted to religion In its general or absolute sense. 

 In certain oriental pantheons there are literally mil- 

 lions of gods; gods in such profusion and richness that 

 a separate god could be assigned to every conceivable 

 function of life or thought. It would seem inevitable 

 that in such rich pantheons there must be at least one 

 minor deity under whose special protection are placed 

 those who write, and that just as certain deities have 

 been made tutelary for sailors, farmers, women, and 

 soldiers, there must be one to look after writers, leg- 

 islators and the like. It would seem that In the eyes 

 of such a tutelary deity the one unpardonable sin 

 would be not sticking to one's subject. I would, there- 

 fore, at this point pour a libation to this unknown 

 forensic deity, this Beog ayvaatog of those who use the 

 pen, that I may avoid the sin of wandering from the 

 issue. 



For the past and present peculiarities of creeds or 

 scientific theories alike have nothing to do with the 

 subject. If our subject is enlarged so as to include 

 the influence of modern physical science on this or that 



