JULIAN S. HUXLEY 115 



ence has amply demonstrated that they are the only 

 ones by which man can hope to extend his control 

 over nature and his own destiny. Science is, in the 

 first instance, merely disinterested curiosity, the desire 

 to know for knowledge's sake. Yet in the long run 

 the new knowledge always brings new practical power. 



But science has two inherent limitations. First, it 

 is incomplete, or perhaps I had better say partial, just 

 because it only concerns Itself with intellectual han- 

 dling and objective control. And secondly, it is mor- 

 ally and emotionally neutral. It sets out to describe 

 and to understand, not to appraise or to assign values. 

 Indeed, science is without a scale of values. The only 

 value which it recognizes is that of truth and knowl- 

 edge. 



This neutrality of science in regard to emotions and 

 moral and aesthetic values means that, while in its own 

 sphere of knowledge It is supreme, in other spheres it 

 Is only a method or tool. What man shall do with 

 the new facts, the new ideas, the new opportunities of 

 control which science is showering upon him does not 

 depend upon science, but upon what man wants to do 

 with them; and this, in turn, depends upon his scale of 

 values. It Is here that religion can become the domi- 

 nant factor. For what religion can do Is to set up a 

 scale of values for conduct, and to provide emotional 

 or spiritual driving force to help In getting them real- 

 ized in practice. On the other hand, it Is an undoubted 

 fact that the scale of values set up by a religion will 

 be different according to Its Intellectual background: 

 you can never wholly separate practice from theory, 

 idea from action. Thus, to put the matter in a nut- 



