lo Science Religion and Reality 



history, with the advantage over other textbooks of being inspired 

 and therefore infalHble. I will not inquire into the merits of this 

 theory. It is not likely to be held by any readers of this volume, 

 whatever be their views either on science or religion. Inspired, 

 in the opinion of the present writer, the Bible certainly is. In- 

 fallible in the sense commonly attributed to that word, it certainly 

 is not. It neither provides, nor, in the nature of things, could 

 provide, faultless anticipations of sciences still unborn. If by a 

 miracle it had provided them, without a miracle they could not 

 have been understood. Its authors belonged each to his own time 

 and country ; speaking their language, sharing their errors, seeing 

 nature through their eyes. And if their spiritual insight has in 

 so many cases made them teachers for all time, science has no cause 

 of complaint. Genius is beyond its jurisdiction. 



It may, perhaps, be urged that while this way of considering 

 the historic parts of the Bible restores the living interest so nearly 

 smothered by the uncritical devotion of earlier generations, it does 

 not touch the real dispute between science and religion. This 

 turns (it will be said) upon allegations of fact which are too 

 inconsistent with the known course of nature for the sciences 

 to accept, and too essential a part of its creed for Christianity to 

 surrender. Neither party can afford either to abandon its position 

 or to explain it away. The natural and the supernatural, science 

 and superstition here come into irreconcilable conflict. Com- 

 promise is impossible. The battle, whatever be the issue, must 

 be fought to a finish. 



This way of looking at things seems to be neither good 

 philosophy, nor good theology, nor good science. Yet I own 

 to feeling a certain reluctance in discussing it — so wearisome is 

 the controversy with which it is historically connected, so ingrained 

 are the confusions on which it rests. But evidently it cannot be 

 wholly avoided if we are to take account of the intellectual 

 considerations which have embarrassed and still embarrass the 

 relations of science and religion. For among all these, none, 

 I suppose, have produced a greater effect in modern times than 

 those which depend on the contrast which is drawn between the 

 natural and the supernatural, or on the credibility or incredibility 

 of miraculous occurrences. 



