4 Science Religion and Reality 



themselves in a world from which religion had been finally expelled 

 by the sciences born of rational research. Though not (as I suppose) 

 himself embarrassed by any form of religious dogma, he was too 

 cautious a man to regard the prospect without some disquiet. But 

 the disease (he thought) was far advanced ; he knew of no remedy ; 

 all he could do, therefore, was to warn his readers of a peril he 

 foresaw but was unable to avert ; and this he did. 



Haifa century has passed since Dr. Draper wrote, and religion 

 is still with us. Not only so, but, so far as I can judge, its relations 

 to science are more satisfactory at the end of this period than they 

 were at the beginning. And this is certainly not because science 

 has been stationary. There has never been a period in which its 

 progress has been more startling, in which its discoveries have been 

 of wider scope or more fundamental significance. Nor do I 

 believe (though here I am on more uncertain ground) that the 

 deeper side of religion has suffered any eclipse, at least among 

 thinking people, during these eventful years. In such circum- 

 stances, it is not perhaps surprising that the most interesting charac- 

 teristic of Dr. Draper's volume of 1873 is its total want of interest 

 for readers in 1925. If it met the needs of anxious inquirers 

 fifty years ago, how greatly has our intellectual climate changed ! 

 How irrelevant to the wider issues of science and religion are the 

 particular incidents, medieval in date or medieval in spirit, on 

 which he chiefly dwells. In the present volume, at least, little is 

 said about them, either directly or by implication. 



II 



This observation must not be taken to mean that the following 

 essays are written in support of any general scheme of belief 

 common to all the writers. Few of them have seen the work of 

 their fellow-authors. None have modified their views to fit them 

 into any prearranged pattern. That, in these circumstances, 

 different and sometimes incompatible points of view should be 

 presented to the reader is inevitable. But few readers, 1 imagine, 

 will regard this as a defect. 



So far as I personally am concerned, I assume that my business 

 is to express in the briefest outline how I regard the subject-matter 

 on which we are all of us engaged. Let me then take as my point 

 of departure an observation incidentally made in the first of the 



