THE DECADENCE OF THEOLOGY 131 



the religious conscience of our time is struggling, 

 one may feel some liking for, but the God of the 

 Puritans, of Calvinism, was a monster too terrible to 

 contemplate. 



We shall soon enlarge the conception of religion 

 till we shall not use the term at all in a special or 

 restricted sense. We shall see that all lovers of 

 truth are lovers of God. When one pauses to look 

 at it, what utter selfishness or selfism lies at the bot- 

 tom of the old creeds — the one thought of a man 

 to secure his personal safety from some impending 

 danger. The soldier who is determined to come out 

 of the battle with a whole skin is not the ideal soldier. 

 The man of science, the truth lover, how much more 

 worthy his self-forgetfulness, his renunciation, which 

 has in view no personal end whatever. The new 

 birth of science, — the dropping of all worldly and 

 secondary ends, the absolute devotion to the truth 

 for its own sake, — is there anything more truly re- 

 ligious than this ? Darwin cared nothing for reli- 

 gion, so called, because his mind and his conscience 

 were enlisted in his science. He was serving God 

 disinterestedly. Science to him was religion. 



" Esaias is very bold and saith, I was found of 

 them that sought me not; I was made manifest to 

 them that asked not after me." 



" He judged the cause of the poor and the needy ; 

 was not this to know me ? saith the Lord." 



