MODERNISM : ITS ORIGIN AND TENDENCIES. 137 



A short time ago I was driven in private controversy to adjure a 

 champion of that school, in the name of intellectual veracity, not to 

 juggle with the word " science," under which all sorts of fallacies 

 may lurk. I hold that, unless a man has done enough work in the 

 region of those sciences which come under the purview of the Eoyal 

 Societ}^, to know the difference between what he knows and what he 

 has only a reading or talking acquaintance with, he needs to beware 

 of getting on very slippery ground, and of advancing some other 

 cause than the cause of truth. (See the correspondence in the 

 Guardian of 1905 between myself and the late Canon MacColl.) 



Then, as regards the scientific aspect of " Modernism," I need not 

 tell the members of the Victoria Institute that I have no sympathy 

 with what Chancellor Lias (p. 122) describes as the " rash dogmatics of 

 the* school of physical science " ; indeed for the last two decades I 

 have been engaged in my small way in combating them. Even Pope 

 Leo XIII. attempted something of the sort, but found himself out of 

 his depth, and had to fall back upon St. Thomas Aquinas (if I 

 remember rightly) as entitled to have the final say upon the highest 

 questions of philosophy, to which the discoveries of science may lead 

 up in this twentieth century ! I should rather say that there is more 

 true philosophy in the dictum of the poet AVordsworth — 

 " To the solid ground 

 Of Nature to trust the mind that builds for aye." 



So when a champion of the "higher criticism " tells me that the 

 real diff"erence between us is in " the presuppositions with which we 

 start," my reply is the simple one, that indncMve science knows no 

 presuppositions ; it finds its data in observed facts, and checks its 

 inferences by further observation of facts. I will ask permission to 

 add two short quotations : — 



" Liberty to seek — liberty to formulate the found. Devoutly 

 we claim it beside the graves, at which the whole world creeps up to- 

 mourn with us ; the shrine of our aged master (Darwin), the snow- 

 drift of our young master (young Balfour of Trinity). Far- withdrawn 

 teachings out of the perfect Work they opened for themselves and 

 for us. What deeper and yet more universal teachings became 

 theirs out of the all-wise Word we perhaps may not know. And 

 they will help us to read the Word itself more truly. Well has it 



* I said " a," not " the."— J. J. L. See p. 122. 



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