i879-] 
The Course of Nature. 
67 
sible existences, that no question affeCting them, even now, 
is a scientific one ; much less can science consider those of 
past generations. 
There is thus a quite well-defined limit between questions 
which are scientific ones and those which are not scientific, 
and with which, in consequence, science has no concern 
whatever. You must not understand me as in any way 
claiming that questions of this last class are not worth 
thinking about. They include many which are of the most 
absorbing interest to the human race, and about which men 
will think the more as they become more thoughtful. But 
to mix them with scientific discussions will only introduce 
confusion of thought respecting sensible things, without in 
any manner advancing their solutions. The current desires 
that science shall consider man as something more than 
an animal are as unreasonable as if we wanted to make 
algebra a help to moral philosophy. 
This limitation of all scientific research to a single specific 
field is something so little understood that I may have occa- 
sion to call it to mind in other connections. But there is 
another equally essential maxim of science which I must 
explain in order that you may understand the spirit which 
animates scientific investigation. It is that the man of 
science, as such, has no preconceived theories to support, 
but simply goes to nature to find out and interpret what she 
has to say according to her exacft meaning. What he may 
desire to be true has no bearing at all on the question what 
really is true. Here arises the inability of men of science to 
view theological questions in a light which shall be satisfac- 
tory to the theologians, and the corresponding inability of 
the latter to appreciate the spirit in which men of science 
discuss the problems of life and being. We hear much at 
the present time of a supposed conflict between science and 
ltligion ; but it is rather a conflict between two sets of men 
who view nature from opposite and irreconcilable stand- 
points. It is essential to tbe understanding of our theme 
that we should see in what this difference of view consists; 
I shall, therefore, endeavour briefly to explain it. 
The theologian looks upon the doCtrines he has been 
taught as something the truth of which is essential to the 
welfare of humanity, and, we might almost say, to the 
supremacy of the Creator. He thus invests them with an 
attribute of moral excellence, implied rather than expressed 
in the term orthodoxy, and looks upon those who attack 
them not simply as men who are mistaken, but as men who 
are seeking to do a great injury to the human race. Hence the 
