tigates the "how" and theology the "whence." Tempted on by two of its indispensable conceptions, matter and force science, overstepping this boundary, has of late affected to know not only the order but the origin of things; in the one case starting them from atoms as their source, in the other from mechanical energy. I try to show that neither datum will work out its result except by the aid of logical illusions. You will get out of your atoms by "evolution," exactly so much and no more as you have put into them by hypothesis. And with regard to force, it is contended that observation and induction do not carry us to it at all, but stop with movements; that the so-called kinds of force are only classes of phenomena, with the constant belief of causality behind; that of causality we have no cognition but as Will, from which the idea of "physical force" is simply cut down by artificial abstraction to the needs of phenomenal investigation and grouping; and that, in conceiving of the single power hid in every group, we must revert to the intuitive type, because the only authorized, and to the highest, because alone covering the highest phenomena. The attempt, under shelter of the unity of energy behind all its masks, to make the lowest phase, besides playing its own part, stand for the whole, is described as a logical sleight of hand by which a heedless reasoner may impose upon himself and others.

After this defensive argument to show that the religious positions are not displaced by natural science, they are traced to their real seat in human nature, and treated as postulates involved in the very existence and life of the reason and conscience. In support of their natural claim to our entire trust, it is contended that, for their ethical power, they are absolutely dependent on their objective truth; and further, that our nature, in respect of its higher

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PROFESSOR TYNDALL'S STRICTURES.

which deal with our sources of religious faith," I expande this phrase by the words, "whether in the scrutiny nature or in the interpretation of sacred books." Thi innocent parenthesis, which simply summarizes the grow ing-grounds of all actual theology, produces in my critic a effect out of all proportion to its significance. Twice h challenges me to show how any "religious faith" can be drawn from "nature," which I regard, he says, as "base and cruel." It suffices to say that "scrutiny of nature" does not exclude "human nature," wherein the springs of religion are afterwards traced to their intuitive seats; and that, in what are called my "tirades against nature" as "base and cruel," I am describing, not my own view of the order of the world, but one which I repudiate as utterly sickly and perverse. Then, again, I am asked how, after giving up the Old Testament cosmogony, I can any longer speak of "sacred books," without informing my readers where to find them. I have occasionally met with scientific men whose ideas about the Bible, if going further than the Creation, came to an end at the Flood, and who thought it only loyal to Laplace and Lyell thenceforth to shelve Moses and the prophets:" but a judgment so borné I should not expect from Professor Tyndall. Can a literature then have nothing "sacred," unless it be infallible? Has the religion of the present no roots in the soil of the past, so that nothing is gained for our spiritual culture by exploring its history and reproducing its poetry, and ascending to the tributary waters of its life? The real modern discovery, far from saying there is no sacred literature, because none oracular, assures us there are several; and, notwithstanding a deepened because purified attachment to our own "Origines" in the Jewish and Christian Scriptures, persuades us to look with an open reverence into all writ

ings that have embodied and sustained the greater pieties of the world. But to my censor it appears a thing incredible that I should find a sanctity in anything human; or deem it possible to approach religion in its truth by intercepting its errors as it percolates through history, and letting it flow clearer and clearer, till it brings a purifying baptism to the conscience of our time.

(2.) In order to give distinctness to that "religion" in relation to which I proposed to treat of "Modern Materialism," I specified "three assumptions" involved in it, of which the first and chief is the existence of the "Living God." I am reproached with making no attempt to verify them, but permitting them to "remain assumptions" "to the end." Be it so, though the statement is not quite exact: still, in every reasoned discourse assumptions have their proper place, as well as proofs; and the right selection of propositions to stand in the one position or the other depends on the speaker's thesis and the hearer's needs. My thesis was, that natural science did not displace these assumptions, because they lie beyond its range; and the proof is complete if it is shown that the logical limit of inductive knowledge stops short of their realm, and is illegitimately overstepped by every physical maxim which contradicts them. To turn aside from this line of argument in order to "verify" the primary matter of the whole discussion, would have been to set out for Exeter and arrive at York. My hearers consisted of the teachers, supporters and alumni of a Theological College; and to treat them as a body of atheists, and offer proofs of the being of a God, would have been as impertinent as for Professor Tyndall to open the session of a Geological Society with a demonstration of the existence of the earth.

(3.) A few reluctant words must suffice in answer to the

charge of "scorning the emotions." I say "reluctant words for to this side of our nature it is given to speak witho being much spoken of; to live and be, rather than be see and known; and when dragged from its retreat, it is s hurt as to change its face and become something els Here, however, little more is needed than to repeat th words which are pronounced to be so "rash" and ever "petulant"-"I trust that when emotion proves empty, w shall stamp it out and get rid of it." Do I then "scorn the "emotion" of any mind stirred by natural vicissitudes or moving realities-the cry of Andromache, "EKTоp, ya Súorvos, at the first sight of her hero's dishonoured corpse; the covered face and silent sobs of Phædon, when Socrates had drained the cup; the tears of Peter at the cock-crowing; or any of the fervent forms of mental life-the mysticism of Eckhart, the intellectual enthusiasm of Bruno, the patriotic passion of Vane? Not so; for none of these are

empty," but carry a meaning adequate to their intensity. It is for "emotion" with a vacuum within, and floating in vacuo without, charged with no thought and directed to no object, that I avow distrust; and if there be an "overshadowing awe" from the mere sense of a blank consciousness and an enveloping darkness, I can see in it no more than the negative condition of a religion yet to come. human psychology, feeling, when it transcends sensation, is not without idea, but is a type of idea; and to suppose "an inward hue and temperature," apart from any "object of thought," is to feign the impossible. Colour must lie upon form; and heat must spring from a focus, and declare itself upon a surface. If by referring religion to the region of emotion" is meant withdrawing it from the region of truth, and letting it pass into an undulation in no medium and with no direction, I must decline the surrender.