ARTICLE III.

Theology as a Science.

WITH all enlightened thinkers to whom the being and providence of God are realities the construction of a genuine theology must be regarded as one of the possibilities of science. The sense also of a need in science for a theology meriting the name must be felt by all such, not only for their own sake, but for the sake of the world as well; because the religious thought of the world is growing, and must continue to grow, in a way that demands rational statements for the expression of relig ious truth.

Among all the principal theologies of the world there is not one that is scientific in any true sense. There never has been in all the past of our race, among the widely-prevalent forms of religious teaching, a system of divinity constructed that was intelligently based on the real nature of things, and that agreed with the actual relations and actual movements of the universe. None of the great doctors or councils has ever yet presented a statement and definition of the spiritual and divine in being, and of their operation, that was truly scientific. The fact is, the religious thought and life of the world have not yet become quite sufficiently developed for the presentation and acceptance of a theology that is at once truly scientific in idea and truly devotional in spirit.

That there is a Divinity-a power omniscient, omnipotent and every way supreme, of which in some sense all objective being is a manifestation, is almost universally believed, and to a degree universally acknowledged. Men seem intuitively to perceive thus much in every stage of their progress above the plane of the lowest savagery of which we know, if not even there also; for there seems to be cause to think that the very lowest of tribes have a faint perception of this character, notwithstanding the adverse conclusions of traveling observers, at first, as to the total irreligiousness of the Australian, the Andaman Islander and others. Be this as it may, there is a point

in the æonian progress of life at which the ideas of imperishable spirit and of Divinity are developed in the finite mind universally; so that everywhere men in some way perceive that visible nature is but the effect, or manifestation of an invisible but intelligent and almighty Power and Essence, the being, the thought and the actuation of which are symbolized by the numberless forms, intricate movements and infinitely varied processes that eternally are coming and going in that determination of being that we call objective.

But at first all the thoughts that men have concerning what they perceive with regard to God in the universe are necessarily very crude, and various too, according to the endless differences of environment and state in which they are condi tioned. Therefore as their varying thoughts and notions are enunciated and promulgated, doctrines relating to God, his being, his operation and his rule arise, and around different centers become established in the world, each of which aims to represent the best religious thought, each of which, too, claims to embody the conclusions of such thought as finalities, -as points that are settled beyond dispute or even the liberty of doubt or cavil; and so from the earliest historic ages every great division of the race has had its peculiar form of religious belief and worship which it has held as final.

The religious element, like every natural element of our being, affords ground for instruction, and gives rise to the advent, from time to time, of teachers and leaders of the people in religion, just as the advent occurs of teachers and leaders of every other kind. But the tendency of the teachers and leaders is to systematize their thought and their work. The teachers and leaders in religion, the priests, doctors and ecclesiastics, have constituted and adopted such embodiments of dogma and such principles of administration as in their united wisdom they decided to be best adapted to the people's needs, and most truly calculated to promote harmony in worship and order in morals; and so each great people has, or has had, its religious system, with its assumptions concerning the Godhead, concerning the divine power and the divine rule, and concerning its own order of ad

ministration. The prophets and poets, who feel the sacred fire of inspiration burning in their souls too strongly to admit of silence on their part, often give utterance to thoughts far in advance of their time (for which generally they are made to suffer). These new thoughts have their effect, for they find a lodgment in many receptive minds, and at least in a modified form they become practically incorporated in the prevailing systems, notwithstanding the assumed infallibility of the systems.

In the past history of religion, as must have been the case in times of universal ignorance among the masses, tradition and fable furnished large material for the construction of theologies, according to the limited conceptions of men concerning the nature of things, the real facts of inspiration, and of revelation through inspiration, and through every form of divine descent from the realm of the invisible immortal. Occasionally a prophet arises gifted with so extraordinary a measure of the divine anointing-so high and so intense a degree of inspiration, and with a personality so peculiar and powerful that very many followers gather around him or succeed him, who partake of his ideas and imbibe his spirit according to their understanding and measure, so that in his name a new movement in religion is begun, and a reformation occurs. This new

movement spreads in spite of opposition even to deadly persecution on the part of the old system till it gains millions of adherents, and acquires a prominent position; and so while religion itself is but one thing, many and various theologies or systems of religious doctrine and worship, come into being all along the line of our career on earth.

But no system of divinity that has ever yet been devised, and adopted by any considerable portion of the race, is a genuine theology. There are serious defects in all the great systems-defects of idea, of structure, of spirit and of manifestation. The great defect underlying all others in the building of theological structures, through all the past, lies in the assuumption that religious knowledge, an understanding of spiritual and divine things, can be primarily attained, not through

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natural processes, but only through "supernatural" communications, or a special interposition of divine power in a manner above the principles and operations of nature, and independently of them-a manner altogether different from the usual and immutable method of the Supreme Spirit naturally in and through all being. Such "supernatural interpositions were assumed as affording the basis of all right theological thought; and this to an utter neglect of that scientific study of nature in every department, visible and invisible, which brings the universe to view as one harmonious whole, with all its determinations, "material and spiritual;" with all its conditions and operations, material, physical, spiritual and divine.

But this study of nature in every accessible department of being, visible and invisible, is the very thing that is needed, because nature is the universal expression of the being, mind and operation of the one Spirit eternal and supreme. Whatever God does, whether to us of an ordinary or extraordinary character, whether in a manner plain to our present understanding or in a manner too mysterious for our immediate comprehension, we may safely feel sure that he does it according to his own eternal method, and that universal nature is his method.

As no subject can be truly known while considered from only one point of view, or in only one aspect of its existence, or in an unnatural or assumed "supernatural" aspect, and as the "supernatural" has always been assumed as the basis of religious knowledge, the grossest errors have arisen in theology, and prevailed, so that systems of doctrine contrary to nature and antagonistic to science have been established by priestly authority, all along the path of history.

Tradition and fable have so ruled, literally, in the religious world, that all the theology that any considerable portion of mankind has as yet had is little, if anything, more than a mythology, of monstrous form and dire portent, in which an unnatural and fickle deity and his equally unnatural and determined opponent, the devil, have acted the principal parts; while virtually the supreme Spirit himself, the infinite Soul of 3

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being, the eternal Father in and through all and directly accessible to every one of his children, has been ignored, and left out of consideration. Indeed, things came to such a pass in theology, long ago, that practically God was not deemed accessible at all except through the interposition of a device, and the administration of a priesthood for proclaiming and exhibiting the device; so that while the theology of the world was but a mythological fabric its religious economy was but little more than the exercise of a craft of priestly rule and power.

The pure, simple, divine life and teaching of the Christ, the force of his example and spirit, the natural march of mind and the discoveries of science, from time to time, through great, and often through the very sorest conflict, have compelled virtual modifications, revisions and supplements in the world's theology, all along through the later ages of history to the present day; but with all the advancement in religious thought that has as yet been made, the world has still no widelyacknowledged theology that is in harmony with the facts of nature and the system of the universe as discerned by science, in any department of her universal and legitimate realm of investigation and study, or as indicated by any of her legitimate methods of investigation, physical or metaphysical, historical or philosophical.

For we must not forget, as some writers and lectures seem to forget, and as even some specialists in science seem to forget, that science is philosophical knowledge as well as an understanding of physical facts; that it is a knowledge, too, of facts in the psychical and spiritual realms, as well as of facts in the realm of matter; that it embraces the philosophical investigation of universal phenomena both objective and subjective, and that everything that can be known as existing, whether visible or invisible, material or spiritual, is a legitimate subject of scientific investigation;-in fact, that there is nothing, that there can be nothing that is not of a knowable nature, though to the finite mind through all its immortal years of progress in changing the unknown to the known, there must still forever remain a realm unknown in the advance. True science admits