waged on entirely different grounds. Thus, when Hypatia was stripped naked in the streets of Alexandria by Cyril's mob of monks, dragged into a church, and there killed by the club of Peter the Reader, it was for the offence of teaching mathematics and the philosophy of Plato and Aristotle. The subsequent conflicts were principally respecting such questions as the nature of the Godhead, the nature of the soul, the nature of the world, the age of the earth, the criterion of truth, and the government of the universe. For many hundreds of years these questions were discussed, the principal arguments employed against science being feebly typified by those of Cyril against Hypatia. Even as late as the eighteenth century the religious polemics of the day were not directed against the fundamental truths of natural religion, but against the system of theology which is based upon the interpretation which the priesthood has given to revelation. The works of Voltaire and of Paine may be cited as the best known examples. Each of these writers has been stigmatized as an atheist but Voltaire believed in God, and steadily upheld the truths of natural religion; whilst Paine, were he living to-day, would find congenial employment in the Unitarian pulpit. The effect of their polemics was great in their day and generation, but it was not lasting. They shook the foundations of creed and dogma, but not of religion. They were not atheists themselves, yet it cannot be denied that their writings have been instrumental in converting many to atheism who have not been able to distinguish between dogma and religion. This effect, however, in the very nature of things, could not be permanent; for no argument not based upon scientific induction can long prevail against the instinct of worship which is inherent in the human mind, or that hope of a life beyond the grave which springs eternal in the human breast.

The science of the nineteenth century, however, has developed an entirely new aspect of the question. The

conflict between religion and science still goes on; but the questions are different and the weapons are not the same. It is no longer a question of geography, or of astronomy, or of the shape of the earth, or of its relative magnitude and importance as compared with the other planets in the solar system. All these questions have been settled, and it will not be denied that in each of these conflicts the palm of victory has been awarded to science.

The doctrine of evolution has now given rise to another controversy (it can no longer be called a conflict) between science and religion, or, rather, between scientists and a portion of the Christian Church. On its face it is a con

troversy relating to the creation and government of the world, whether it was by a special creative act of God, followed by incessant divine intercession, or by the operation of primordial and immutable law. The Church, however, is by no means united in its opposition to the doctrine of evolution. On the contrary, many of its most progressive and enlightened adherents accept the doctrine without qualification, whilst others attempt to harmonize it with the Mosaic account of creation. There can be little doubt of the ultimate triumph of science in this, as in other controversies; and there can be as little doubt that, when the day of its triumph comes, it will be found that true religion has lost nothing. Religion has never lost anything as a result of the triumphs of science, but only as a result of misdirected zeal in opposing science. Religion, therefore, has nothing to fear from the doctrine of evolution, or from any other science, if religion is truth; for no truth is inconsistent with any other truth.

The real danger consists, not in the conflict of religion with science, but in the failure of the Church to meet the demands of science. The latter reaches its conclusions from the observation of facts, and holds that nothing is worthy of belief that is not sustained by observable phe

nomena; and it demands of the Church the same quality and character of evidence of what that institution claims to be truth as is demanded of science in support of its propositions. The failure to meet this demand is filling the civilized world with materialism; for scientists are prone to hold that whatever is not susceptible of scientific proof by the processes of induction is, ipso facto, disproved. On the other hand, this proposition is offset by many of the clergy by the declaration that questions relating to immortality and the existence of a God are not proper subjects of scientific investigation; that spiritual truths must be discerned by spiritual perception, must be seen by the eye of faith alone, — and are necessarily undemonstrable by scientific induction. Herein lies the fundamental error, an error which is fast driving the scientific world into the ranks of materialism; for science holds that truth is only sacred in the sense that error should never be allowed to usurp its place, and that anything which man desires to know is a legitimate subject of scientific investigation. In this declaration science is undoubtedly right; and it might well go a step farther, and declare that anything which it is important for man to know can sooner or later be scientifically demonstrated by the processes of inductive reasoning. In making this declaration I make no distinction between physical and spiritual laws. A psychic fact is just as much a fact as a granite mountain. If there is a God, it is important for man to know it; and there are facts which will prove it. If there is a life beyond the grave, it is important for man to know it; and there are facts which will demonstrate it beyond a peradventure. It is to the task of presenting a few of these facts that I address myself in succeeding chapters.

CHAPTER II.

DEFECTIVENESS OF THE OLD ARGUMENTS.

The Four Leading Arguments: 1. Analogical Reasoning inherently Defective. Metamorphosis. Butler's Analogy. Physical Laws not Identical with Spiritual Laws.- Illustration is not Proof. - Averroism. - Emanation and Absorption. 2. Prescriptive Authority. - The Hiding-Place of Power. - The Priesthood and Divine Revelation. — Inductive Arguments of the New Testament. 3. Philosophical Speculation. Emerson's Belief. - His Despair of Proof. - Plato's Phædo. — His Three Arguments for · Reminiscence. Immortality. The Doctrine of Contraries. Reincarnation. - The Capacity of Great Men for Minute Subdivision. The Soul a Simple Substance. The Phædo a Promoter of Suicide. 4. Instinctive Desire. -A Valid but not Conclusive Argument.

EFORE proceeding with the line of argument which it

BEFORE

is proposed to adopt in the discussion of the subjects under consideration, I deem it proper to say a few words regarding the methods of reasoning which have heretofore prevailed, with the view of pointing out a few of the salient defects in the arguments commonly employed, as viewed from a purely scientific and logical standpoint. This will not be done in any spirit of censure or fault-finding; for I cannot be unaware of the difficulties which have heretofore environed the whole subject-matter, and of the practical impossibility of formulating a conclusive argument in the absence of those facts which have come to light only within the last quarter of a century. No one can justly be blamed for failure to reason inductively in the absence of facts per

taining to the subject-matter of his speculation; and no man can be justly censured, except from an ultra-scientific standard of reasoning, for accepting, without too critical an examination, such arguments as were available in support of a doctrine which has given to mankind so much of comfort and consolation as the belief in a future life has afforded to a great majority of the human race. For, much as we may deprecate many of the dogmas of the Church, much as we may deride the crude speculations of men regarding the future destiny of the soul and its rewards and punishments, the fact remains that they have all served their purpose in their day and generation; and it is difficult now to see how the world could have gotten along without them. Their terrors have been a potent means of restraint from wrong-doing among men whom nothing else could restrain; and their promises have filled the human heart with consolation in this life, and placed the iris above the door of the sepulchre. Each dogma, each system of religious belief, has been a step in the evolution of the human mind towards a knowledge of the attributes, the powers, and the destiny of man.

In looking backward, therefore, over the tortuous and difficult pathway which the human mind has been compelled to tread in its search for evidences of the reality of that most important of all the objects of human aspiration, immortal life, it would ill become us to despise, or affect to despise, any one of the gradients by which mankind has been gradually lifted into a purer intellectual atmosphere, and enabled to enjoy a clearer perception of truth. In this spirit it is proposed briefly to examine the arguments which have heretofore been advanced in support of the doctrine of a future life, and to test their validity by the simple but infallible rules of logic which every intelligent reader understands and appreciates. If the old arguments are found invalid or inconclusive from a scientific stand