sions: Either the two causes are independent, in which case we have what may be called Bi-theism; or one is dependent on the other, in which case the dependent one can but be a mode of manifestation of the other, and we are at once thrust back on the conception of a single Unknown Cause.

In a classification of the various types of philosophy, the reviewer says,

"Is the organism purely the product of the environment? then we have empiricism, sensationalism, materialism." [And, after defining idealism :] "Are the organism and environment both products of some underlying and active unity? then we have identity or pantheism."

Under which of these heads does the reader suppose the reviewer classes Mr. Spencer? Of course, it will be said, under the last. Has he not been reproaching Mr. Spencer with Monism, and insisting on the truth of Dualism? and is not this the theory of Monism, that the organism and environment are both products of some underlying and active unity? Of course, then, the class which asserts this last proposition is that in which he places Mr. Spencer. Not at all. He puts Mr. Spencer in the first class, and then proceeds to show, on the strength of it, his inconsistency; asserts that Mr. Spencer makes his election in empiricism, but shrinks from the acceptance of its necessary implications. He then expends a couple of pages on the unscientific character of empiricism, all of which is supposed to tell against Mr. Spencer; though, as we have already seen, he has repeatedly repudiated empiricism, and though the reviewer's own definitions exclude him from the empirical school.

Again :

"He (Mr. Spencer) sets aside the three theories of Theism, Atheism, and Pantheism, as equally claiming to comprehend the incomprehensible; and will not suffer 'religion' to use either of them as means or helps in the discovery of truth. Yet, by his own showing, the idea of Space, Time, Matter, Motion, and Force, which he allows science to use in her own investigations, are precisely as incomprehensible as the idea of God. What sort of consistency or impartiality is this?" (p. 253, 254.)

VOL. LXXXII. — NEW SERIES, VOL. III. NO. II.

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Theism, then, according to the reviewer, is not a truth,

-

but

a help in the discovery of truth. In this case, it is not clear what is his ground of quarrel with Mr. Spencer. Certainly, Mr. Spencer objects to Theism, Atheism, and Pantheism, only in so far as they claim to be ascertained truths; and if the reviewer regards them simply as convenient hypotheses, to be used as "helps in the discovery of truth," he will find it hard to point out in Mr. Spencer's work any demurrer to their being so used. Having first represented him, not as denying each of these theological formulas to be an ascertained truth, which he does, but as disallowing the use of it as a help to the discovery of truth, which he does not, the reviewer proceeds to say, that Mr. Spencer is inconsistent in allowing science to use, in her own investigations, the ideas of Space, Time, Matter, Motion, and Force, which are precisely as incomprehensible. Now, if Mr. Spencer had used, or proposed that science should use, Matter, Motion, &c., as words severally standing for a positive theory, in the same way as Theism or Atheism does, there would be the inconsistency charged. But he does nothing of the kind. Over and over again he asserts that they are to be used as symbols of things unknown; that all which science can do is to simplify the equations expressed in these symbols; and that, when it has reduced the equations to their lowest forms, the unknown quantities are unknown quantities still.* Where, then, are the alleged inconsistencies? Mr. Spencer rejects the atheistic or the theistic idea, in so far as it claims to be a piece of definite knowledge; and he equally rejects every idea of Matter or Force which pretends to be a piece of definite knowledge, having elaborately shown that every such idea ends in absurdity. If the proposition that the universe has resulted from the act of a Creator, and every other proposition professing to be an explanation of the universe, had been described by Mr. Spencer as inadmissible; and if he had then accepted such a proposition as that matter consists of atoms, or that it is composed of unextended monads, or that it is

* See First Principles, chap. xvii.

made up of centres of force, he would have assumed for science a liberty which he denied theology. But, while he rejects as unthinkable every proposition respecting the nature of the universe in general, he equally rejects as unthinkable every proposition respecting the nature of matter. While he admits that we are obliged to use, for the purpose of investigation, the conception of matter as formed of units, yet he expressly points out that such conceptions, being merely the product of our own forms of thought, must not be understood as corresponding to the reality; and he takes just as much care to show that such a conception, if supposed to represent the reality, brings us to contradictory absurdities, as he takes to show that the conception named Atheism or Pantheism, if supposed to represent the reality, brings us to the same result.

Perhaps it will still be said, that, as Mr. Spencer admits an hypothesis respecting the constitution of Matter to be used by science, and holds as valid the conclusions thereby reached, he ought to admit the legitimacy of the hypothesis of Theism as a means of reaching possibly valid theological conclusions. The reply is, that the conclusions proposed to be reached in the two cases are of totally different orders, and claim to be truths in totally different senses. The only truths proposed to be reached by this hypothesis respecting the constitution of matter are constant relations of co-existence and sequence among phenomena; whereas the truths proposed to be reached by one of these theological hypotheses are truths concerning noumenal existence underlying phenomena. The propositions which science aims by such means to establish, pretend only to express the order among the manifestations of the Unknowable; whereas the propositions which theology aims by such means to establish, pretend to express the nature of the Unknowable itself. Relative truth is the assigned end in the one case; absolute truth in the other. Yet Mr. Spencer is called inconsistent, because the method of inquiry which he admits as legitimate in the one case, he considers illegitimate in the other.

The reviewer goes on to say in the next sentence,

"And further, when we find him identifying the Unknowable with the scientific idea of Force, and predicating of it Unity, Omnipresence, and Causation, at the very same time that he denies our right to predicate of it any attributes at all, what shall we say of such surreptitious and ostensibly disallowed predications?" (p. 254.)

In

Let us take by itself the first clause of this sentence. it Mr. Spencer is represented as identifying the Unknowable with the scientific idea of Force. Now, inasmuch as the scien tific idea of Force, as understood commonly, and as understood even by men of science, is supposed to be something of which we have a conception, Mr. Spencer is here made to appear as identifying the unknowable with something that is conceivable. But the identification which he makes is exactly the reverse of this. Already, in his chapter on "Ultimate Scientific Ideas," he has shown that the scientific idea of Force, when pushed to the last result, is not an idea at all, but the sign of something unknown; and, in his chapter on the "Persistence of Force," he takes especial care to insist upon the truth there arrived at, that the Force which science postulates in all its inquiries and conclusions is no one of the forces for which science has a name; but that what is tacitly postulated by the doctrine of the persistence of force, is really that Unknowable Cause of which the forces dealt with by science are manifestations. The reviewer's proposition should thus be inverted. He should have said that Mr. Spencer merges the scientific idea of Force into the Unknowable; and, had he said this, the sentence would have had a quite contrary implication. The difference is as great as that between saying of any one that he identifies morality with good manners, and that he identifies good manners with morality.

Turning to the criticism on Mr. Spencer's treatment of the question of Religion and Science, we again find the reviewer making his points by misrepresentations. He sets out by distinguishing between two meanings of the word “religion;” saying, truly enough, that "while religious knowledge, supposing it to exist, is what we more properly call theology,

religion is a term more properly confined to the emotional and moral phenomena which reciprocally cause, and are caused by, the consciousness of our relations to God." If for the word "God" we read "Unknowable Cause," this is the meaning given to the word "religion" all through the first part of Mr. Spencer's work. The reviewer, however, makes it appear that Mr. Spencer means by religion what is more properly called theology; and thereupon proceeds to evolve inconsistencies from his argument. He does this by the help of a certain quotation which seems to bear the alleged construction, but which a moment's thought shows does not bear it. The sentence is, "Every religion is an a priori theory of the universe." Now, it might have been thought sufficiently clear, that any one who speaks of an individual religion, either singly or as one of a number, means a system of theology. Current usage has established a wide distinction between "religion" spoken of without reference to any creed, and "a religion," as Catholicism or Mahometanism, which becomes individualized by virtue of its creed. But the reviewer has overlooked this very plain distinction. He has dealt with the sentence as though it ran, " Religion is an a priori theory of the universe." This is a proposition of an entirely different meaning, one which probably nobody would make, and totally at variance with the whole tenor of Mr. Spencer's argument. Yet it is on the strength of this reading that the reviewer goes on to manufacture a page full of incongruities. He might have been excused for this misconstruction, had there been no passage showing that it could not be the right one; but he ignores the repeated proofs that by "religion Mr. Spencer means the emotional state produced by the contemplation of the Unknowable, and deliberately asserts in the teeth of them that by religion Mr. Spencer means theology, or the intellectual theory of religion.*

We close these remarks, which might easily be extended to a much greater length, with some passages in a private

* The reader may verify the foregoing by reference to pp. 17, 44, 98, 100, 107, of "First Principles."