SCIENCE AND FAITH

Press, Volume LXX, Issue 21246, 18 August 1934, Page 17

SCIENCE AND FAITH

The Great Design. Edited by Frances Mason. Angus and Robertson Ltd. 259 pp. (7/6.) "A mud-pie made by two blind children, Matter and Force." Fourteen scientists of international eminence, biologists, geologists, chemists, physicists, astronomers, have each contributed a chapter of this book, to prove or to declare their faith—are these the same?—that order and intelligent design, the work of a supreme creative mind, are everywhere visible in the processes of nature. As the anti-pro-position stands it has been easy for each contributor to show that mudpies are mysteries, that force and matter are not definable apart and together are a portion of time, and that if these artificers of the world are blind no one knows it. Yet when the question of questions hidden in that word "blind" is reasked—ls there a design and what has it to do with us?—who can answer, unless he knows what the design is? And neither Hans Driesch nor Sir Oliver Lodge, nor Professors Metcalf, Eve, and Crowther, nor any other contributor is able to say, "Here it is: it is good." No man can do that. He can look and marvel, work and pray, enjoy his life, be faithful in difficulty, communicate his helpfulness and courage, and hope it is not all waste; but he can do no more, and no contributor here thinks of doing more than this. The value of the design, if it is a design riot synonymous with chance, remains undisclosed. It is secretly personal both in the scope of the. individual and the greater individuality beyond him. It is only what it can be thought to be, a great hope shadowed by a great doubt.