RELIGION AND SCIENCE.

Dominion, Volume 1, Issue 20, 18 October 1907, Page 11

RELIGION AND SCIENCE.

THE DEFENCE OF REVELATION. BRITISH. ASSOCIATION.. Saturday, August j, was devoted by those members of the British Association lor the Advancement of Science who elected to spend 1 the: week-end near tlio scene of their labours to geographical, botanical, or otlior scientific researches in tho neighbourhood of Leicester, or to excursions, tho main object of which was unmixed relaxation or pleasure combined with a minimum of scientific investigation. | On August 4 special sermons were preached at'many, churches, among the preachers being the Bishop of Southwark, tho Bishop of, Glasgow, ami tlio liishop of Peterborough. One of the features of the Sunday gatherings 'was the defenco of revelation and warning against modern rationalism by tlio Jesuit astronomer, Father, Cortie. Experience and Faith. The Mayor of Leicester attended St. Martin's Church in State. Tho service was proached by the Bishop" of Southwark, who > took for his text Matthew xxii. 35, and fol- : lowing verses, "One of them, a lawyer, asked Him a question, tempting Him, and saying, |Master, which is the 'great commandment ,in the Law?' . And He said unto him, 'Thou heart, and with all t£y soul,, and with nil thy heart and :with all tliy soul and with all thy mind. This is .the first and great comm- : mandment. And the .second is like unto it. Thou sbalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law ; and. the :prophets." He declared that .we should: bo wrong to say that these words contained the sum of Christianity, because , it would leave the Divino speaker out of account, but they might bo taken as covering 'the moral and spiritual demand upon men, .and tlioy suggested some thoughts as to the . naturo of'the. Christian claim. Ho. insisted that tho value of light was; best understood Oy those 1 who had seen it shine, and tlia? Christian faith must ho made by self-search-;ing. But what 1 could self-witness-;be —what form'icould it'take in such a case? It must come by the interpretation of experience 011- , the common Toad of ■ all. ' knowledge. Only .- ; tho experience must-not be thought of as . .monotonous ■or stationary. There was nothing to show that Nature, in tho largest sense did; not yield npw things, or that new things' did' not manifest themselves through her: There was. much -to show tho opposite. .Nor, again, was thero any shadow of reason for'assuming that the highest truth or new truth was .merely the mechanical yield of experience which was working upon tho receiving machmo', in man. The intellect of man in all time; from Homer'onward, in experience could; witness'to religion, if tlioy took experience whole as they ' found it, and did not limit it. Man was a part of nature, and the things of his heart and brain-were part . of the facts. : There were things which seemed to him as'real for tho man who interpreted the facts-as. were, tlio ?olar systom, or the order of the seasons. First, there was the-feeling'in man, dim, inarticulate, apparently contradicted, and yet persistent, that 'he received through the mighty - order - of things,, visible, real-impressions which 1 were neither graphic/ numerable or ponderable, those impressions, crude or refined, of the man who shuddered, when the sky was black, aind quivered before the thunderbolt or the lightning spear of .Jove. A second thing ,was the mystery of the impressions on the con•scierico of 'man—that conscience which was the most intimate .part of himself, which •made things'what tlioy. wero, whatever tlioy seemed to be. These things wero part of ex-perience,'-and all the splendid fearlessness of 1 inexorable scientific- analysis ' had only ma'do-the realities moro real, until-th#y had heard men say on all hands that materialism was out of date. Truth must have certain' characteristics. By'upholding, by: fulfilment,' the truth must be, indeed, and effectually, new—an altogether 1 new thing, 'of » which"."lithe like had •never before been seen. It must inaugurate and l make 'the' world '-'a 'new placo. These ;things" were, .in a measure, true'-of every epoch-riiaking step in - thought and its - achievement," but tho 1 claimant-for 'the name of • the truth must have more to show than that. Thero must' bo finality,' though not in ' tho sense of leaving men nothing to look forward to; "The Gospel of Christ, in/a wonderful degreo,'makes a way to satisfy thes'o demands, and they had, in the words of his text, a clear instance of interpretation and fulfilment. Christ drew them from the-Old Testament, and laid' stress ,on t-ho fact. The double commandment was final; there-was neither spiritual nor moral'progress-beyond., Natural and Supernatural.. The enlinent ! Jesuit' astronomer from Stonyhurst .preached at' St. Patrick's' in the morning. The knowledge of natural phenomena was, he said, an excellent thing',, its 'immediato. objects ibeing all the. creatures with which the Almighty had peopled this universe! Tho methods of science consisted in experiment and observation,'but in order to enunciate' the great laws of science'which flowed from experiment and observation,was required a sound philosophy, which must bo consonant:' with' the' rules of right reason. True science .consisted not only of the' study of things, 1 but of tho'cause of things." Wo were'bound; to admit tho principle'of' causal l ity,-arid, this principlo, pushed, to'its logical consequences,, showed 1 the existenco of a pri-mary-canso'or. Almighty God. ; Such n knowledge of God would be a : mere natural knowledge, arid would riot be meritorious of eternal life. _ Still, "it 'could bo obtained by . all who studied "the fapts of ; nature,-' and those who had: not attained to' such knowledge were condemned as- vaiif in '.the Book of Wisdom'.' ; But there was a higher order than, the more 'natural order, and that was the supernatural, or 1 tlio order of grace. ' Our first parents had been placed in this order by tho gratuitous gift of God. ■ They ' had lost this state, and tlio corresponding gifts, by sin, and it had required'the Incarnation of the second Person of ; the Blessed Trinity and His' death upon the Cross to restoro to us this order of grace. Tlio : channels of grace were the' Sacraments in the Christian Dispensation; : and one • obtained admittance ' . to,tho supernatural' order by the sacrament .of baptism., l With' this: sacrament was 'also' •conveyed the habit of faith by which we wero enabled to" believe; without doubting the truths of revelation which had been committed to the Church, of. Christ. The naturo of faith was tho authority of God, who'was infinitely true and wise. There could bo 110 contest; between natural science and supernatural science, because 'the God "of Naturo was'the God of Faith, who could not contradict himself:, The Catholic Church was no enemy >to ' scientific progress, but welcomed all the' discoveries of science, provided tlioy woro consonant with a right philosophy or system of thought. 1 AH' tho discoveries of science could 'oiily redound to the credit of religion. Tho sermon concluded with an exhortation to preserve true faith and a warning against the rationalistic tendencies of much modern literature and preaching founded upon false analogies, which could not stand tho test of scientific investigations.