18 OCTOBER 1935, Page 21

Religion and Science

By the VERY REV. W. R. INGE

LORD RUSSELL is a formidable controversialist, and in this book he deals, as we might expect, shrewd blows at those

• who still think that the cause of religion may be defended against triumphant naturalism. He believes in science, and " cannot admit any other method of arriving at truth." " Whatever knowledge is attainable must be attained by scientific methods."

He believes in science as the only avenue to truth. And yet for him all truth is relative. The question between Galileo and the Inquisition was " only one of convenience in description, not of objective truth." It is not an intellectual . error to say that the sun goes round the earth. Now this may • be good science—it is not for me to say—but I think it is bad Philosophy. If all truth is relative, there is no standard by Which to measure anywhere, and the word truth, which has an absolute meaning, had better be dropped. Some of our Physicists and astronomers dabble in subjective idealism, I • think illegitimately. We cannot begin with atoms (no matter how much minced up) regarded as concrete entities, and end with mental concepts. Science is based on realistic assump- tions, and cannot drop them at will.

The assumption of universal relativity leads Lord Russell, quite logically, of course; to declare dogmatically that there are no absolute values. Now as religion rests entirely on the belief that the ultimate values are absolute, all possibility of agreement is cut off at the outset. If he is right, religion is not worth discussing. • For him, " mysticism expresses an emotion, not a fact ; it does not assert anything, and therefore can be neither con- firmed nor contradicted by science." Religion poaches when it " makes assertions about what is and not only about What ought to be." " Questions as to values lie wholly out- side the domain of knowledge." " What science cannot discover, mankind cannot know," . • No papal bull could be more dogmatic than these statements. But a Christian philosopher would deny every one of them. He is not interested in what ought to be, but in what is. Mysticism seeks for facts, not emotions. Spiritual truth is not apprehended by science ; but it is, in Plato's language, true " knowledge," whereas our views about the external World are only " opinion." Those who attack religion without Perceiving the foundation on which it rests may do some pretty sniping at the outposts, but they will never carry the main position.

Let us suppose, with some not inconsiderable thinkers, that reality is spiritual, and that it is partially. but truly revealed

to us under the three forms of truth, love (or goodness), and beauty, which the religious mind believes to be the attributes of a living and unchanging Creator. Then we approach nearest to truth and reality (the two words are almost inter- changeable) when our minds arc most fully possessed by the quest of truth, the experience of love, and the appreciation of beauty. The proof is experimental ; in following these three ideal's we arc at once lifted above ourselves and exalted into a higher state of being. We feel and know that we are in contact with reality. In all philosophy we come to a place Where we must trust ourselves ; and no other experiences can he compared with these.

Within this scheme, science holds a very honourable place. It is entirely false to say that science gives us facts without values. This is a most fallacious abstraction ; there is no Perception without valuation. Science is the service of one of the ultimate values, truth. Nor'is it possible, since human Religion and Science. By Bertrand Russell. (Homo University Library Thornton Butterworth. 2s. 6d.) nature is after all one, to pursue one of these uldinate values alone. Lord Russell is by no means an example of scientific detachment when he encounters cruelty, oppression, and injustice. But, speaking broadly, we may say that Darwin, St. Francis, and Wordsworth climbed the hill of the Lard by different paths. Does Lord Russell really think that only the first attained to real knowledge ?

If I am right, Lord Russell has begun his study of religion with presuppositions which predetermine his verdict against it, and prevent him from understanding the religious view of reality. Science is a noble pursuit, but the saint and the poet or artist have equal rights ; and it is a happy truth that those who follow any one of these eternal spiritual values are not much cramped by their specialising, for the three, though distinct, are united as "a threefold cord not quickly broken."

Having thus made our necessary protest, we are free to enjoy the brilliant sword-play of the author. He has a heavy indictment against ecclesiastics for taking away the key of knowledge, and persecuting those who wished to explore new truths. I have no wish to defend them. Rome especially has always been a bully, under Diocletian, under the Popes, and now under Mussolini. It has believed in coercion. We cannot make a man unsee, but we can sometimes make him unsay, or at least we may make him hold his tongue. But I think there have been times—say in the fourth century and in the thirteenth, when theology was abreast of the best thought of the time ; and Lord Russell himself thinks it possible that religion and science will soon cease to quarrel. Our angry passions haVe been diverted to politics, and those who value what Bismarck called the imponderables may find themselves on the same side.

Some of the sly hits are delicious. When chloroform was

first used in childbirth, the clergy quoted Genesis " In sorrow shall thou bring forth children." " Yes, but God gave Adam an anaesthetic when He extracted his rib." " True, but He never gave the woman one."

" The Hegelians identified the moral law with the law of the State, so that true freedom' consisted in obeying the police. This doctrine was much liked by governments." His criticism of alleged cosmic purpOse is, I am afraid, unanswerable; " Why' did the sun give birth to planets ? Why did the earth cool, and at last give rise to life ? Because in the end something admirable was going to result—I am not quite sure what, but I think it was scientific theologians and religiously-minded scientists."

It is well known that there is a keen controversy between the mechanicists and those whom their opponents call vitalists, as to whether the laws which regulate inorganic matter are sufficient to explain the phenomena of life, mind, and spirit. Lord Russell very dogmatically, as usual, supports the mechanicists, and says that only " a very few " men of science hold the opposite opinion. Oddly enough, this is almost a quarrel between the two old Universities. I once asked the doyen of Cambridge science what he thought of Professor • John Haldane's views on this subject. He shook his head, and said, " We think him a heretic." But at Oxford he is strongly supported. Lord Russell, of course, is a Cambridge man.

The book ends with the sadly true warning that "the threat to intellectual freedom is greater in our day than at any time since 1660 ; but it does not now come from the Christian churches." We may trust a determinist to be a champion of freedom, like the Calvinists ; the Jesuits, the apostles of free- will, have been the worst enslavers of the mind and conscience. Should a philosopher laugh or weep over the vagaries of human nature ?