RATIONALISM AND REASON
[To the Editor of THE SPEcTATOR.] Sra,—Lady Simon's letter raises great issues, and begs many questions ; but the present state of Europe seems to supply the answer to her statement about " the firmer ground of human ideals." The civilised world is thickly strewn with the wreckage of human ideals, which has been steadily accumulating since the seventeenth century.
Much of the language of the Christian religion is of necessity mythological, but not therefore superstitious. Even if the extreme view be taken that all the statements of the Apostles' Creed are probably untrue, it might yet be claimed that the Christian religion gives the only coherent account of the Most intractable problem in the universe—the moral reformi- tion and co-ordination of human character—and offers an equally coherent method for its solution. On this subject, May I refer to the lectures of the late Professor Josiah Royce on "The Problem of Christianity" ?
The fatal objection to all naturalist and humanist systems of moral philosophy is that they issue in a final incoherence, and give rise to the most dangerous of all superstitions—. the slavery of the mind to the magical power of abstract Stoke Prior Vicarage, Bromsgrove, Worcestershire.
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