Morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven [Conn.]) 1848-1894, 1884-02-16

w Oell6V9 absence
We believed Az, believe SO firmly. so fully
SO positively, that we would, and indeed do
stake daily our lives, OR fortunes, all we
hold dear, npon the absolute truth of linn
tied experience, and upon the validity of con-
illusions founded upon an Elf So firmly,
SO fully, so positively do we believe, that
even rigid demonstration, If it were ettsina-
bic, could add to our conviction not one par
ticle of strength acs
Who, then, can question our position if we
choose to go one step farther and add still
one more assn nption to those which science
accepts? If we assume in addition that which
all experience confirms and all analogy sug-
gests-that identity of plan implies commu-
nifty of origin, that the correspondence of
mind and nature demands the recognition of
common source for both. that 'sthe divine
image photographed upon the soul of man
from the great center of all light is every
where seen reflected from the works of crea-
tion?" That, in short, it may well be more
than mere poetic fancy which sees in this
earth
thought"
Surely not the man of science! Does his
boosted knowledge stand upon SO sure a
foundation that he can call a halt just here?
We go to analogy, as he does, and analogy
suggests it. We look abroad upon the works
of nature and they confirm it. We look
within, and the experience of every heart
and the constitution of every mind demand
it. We go to all experience for an answer,
and we find that all experience is but
San arch wherethrop
CLEANS that untraveled world whose margin fades
Forever and forever as We move"
My friends, it seems to me that in these
days of the NEW dark ages"
sswhen the bat comes out OF his cave
And the owls are WhOoping at noon,"
the greatest debt we owe to science, apart
from all she has done or is doing for our
bodily comfort and mental develop
ment, is for the lesson of
faith she is thus eeer teaching u.s.
Faith is the invisible and the intangible. The
lesson, that reason and faith must ever go
hand in hand, that poetry and science are
twin sisters. The lesson, that man can never
feel sure of attaining absolute knowledge
that pure truth is not for him, that just SO
surely as he walks by reason, and by reason
only, just so surely he will reach a point
where reason halts and waits on faith; that
the only essential difference between relig-
ious and scientific faith is, that while the one
finds its only justification in the limited ex-
perience of the Senses the other finds in
addition higher justification in the expert
ence Of the soul.
And in view of this is it not indeed well for
man that absolute truth should be for him
thus unattainabIe? That he should be gifted
with this
Esprit yearning In desire
To follow knowledge like sinking star
that he should ever seek, and strive, and long
for truth; and be forever doomed to seek,
and strive, and long in vain? In the memo
rable words of one of Germany's great poets
and scholars: ''If God held all truth shut in
his right hand, and in his left hand nothing
but the ever restless instinct for truth,
though with the condition of forever and
forever erring, and should say to me- choosel
I would bow reverently to his left hand, and
say, Father giveI Pure truth is for thee
alone!"
Why? "To know everything would be to
learn nothing; to be deprived of the highest,
purest pleasure this earth affords; to have no
hopes, no lofty desires-With consciousness
worthless and volition a farce" But worse
than all this and beyond ell this it would be
| to lose the daily testimony of science to the
efficacy of faith; the strongest proof of the
validity of religious belief.
For how does religious belief essentially
differ from the scientific? Like science it has
reason for its guide, and like science, too it
defines that reason must go hand in hand
with faith. This faith, like science, it bases
| on experience and on cumulative proof; and
like science, too, analogy leads it on to specu-
| lations which are found to accord with all
we know. But here, and in this one thing it
differs; it adds to reason faith and to faith
hope!
s'ThAt hope which dares to feel
"Altho' no tongue can prove,
That veileth love, Itself is love-"
That hope, which amidst all the wranglngs
of science and all tho pelemics of theology
can look up and say with all the serenity of a
confidence that cannot be shaken
| 'Our little systems have their day;
They have their day and cease to be:
They but broken lights of thee,
| And thou, Lord, art more than they"
That hope, which, like science, is based
upon faith, but which, unlike science, tran
sends experience; that hope, which science
does not impart and which science cannot de-
stroy which, rising triumphant from the
depths of sorrow and despair, and the ashes
of bereavement can gaze unterrifed through
even the dark portals of death itself, and
with all the confidence of radiant conviction,
| exclaim
| THAT nothing walks with aimless feet"
| That not one life shall be destroyed
| Or cast rubbish to the Void,
| When God hath made the pile complete