Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1885-05-30

Religion and Science Do Not Neces.
sarily Conflict.


standing room. The unusual crush was caused
J by the general desire to hear the first of Mr.
/ Beecher's proposed series of sermons on evolu-
ton in its relation To religion. The Plymouth
pastors discourse was not SO sensational as
some who had come to hear it expected or
| hoped Tor. He announced no startling change
| in his religious belief. His utterances however,
! were as bold or holder than ever, and so elo-
quenty expressed were they that even the sen.
sation hunters were not disappointed.
| Eternal life through the knowledge of God
as made known in Jesus Christ-is there any
and i earnest men, besan Mr. Beecher c @God
! likeness, immOrtality-wilat has all the world
to offer higher. nobler than that? To know
God-can il be done? The very questions which
| excite the thinking world today more than
overland they have always fingered in the
atmosphere of thought-are of such nature as
these: Is there God, personal, creative, sus-
| tanning. governing? If yes, then is it possible
Can we do MORE than to hope and dream" Can
! we know? IT there be God is il possible for
the limited intelligence OF man to understand
Him" To all these reply: The Holy Scripture
teaches that there is a personal, conscious, in
| teilIgent God; that the scope of His whole ma
ture does lie beyond the reach of the human
mind, but that enough of the Divine will and
| disposition may be known to constitute a
ground and reason for alteration. love and obe-
| dience to his WILL
ain this discourse pass by the question of
the nature of God, and shall consider how
mankind may come to the knowledge of God
by growth in grace. 1t is simply an exposition
of the truth that the knowledge of God is to be
derived chiefly from moral experience and the
moral intuitions of mankind-evoution in
moral experiences the ground and reason
| of evolution in the knowledge of God.
THE question of the origin of man is in many
| respects yet uncertain and d batable 1t is by
no means proved that he was evolved from
| the inferior mammalian world though MANY
| positively believe it. Whatever analogies or
probabilities there may be-and there are
many-there is as yet no demonstration any
thing that looks like absolute proof, do
| see yet how any bridge can be constructed over
the abyss between Inan and his ancestors, if
such there were, in the animal, inferior king
doms. which shall lead us to an absolute GER
tainty. But that the human race began at a
| very low point as compared with civilized and
Christian men there can scarcely be any
| doubt.
at is almost an absolute and demonstra-
bic certainty that the human race appeared on
the earth long periods before there any
| such chronology the church has hitherto
held. The creation of the world, according
to church chronology, was but a little over six
thousand years ago. Chronology based upon
the sacred scripture Is acknowledged by the
very men who make it to be uncertain. 1t is
hardly any longer matter OF doubt among
christian scientists that man made his appear
ance ages and ages before any such chronology
cal date as the church fixes it at The six thOus-
and years of Archbishop USHER dwindle into
a mere SemicOlon a mere comma. compared
with the geological certainties OF this matter"
APERIoD OF GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT.
Mr.. Beecher then argued at considerable
| length that the tens of thousands of years that
men inhabited the earth preceding the Bible
account of them was period of growth and de-
velopment, during which men were coming by
slow stages to Il knowledge of themselves and
from whence they sprung. "In the lower
stages of thought" he went on, "men believed
that every force that was operating god
force; that separate deity was acting. Every
thing that lived had force in it. and ten thou
sand creatures of the Imagination besides. pop
uatcd the realm around about their heads.
The next step on in the existence of gods was
the clothing Of them with some attributes. dis
position Misunderstanding their knowledge of
them from within themselves. This is what we
must do-make UP in our imagination and
reason Il conception of God derived from our
knowledge ot certain admirable moral qualities.
We are God builders. He is character
builder. So that in limited and figurative
sense ii must be said that every man creates in
himself his OWN notions of God.
THE savage S conception of God" Mr.. Beec!ler
continued, " had no place in civilization. Even
the NEUROLOGICAL divinities of Greece and Rome,
graceful though some OF them WERE had been
outgrown. At length came people that struck
the true path-the one only race SO far as we
know it now. In everything that constitutes
superior religion are indebted to the great
Hebrew stock. This branch OF the Semitic race,
the Hebrew people, have given to the world the
earliest and the only true conception OF God. 1t
Is little remarkable that the whole Christian
world to-day have set their faces and their h;t-
tired against that people that gave to them all
that they believe, from Genesis to Revelation.
There is not u line of the Old Testament or the
New that was not evolved by that race which
men now wipe their feet on or their tongue.
wiich is filthier still. But this nobler example
h Is been subject TO the great divine law of I'M
not known to antiquity-nOt even the Jewish
antiquity. The conception which they gave us,
and which has been retained ever since, was
that OF one God, the great jehovah
1T HAD To BE FOUND OUT
Mr.. Beecher went on TO say that all that man
had learned about God or themselves had been
"a matter OF finding out No instruction had
been given to mankind by God in regard to
anything. Man was compelled to gropc his
way into light. This was alike true of physical |
and moral things. God Himself was the re-
sultant of all the findings out of the human
family through the intellect and the higher
moral development OF the race. \ clearer com
ception of the personality and nature of God
would come with greater development in the
! human family. The progress of our knowledge
of what are the constituent elements of dviII-
lty Is 10 go on until the fuiginous doct zine OF
amending conscious torment is swept out of the
/ great heavens where love shines, and where
justice hates cruelty.
"ln this view let me say that the petty critI-
/ cisIns which peck at God Word are amazingly
contemplate in the presence Of this orient
light which rose in freight. but waxed brighter
and brighter toward perfect day. The petty
criticisms ought 10 be the marvel and the
wonder of men. What if there be anachroisn?
/ w hat does that amount 10? What if there
| should be mistaken dates. stumblngs OF good
men. worn out and wasted customs still en-
4
t laws permitted What if the dust and the
| detritus of wretched people and corrupt ages
should still be found here and there in the
| Bible: They are but fieeting elements and
/ nave their use in markin. the stages of deyei-
| opment by which the human intelligence rose
| from darkness into relative light and the CON
seriousness into relative purity and the higher
being born gathered To itself treasures of riches
! The Bible is not Il book written us John Milton
wrote Paradise Lost nor is ii u book written
as u man writes history. 1t is record of the
progress OF the human race in the develop
ment into the Divine idea through the medium
| Oh right living themselves. Ii IS the history of
the construction OF the nobiest elements that
belong 10 human consciousness. Should il /
! had stood upon the Acropolis and discovered
| that there were spiders in the great temple or
that there was leak in the roof, or that there
| Was dust blown upon the cOruices, blow il TO
/ the winds because saw these things in ito And
yet there are meu going about the country with
| WHY eloIuence deridinS the grandest coIIec-
ton 0f the eyoiutiOnS of human consciousness
| toward the highest ideal and with no coyfcep-
| non oi the grandeur OF this movement nor OF
The grandeur of its results
THE LIMITS OF SCIENCE
| Touching briefly upon the teachings of science,
| Mr. Beecher said: "The human intellect in the
| Ing force can never discover God except so far
| as lie Is capable of u material represe NATION
| Largely in continental Europe scientific men
stand apart, and either are agnostic or atheistic
Ihey simply say, Reason cannot tcscrys God
/ ana, therefore, as nothing can be accepted as
| true which has not had its probation in the
| school OF reason. we either don't believe or we
| ooi KNOW. Either OF them amounts to the
same thing. substantially-no God. And that
| Is the attitude to-day. But while we are in
| debted % tine spirit OF investigation for mi,ch
/ "a