The Scientific Spirit of the Age, and Other Pleas and Discussions

Transcriber’s Note:
The cover image was created by the transcriber and is placed in the public domain.
FRANCES POWER COBBE
AUTHOR OF “AN ESSAY ON INTUITIVE MORALS,” “RELIGIOUS DUTY,” “BROKEN LIGHTS,” “THE HOPES OF THE HUMAN RACE,” “THE PEAK IN DARIEN,” “THE DUTIES OF WOMEN,” “A FAITHLESS WORLD,” ETC.
BOSTON
GEO. H. ELLIS, 141 FRANKLIN STREET
1888
We are all possessed of friends who, when any serious belief or matter of practical conduct is in question, take up at the outset a thesis of their own which they press on our acceptance with the best arguments at their disposal. It is a rarer privilege to enjoy the intercourse of one who does not invariably start with a ready-made opinion of what may be true, right, or expedient in the doubtful case on which we wish to consult him, but who will patiently turn over the matter with us, suggest and register the various “pros and cons,” refer to admitted principles and facts, and thus aid us to form a comprehensive judgment for ourselves rather than induce us to accept his own. The discourse of the first order of friends is an Argument, a Plea, a Contention; that of the second, a Discussion.
In the present little collection of Essays, written at various times and for various objects, it will be found that the first three belong to the class which I have described as Pleas, and the last three more or less to that of Discussions.
I plead that the Scientific Spirit of the Age, while it has given us many precious things, is, in its present exorbitant development, depriving us of things more precious still.
I plead that the Education of the Emotions (to be carried on chiefly through the contagion of good and noble sentiments) is an object of paramount importance, albeit nearly totally ignored in ordinary systems of education.
I plead that, in the present disintegration of all religious opinion, Judaism may yet become a progressive, and cease to be merely a tribal, faith; and that, if it absorb the moral and spiritual essence of Christianity, it may solve the great problem of combining a theology consonant to modern philosophy with a worship hallowed by the sacred associations of the remotest past.