CHAPTER XXVII.
WHAT IS EVIDENCE?
If you go to any believer in any religion—in any of the greater religions, I mean—and ask him why he believes in his religion, he has always one answer: "Because it is true." And if you continue and say to him, "How do you know it is true?" he will reply, "Because there is full evidence to prove it." He imagines that he is guided by his reason, that it is his logical faculty that is satisfied, and his religion can be proved irrefragably. And yet it is strange that if any religion is based on ascertained fact, if any religion is demonstrably true, no one can be brought to see this truth, to accept this proof, except believers who do not require it. The Jew cannot be brought to admit the truth of Christianity, let the Christian argue ever so wisely; nor will the Christian accept Mahommedanism or Buddhism as containing any truth at all, no matter how the adherents of these faiths may argue.
It is not so with most other matters. If a problem in chemistry or physics be true at all it is altogether true for every one. Nationality makes no difference to your acknowledging the law of gravity, the science of the stars, the dynamics of steam, or the secrets of metallurgy. If an Englishman makes a discovery a Frenchman is able to follow the argument. The Japanese are not Christians, but that does not in any way prevent them assimilating modern knowledge. Twice two are four all over the world, except in matters of religion.
This is a somewhat remarkable phenomenon. What is the reason of it?