But if an unbiased and impartial intellect were permitted to go about among all the different religious sects on earth, and found each and every one proclaiming with the same fervid conviction the unique and everlasting truth of their doctrine and the error of all others, how far could it get in the way of a reasonable conclusion?
There is a sort of conclusion, which appears fairly obvious.
If any one of the doctrines should in truth be all that is claimed for it—the divine revelation, or the divine inspiration, of an Almighty Providence—then all the other doctrines can be no more than theories, more or less ingenious, more or less erroneous, mere products of man's imagination. Then countless millions of people for countless generations have been left to lead their lives without a right understanding of life or death, the body or the soul, or the real purpose or design for which they were created and by which they will be judged? Only the few lucky ones who happened to be born and brought up in the one true belief can have the advantage of grasping the situation. To an impartial intellect, there would seem to be something about such an arrangement hardly fair or just to all the other countless millions.
But even so, and admitting what is apparently obvious, how could any amount of reasoning arrive at a decision in the matter?
There is nothing to prove that all the theories and doctrines may be any more than guesses, bolstered up with impressive formalities and imagery, according to the needs and temperament, of the races for whom they were made. Taken as a whole, they suggest a great confusion of ideas and many curious contradictions concerning the purpose of man's earthly life and the destiny of his soul.
Has man really a soul, at all? In what part of his body is it located? What ground is there for imagining that it is any more immortal than his heart or his eye? We can study the eye and dissect it and arrive at a fairly accurate idea of how it works. We know that it can be blinded—put out; also we know that if anything stops the heart from beating, the eye, the brain and our other functions cease to operate and become transfixed in death. Why should this not apply as well to the soul, if there is a function in man which goes by that name?
Enough has been said to indicate a few of the difficulties which stand in the way, when we approach the consideration of man's spiritual nature. A study of the various religions and spiritualistic beliefs which are current in the world to-day would be a tedious task for the average mind and would probably be of little practical use or help to any one.
The same may be said about the scientific theory of evolution. That is essentially an effort of the intellect, focusing the attention on details, processes and stages of development in living things and arriving no nearer to a solution of the unexplainable than we were in the beginning.
Suppose I happen to be impressed by the beauty and wonder of an orange tree, with its golden, luscious fruit, its delicately tinted and deliciously scented blossoms, its graceful leaves and branches, its symmetrical trunk so firmly rooted in the ground? Merely as a piece of machinery, as a little factory, designed to manufacture a certain kind of edible product, it is far more ingenious, economical and generally marvellous than anything the combined brains of mankind have been able to design throughout the centuries. It is automatic, self-lubricating, self-repairing and goes on, year after year, in fair weather or foul, turning out its brand of juicy pulp, done up charmingly in little yellow packages. How does it operate? How does it always manage to get the necessary raw materials from the earth and the air? How do the roots and the leaves and the sap ever contrive to convert these into perfume and blossoms and pulp and pigment?
Now suppose a scientific intellect comes along and, after investigating, dissecting, analyzing, eventually holds out before my eyes a tiny white seed which it has located in the centre of the yellow package—and says: