From the point of view now reached we can understand also—so far as understanding is possible in such a case—the apparent riddle of our knowledge of the existence of the Unknowable. We can explain the universal sentiment of religious minds that there is some direct relation between them and the object of their worship. The sense of an intuitional perception of that object, the sense of undefinable similarity thereto, the sense of inspiration and of guidance thereby, are included under and rendered intelligible by the actual identity in their ultimate natures of the subject and the object of religious feeling. And the incomprehensibility of the latter is shown to have an obvious reason. For the part cannot comprehend the whole of which it is a part. It can but feel that there is a whole, in some mysterious way related to itself. But what that whole is, the conditions of its existence render it impossible that it should even guess.
Imagine the whole of the atmosphere divided into two great currents: a hot current continually ascending, and a cold current continually descending. And let the hot current represent the stream of conscious life, the cold current the stream of material things. To complete the simile, conceive that there is a sharp boundary between the two currents, so that atoms of air can never cross to and fro; while yet the conscious atoms in the hot current are aware of the existence of the unconscious atoms in the cold one. Now if the atoms or particles in the conscious current should be gifted with senses in proportion to their size, they will see and feel an infinitely minute portion both of the ascending current in which they they themselves are placed, and of the descending current they are passing by. But of the whole of the atmosphere of which they are themselves fragmentary portions they will be able to form no conception whatever. Its existence they will be aware of, for it will be needed to explain their own. But of its nature they will have no idea, except that in some undefinable way it is like themselves. Nor will they be able to form any picture of the cause which is continually carrying them upwards, and forcing their homologues in the opposite current downwards. While, if we suppose these opposite movements to represent the elements of Time and Space, they will be conscious of themselves only in terms of movement upwards, and of the unconscious particles in terms of movement downwards. They will suppose these two movements to be of the very essence of hot and cold particles, and will be able to conceive them only under these terms. Suppose, lastly, that at a certain point in their progress the hot particles become cold and pass into the opposing current, losing their individual, particular life, then their fellow-particles in the hot current will lose sight of them at that point, and they will be merged in the general stream of being to emerge again in their turn into the stream of conscious being.
Imperfect as this simile is, and as all such similes must be, it serves in some faint measure to express the relation of the mind of man to its mysterious Source. And it serves also to illustrate the leading characteristics of Religion and Theology, or Faith and Belief, the function of the first having ever been to conceive the existence of that relation, and the function of the second to misconceive its character. Thus there runs through the whole course of religious history a pervading error and a general truth. In all its special manifestations these two have been mingled confusedly together, and the manifold forms of error have generally obscured from sight the single form of truth.
The relation held by Faith to Belief, by the true elements to the false, in special creeds, may be thus expressed: That the creeds have sought to individualize, and thus to limit that which is essentially general and unlimited. Thus worship, in its purest character a mere communing of the mind with its unknown Source, has been narrowed to the presentation of petitions to a personal deity. Particular places and peculiar objects have been selected as evincing, in some exceptional manner, the presence of the infinite Being which pervades all places and things alike. Certain men have been regarded as the exclusive organs of the ultimate Truth; certain books, as its authorized expressions; whereas the several races of men in their different modes of life, and in the diverse products of their art and their culture, are all in their variety, and even in their conflict, inspired workers in the hands of that Truth which is manifested completely in none, partially in all.
And as it has been with the special objects upon which Theology has fixed its gaze, so it has been with the general object which underlies them all. This, too, has been individualized, limited and defined. It has been forgotten that we are but forms of that which we are seeking to bring within the grasp of our reason, and cannot therefore see around it, above it, and below it. But this truth, which Theology is ever forgetting, Religion must ever proclaim. The proclamation of this truth is the title-deed of its acceptance by mankind. Without this, it would sink into the dishonored subject of incessant wranglings and profitless dispute. When it begins to define the Infinite, it ceases, in the purer sense of the word, to be Religion, and can only command the assent of reasonable beings in so far as its assertions comply with the rigorous methods of logical demonstration. But this condition is in fact impossible of fulfillment, for the nature of the object concerning which we reason, renders the exact terms of logical propositions misleading and inadequate. The Unknowable Reality does not admit of definition, comprehension, or description. How should we, mere fragments of that Reality, define, comprehend, or describe the Infinite Being wherein we have taken our rise, and whereto we must return?
Thus is Religion analyzed, explained and justified. Its varied forms have been shown to be unessential and temporary; its uniform substance to be essential and permanent. Belief has melted away under the comparative method; Faith has remained behind. From two sides, however, objections may be raised to the results of this analysis. Those who admit no ultimate residuum of truth in the religious sentiment at all, may hold that I have done it too much honor in conceding so much; while those who adhere to some more positive theology than is admitted here, will think that I have left scarcely anything worth the having in conceding so little.
To the first class of objectors I may perhaps be permitted to point out the extreme improbability of the presence in human nature of a universally-felt emotion without a corresponding object. Even if they themselves do not realize in their own minds the force of that emotion they will at least not deny its historical manifestations. They will scarcely question that it has been in all ages known to history as an inspiring force, and often an overmastering passion. They will believe the evidence of those who affirm that they are conscious of that emotion now, and cannot attribute it to anything but the kind of Cause which religion postulates. The actual presence of the emotion they will not deny, though the explanation attempted of its origin they will. But those who make the rather startling assertion that a deep-seated and wide-spread emotion is absolutely without any object resembling that which it imagines to be its source, are bound to give some tenable account of the genesis of that emotion. How did it come into being at all? How having come into being, did it continue and extend? How did it come to mistake a subjective illusion for an objective reality?
These are questions pressing for an answer from those who ask us to believe that one of our strongest feelings exists merely to deceive. But it will be found, I believe, that all explanations tending to show that this emotion is illusory in its nature assume the very unreality they seek to prove. Should it, for example, be contended that human beings, conscious of a force in their own bodies, extend the conception of this force to a superhuman being, which extension is illegitimate, it is assumed, not proved, in such an argument as this, that the force manifested in the universe at large is not in some way akin to that manifested in human beings. Again, should it be urged that man, being aware of design in his own works, fancies a like design in the works of nature, it is a mere assumption that this attribution of the ideas of his own mind to a mind greater than his is an unwarrantable process. The argument from design may be, and in my opinion is, open to other grave objections; but its mere presence cannot be used as explaining the manner in which the religious emotion has come to exist. Rather is it the religious emotion which has found expression in the argument from design. The same criticism applies to all accounts of this sentiment which aim at finding an origin for it sufficient to explain its presence without admitting its truth. They all of them assume the very point at issue.
But the real difficulty that is felt about religion lies deeper than in the mere belief that a given emotion may be deceptive. It lies in the doubt whether a mere emotion can be taken in evidence of the presence in nature of any object at all. Emotions are by their very nature vague, and this is of all perhaps the vaguest. Nor are emotions vague only; they are inexpressible in precise language, and even when we express them as clearly as we can, they remain unintelligible to those who have not felt them. Now this general and unspecific character of emotions renders it hard for those who are wanting in any given emotion to understand its intensity in others, and even fully to believe in their statements about it. Were religion a case of sensible perception they would have no such doubt. Color-blind persons do not question the faculty of distinguishing colors in others. But while the sharp definitions of these senses compel us to believe in the existence of their objects, the comparatively hazy outlines drawn by the emotions leave us at least a physical possibility of disputing the existence of theirs.