adequate grounds for believing in the existence of God, the intuitions of the religious consciousness are facts of which account must be taken when we speculate as to the nature and being of God. Granted even the probability of the existence of God, there is nothing intrinsically unreasonable in the supposition that He may have revealed Himself. Rather, the burden of proof lies with those who deny and not with those who assert. Yet it still remains true that the ultimate appeal for each is to his own experience. This must necessarily be the case. It may be possible to justify a belief in God by processes of abstract reasoning, but there is a world of difference between the purely philosophical and the religious conception of God. It does not follow that the two are ultimately incompatible, nor does it follow that, even though it was arrived at not by processes of pure philosophy but rather intuitively and through direct spiritual apprehension, the religious conception cannot be rationally justified. Yet the fact remains that truth which is spiritually perceived cannot be fully apprehended by any purely logical process. I cannot "prove," for example, that a picture is beautiful. I may point out its merits, but in the last resort my argument will only carry conviction to those who possess and to the extent to which they do possessa capacity to appreciate beauty when it is presented to them. And so, too, it must be with regard to that conception of God which is found in the Biblical writers. It may not be impossible to justify it on rational grounds, but it is impossible to "prove it by any purely logical process to those, if there are any, who do not possess a religious sense. "Profane men," says Luther, "desire and insist to have it proved by reason that Moses and the prophets were divinely inspired. But I answer that the testimony of the Spirit is superior to reason. For, as God alone can properly bear witness 1 Cf. Essay IX. pp. 501 et seq. 2 Cf. Introduction, p. ix. to His own words, so these words will not obtain full credit in the hearts of men until they are sealed by the inward testimony of the Spirit. The same Spirit, therefore, who spoke by the mouth of the prophets must penetrate our hearts, in order to convince us that they faithfully delivered the message with which they were divinely entrusted." The same truth is stated with equal force in the Westminster Confession: "Our full persuasion and assurance of the infallible truth and divine authority (of Holy Scripture) is from the inward work of the Holy Spirit bearing witness by and with the word in our own hearts." Translating this into the language which we have hitherto been using, we may say that as it is only the man with a sense of beauty who can perceive beauty and express it in a picture, and also only the man with a sense of beauty who can judge and appreciate the beauty of the picture when it is painted, so it is only the man with a religious sense who can truly know God and reveal Him, and also only the man with a religious sense who can fully apprehend the truth of the message about God which the prophet proclaims. That same Spirit which enables the religious genius to know God enables us-so far as we share it to know the truth of what he says about God. Only those who possess the gift of the Spiritor, as we have called it, the religious sense-are able fully to apprehend the products of it. Experience, however, shows that those other senses with which we have compared the religious sense are capable of development and cultivation, and, more than this, actually require it. In a well-known passage in his autobiography, Darwin tells us how in later life he lost his taste for pictures and music: he even found Shakespeare "intolerably dull." This was almost inevitable. If we never look at beautiful things, we shall soon cease to love them. "If I had to begin my life again," Darwin concludes, "I would make a rule to read some poetry or to hear some music at least once a week." Accordingly it is legitimate to supposeand experience justifies the supposition that the religious sense is capable of and requires cultivation not less than these other senses. It is hardly likely that men will be able to know God without at least that amount of trouble which is required for the appreciation of literature or music. Reference has already been made to the fact that there are some men who seem to have little or no religious sense. It would, perhaps, be truer to say that in such cases-which are more numerous than we sometimes think-the religious sense is either undeveloped or atrophied through disuse, than that it is non-existent. It may well be that the "light which lighteth every man has, for them, become darkness, because they have failed to "stir up the gift' which is in them. But if God is what the prophet declares Him to be, it follows that this failure to develop the religious sense by which man enters into communion with God and knows Him, results in an impoverishment of the whole life in a sense, because to a degree, quite different from that in which the failure to develop, for example, the musical or the artistic sense impoverishes life. There are men who seem to have so little capacity for appreciating music that, while recognising their lack of musical sense as a defect, we should feel that they might more profitably devote themselves to the development of other faculties which they do possess and in a higher degree. But if that conception of God which the prophets proclaim is true, the case with regard to religion is wholly different. Religion's all or nothing; it's no mere smile If God is what the prophet declares Him to be, the life of the man who does not know Him is not merely The incomplete, but defeated and half unfulfilled. revelation of God which the prophet gives is life and abundant life.1 Further, it is reasonable to suppose that the method by which the religious sense may be cultivated and developed will be the same as that by which those other senses with which it has been compared are developed. What this method is may be illustrated from the artistic sense. Most of us begin by liking bad art, and even continue to do so though we are conscious that it is bad. "I know which pictures I like, but I don't know which are good," adequately represents the position of the ordinary man. And if ever we are to be able to appreciate or recognise the great masters, we must deliberately attempt to train and cultivate our taste. For this purpose we go to the expert, to one whom we recognise as qualified by his experience and knowledge to tell us which are the great masters and why, and then we study these pictures ourselves. And the result of this study of the great masters is that in course of time our taste is educated and stimulated, and we become able to appreciate the greatness of their pictures and to pass judgment upon them. We become, in fact, experts ourselves. This, of course, involves an appeal to authority, an appeal which is capable of misuse, and, in the religious sphere, at any rate, has been misused. But abusus non tollit usum. Under certain conditions it is both legitimate and inevitable. As applied in the case we have considered, there is no authoritative imposition of beliefs on grounds which are irrational, and there is nothing which conflicts with the claims of reason. The appeal to authority is, in fact, based upon reason: it is simply the recognition of the fact that the opinion of one man is not necessarily as true as that of another, but that on his own subject the judgment of the expert is of more value than that of the ordinary man. Cuique 1 Cf. Essay IX. p. 479. in sua arte credendum. On his own subject, on the subject, that is, for which he has unique capacities and gifts, the specialist has a unique knowledge, and so can speak with a unique authority, and the ordinary man must be ready to learn from him, to take advantage of his wider experience, and train his own perceptions by his help. He must make, in fact, the venture of faith, and accept, provisionally, the judgment of the expert. But he does this with the expectation that, since the judgment of the expert is probably right, as his own experience widens and deepens, his judgment will become the same as that of the expert. What he accepts on authority he will afterwards verify in his own experience, but the acceptance of the authoritative judgment is the essential starting-point.' Faith, it has been well said, is an experiment which ends in an experience it is not believing instead of knowing, but rather believing in order to know. Applying this method in the religious sphere, we may say that as in the case of music or art we train our perceptions and cultivate our taste by the help of the great musicians and artists, so also we must train our religious perceptions and cultivate our spiritual sense by the help of those who have a special genius for religion. But how are we to find the religious genius? How are we to distinguish the true prophet from the false, and where is the "expert" who will show us which are the "great masters of religion? Here, too, the analogy we have drawn between religion and art will help us again. How do we recognise or test genius in art? There is, perhaps, a threefold test. First, the genius is the man who possesses special faculties of insight which enable him to catch some glimpse of truth or beauty which the ordinary man cannot see. "He is the greatest artist," says Ruskin, "who has embodied, in the sum of his works, the greatest number of the greatest ideas." And, secondly, he is one who is able 1 Cf. Essay VIII. pp. 366-7. |