to let me know that Mr. Wells had already written a story on this
theme. I was grateful to them for having caused me to read the _New
Accelerator_, which by some strange chance I had managed to miss: but
Mr. Wells’s treatment is so wholly different from that which I have
sketched that I feel no scruples in letting it stand: and, if amends
are needed, at least I make him a present of the germ of a new tale,
and so feel that honour should be satisfied.
VI
RATIONALISM AND THE IDEA OF GOD
GODS
Surprised by doubt, and longing but to know,
I asked of men and books what God might be:--
“An immanent spirit, clothed with the world we see”--
“A King of kings, ruler of all below”--
“Pure Love”--“A golden calf set up for show”--
“A jealous chief and tribal sectary”--
“Figment of fear and Man’s servility”--
“The final Judge that dooms to joy or woe” ...
I turned away; and found my God alone.
God is the world--yet captive in our thought:
Our thought--when it the head of the world is grown:
Love--with what love we to ourselves have taught.
The Soul must incarnate Divinity,
And God in each anew must builded be.
RATIONALISM AND THE IDEA OF GOD
“Du gleichst dem Geist, den du begreifst.”
--GOETHE.
“Nowadays, matters of national defence, of politics, of religion,
are still too important for Knowledge, and remain subjects for
certitude; that is to say, in them we still prefer the comfort of
instinctive belief because we have not learnt adequately to value
the capacity to foretell.”--W. TROTTER.
No one who has read Flaubert’s _Tentation de St. Antoine_ will be
likely to forget that amazing procession of Gods, hundreds upon
hundreds, in every diversity of form, defiling past the visionary
Saint to topple over into the abyss of nothingness and be for ever
destroyed--the doomed and outworn divinities of man’s childhood and
adolescence, put away as he came to maturity. “Man created God in his
own image,” wrote the irrepressible pen of Voltaire; and if it is not
always true that Gods have been in his own image, but also in the image
of animals and monsters, of embodied fears and hopes, it is indubitable
that man has created God after God, only to throw them on the scrapheap
as he outgrows them, like a child rejecting his old toys for new.
Indubitable--in a sense; indubitable that he has given each of them
their peculiar and characteristic form, endowed this and that God
with different qualities. But there is another part which he has not
created, which he can only perceive, mould, clothe. The raw material of
Divinity and its elemental attributes are given--man can but take it or
leave it; and, what is more, it is difficult for him to leave it. It is
given as the raw material and elemental attributes of life are given,
and the evolutionary process can but take them. Man moulds and forms;
but evolution has no more created living matter than he Divinity.
* * * * * * *
I propose, then, to lay down as my main point that the idea of God is
an inevitable product of biological evolution, arising when the human
type of mind first came into being, and taking shape and form as a
definite God or Gods. That the Gods who thus arise, although of course
they play a rôle in the affairs of the human species only, have a
definite biological function. That the term God can still be properly
and profitably employed to denote a certain complex of phenomena, with
a certain function in human evolution.
What, then, do we mean by saying that the idea of God arises inevitably
with the appearance of man upon the evolutionary scene? How can the
appearance of man account for such a curious phenomenon?
With man, for the first time in the history of life upon the earth, an
organism appeared capable of generalizing, of framing concepts, and of
communicating them to his fellows. Through sense-organs and brain, an
organism reflects in its mind some of the events of the world outside,
creates some sort of a microcosm over against the macroscosm. But
the animal with no more than associative memory can at best create a
haphazard microcosm, a mere cinema record, and incomplete at that, of
the most elementary organization; while all one can say of its power
of profiting by experience is that a certain primitive plot is thus
provided for the series of adventures which make up the scenario.
With an organism like man, however, in which to the faculty of
associative memory there has been superadded the power of framing
concepts and of accumulating experience by tradition, the picture is
altogether changed. The microcosm becomes more highly organized; from
rough-and-tumble cinema it develops into an elaborate drama, whose plot
is knotted up in the same general way as that of the great macrocosmic
drama unrolling itself outside. Microcosm images macrocosm more nearly,
both in its form and in its scope. As result of this, life is for the
first time enabled in man’s person to frame some general ideas of the
outer world. Not only is it enabled, it cannot help but do so. The
outer world is there; it impinges through man’s sense-organs on his
mind, and his mind is so constructed that, if it thinks at all, it must
think in general terms.
For the first time, life becomes aware of something more than a set
of events; it becomes aware of a system of powers operating in
events. These powers (to use a general, and what is intended to be a
non-committal, term) are in constant action upon man’s life. There is
a power in the sun, a power in the storm, in the growth of crops, in
wild beasts, in strange tribes, in the unrealized recesses of man’s own
heart; and in the course of his life man is brought into contact with
these powers, which may act with him or against him. Man frames his own
idea of these powers; and once that idea is framed, it exerts an effect
upon the rest of his ideas, upon his emotions, upon his conduct. The
more strongly the idea is held, the greater the effect.
But the idea may obviously be held and organized in many different
ways. It is when the idea is organized in one particular way that
we call it religious. We call it religious when on the one hand it
involves some recognition of powers operating so as to underlie the
general operations of the world; and, on the other hand, when it
involves the emotions. It must involve the idea of the general powers
operating in the outer world; so that an emotional reaction entirely
limited to a single human being, or to beauty, or to a single event,
is not religious. And it must involve the emotional nature of man, so
that a purely intellectual investigation of the powers in operation, or
a purely practical response, a purely moral reaction to them, is again
not religious.
* * * * * * *
In primitive societies, as the studies of a Frazer or a Rivers have
shown us, the whole of life is enmeshed with religion, and there is
scarcely an activity of man which is not spun round with religious
emotion and ritual. Very often the idea of God has not in this stage
been clearly formulated; there is simply a notion of _power_, of
mysterious influence, sometimes partly crystallized round a primitive
deity. Later, however, the power became frankly anthropomorphic, and
Gods came into being--many or one. Man had projected the idea of that
active agency he knew best--human personality--into his idea of cosmic
powers.
Into the God thus fashioned there are always projected, to greater or
less degree, the ideals of the community; and thus, at a certain stage
of development, we find definitely tribal Gods. Here the biological
function of Gods becomes extremely obvious. The God, by his inspired
prophets and priests, orders the destruction of his rivals--the false
Gods of neighbouring tribes--or of his enemies, the members of those
tribes.
The people of the tribe, however the result may have been brought
about, do as a matter of fact find themselves, all unconsciously,
caught up in the system which they and their forefathers have made.
They have fashioned their God so that their inmost life is joined
to him. When they sin, they fear him; when they look into their own
hearts to take stock of their ultimate ideals, they find that these are
attached, through the impalpable but infinitely resistant fibres of
tradition, of childish memory and of education, to him; he is on their
side against their enemies, so that their advantage is on the whole his.
Whatever, therefore, arouses the idea of God in their minds will send
messages into every corner of their being. And if they can be firmly
persuaded that God wishes something done, the call will pull at their
heart-strings and bring them to convinced and united action.
The most familiar example of this type of effect is to be found in the
history of the Jews in the Old Testament. But even to-day such tribal
ideas are not extinct: an educated and charming lady said to me during
the war--“I am convinced that if Jesus Christ were alive to-day He
would be fighting on the side of the Allies.” ...
* * * * * * *
In our further analysis we must carefully distinguish between the
outer and inner components of the idea of God. The outer components
are the powers acting upon man. Some of these are inorganic--storms,
winds, floods, the sun and moon; others are organic--wild beasts,
pestilence, crops, and fruits, domesticated animals; others again
are human--personal or national enemies, the community in which the
individual lives. And they may act upon man’s body or upon his mind.
The sun warms his body, but makes an impression on his mind as well.
The practice of astrology shows what power can be exerted on the mind
by quite imaginary properties of external reality. But, whatever we
may think of these outer components, there they are, and they do affect
us for better or for worse. Before such a heterogeneous assemblage
as is constituted by the outer components can operate as a single
idea, can deserve a single name such as God, they must be elaborately
organized.
The contribution to the idea of God from within, from the mind of man
himself, is its form; and this form is the outcome of a process of
mental organization every bit as real as the physical organization
occurring in the unborn embryo.
The essential thing about both is, as we have indicated, that unity
should arise in spite of diversity, and the resulting entity--organism
in the one case, organized idea in the other--should thus be able to
act as a single whole.
The system of ideas which man holds concerning external powers may be
thus organized by thinking of it in terms of magic, of “influence,”
manifesting itself in different ways in different operations of Nature;
or in terms of personality, the manifestations of power being supposed
to result from the activities of a being or beings more or less
similar to ourselves; or it may be organized, as we shall see, on more
scientific lines, by carefully pruning away all parts of it which are
either definitely the mere product of our own imaginations, or else are
not proven.
Thus what we have called the raw material of Divinity is given in the
outer forces of nature, which not only act upon man as they act upon
all organisms, but are by him perceived so to act in a way special and
peculiar to man alone.
But, being so perceived, they are inevitably taken up into his mental
life and made part of his mental organization. They are often perceived
emotionally--to take the simplest examples, pestilence with horror,
storm with fear, the growing of crops with gratitude. They are bound
to enter into relation with his emotions, with his ideals and hopes;
bound also to be in some degree generalized intellectually. When thus
emotionally and intellectually built up so as to form a coherent and
unitary idea, then only do they deserve the name of a God.
In parenthesis, let us make it quite clear that we are speaking of God
and Gods as they operate in human affairs, as they can be classified
by the anthropologist, analysed by the philosopher, experienced by the
mystic. These have always been constituted as we have described--as a
particular _idea_ of the powers of nature, the cosmic forces taking
shape through the moulding and organizing capacity of human thought,
or, if you prefer it, as an interpretation and unification of outer
and inner reality. The Absolute God, on the other hand, may be
one--may, in fact, operate as a unitary whole in the same sense as this
extraordinary product of the evolutionary process, this anthropological
God; but we can never know it as such in the same sense as we know a
person to be one.
This may be illustrated by a common fallacy--the ascription of
personality to God on the ground that a purpose exists in the universe.
Paley saw proof of this purpose in adaptations among organisms. Modern
theologians, driven from this position by Darwin, take refuge with
Bergson in the fact of biological progress. But this, too, can be shown
to be as natural and inevitable a product of the struggle for existence
as is adaptation, and to be no more mysterious than, for instance,
the increase in effectiveness both of armour-piercing projectile and
armour-plate during the last century. The time has gone by when a Paley
could advance his “carpenter” view of God; when a Fellow of the Royal
Society could be sure of general approval, as could D. Pront in his
Bridgewater Treatise, with a work entitled _Chemistry, Meteorology,
and the Function of Digestion, considered with reference to Natural
Theology_, or when a distinguished geologist like Buckland (almost
foreshadowing later writers of a certain type on labour questions)
could ascribe to a Beneficent Designer the existence of Carnivora, as
a means to the increase of the “Aggregate of Animal Enjoyment,” and
solemnly open a sentence such as “while each suffering individual is
soon relieved from pain, it contributes its enfeebled carcass to the
support of its carnivorous benefactors.”
No--purpose is a psychological term; and to ascribe purpose to a
process merely because its results are somewhat similar to those of
a true purposeful process, is completely unjustified, and a mere
projection of our own ideas into the economy of nature. Where we
experience only phenomena of one order we cannot hope to reach behind
them to phenomena of another order, or to the Absolute.
The ground is now cleared for our real investigation--our inquiry into
the task which Rationalism has before it in finding how best what we
have called the raw material of Divinity may be organized by the mind’s
activity, how best clothed with word or symbol to make it more the
common property of mankind as a whole.
The current Christian conception of God is of a person who is also
the creator and the ruler of the universe. This person has certain
attributes--is omnipotent, omniscient, and somehow, in spite of all
the unhappiness and squalor and cruelty in the world, all-loving. He
has personal qualities--he created the universe, and all that is in
it; he takes pleasure in being worshipped; is displeased when men
or women neglect him, or commit crimes or sins; takes pity on the
follies and sufferings of man; and was so moved by them (albeit after
a very considerable period had elapsed since man had first appeared
upon the scene) that he sent his son into the world as a redeemer.
(For simplicity’s sake, I omit all reference to the complexities of
Trinitarian doctrine, which, however important in distinguishing
Christianity from other religions envisaging an omnipotent personal
God, do not affect the essential point at issue.) Further, he grants
petitions, reveals himself to certain chosen persons, and is enthroned
in a somewhat elusive heaven, where he is (or will be after the Day of
Judgment--opinions seem to differ somewhat on the subject) surrounded
by the immortal souls of the elect.
Now this view, or any view of God as a personal being, is becoming
frankly untenable. The difficulty of understanding the functions
of a personal ruler in a universe which the march of knowledge is
showing us ever more clearly as self-ordered and self-ordering in
every minutest detail is becoming more and more apparent. Either a
personal God is a ruler without power, or he _is_ the universe. In
the former case he becomes a mere fly on the wheel; in the latter we
revert to a frank pantheism, in which the idea of a personal Being
can no longer properly be upheld. A personal creation of the world,
in any reasonable sense of that term, is now meaningless except for
a hypothetical creation of the original substance of the cosmos in
the first instance. Creation of earth and stars, plants, animals, and
man--Darwin swept the last vestiges of that into the waste-paper basket
of outworn imaginations, already piled high with the debris of earlier
ages. After the psychological insight which the last half-century has
given us, miracles have ceased to be miracles, and have become either
delusions, or, more frequently, unusual phenomena for which a cause
has not yet been found. The immutability of the fundamental laws of
matter and motion, more particularly the grand generalization of the
conservation of energy and the substitution by science of an orderly
for a disorderly conception of nature, make it impossible to think of
occasional interference by God with this world’s affairs. Accordingly
the value of petitionary prayer falls to the ground. Revelation and
inspiration have resolved themselves into exceptional mental states,
and are no longer looked upon as a sort of telepathy between divine
and human minds. If we reflect, we see that all these intellectual
difficulties in modern theology arise from the advance of scientific
knowledge, which has shown that the older ideas of God were only
symbolic, and therefore false when the attempt was made to give real
value to them.
That being the quagmire in which traditional Christian theology
is floundering, it behoves us to discuss the opposite side of the
question, and to see whether the very advance of science which has
seemed to exert only a destructive influence may not have made it
possible to build up new and sounder conceptions of fundamental
religious ideas.
We have already seen that the conception of God always represents
man’s idea of the powers operating in the universe; that it has two
components--the outer consisting of these powers so far as they are
known to man, the inner consisting in the mode in which the conception
is organized and the way it is related to the rest of the personality.
It is obvious that both man’s knowledge of the cosmic powers as well
as his method of organizing them in his mind can grow and change; and
man’s Gods can--and do--grow and change accordingly.
The growth of science in the last few centuries has radically altered
our knowledge of the outer world. It has shown us, in the first place,
a fundamental unity of all phenomena, however apparently diverse. It
has shown us the inorganic part of the cosmos pursuing a direction--the
progressive degradation of energy--which, if it is carried to its
limit, will result in the extinction not only of life, but of all
activity. It has next shown us the organic part, sprung from the
inorganic but running a different course, ascending during evolutionary
time to increasing heights of complexity and to increasing control over
its inorganic environment.
Finally, we have the psychozoic or human portion--that minute fraction
of the cosmos which yet is of a preponderant importance, since it
definitely represents the highest level yet reached by evolutionary
progress. In this sphere mind is the dominant partner, biologically
speaking, in the mind-matter partnership; evolution can begin to
be conscious instead of fortuitous; and true _values_ arise which,
incorporated in ideals and purposes, exert an effect upon events.
As regards our own mental organization, psychological science has
recently shown us the enormous importance of what we may call the
extra-personal portion of our mind--all that which is normally
subconscious, or has not been during our mental growth incorporated
to form an integral part of our private personality. But this
extra-personal part of the mind may from time to time irrupt into the
personal, and does normally do so at some period of life. It is the
merit of psychology to have shown the true nature of this relationship
between personal and extra-personal, which was in the past a source of
an infinity of mistaken ideas--revelation, inspiration, possession,
direct communion with angels, saints, gods, or devils, and so forth.
Thus the powers operating in the cosmos are, though unitary, yet
subdivisible; and, though subdivisible, yet related. There are the vast
powers of inorganic nature, neutral or hostile to man. Yet they gave
birth to evolving life, whose development, though blind and fortuitous,
has tended in the same general direction as our own conscious desires
and ideals, and so gives us an external sanction for our directional
activities. This again gave birth to human mind, which, in the race, is
changing the course of evolution by acceleration, by the substitution
of new methods for old, and by introducing values which are ultimate
for the human species; and, in the individual, provides, in the
interplay of conscious and subconscious, unbounded possibilities of the
invasion of the ordinary and humdrum personality of every day by ideas
apparently infinite, emotions the most disinterested and overwhelming.
Still other light has of late years been thrown by psychology upon
the inner component of the idea of God. Recent work has shown, for
instance, that the mind, unless deliberately corrected and trained,
tends to think in terms of symbols instead of along the more arduous
paths of intellectual reasoning, tends to explain the unknown in terms
of the known, tends accordingly to project the familiar ideas of its
own personality as symbols for the explanation of the most varied
phenomena. The science of comparative religion has shown us an early
stage of religious belief in which but one idea held sway--the idea
of a magical influence residing in all things potent for good or ill:
the projection was so complete that no distinction whatever was made
between the personal and the impersonal. Later, the idea of particular
divine beings or Gods arose; and in early stages man still continued to
project not only his own passions, but even his own form, into these
divinities. The statement of Genesis that God made man in his own image
is in reality an admission of the converse process. Still later, the
divinity was purged of the grossness of human form and members, and,
gradually, of characteristically human passions; but God remained
personal, although the personality was now organized chiefly of ideals.
There is, however, no reason whatever to admit that personality is a
genuine characteristic of any knowable God; but every reason to suspect
that it is, as a matter of hard fact, merely another product of this
property of projection so strong in the human mind.
On the other hand, an analysis of religious experience as a phenomenon,
as something equally worthy of patient and scientific study as the
gas-laws or the methods of evolution, shows that the powers which
move in the universe, when organized by thought into a God, are
apprehended by the majority of the great mystics and those to whom
religious experience has been richly granted as in some way personal.
Although, if our line of argument is valid, this will be partly due to
a projection of the idea of personality into the idea of God, yet it is
clearly in part due to the idea of God being organized by our mental
activity to be of the same general type as is a normal personality--as
something into which concepts of power, of knowledge, and of feeling
and will all enter, with such interconnections between its parts that,
like a personality, all of its resources are capable of mobilization
at any one point. It will be one of the great constructive tasks of
psychology to ascertain just how such a conception is organized, and
how it operates to produce the experiences, often of overpowering
intensity and lasting value, which as a matter of record it often
does.[43]