The Freedom of Science Part 10

In general, where there is real contradiction between science and faith, the matters in question are invariably _hypotheses_. Is it more than an hypothesis, and a very doubtful hypothesis at that, that the world and G.o.d are identical, that there is an eternal, uncreated course of the world, that miracles are impossible? That what is said about the natural origin of Christianity, the origin of the Jewish religion from Babylonian myths, the origin of all religions from fear, fancy, or deception, is it anything more than hypothetical? The false systems of knowledge, subjectivism, and agnosticism-are they more than hypotheses? Ask their originators and champions; they will admit it themselves; and if they will not admit it, others will tell them that their propositions are not only hypotheses, but often quite untenable. There is hardly a single hypothesis which has not its vehement opponents. That the serious conflict between dogma and science is waged only in this field could be proved by abundant examples.

Besides, is it not the philosophical axiom of modern freedom of thought, that in the sphere of philosophy and religion there is no certain knowledge, but only supposition?

Can hypotheses claim to rank as a.s.sured results of research which should be universally accepted? Why should it not be allowed to contradict them, to oppose them with other suppositions? Is it not in the interest of science that this be done, that they be subjected to sharp criticism, lest they gradually be given out for positive results? Is it not a shameful trifling with the truth, when a _Haeckel_ deceives wide circles by pretending that most frivolous hypotheses are established results of science? Is it not misleading when modern science treats the rejection of a supernatural order as an established principle?

And how often the hypotheses of profane sciences change! "Laymen are astonished," says _H. Poincare_, "that so many scientific theories are perishable. They see them thrive for a few years, to be abandoned one after the other; they see wrecks heaped upon wrecks; they foresee that theories now fashionable will after a short while be forgotten, and they conclude that these theories are absolute fallacy. They call it the bankruptcy of science"

(Wissenschaft u. Hypothese, German by _F. Lindemann_, 2d ed., 1906, 161). The conclusion is certainly unjustified, but the fact itself remains. Is it then a loss to science when faith opposes in the field of religion these variations of opinion with fixed dogmas?

Or are these perhaps of less worth, or less certain than their contraries? Is the dogma of the existence of G.o.d of less value than atheism? Is the conviction of the existence of a world of spirits less substantial than the philosophy of materialistic monism? Is the doctrine of the origin of the human soul from the creating hand of G.o.d found inferior to the notion that the soul has developed from the lower stages of animal life? Should the holy teaching of Christianity, doctrines believed by the best periods in the world's history, believed in and professed by minds like those of an _Augustine_, a _Thomas_, and a _Leibnitz_; doctrines that since their appearance on earth have always attracted the n.o.ble and good, and repelled chiefly the base and immoral; doctrines that still wait for their first un.o.bjectionable refutation-should such doctrines be less sure than the innumerable, ever-changing suggestions of unregulated thought, apparently directed by an aversion to everything supernatural?

Erravimus.

Yet another fact may be pointed out. It is an undeniable fact that science, after straying for some time, is not unfrequently _compelled to return to what is taught by faith and the Church_, thus confirming the truth of the faith. Frequently the new theory has come on like a tornado, sweeping all minds before it. But the tempest was soon spent, the minds recovered their balance and the hasty misjudgment was recognized.

Not long ago, when materialism revelled in its orgies, especially in Germany, when _Vogt_, _Buechner_, and _Moleschott_ were writing their books, and science with _Du Bois-Reymond_ was hunting _Laplace's_ theory in the evolution of the world, the Syllabus, undaunted, put its anathema upon the (58.) proposition: "No other forces are acknowledged but those of matter." The summer-night's dream came to an end, and people rubbed their eyes and saw the reality they had lost a while. The materialism of the 60's and 70's has been discarded by the scientific world, and finds a shelter only in the circles of unschooled infidelity. _J. Reinke_, in the name of biology, bears testimony in the words: "In my opinion materialism has been disposed of in biology; if, nevertheless, a number of biologists still stand by its colours, this tenacity may be explained psychologically; for, in the apt words of _Du Bois-Reymond_, in the domain of ideas a man does not willingly and easily forsake the highway of thought which his entire mental training has opened up" (Einleitung in die theoretische Biologie, 1901, 52).

A few decades ago a number of scientists declared it impossible that the different races could have descended from one pair of ancestors, as taught by faith: the difference between the various families being too great and radical, it was said; the difference being rather of species than of race. Moreover, there was announced the discovery of people without religion, without notions of morality and family life; of tribes incapable of civilization and culture; it was a.s.serted in the early days of _Darwin_ enthusiasm that there had been discovered a race of men that clearly belonged to the species ape. a.s.sertions of this kind have gradually ceased. Now the different human races are considered to belong to the same species, and their common parentage is considered possible from the view-point of the theory of evolution. The anthropologist _Ranke_ expresses his opinion thus: "We find the bodily differences perfectly connected by intermediate forms, graded to a nicety, and the summary of the differences appears to point to but one species.... This is the prevalent opinion of all independent research of anatomically schooled anthropologists" (Der Mensch, 2d ed., II, 1894, 261).

Ethnology denies the existence of nations or tribes without religion (_Ratzel_, Voelkerkunde, I, 1885, 31). _Peschel_ says: "The statement that any nation or tribe has ever been found anywhere on earth without notions and suggestions of religion can be denied emphatically" (_O. Peschel_, Voelkerkunde, 6th ed., 1885, 273). "The more recent ethnology knows of no tribes without morality, nor does history record any" (_W. Schneider_, Die Naturvoelker, 1886, II, 348).

Until a short time ago it was believed that the derivation of man's life from inferior stages of animal life would not be difficult to prove; but at present, while many still adhere to the theory that man has developed from the brute, the conviction is steadily gaining ground that it cannot be scientifically proved and that it becomes more and more difficult to disprove man's higher origin. Unable to withstand the force of facts, one hypothesis gives place to another: what had to be found could not be found, living or extinct links between the brute and man refused to appear anywhere, and those which people thought they had found, turned out to be unsuitable. _Kohlbrugge_ concludes his criticism of the recent theories of the evolution of the body of man from lower animals with the confession: "The above summary is enough to convince everybody that we do not know anything distinct about the great problem of evolution; we have not yet seen its face. All must be done over again" (Die Morpholog. Abstammung des Menschen, 1908, 88). _Virchow_ said at the anthropological congress of Vienna, 1889: "When we met at Innsbruck twenty years ago Darwinism had just finished its first triumphal march through the world, and my friend _Vogt_ became its ardent champion. We have searched in vain for the missing link connecting man directly with the ape."

What has become of those anatomic-morphologic links between man and beast, the _pithecanthropus erectus_, the man dug out at Neandertal, Spy, Schipka, La Naulette, and Krapina, and shown with great confidence to the world? What has become of the prehistoric man, said to belong to the glacial period of Europe, and to have ranked far below the present man? _J. Kohlmann_ writes: "I wish to state that I thoroughly adhere to the theory of evolution, but my own experience has led me to the result that man has not changed his racial characteristics since the glacial period. He appears on the soil of Europe physically complete, and there is no ape-man to be found" (apud _Ranke_, Ibid. 480). Prof. _Branco_, director of the Palaeontological Inst.i.tute of Berlin, says: "Palaeontology tells us nothing about the missing link. This science knows of no ancestors of man" (at the 5th international Zoological Congress, 1901, _Wasmann_, Die mod. Biolog. 3, p. 488). And the palaeontologist _Zittel_ says: "The missing link between man and ape, though a postulate of the theory of evolution, has not been found" (_Ranke_, l. c. 504). _E. Grosse_ concludes his studies on evolution with the significant words: "I began this book with the intention of writing a history of the evolution of the family, and I finish it convinced that at present the writing of that history is impossible for me or for anybody else" (Die Formen der Familie, 1896, Vorwort). _Ranke_ is perfectly right in saying that "it behoves the dignity of science to confess that it knows nothing of the origin of man" (Thuermer V, 1902, I. Heft).

A century ago or so, ridicule was heaped in the name of science on the description in the Bible of the last day: "The stars shall fall," "and the powers of heaven shall be moved," "the elements shall be melted with heat, and the earth shall be burnt up" (Matt.

xxiv. 29 _seq._; Luke xxi. 25 _seq._; Mark xiii. 24 _seq._; 2 Pet.

iii. 10). Then the a.s.sertion that stones could fall from the skies caused a smile, but now science has come to the general knowledge that this is not only possible, but perhaps really will be the end of all things, if once our earth on its journey through unknown s.p.a.ces of the universe should collide with a comet or get into a cosmic cloud of large meteors. (Cf. the graphic description in _K.

Braun_, Ueber Kosmogonie, 3d ed., 1905, p. 381 _seq._)

An example of another kind: It is not so long since Protestant, liberal Bible-criticism and its history of early Christian literature, in the endeavour to remove everything supernatural from the beginning of Christianity, regarded the New Testament and the oldest Christian doc.u.ments as unreliable testimony, even forgeries, and for this reason placed the date of their origin as late as possible. But now they have to retrace their steps.

_A. Harnack_ writes: "There was a period-the general public is still living in it-when the New Testament and the oldest Christian literature were thought to be but a tissue of lies and forgeries.

This time has pa.s.sed. For science it was an episode in which much was learned of which much must be forgotten. The result of subsequent research over-reaches in a 'reactionary' effect what might be termed the central position of modern criticism. The oldest literature of the Church is in the main and in most details true and reliable, that is, from the literary and historical point of view.... I am not afraid to use the word 'retrogressive'-for we should call a spade a spade-the criticism of the sources of the earliest Christianity is beyond doubt moving retrogressively towards tradition" (Chronologie der Alt-Christ. Literatur I, 1897, VIII). In a more recent work the same savant writes: "During the years from 30 to 70 all originated in Palestine, or, better, in Jerusalem, what later on was developed. This knowledge is steadily gaining and replacing the former 'critical' opinion that the fundamental development had extended over a period of about a hundred years" (Lukas der Arzt, 1906, Vorwort). This retrogression is continued still farther in his later work, "Neue Untersuchungen zur Apostolgesch. u. zur Abfa.s.sungszeit der synopt. Evang., 1911,"

in which _Harnack_ draws very near to the Catholic view regarding the date of writing of the Acts of the Apostles, as also regarding _St. Paul's_ att.i.tude towards Judaism and Christian-Judaism, and departs from the modern Protestant view (cf. pp. 28-47, 79 _seq._, 86, 93 _seq._). "Protestant authorities on church-history," he says elsewhere, "no longer take offence at the proposition that the main elements of Catholicism go back to the Apostolic era, and not only peripherically" (Theol. Literar. Zeitung, 1905, 52).

In a speech, much commented on, which he made at his university January 12, 1907, Prof. _Harnack_, discussing the religious question in Germany, called attention to the fact that there has been quite a marked return to the Catholic standpoint: "From the study of Church history we find that we all have become different from what our fathers were, whether we may like it or not. Study has shown that we are separated from our fathers by a long course of development; that we do not understand their ideas and words at all, much less do we use them in the sense they used them." He then draws out the comparison more particularly: "_Flacius_ and the older Protestants denied that _Peter_ had ever been in Rome at all. Now we know that his having been there is a fact well evidenced in history." The motto of the older Protestants was that the Scriptures are the sole source of revelation. "But now, and for a long time past, Protestant savants have realized that the Scriptures could not be separated from tradition, and that the collecting of the New Testament Scriptures was a part of tradition." "Protestants of the sixteenth century taught justification by faith alone, without works. In the absence of confessional controversy, no evangelical Christian would now find fault with the teaching which declares only such faith to be of any worth which shows itself by the love of G.o.d and of the neighbour" (Protestantismus u. Katholizismus in Deutschland, Preussisch. Jahrbucher 127. Bd., 1907, 301 _seq._).

Many similar instances of science confessing Erravimus in regard to the Christian or Catholic position could be cited. They are an admonition to be modest, not to overrate the value of a scientific proposition, and not, with supreme confidence and infallibility, to brand it as an offence against the human intellect to let one's self be guided by the principles of faith.

Moreover, it has often happened that science emphatically and sneeringly rejected propositions, and called them false and absurd, which to-day are considered elementary.

_Newton_, in 1687, had correctly explained the revolution of the moon around the earth, and of the planets around the sun, as the co-operation of gravitation and inertia, and thence concluded also the elliptic form of the orbits of planets previously discovered by _Kepler_. _Leibnitz_ rejected this theory, _Huygens_ called it absurd, and the Academy of Paris as late as 1730 still favoured the theory of revolution of _Descartes_; it was only about the year 1740 that it was generally accepted. _Huygens_, himself, had formed in 1690 his theory about light-waves. For a long time it was misunderstood. Only in 1800, or somewhat later, it received its merited acknowledgment, but noted physicists like _Biot_ and _Brewster_ rejected it still for some time and held to the theory of emission. "Even in the intellectual world the law of inertia holds good" (_Rosenberger_, Gesch. der Physik, III, 1887, 139).

The great discoverer _Galvani_ complained of being attacked from two opposite sides, by the scientists and by the ignorant: "Both make fun of me. They call me the dancing master of frogs. Yet I know I have discovered one of the greatest forces of nature."

When _Benjamin Franklin_ explained the lightning-rod to the Royal Academy of Sciences, he was ridiculed as a dreamer. The same happened to _Young_ with his theory of the undulation of light. "The Edinburgh Review"

proposed to the public to put _Thomas Grey_ in a strait-jacket when he presented his plan for railroads. Sir _Humphry Davy_ laughed at the idea of illuminating the city of London by gas. The French Academy of Sciences actually sneered at the physicist _Arago_ when he proposed a resolution to merely open a discussion of the idea of an electric telegraph (_Wallace_, Die wissensch. Ansicht des Uebernatuerlichen, 102 _seq._).

Until about a hundred years ago scientists almost universally thought it impossible for a stone to fall from the skies-not to mention a rain of stones. Of the big meteor that fell at Agram in 1751 the learned Vienna professor, _Stuetz_, wrote in 1790 as follows: "That iron had fallen from the skies may have been believed in Germany in 1751 even by its enlightened minds, owing to the uncertainty then prevailing in regard to physics and natural history. In our times, however, it were unpardonable to consider similar fairy tales even probable." Some museums threw away their collections of meteors, fearing they would appear ridiculous by keeping them. In that very year, 1790, a meteor fell near the city of Juillac in France, and the mayor of the town sent a report of it to the French Academy of Sciences, signed by three hundred eye-witnesses. But the wise men of the academy knew better. Referee _Bertholon_ said: "It is a pity for a town to have so foolish a mayor," and added: "It is sad to see the whole munic.i.p.ality certifying by affidavit to a folk-saga that can only be pitied. What more can I say of an affidavit like that? Comment is self-evident to a philosophically trained mind who reads this authentic testimonial about an evidently false fact, about a physically impossible phenomenon." _A. Deluc_, in other respects a sober-minded man, and a scientist, even remarked that should a stone like that fall before his feet, then he would have to admit that he had seen it, but nevertheless would not believe it.

_Vaudin_ remarked: "Better to deny such incredible things than to have to try to explain them." Thus taught the French Academy of that time (apud _Braun_, Ueber Kosmogonie, 3d ed., 1905, 378 _seq._). And now science is teaching the contrary. Everybody knows that such falling meteors are not only possible, but that they fall about seven hundred times a year on our earth.

Do not these examples bear a striking resemblance to the att.i.tude of many of the representatives of modern science towards facts and truths of our faith?

This has not been said with a view of detracting from the reputation of science. Not at all. It has fallen to the lot of man to be subject to error. The above was said to recall that fact. Science is not so infallible as to be able to claim the right to ignore, in religious and ethical questions, faith and the Church, and even to usurp the place of the faith given by G.o.d, in order to lead its disciples upon the new paths of a delivered mankind.

Chapter III. Unprepossession Of Research.

What It Is.

In the year 1901 a case, insignificant in itself, caused great excitement in and even beyond the scientific world. What had happened? At the University of Stra.s.sburg, in a territory for the most part Catholic, no less than one-third of the students were Catholic, yet of the seventy-two professors sixty-one were Protestant, six Israelites and but four Catholics (according to the report of the Secretary of State, _Koeller_, in the 115th session of the Reichstag, January 11, 1901). The government resolved, in view of the state of affairs, to give more consideration, when appointing professors, to the Catholic members of the university.

Even the non-Catholic members of the Bundesrat desired it. A vacancy occurring in the faculty of history, the government, besides appointing the Protestant professor proposed by the faculty of philosophy, decided to create a new chair to be filled by a Catholic.

The appointment of a Catholic professor of history was regarded as seriously endangering science. The storm broke. The venerable historian, _Th. Mommsen_, who had been a champion of liberty in the revolution of 1848, promptly gave the alarm. In the Munich "Neueste Nachrichten" there appeared over his signature an article that created a general sensation.

"German university circles," he said, in his solemn protest, "are pervaded by a feeling of degradation. Our vital nerve is unprejudiced research; research that does not find what it seeks and expects to find, owing to purposes, considerations, and restraints that serve other, practical ends extraneous to science-but finds what logically and historically appears to the conscientious scientist the right thing, truthfulness. The appointment of a college teacher whose freedom is restricted by barriers is laying the axe to the root of German science. The call to a chair of history, or philosophy, of one who must be a Catholic or a Protestant, and who must serve this or that confession, is tantamount to compelling him to set bounds to his work whenever the results might be awkward for a religious dogma." And he concludes with a ringing appeal for the solidarity of the representatives of science: "Perhaps I am not deceived in the hope of having given expression to the sentiments of our colleagues." This statement of the famous scientist, conceived in the temper of his days of '48, was soon softened, if not neutralized, by a subsequent statement from his pen. But the spark had already started the fire. From most universities there came letters of approval and praise of his courageous stand, in behalf of the honour of the universities and of German science.

On the other hand, some gave vent to their regret of his hot-spurred action. Since then the song of unprejudiced science has been sung in countless variations and keys, ending as a rule with the chorus: Hence the believing, especially Catholics, cannot be true scientists. For this was the central idea of _Mommsen's_ protest, and in that sense it had been understood.

For the sake of clearness we shall condense the substance of the thought into a brief form: The vital nerve of science, the condition under which alone it can exist, is unprepossession, that is, a straightforward honesty that knows of no other consideration than to aim at the truth for its own sake. The believer, the Catholic, cannot be unprepossessed, because he must pay regard to dogmas and Church-doctrine and precept. Therefore he is wanting in the most essential requisite of true science. Hence college professors of a Catholic conviction are anomalous: they have no right to claim a chair in the home of unprepossessed science. For reasons of expediency it may be advisable to appoint some of them, but they cannot be regarded as sterling scientists. Catholic theology, building upon faith, is not science in the true sense of the word, and deserves no place in a university. A Catholic university, a home of scientific research built upon a Catholic foundation, is something like a squared circle. It may be that Catholic scientists, too, have their achievements, but they cannot be expected to be possessed of that unflinching pursuit of the truth which must be part of the man of science.

These are thoughts which have petrified in the minds of many into self-evident principles, with all the obstinacy of intolerance. It is not difficult to recognize in it the old reproach we have already dealt with, it is here in a slightly different form. The believing scientist is not free to search for the truth, being tied down by his duty to believe.

Science, however, must be free. Hence the believer cannot properly pursue science.

Freedom of science and science unprepossessed are related terms and are often used synonymously. Therefore, in putting the probe to the often-repeated demand for unprepossession, we shall meet with ideas similar to those we have already discussed, only in a slightly different shape.

What, then, is that unprepossession which science must avow? Can the Catholic, the believing scientist, possess it? Unprepossessed research-"I don't like the expression," says a representative of free-thought, "because it is a product of that shortcoming which has already done great damage to free-thought in its struggle with the powers of the past"

(_Jodl_). Hence we have reason to fear that the confidence with which this word is used is greater than the clearness of thought it represents.

What is meant by saying that science must be _unprepossessed_? Undoubtedly it means that science should make no presuppositions, it must enter upon its work free from prejudice and presumption. And what is presumption?

Evidently something presumed, upon which the research is to rest the level and rule of its direction: the supposition being taken for granted, without express proof. What I have expressly proved in my process of thought is no longer a supposition to the structure of thought, but a part of that structure.

Is the scientist, however, to allow no presumption at all? That would be impossible. When making his calculations the mathematician presupposes the correctness of the multiplication table. Or is he first to prove that twice three are six? He could not do it, because it is immediately self-evident. In his optical experiments in the laboratory, in drawing inferences as to the nature of light from different indications, the physicist presupposes that senses are able to observe the facts correctly, that everything has its respective reason, that nothing can be and not be, at the same time, under the same conditions. Can he or must he try first to prove it? He must presume it because it is beyond a doubt, and because it cannot be proved at all, at least all of it cannot. The astronomer, too, makes unhesitating use of the formulas of mathematics without examining them anew; every natural scientist calmly presupposes the correctness of the results established by his predecessors and goes on building upon those results: he may do so because he cannot with reason doubt them. Hence presumptions are common; they may be made when we are convinced of their truth; they must be made because not everything can be proved. Much cannot be proved because it is immediately self-evident, as, for instance, the ability to recognize the true or the elementary principles of reasoning; many other things cannot always be proved minutely, because not every scientist cares to begin with the egg of Leda.

He that wants to build a house builds upon a given base; if he will not accept it, if he desires to dig up the fundament to the very bottom, in order to lay it anew, he will be digging forever, but the house will never be built.

Hence to say that science must be unprepossessed cannot mean that it must not make any presupposition. What, therefore, does it mean? Simply this: _Science must not presume anything to be true which is false, nor anything as proved which is still uncertain and unproved_. Whatever the scientist knows to be certain he may take as such, presuming it as the foundation and direction of further work; and what he knows to be probable he may suppose to be probable.

In so doing he in no way offends against the ideal that should be ever-present to his mind-the truth, because he merely allows himself to be guided by the truth, recognized as such. And the sequence of truth cannot but be truth, the sequence of certainty cannot but be certainty. But should he presuppose to be true what is false and unproved, and the uncertain to be certain, then he would offend against truth, against the aim of every science.