An Outline of the History of Christian Thought Since Kant | Page 5

in much
of the popular speech is evidence of this fact. To many minds it appeared as if one could
not be an adherent both of reason and of faith. That was a contradiction which Kant, first
of all in his own experience, and then through his system of thought, did much to
transcend. The deliverance which he wrought has been compared to the deliverance
which Luther in his time achieved for those who had been in bondage to scholasticism in
the Roman Church. Although Kant has been dead a hundred years, both the defence of

religion and the assertion of the right of reason are still, with many, on the ancient lines.
There is no such strife between rationality and belief as has been supposed. But the
confidence of that fact is still far from being shared by all Christians at the beginning of
the twentieth century. The course in reinterpretation and readjustment of Christianity,
which that calm conviction would imply, is still far from being the one taken by all of
those who bear the Christian name. If it is permissible in the writing of a book like this to
have an aim besides that of the most objective delineation, the author may perhaps be
permitted to say that he writes with the earnest hope that in some measure he may
contribute also to the establishment of an understanding upon which so much both for the
Church and the world depends.
We should say a word at this point as to the general relation of religion and philosophy.
We realise the evil which Kant first in clearness pointed out. It was the evil of an
apprehension which made the study of religion a department of metaphysics. The
tendency of that apprehension was to do but scant justice to the historical content of
Christianity. Religion is an historical phenomenon. Especially is this true of Christianity.
It is a fact, or rather, a vast complex of facts. It is a positive religion. It is connected with
personalities, above all with one transcendent personality, that of Jesus. It sprang out of
another religion which had already emerged into the light of world-history. It has been
associated for two thousand years with portions of the race which have made
achievements in culture and left record of those achievements. It is the function of
speculation to interpret this phenomenon. When speculation is tempted to spin by its own
processes something which it would set beside this historic magnitude or put in place of it,
and still call that Christianity, we must disallow the claim. It was the licence of its
speculative endeavour, and the identification of these endeavours with Christianity,
which finally discredited Hegelianism with religious men. Nor can it be denied that
theologians themselves have been sinners in this respect. The disposition to regard
Christianity as a revealed and divinely authoritative metaphysic began early and
continued long. When the theologians also set out to interpret Christianity and end in
offering us a substitute, which, if it were acknowledged as absolute truth, would do away
with Christianity as historic fact, as little can we allow the claim.
Again, Christianity exists not merely as a matter of history. It exists also as a fact in
living consciousness. It is the function of psychology to investigate that consciousness.
We must say that, accurately speaking, there is no such thing as Christian philosophy.
There are philosophies, good or bad, current or obsolete. These are Christian only in
being applied to the history of Christianity and the content of the Christian consciousness.
There is, strictly speaking, no such thing as Christian consciousness. There is the human
consciousness, operating with and operated upon by the impulse of Christianity. It is the
great human experience from which we single out for investigation that part which is
concerned with religion, and call that the religious experience. It is essential, therefore,
that those general investigations of human consciousness and experience, as such, which
are being carried on all about us should be reckoned with, if our Christian life and
thought are not altogether to fall out of touch with advancing knowledge. For this reason
we have misgiving about the position of some followers of Ritschl. Their opinion, pushed
to the limit, seems to mean that we have nothing to do with philosophy, or with the
advance of science. Religion is a feeling of which he alone who possesses it can give

account. He alone who has it can appreciate such an account when given. We
acknowledge that religion is in part a feeling. But that feeling must have rational
justification. It must also have rational guidance if it is to be saved from degenerating into
fanaticism.
To say that we have nothing to do with philosophy ends in our having to do with