Natural Law in the Spiritual World | Page 2

coloring given to Religion, the
mere freshening of the theological air with natural facts and
illustrations. It was an entire re-casting of truth. And when I came
seriously to consider what it involved, I saw, or seemed to see, that it
meant essentially the introduction of Natural Law into the Spiritual
World. It was not, I repeat, that new and detailed analogies of
Phenomena rose into view--although material for Parable lies
unnoticed and unused on the field of recent Science in inexhaustible
profusion. But Law has a still grander function to discharge toward
Religion than Parable. There is a deeper unity between the two
Kingdoms than the analogy of their Phenomena--a unity which the
poet's vision, more quick than the theologian's, has already dimly
seen:--
"And verily many thinkers of this age, Aye, many Christian teachers,
half in heaven, Are wrong in just my sense, who understood Our
natural world too insularly, as if No spiritual counterpart completed it,
Consummating its meaning, rounding all To justice and perfection, line
by line, Form by form, nothing single nor alone, The great below
clenched by the great above."[1]
The function of Parable in religion is to exhibit "form by form." Law
undertakes the profounder task of comparing "line by line." Thus

Natural Phenomena serve mainly an illustrative function in Religion.
Natural Law, on the other hand, could it be traced in the Spiritual
World, would have an important scientific value--it would offer
Religion a new credential. The effect of the introduction of Law among
the scattered Phenomena of Nature has simply been to make Science, to
transform knowledge into eternal truth. The same crystallizing touch is
needed in Religion. Can it be said that the Phenomena of the Spiritual
World are other than scattered? Can we shut our eyes to the fact that
the religious opinions of mankind are in a state of flux? And when we
regard the uncertainty of current beliefs, the war of creeds, the havoc of
inevitable as well as of idle doubt, the reluctant abandonment of early
faith by those who would cherish it longer if they could, is it not plain
that the one thing thinking men are waiting for is the introduction of
Law among the Phenomena of the Spiritual World? When that comes
we shall offer to such men a truly scientific theology. And the Reign of
Law will transform the whole Spiritual World as it has already
transformed the Natural World.
I confess that even when in the first dim vision, the organizing hand of
Law moved among the unordered truths of my Spiritual World, poor
and scantily-furnished as it was, there seemed to come over it the
beauty of a transfiguration. The change was as great as from the old
chaotic world of Pythagoras to the symmetrical and harmonious
universe of Newton. My Spiritual World before was a chaos of facts;
my Theology, a Pythagorean system trying to make the best of
Phenomena apart from the idea of Law. I make no charge against
Theology in general. I speak of my own. And I say that I saw it to be in
many essential respects centuries behind every department of Science I
knew. It was the one region still unpossessed by Law. I saw then why
men of Science distrust Theology; why those who have learned to look
upon Law as Authority grow cold to it--it was the Great Exception.
I have alluded to the genesis of the idea in my own mind partly for
another reason--to show its naturalness. Certainly I never premeditated
anything to myself so objectionable and so unwarrantable in itself, as
either to read Theology into Science or Science into Theology. Nothing
could be more artificial than to attempt this on the speculative side; and

it has been a substantial relief to me throughout that the idea rose up
thus in the course of practical work and shaped itself day by day
unconsciously. It might be charged, nevertheless, that I was all the time,
whether consciously or unconsciously, simply reading my Theology
into my Science. And as this would hopelessly vitiate the conclusions
arrived at, I must acquit myself at least of the intention. Of nothing
have I been more fearful throughout than of making Nature parallel
with my own or with any creed. The only legitimate questions one dare
put to Nature are those which concern universal human good and the
Divine interpretation of things. These I conceive may be there actually
studied at first-hand, and before their purity is soiled by human touch.
We have Truth in Nature as it came from God. And it has to be read
with the same unbiased mind, the same open eye, the same faith, and
the same reverence as all other Revelation. All that is found there,
whatever its place in