The second, set forth at length in the foregoing section, is that while thoseconcrete elements in which each creed embodies this soul of truth, are badas measured by an absolute standard, they are good as measured by a relativestandard. The remaining one is that these various beliefs are parts of theconstituted order of things, and, if not in their special forms yet in theirgeneral forms, necessary parts. Seeing how one or other of them is everywherepresent, is of perennial growth, and when cut down redevelops in a form butslightly modified, we cannot avoid the inference that they are needful accompanimentsof human life, severally fitted to the societies in which they are indigenous.
We must recognize them as elements in that great evolution of which the beginningand end are beyond our knowledge or conception -- as modes of manifestationof The Unknowable, and as having this for their warrant.
Our toleration therefore should be the widest possible. In dealing withalien beliefs our endeavour must be, not simply to refrain from injusticeof word or deed, but also to do justice by an open recognition of positiveworth. We must qualify our disagreement with as much as may be of sympathy. §34. These admissions will perhaps be held to imply that the currenttheology should be passively accepted, or, at any rate, should not be activelyopposed. "Why," it may be asked, "if creeds are severallyfit for their times and places, should we not rest content with that to whichwe are born? If the established belief contains an essential truth -- ifthe forms under which it presents this truth, though intrinsically bad, areextrinsically good -- if the abolition of these forms would be at presentdetrimental to the great majority -- nay, if there are scarcely any to whomthe ultimate and most abstract belief can furnish an adequate rule of life;surely it is wrong, for the present at least, to propagate this ultimateand most abstract belief."
The reply is that though existing religious ideas and institutions havean average adaptation to the characters of the people who live under them,yet, as these characters are ever changing, the adaptation is ever becomingimperfect. and the ideas and institutions need remodelling with a frequencyproportionate to the rapidity of the change. Hence, while it is requisitethat free play should be given to conservative thought and action, progressivethought and action must also have free play. Without the agency of both therecannot be those continual re-adaptations which orderly progress demands.
Whoever hesitates to utter that which he thinks the highest truth, lestit should be too much in advance of the time, may reassure himself by lookingat his acts from an impersonal point of view. Let him remember that opinionis the agency through which character adapts external arrangements to itself,and that his option rightly forms part of this agency -- is a unit of forceconstituting with other such units, the general power which works out socialchanges; and he will perceive that he may properly give utterance to hisinnermost conviction: leaving it to produce what effect it may. It is notfor nothing that he has in him these sympathies with some principles andrepugnance to others. He, with all his capacities, and aspirations, and beliefs,is not an accident but a product of the time. While he is a descendant ofthe past he is a parent of the future; and his thoughts are as children bornto him, which he may not carelessly let die. Like every other man he mayproperly consider himself as one of the myriad agencies through whom worksthe Unknown Cause; and when the Unknown Cause produces in him a certain belief,he is thereby authorized to profess and act out that belief. For, to renderin their highest sense the words of the poet --
Nature is made better by no mean, But nature makes that mean: over that art Which you say adds to nature, is an art That nature makes.
Not as adventitious therefore will the wise man regard the faith whichis in him. The highest truth he sees he will fearlessly utter: knowing that,let what may come of it, he is thus playing his right part in the world --knowing that if he can effect the change he aims at -- well; if not -- wellalso; though not so well.
