hem. The question is
whether we have applied to any one belief or set of beliefs the tests we
have applied to others: whether, for instance, we can honestly profess
to believe in prayer or the doctrine of the Trinity or heaven and hell
as we believe in Gresham's Law or the effects of quinine or the
roundness of the earth; whether we have criticised the religion in which
we were brought up as we criticise Mohammedanism or any other; whether
we have scrutinised the legends of our creed as we have scrutinised the
legend of King Arthur and his Knights; or whether, on the other hand, we
hold the atomic theory or faith in vaccination by mere authority, while
we dispute about religious teaching in the schools.

This does not mean that we are to apply the same kind of test to every
kind of proposition; that we are to ask for evidence of immortality as
we ask for evidence of the Darwinian theory. The test is one of
consistency. Does the belief in immortality, we are to ask, consist with
either our knowledge or our imagination? Do we hold it critically and
coherently or as a mere congeries of irreconcilable propositions? Do we
ask ourselves what we mean by 'meeting again'? Is it anything more than
a fantasy which we affirm for our own comfort or the supposed comfort of
others, or for the sake of mere conformity with popular sentiment? No
thoughtful man, perhaps, will deny that he holds some of his opinions by
some such easy tenure; were it only for the reason that consistent
ascertainment is often laborious, and that common consent has to be
allowed to take its place in regard to many beliefs of plainly inferior
importance. But religious beliefs are not so classed by those who
seriously debate them; and here, if ever, the challenge to scrutiny and
consistency is imperative.

And so disturbing is the challenge that for centuries past the higher
religious consciousness has been engaged in an unceasing effort to
persuade itself and its antagonists of the secular or mundane
reasonableness of its supernaturalist creed. Religious life is seen
going on at two widely removed standpoints: one that of the emotional
believer who knows no conceptual difficulties, and is concerned only to
maintain in himself and others the quasi-ecstatic state of faith; the
other that of the would-be reasoner who is concerned to secure peace of
mind by arguing down his own misgivings and the positive antagonism of
unbelief. Between those extremes, probably,