ve method of science dwells upon
the fact that things which differ from one another may also resemble
one another, and that their resemblances may be stated in the form of
scientific laws,--there is still another aspect of the truth, and it is
that between things which resemble one another there are also
differences. And the jury of the world will ultimately demand to know
the truth and the whole truth.

Now, to get not only at the truth, but at the whole of the truth, is
precisely the business of the applied science of religion, and is the
very object of that which, in order to distinguish it from the
comparative method of science, I have called the method of comparison.
For the purposes of fair comparison not only must the resemblances,
which the {22} comparative method of science dwells on, be taken into
account, but the differences, also, must be weighed. And it is the
business of the method of comparison, the object of the applied science
of religion, to do both things. Neither of the two can be dispensed
with; neither is more important than the other; but for the practical
purposes of the missionary it is important to begin with the
resemblances; and on grounds of logic and of theory, the resemblances
must be first established, if the importance, nay! the decisive value,
of the differences is to go home to the hearts and minds of the
missionary's hearers. The resemblances are there and are to be studied
ultimately in order to bring out the differences and make them stand
forth so plainly as to make choice between the higher form of religion
and the lower easy, simply because the difference is so manifest. Now,
the missionary's hearer could not know, much less appreciate, the
difference, the superiority of Christianity, as long as Christianity
was unknown to him. And it is equally manifest, though it has never
been officially recognised until now and by the Hartford Theological
Seminary, that neither can the missionary adequately set forth the
superiority of Christianity to {23} the lower forms of religion, unless
he knows something about them and about the points in which their
inferiority consists. Hitherto he has had to learn that for himself,
as he went on, and, as it were, by rule of thumb. But, on business
principles, economy of labour and efficiency in work will be better
secured if he is taught before he goes out, and is taught on scientific
methods. What he has to learn is the resemblances between