nd helpless and ignorant,
and worthless to know, of ourselves, any saving truth; and upon
nevertheless insisting that we are quite capable of one very lofty
type of knowledge--that we are capable, namely, of knowing God's voice
when we hear it, of distinguishing a divine revelation from all other
reports, of being sure, despite all our worthless ignorance, that the
divine higher life which seems to speak to us in our moments of
intuition is what it declares itself to be. If, then, there is a pride
of intellect, does there not seem to be an equal pride of faith, an
equal pretentiousness involved in undertaking to judge that certain of
our least articulate intuitions are infallible? Surely here is a
genuine problem, and it is a problem for the reason. We know that men
differ in faith. We know that one man's intuition regarding the way of
salvation may seem to another man to be a mere delusion, a deceitful
dream. We know, from the reports of religious experience, that at
times even the saints of greatest renown have doubted whether some of
their most persuasive visions of the {104} divine were not, after all,
due to the cunning deceit of an enemy of souls whom they more or less
superstitiously feared. We know that to common-sense, despite its
interest in salvation, the reports of the mystics and of the faithful
have often appeared to be but the tale of private and vain imaginings.
It is fair to ask what are the criteria whereby the true spiritual
gifts, the genuine revelations, are to be distinguished. And this, I
insist, is a question for the reason, for that aspect of our nature
which has to do with forming estimates of wholes rather than of
fragments--estimates of life in its entirety rather than of this or
that feeling or moment of ecstasy in its isolation.

If, hereupon, without for the moment attempting to discuss how others,
as, for instance, James himself, deal with the problem of the
reasonable estimate of the value of our religious intuitions, I sketch
for you my own opinion as to how reason does throw light upon the
religious paradox, I must again emphasise a matter that I mentioned in
my opening lecture and that is much neglected. Religious faith does,
indeed, involve a seemingly paradoxical attempt to transcend the
admitted ignorance of the needy human being, to admit that of himself
this being knows almost nothing about the way of salvation, and
nevertheless to insist that he is able to recognise his Delivere