Nor did the germ of
religion fail when science began to bud. Listen to words which, though
new, are yet three thousand years old:--
. . . When in heaven the stars about the moon Look beautiful, when all
the winds are laid, And every height comes out, and jutting peak And
valley, and the immeasurable heavens Break open to their highest, and
all the stars Shine, and the shepherd gladdens in his heart.[44]
If the half savage Greek could share our feelings thus far, it is
irrational to doubt that he went further, to find as we do, that upon
that brief gladness there follows a certain sorrow,--the little light of
awakened human intelligence shines so mere a spark amidst the abyss
of the unknown and unknowable; seems so insufficient to do more than
illuminate the imperfections that cannot be remedied, the aspirations
that cannot be realised, of man's own nature. But in this sadness, this
consciousness of the limitation of man, this sense of an open secret
which he cannot penetrate, lies the essence of all religion; and the
attempt to embody it in the forms furnished by the intellect is the
origin of the higher theologies.
Thus it seems impossible to imagine but that the foundations of all
knowledge--secular or sacred--were laid when intelligence dawned, though
the superstructure remained for long ages so slight and feeble as to be
compatible with the existence of almost any general view respecting the
mode of governance of the universe.
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