An Introduction to the Study of Comparative Religion. F. B. Jevons

some real being, in which is no shadow of turning. When the practical man uses the results of pure science for some practical end, he is taking them on faith and uses them in the further faith that the end he aims at can be realised, and shall by him be realised, if not in one way, then in another. The missionary, then, who uses the results of the science of religion, who seeks to benefit by an applied science of religion, is but following in the footsteps of the practical man, and using business methods toward the end he is going to realise.

      The end he is going to realise is to convert men to Christianity. The faith in which he acts is that Christianity is the highest form which religion can take, the final form it shall take. As works of art or literature may be classed either according to order of history or order of value, so the works of the religious spirit may be classed, not only in chronological order, but also in order of religious value. I am not aware that any proof can be given to show that any given period of art or literature is better than any other. The merits of Shakespeare or of Homer may be pointed out; and they may, or they may not, when pointed out, be felt. If they are felt, no proof is needed; if they are not, no proof is possible. But they can be pointed out—by one who feels them. And they can be contrasted with the work of other poets in which they are less conspicuous. And the contrast may reveal the truth in a way in which otherwise it could never have been made plain.

      I know no other way in which the relative values of different forms of religion can become known or be made known. You may have been tempted to reflect, whilst I have been speaking, that, on the principle I have laid down, there is no reason why there should not be five hundred applied sciences, or applications of the science, of religion, instead of one; for every one of the many forms of religion may claim to apply the science of religion to its own ends. To that I may reply first, that à priori you would expect that every nation would set up its own literature as the highest; but, as a matter of fact, you find Shakespeare generally placed highest amongst dramatists, Homer amongst epic poets. You do not find the conception of literary merit varying from nation to nation in such a way that there are as many standards of value as there are persons to apply them. You find that there tends to be one standard. Next, since the different forms of religion must be compared if their relative values are to be ascertained, the method of the applied science of religion must be the method of comparison. Whatever the outcome that is anticipated from the employment of the applied science, it is by the method of comparison that it must act. And one indication of genuine faith is readiness to employ that method, and assured confidence in the result of its employment. The missionary's life is the best, because the most concrete example of the practical working of the method of comparison; and the outcome of the comparison which is made by those amongst whom and for whom he works makes itself felt in their hearts, their lives, and sometimes in their conversion. It is the best example, because the value of a religion to be known must be felt. But though it is the best because it is the simplest, the most direct, and the most convincing it is not that which addresses itself primarily to the reason, and it is not one which is produced by the applied science of religion. It is not one which can be produced by any science, pure or applied. The object of the applied science of religion is to enable the missionary himself to compare forms of religion, incidentally in order that he may know what by faith he feels, and without faith he could not feel, viz. that Christianity is the highest form; but still more in order that he may teach others, and may have at his command the facts afforded by the science of religion, wherewith to appeal, when necessary, to the reason and intelligence as well as to the hearts and feelings of those for whose salvation he is labouring.

      The time has happily gone by when the mere idea of comparing Christianity with any other religion would have been rejected with horror as treasonous and treacherous. The fact that that time has now gone by is in itself evidence of a stronger faith in Christianity. What, if it was not fear, at any rate presented the appearance of fear, has been banished; and we can and do, in the greater faith that has been vouchsafed to us, look with confidence on the proposal to compare Christianity with other religions. The truth cannot but gain thereby, and we rest on Him who is the way and the truth. We recognise fully and freely that comparison implies similarity, points of resemblance, ay! and even features of identity. And of that admission much has been made—and more than can be maintained. It has been pressed to mean that all forms of religion, from the lowest to the highest, are identical; that therefore there is nothing more or other in the highest than in the lowest; and that in the lowest you see how barbarous is religion and how unworthy of civilised man. Now, that course of argument is open to one obvious objection which would be fatal to it, even if it were the only objection, which it is not. That objection is that whether we are using the method of comparison for the purpose of estimating the relative values of different forms of religion; or whether we are using the comparative method of science, with the object of discovering and establishing facts, quite apart from the value they may have for any purpose they may be put to when they have been established; in either case, comparison is only applied, and can only be applied to things which, though they resemble one another, also differ from one another. It is because they differ, at first sight, that the discovery of their resemblance is important. And it is on that aspect of the truth that the comparative method of science dwells. Comparative philology, for instance, devotes itself to establishing resemblances between, say, the Indo-European languages, which for long were not suspected to bear any likeness to one another or to have any connection with each other. Those resemblances are examined more and more closely, are stated with more and more precision, until they are stated as laws of comparative philology, and recognised as laws of science to which there are no exceptions. Yet when the resemblances have been worked out to the furthest detail, no one imagines that Greek and Sanskrit are the same language, or that the differences between them are negligible. It is then surprising that any student of comparative religion should imagine that the discovery or the recognition of points of likeness between the religions compared will ever result in proving that the differences between them are negligible or non-existent. Such an inference is unscientific, and it has only to be stated to show that the student of comparative religion is but exercising a right common to all students of all sciences, when he claims that points of difference cannot be overlooked or thrust aside.

      If, then, the student of the science of religion directs his attention primarily to the discovery of resemblances between religions which at first sight bear no more resemblance to one another than Greek did to the Celtic tongues; if the comparative 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 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 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