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Lesson 10.
The Bubbling of the Pot.
In our last chapter I spoke of the Renaissance that remarkable
period of transition from the thought of the Middle Ages to
that of modern times that strange reawakening of religious
and philosophical thought, and of art, letters and material
progress. The term renaissance means, literally, new birth, and
while generally used in the sense of a revival of anything long
extinct, lost or obsolete, it has an inner sense or meaning, i. e.,
the generation of the new individual or thing from the body
of the old the birth of the new generation of the thing. And
the Renaissance of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries affords
an excellent illustration of this birth of a new generation of
thought. This wonderful period of history manifested rebirth
of nearly all forms and phases of thought. In philosophy it
brought about the death of Scholasticism and the birth of
the newer conceptions of reasoning and the tendency to go
back to nature for truth. In metaphysics it brought about the
overturning of the popular Aristotelian thought, and the revival
of the Platonic influence under the form of Neo-Platonism. In
religion it brought about the attack upon the absolute power
and authority of the Church, which resulted in the Reformation
and rise of Protestantism. In short, the Renaissance was a period
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of the sweeping away of old things and the replacing of them
with new ideas, new forms, new names. The old, dying, gave
birth to the new.
In considering the influences at work to-day in the field
of theological, metaphysical, and philosophical thought,
one must be struck with their general resemblance to the
influences operative during the period of the Renaissance. The
same spirit of unrest and the desire for change is manifest. The
same iconoclastic tendency on the one hand, and the creative
impulse on the other, are seen in to-day s field of thought. The
same demand for a new synthesis is heard from the schools
of theology, philosophy and metaphysics. The same revival of
the search for truth, the same demand for, and willingness to
accept truth in whatever form it may present itself, just so it
really is truth and last, the same remarkable revival of interest
in the Neo-Platonic philosophy all these are manifested
to-day as strongly as they were in the Renaissance of the
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. In fact, many careful thinkers
have expressed the idea that we are now entering into the stage
of a new Renaissance the new generation of thought the
Renaissance of the twentieth century.
And it is this tossing of all the old conceptions and thought
into the great Crucible of Modern Thought the melting
process now under way and the new Something which is
to result therefrom that forms the subject of this book. We
have seen herein the evidences of the great mental and spiritual
unrest. We have seen the direct influence of Transcendentalism
upon this unrest. We have also traced back to ancient Greece
and ancient India the beginning of the ideas observable in the
latter-day conceptions. We have re-traced the path of these
ideas from the past to the present, showing their influence
upon the present thought. We have had, in short, presented
to us the various elements and ingredients which have been
tossed into the great melting pot of thought. And now, before

we venture to prophesy what the outcome is likely to be, let us

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consider the evidences of the bubbling of the pot let us see
what is being brought to the surface of the pot by the ebullition
of the various ingredients under the heat of the fire of mental
evolution. For, be it remembered, this is not as yet the period of
the new crystallization. We have not as yet reached the period
of the new which is to succeed the old. We are merely in the
transition stage the stage of the bubbling pot. The periods
of pouring out, and cooling, must follow later. Let us now
examine the bubbling pot and see what is being brought to the
surface.
In the field of theology and religion we are brought face to
face with evidences of the most marked and radical changes.
Thoughts which twenty-five years ago would have stamped
the utterer thereof as a free-thinker are to-day calmly stated
without protest from many orthodox pulpits. An examination
of the heresy trials of twenty years ago will show that ministers
were expelled from their churches for utterances which
would pass unnoticed and unrebuked to-day. Thomas Paine,
for a century proclaimed as a heathen, and by an eminent
personage called a dirty little atheist, is seen today to have
been not an atheist at all, but merely a Unitarian born a century
before his time. Were he living to-day, he would be received in
full membership in many of the liberal churches, and his much
decried statements would be seen to be practically in accord
with many of the findings of the Higher Criticism of the Church
of to-day. The universities of to-day are giving utterance to the
most heterodox ideas and statements, and yet only here and
there an ultra-orthodox clergyman objects.
The Christianity of to-day is an entirely different conception
from that of the Christianity of our fathers. There is everywhere
among educated people seen the desire to examine the
fundamental basis of the theology and doctrine of the Church,
and much that was formerly accepted without question is now
being thrown overboard by the churches as unwarranted and
irrational. The Old Testament conceptions are rapidly losing
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favor, and Christianity is growing more and more away from
the doctrines based thereon. Christianity to-day is adhering
closer than ever to the New Testament conceptions and to
the spirit thereof rather than to the letter. It is clinging closer to
the Christ ideal than to the Church doctrine, the latter being
now regarded as due more to the influence of Paul than to that
of his Master. Christianity means a great deal less to many than
it did formerly but also a great deal more. It is not too much
to say that, while theological Christianity may be declining, the
idea and ideals of the Christ are gaining in favor. The theology
of the Christian Church is suffering, but the religion of Christ is
gaining strength, in new forms and from new sources.
Science and Religion, so long thought to be inveterate foes,
are now seen to be growing closer together, as new points of
agreement are being reached. Science, throwing away much
of its former materialistic dogma, and Religion throwing
away much of her old theological dogma, find that they are
kinspeople and not enemies. It was the old clothing of each
which hid the familiar form, and deceived each other and the
onlookers. We hear much now of the Religion of Science and of

the Science of Religion surely a hopeful sign. Religion is now

taking into consideration the problems, ideas, conceptions and
discoveries of Science, applying them to the religious concepts,
the result being the broadening and vitalizing of both. In the
more advanced pulpits we hear ministers considering the
most radical conceptions of Science, not necessarily to oppose
them, but rather endeavoring to blend them with the truths
of religion. Both Science and Religion are now seen striving,
hand in hand, to discover truth. The best in each camp care
nothing as to which side shall make the discovery first the
only concern being that it must and shall be truth. It is true that
there are the ultra-orthodox in both camps. There are scientists
who hold that Religion is a huge aberration of the human
mind; and theologians who hold that Science is atheistic
the handiwork of the Devil. But the most advanced in each
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