The Relation of Science and Religion.pdf - Online Christian Library

246 SCIENCE AND RELIGION.Still, it must be allowed that in the pathwayof science nothing is to be foreclosed,and no area, whether large or small, is to beshut off on which the appliances of sciencecan be brought to bear. Science can notexclude man from the range of investigation;can not on any warrant supplied by the conditionsof its own procedure, draw a linewithin the circumference of nature, eventhough it may be constrained to allow thatthere are many things within nature of whichit can offer no explanation.That science has by recent research donemuch to explain phases of human activity previouslyunexplained, may be clearly shown.The modification of previously received opinionmay be indicated thus,-that many formsformerly regarded as in the true sense voluntary,and so described in the life notonly of man, but also of the higher animals,can be explained by the action of brain andnerve. This involves a considerable extensionof the area of the mechanical in humanaction, and a considerable restriction of thearea of the voluntary. In seeking to indicateroughly the form of this restriction, wemay find enough for our p~wposc in the dis-