The ethic of freethought : and other addresses and essays / by Karl Pearson.

  • Karl Pearson
Date:
1901
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The ethic of freethought : and other addresses and essays / by Karl Pearson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    25/454 (page 7)
    dogmatism of false science, of false freethought,—every bit as dangerous as that religious dogmatism which would explain all things by the existence of a personal god or of a triune deity. Hence, materialism in so far as by dogmatism it slurs over scientific ignorance; atheism in so far as it is merely negative; positivism while it declares the relation of the finite to the infinite to be beyond solution ; and pessimism which also treating the problem as beyond solution, replaces beliet by no system of enthusiastic human morality—these one and all are not identical with freethought. True freethought never slurs over ignorance by dogmatism; it is not only destructive but creative; it believes the problem of life to be in gradual process of solution; it is not the apotheosis of ignorance, but rather that of knowledge. Thus I cannot help thinking that no true man of science is ever a materialist, a positivist, or a pessimist. If he be the first, he must be a dogmatist; if he be either of the latter, he must hold his task impossible or useless. I do not by this identify free- thought with science. Ear from it! Freethought, as we have seen, is knowledge of the relation of the finite to the infinite, and science, in so far as it explains the position of the indi¬ vidual with regard to the whole, is a very important element, but not the totality of such knowledge. I trust you will pardon the length at which I have dis¬ cussed Religion, Freethought, and Dogmatism. I want to succeed in conveying to you what I understand by these terms. Religion I have defined as the relation of the finite to the infinite; Freethought as our necessarily partial knowledge of this one true religion; and Dogmatism as that mental habit which replaces the known by the mythical, or at least supple¬ ments the known by products of the imagination,—a habit in every way impeding the growth of freethought. Y ou will say at once that it is an extremely difficult, if not impossible, task to be a freethinker. I cannot deny it. It is extremely difficult to approach closely any religious ideal. How many perfect Christians have there been in the last nineteen hundred years ? Answer that, and judge how many perfect freethinkers fall to the lot of a century! No more