It is through wisdom of the years I have learned to determine truth.
Now pay attention to how this can be determined by even one of your ignorance.
All this chaos in the religious area was attended, accentuated, if
0not largely inspired by, one of the most staggering phenomena in the history of the race. This was--and is--the presence, power, and
influence of a--Book. This momentous tome appears to be a
collection of ancient documents, of predominantly hagiographic
nature, about which the tradition of their personal authorship by
God himself, ostensibly using "holy men of old" as amanuenses for purposes of dictation, has tenaciously clung. It gained the name and renown of being the sole transmission of God's wisdom in literary
form to his children on earth. To all intents and purposes, it was regarded as God's manual of instruction, knowledge, wisdom and truth.
Under the power of such a persuasion, which spread to virtual universality in the West, this extraordinary volume gained a
veritable homage and reverence that would not be erroneously
described as the worship of a fetish.
The Book proves to be in many ways undeniably exceptional. It is replete with the maxims of high morality, the soundest incentives to spiritual aspiration and truth and wisdom of unchallengeable
authority. But the oldest portion of it purports to record the dealings of God with one particular tribe of early herdsmen in Palestine, whom, for reasons unknown to the rest of humanity, he
hadchosen to be the special beneficiaries of his favor and his agents for the consummation of his cosmic purposes in the redemption of mankind. The second and smaller portion of the Book is another collation of venerable documents which are claimed to recite chapters of history taking place in Palestine about the beginning of the first Christian century, which are interpreted as being the fulfilment of God's designs for future human history, but in a manner contrary to the expectations of those people he had chosen in the first part of the Book.
The influence of the Book has done nothing to mitigate the virulence of the Western religious bias against nature. Its glorification of
the person and function in history of the Son of God has in effect
diverted all interest in the religious field away from man's relation to nature.
Having taken a cursory glance at the disastrous outcome for religion and culture of the free mind's efforts to capture truth in the open mental sky looming above nature, it is now our task to examine
the activity of more stable-minded and deeply reflective thinkers, who, with better aim and control, have likewise sought out the roads that stretch out in all directions through the vast domain of
human psychology. These were not haphazard efforts, but reflection grounded on principle and logic and with an eye never taken
completely off the evidence afforded by nature. Here we shall
have more balanced and rational consideration of nature. Her
testimony will not be scorned. There will be caught also a
recognition that nature holds a kind of final jurisdiction in all decisions.
In the use of the free action of the mind in the search for truth, scholars--and one might give outstanding prominence in this respect
to George Santayana--have pointed to the way of discovery as running through the region of the imagination. Many speak of the
truth-seeking agency of the "literary imagination," and Santayana constantly refers to the broad human effort of the most cultured
minds as "literary discourse." By these phrases is connoted that whole cultural enterprise of refined society to carry on the pursuit of knowledge and the refinements of character. Embraced in it are the highest cogitations of philosophers, the most enlightened
pronouncements of the clergy, the higher-aiming portion of the output of periodical literature and the finest books of first-grade authors. It represents the most direct effort of a civilization to maintain
its most vitalrelation to the influences of culture.
It is therefore imperative now to trace the possibilities that may be implicit in this liberal but controlled use of the creative imagination, as that implement suggested by learned thinkers as the
most eligible pathway to the deepest truth. But what is to
distinguish the free use of the imagination here from that same free use of the function that, as we have shown wrought havoc in the
realm of religious pietism? This is the big point and the crux of the discussion. In the one case, it was wild license of thought and fancy without restraint of any basic standard of truth or value. In the other it is the play of thought over the ground of reality in a world where the living order itself prescribes the terms of the problem and hints at the answers. All adventuring of the mind in search of truth has had to exercise the power of thought, but the vast difference between some thinking and other consists of the absence or presence
of basic principles derived from an authoritative source. So the
intellectual quest goes on, with far from futile results. And the aim in this work has been to demonstrate that there is no authoritative source of verity but the world of nature. The human mind may rush
into the most active use of its great imaginative powers, but unless it is guided by the principia of a fundamental reality, it runs the risk of wandering astray from truth.
Yet what a strange prospect is unrolled here for our contemplation! What the astute thinkers and writers are saying is that ultimate truth is to be reached by poetic imagination! Not science, not history, not logic, not mathematics lay our path to highest truth, but it is for poets to lead us to truth. Poets, philosophers, romanticists have
long used this agency in the enterprise of apprehending truth.
But never has this methodology gained any authentic recognition in circles of science or academic authority. In those circles the poetic imagination has been regarded as something undependable, extraneous, outside the pale of either evidence or revelation, amenable to no
code of evaluation or judgment. It lay in the sphere of the visionary, the emotional, the fling of fancy. It could not be taken seriously. Now the astutest minds look to it for the clearest perceptions of basic truth. It may be the right road to knowledge, to discovery, to revelation of recondite verity. It can never ignore the basic facts
of science, nor can it disregard natural law. But, taking off from there, it can use the faculties of the exploring intellect to envisage inner realities and discern the eternal laws. And why not? The intellectual processes of a poet may be just as keen and subtle as those of the scientist; his logic may be as good, and by nature he
may be more discerning of hints and clues to meaning than the scientist. It is the tradition at any rate that the most lucid
visions of truth in man's moral-spiritual life have been caught by
men who had nothing in the way of science on which to ground their
conclusions. The impression still lingers that there is a capability in the as yet unexploited genius of human intellect adequate to
pierce to the heart of knowledge. If truth is to be captured, mind must be the agent, whether of the scientist or the poet.
The stage is set finally for the conclusion of our effort. We can go on relying on the faculty which Hindu intelligence has indicated as the one workable tool in the human equipment capable of giving
man his deepest and clearest insight into the realities of being. As far as they are apprehensible by man, man can grasp them. Outside of this capability, there is no other road of communication between
human consciousness and truth's realizations.
But the ultimate understanding of this transcendent question is to be subsumed under the authoritative principle that links the entire subject with the theme of nature. The vast region of as yet
undiscovered truth stretches ahead of man and extends presumably to the heights of the conscious powers of mortals on to the
intelligence of minor deities, and on up to the inconceivable
summits of the knowledge of archangels and gods, as the Greeks asserted. Into this illimitable field of conscious potential, the
mind of man is destined to advance, as his evolving organism develops more sensitive instrumentalities and powers. The road of evolution to higher being beckons man ever onward.
Now the crown of the argument can be put on the whole discussion, with the statement that the human mind may safely and profitably advance into the field of speculative truth if it proceeds with the manual of nature's instruction in hand. Mind has essayed to explore the immense reaches of possible discovery in the area above nature. But to
proceed into that terrain without nature's manual as a guide is to risk aberrancy at every turn. Henceforth, investigation must start from nature, and as full and comprehensive a formulation of nature's cardinal principia, her representation of the divine archai, as can possibly be outlined and organized in systemic form must be constructed as primary knowledge. Every speculative theory must be held up to nature to see if nature endorses it. Nature must be made the criterion of all judgment and decision. If no analogy or correspondence with a theory can be found in nature, or phenomena contradictory to it are found, it stands discredited. Somewhere in nature will be found a parallel to whatever is true.
The whole problem calls for the intensive cultivation and clever use of what Hindu wisdom called the "sharp and subtle intellect." No powers within reach of a commonplace order of mind can ever
discern these analogues. Minds of this caliber look upon nature with no sense of meaning in it whatever. It is, after all, the philosopher, the poet, the mystic, and no less the scientist who may have conditioned his mind to look for the reflection of God's thought in his works, who may be expected to glean a harvest of truth from the cultivation of nature. Thought, divine or human, always precedes and initiates overt action. In every human and divine action, there is implicit the flash of a mental determination.
Nature and spirit together are revelatory of truth. It is the task of spirit to discern truth from the evidences nature presents. As we have seen, nature is the expression of the modes and forms of God's subconscious mind. They are therefore impersonal, immutable products of mind. The child of God who would live his divinely ordained life moving always with the inexorable current of life will be wise to observe the phenomena, study them for discovery of purpose or beneficence, and in the end prudently conform his life to them and
the courses they intimate.
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