Transcriber’s Notes
The cover was created by adding text to a plain background and isplaced in the public domain.
Obvious typographical errors have been silently corrected.
THEISM AND HUMANISM
BEING
THE GIFFORD LECTURES
Delivered at the University of Glasgow, 1914
BY THE
Rt. Hon. ARTHUR JAMES BALFOUR
M.A., F.R.S., LL.D., D.C.L.
(HON. FELLOW OF TRINITY COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE)
HODDER AND STOUGHTON
LONDONNEW YORK TORONTO
MCMXV
Printed in Great Britain by Hazell, Watson & Viney, Ld.
London and Aylesbury.
TO THE PROFESSORS AND STUDENTSOF THE UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW,WHO GAVE SO KIND A RECEPTIONTO THESE LECTURES ON THEIR DELIVERYIN THE BUTE HALL, IDEDICATE THIS VOLUME.
vii
This volume contains the substance of theGifford Lectures delivered at the Universityof Glasgow in January and February 1914.I say the substance of the lectures, lest any ofthose who formed part of my most kindlyaudience should expect a verbal reproductionof what they then heard. No such reproductionwould have been either expedient orpossible. The lectures were not read: theywere spoken (with the aid of brief notes) insuch terms as suggested themselves at themoment; and their duration was rigidlyfixed, to suit my academic audience, so asjust to occupy the customary hour. Although,therefore, they were largely (thoughnot wholly) based upon written drafts, noneof the language, and not all the ideas andillustrations contained in the original couldbe reproduced in the spoken lectures, nordid everything in the spoken lectures representpassages in the written originals.
It is not, in these circumstances, surprisingviiithat the work has had, in large measure, tobe rewritten, though the argument itself, andthe order in which its various parts are presentedfor consideration, remains substantiallyunchanged.
I should not have troubled the reader withthis very unimportant narrative except forthe purpose of explaining the long intervalthat has elapsed between the delivery of thelectures and their publication. Literary compositionI have always found laborious andslow, even in favourable conditions. But theconditions have not been favourable. Myanxiety to make the argument easy to readfor persons who take little interest in, andhave small knowledge of, philosophical controversiesdid not make it easy to write;while external circumstances were singularlyunfavourable to rapid composition. No onewho took any part in public affairs betweenMarch 1914 and the outbreak of the war, orbetween the outbreak of the war and thepresent moment, is likely to regard thesemonths as providing convenient occasion forquiet thought and careful writing. I say this,however, not as an excuse for poor workmanship,but only as an explanation of longdelay.
ix
It may be desirable to warn the intendingreader before he embarks on these lectures,that though the basis of the argument is wide,its conclusion is narrow: and though that conclusionis religious, the discussions leading upto it are secular. I make no dialectical useof the religious sentiment; nor do I attemptany analysis of