Our doctrine of loyalty is founded not upon a decision
about nature's supposed mechanism, but upon a study of man's own inner
and deeper needs. It is a doctrine about the plan and the business of
human life. It seems, therefore, to be neutral as to every so-called
conflict between science and religion.
But now, in answer to these remarks, I have to show that the doctrine of
loyalty, once rightly understood, has yet a further application. It is a
doctrine that, when more fully interpreted, helps us toward a genuine
insight, not only into the plan of life, but into the nature of things.
The philosophy of loyalty has nothing to say against precisely so much
of naturalism as is indeed an established result of common sense and of
the scientific study of nature. The theory of the loyal life involves
nothing superstitious--no trust in magic, no leaning upon the
intervention of such spiritual agencies as the old mythologies
conceived. And yet, as I shall insist, nobody can understand and
practise the loyal spirit without tending thereby to get a true view of
the nature of things, a genuine touch with reality, which cannot be
gained without seeing that, however much of a mechanism nature may
appear to be, the real world is something much more than a mechanism,
and much more significant than are the waters which wear away stones.
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