THE ROLE OF SCIENCE IN GENESIS.

— The history of the origin of almost all ancient peoples is intermingled with that of their religion, whence it came that their first books were religious; 2 and since all religions are linked to the principle of things, which is also that of Humanity, they gave, regarding the formation and arrangement of the Universe, explanations in accordance with the state of knowledge of the epoch and of their founders.

The result was that the first sacred books were at the same time the first books of science, just as they were, for a long period, the sole code of civil laws.

— In the primitive ages, the means of observation being necessarily very imperfect, the first theories about the system of the world were bound to be very tainted with gross errors; 2 but, even had those means been as complete as they are today, men would not have known how to make use of them; besides, such means could only be the fruit of the development of intelligence and of the consequent knowledge of the laws of Nature.

As man advanced in the knowledge of those laws, he also penetrated the mysteries of Creation and rectified the ideas he had formed concerning the origin of things.

— He proved powerless to solve the problem of Creation, until the moment when Science furnished him the key to it.

He had to wait for Astronomy to open to him the gates of infinite space and allow him to plunge his gaze therein; for it to become possible for him, by the power of calculation, to determine with rigorous exactitude the movement, the position, the volume, the nature, and the role of the celestial bodies; for Physics to reveal to him the laws of gravitation, of heat, of light, and of electricity; for Chemistry to show him the transformations of matter, and Mineralogy the materials that form the surface of the globe; for Geology to teach him to read, in the terrestrial strata, the gradual formation of that same globe.

To Botany, to Zoology, to Paleontology, to Anthropology fell the task of initiating him into the filiation and succession of organized beings; with Archaeology he was able to follow the traces that Humanity has left throughout the ages; 4 in a word, completing one another, all the sciences had to contribute that which was indispensable for the knowledge of the history of the world; for lack of those contributions, man had his first hypotheses as guide.

Therefore, before he came into possession of those elements of appraisal, all the commentators of Genesis, whose reason ran up against material impossibilities, revolved within a circle, without managing to get out of it; they only succeeded when Science opened the way, splitting open the old edifice of beliefs; everything then changed aspect; once the guiding thread was found, the difficulties were promptly smoothed out; in place of an imaginary Genesis, there arose a positive and, in a certain way, experimental Genesis; 6 the field of the Universe extended to infinity; the gradual formation of the Earth and of the heavenly bodies was followed, according to eternal and immutable laws, which demonstrate far better the greatness and the wisdom of God than a miraculous creation, drawn suddenly out of nothing, like a stage transformation in plain view, through the effect of a sudden idea of the Divinity, after an eternity of inaction.

Since it is impossible to conceive of Genesis without the data that Science furnishes, it may be said with entire truth that: Science is called to constitute the true Genesis, according to the laws of Nature.

— At the point it has reached in the nineteenth century, has Science overcome all the difficulties of the problem of Genesis?

No, certainly not; but it cannot be disputed that it has destroyed, irremediably, all the capital errors and has laid for it the essential foundations upon irrefutable data; 3 the points still doubtful amount, so to speak, only to questions of minutiae, whose solution, whatever it may turn out to be in the future, cannot prejudice the whole.

Moreover, despite the resources it has had at its disposal, it has lacked, until now, an important element, without which the work could never be completed.

— Of all the ancient Geneses, the one that comes closest to the modern scientific data, notwithstanding the errors it contains, brought to light today, is incontestably that of Moses.

Some of those errors are even more apparent than real and arise either from a false interpretation attributed to certain terms, whose primitive meaning was lost as they passed from language to language through translation, or whose acceptation changed with the customs of peoples, or they also stem from the allegorical form peculiar to the oriental style, which was taken literally instead of its spirit being sought.

— The Bible, evidently, contains facts that reason, developed by Science, could not accept today, and others that seem strange and derive from customs that are no longer ours.

But, alongside this, it would be biased not to recognize that it preserves great and beautiful things.

Allegory occupies a considerable space there, hiding beneath its veil sublime truths, which become manifest as soon as one descends to the very core of the thought, since the absurdity then immediately disappears.

Why then was the veil not lifted from it sooner?

On the one hand, for lack of enlightenment that only Science and a sound philosophy could furnish, and, on the other hand, through the effect of the principle of the absolute immutability of faith, a consequence of an ultra-blind respect for the letter, before which reason must bow, and, thus, through the fear of compromising the structure of beliefs, raised upon the literal sense.

Such beliefs, proceeding from a primitive point, there was the fear that, if the first link of the chain were broken, all the meshes of the net would end up coming apart; the eyes were then obstinately shut; but to shut one's eyes to danger is not to avoid it.

When a structure leans away from the plumb line, does not prudence command that the bad stones be immediately replaced by good ones, instead of waiting, out of the respect inspired by the antiquity of the edifice, until the harm becomes irremediable and it becomes necessary to rebuild it from top to bottom?

— Carrying its investigations into the bowels of the Earth and into the depths of the heavens, Science has demonstrated, in an irrefutable manner, the errors of the Mosaic Genesis taken literally, and the material impossibility that things happened as they are textually related there; it has, for that very reason, dealt a profound blow to age-old beliefs.

Orthodox faith took alarm, because it judged that its foundation stone was being taken from it; but on whose side was reason bound to be: with Science, which advanced prudently and progressively over the solid ground of figures and observation, affirming nothing before having the proofs in hand, or with a narrative written when the means of observation were absolutely lacking?

In the end, who is to prevail: the one who says 2 and 2 make 5 and refuses to verify, or the one who says that 2 and 2 make 4 and proves it?

— But, they object, if the Bible is a divine revelation, then was God mistaken?

If it is not a divine revelation, it lacks authority and religion collapses for want of a base.

One of two things: either Science is in error, or it is right; 4 if it is right, it cannot make an opinion contrary to it be true; 5 there is no revelation that can override the authority of facts.

Incontestably, it is not possible that God, being all truth, should lead men into error, either knowingly or unknowingly, for otherwise He would not be God.

Therefore, if the facts contradict the words attributed to Him, what must logically be concluded is that He did not pronounce them, or that such words were understood in a sense opposite to that which is properly theirs.

If, with such contradictions, religion suffers harm, the fault is not Science's, which cannot make that which is cease to be; but men's, for having prematurely established absolute dogmas, of whose prevalence they have made a matter of life or death, upon hypotheses susceptible of being belied by experience.

There are things to whose sacrifice we must resign ourselves, willingly or unwillingly, when we cannot manage to avoid it.

Since the world marches on, without the will of a few being able to stop it, the most sensible thing is for us to accompany it and accommodate ourselves to the new state of things, instead of clinging to the past that is crumbling away, at the risk of being dragged down in its fall.

— Out of respect for the Sacred Texts, ought Science to be compelled to keep silent?

That would be as impossible as preventing the Earth from turning.

Religions, whatever they may be, have never gained anything by sustaining manifest errors.

Science has for its mission to discover the laws of Nature; now, those laws being the work of God, they cannot be contrary to religions founded upon truth.

To hurl an anathema at progress, as an attack upon religion, is to hurl it at the very work of God; 6 it is, moreover, useless labor, for not all the anathemas in the world would be capable of preventing Science from advancing and truth from opening its way.

If Religion refuses to advance with Science, the latter will advance alone.

— Only stationary religions can fear the discoveries of Science, which are baneful only to those that allow themselves to be left behind by progressive ideas, immobilizing themselves in the absolutism of their beliefs; 2 they, in general, form so mean an idea of the Divinity that they do not understand that to assimilate the laws of Nature, which Science reveals, is to glorify God in His works; 3 in their blindness, however, they prefer to render homage to the Spirit of evil, attributing those laws to him.

A religion that was in no point in contradiction with the laws of Nature would have nothing to fear from progress and would be invulnerable.

— Genesis divides into two parts: the history of the formation of the material world and that of Humanity considered in its dual principle, corporeal and spiritual.

Science has limited itself to the investigation of the laws that govern matter; in man himself, it has studied only the carnal envelope.

On that side, it has come to acquaint itself, with exactitude, with the principal parts of the mechanism of the Universe and of the human organism.

Thus, on that capital point, it can complete the Genesis of Moses and rectify its defective parts.

But the history of man, considered as a spiritual being, belongs to a special order of ideas, which are not within the domain of Science properly speaking, and which, for this reason, it has not made the object of its investigations.

Philosophy, to whose attributions this kind of study belongs more particularly, has only formulated, on the point in question, contradictory systems, ranging from the purest spirituality to the negation of the spiritual principle and even of God, with no other bases than the personal ideas of their authors; it has, therefore, left the matter undecided, for lack of sufficient verification.

— This question, however, is the most important for man, since it involves the problem of his past and of his future; that of the material world affects him only indirectly.

What matters to him to know, above all, is whence he came and whither he is going, whether he has already lived and whether he will still live, what destiny is reserved for him.

On all these points, Science remains mute.

Philosophy only puts forth opinions that conclude in a diametrically opposite sense, but which, at least, allow discussion, which causes many persons to take its side, in preference to following religion, which does not discuss.

— All religions are in agreement as to the principle of the existence of the soul, without, however, demonstrating it; 2 but they are not so, either as to its origin, or with respect to its past and its future, nor, principally, and this is the essential thing, as to the conditions on which its future destiny depends.

For the most part, they present, of the future of the soul, and impose on the belief of their adherents, a picture that only blind faith can accept, since it does not withstand serious examination.

Bound to their dogmas, to the ideas that in primitive times were formed of the material world and of the mechanism of the Universe, the destiny they attribute to the soul cannot be reconciled with the present state of knowledge.

Being able, then, only to lose by examination and discussion, religions find it simpler to proscribe both the one and the other.

— From these divergences regarding the future of man were born doubt and incredulity.

Yet incredulity gives rise to a painful void; man regards with anxiety the unknown into which he must fatally penetrate; the idea of nothingness freezes him; his conscience tells him that something is reserved for him beyond the present. What will it be?

His reason, with the development it has attained, no longer permits him to admit the stories with which he was lulled in infancy, nor to accept the allegory as reality.

What is the meaning of that allegory? Science has torn for him a corner of the veil; it has not, however, revealed to him what most matters for him to know.

He questions in vain, it answers him nothing in a peremptory manner suited to calm his apprehensions; everywhere he encounters affirmation colliding with negation, without positive proofs being presented on either side; hence uncertainty, 6 and uncertainty about what concerns the future life makes man throw himself, seized by a kind of frenzy, into the things of material life.

Such is the inevitable effect of epochs of transition: the edifice of the past collapses, while that of the future is not yet built.

Man resembles the adolescent who, no longer having the naive belief of his early years, does not yet possess the knowledge proper to maturity; he feels only vague aspirations, which he does not know how to define.

— If the question of spiritual man has remained, until the present day, in a state of theory, it is because the means of direct observation were lacking, such as exist for verifying the state of the material world, the field thus remaining open to the conceptions of the human spirit.

As long as man did not know the laws that govern matter and could not apply the experimental method, he went wandering from system to system, regarding the mechanism of the Universe and the formation of the Earth.

What happened in the physical order happened also in the moral order; to fix ideas, the essential element was lacking: the knowledge of the laws to which the spiritual principle is subject.

This knowledge was reserved for our epoch, as that of the laws of matter was reserved for the last two centuries.

— Up to the present, the study of the spiritual principle, comprised within Metaphysics, was purely speculative and theoretical; in Spiritism, it is entirely experimental.

With the aid of the mediumistic faculty, more developed at present and, above all, generalized and better studied, man found himself in possession of a new instrument of observation.

Mediumship was, for the spiritual world, what the telescope was for the astral world and the microscope for the world of the infinitely small; 4 it allowed the relations of that world with the corporeal world to be explored and studied, so to speak, by direct sight; 5 it allowed the intelligent being to be separated, in living man, from the material being, and the two to be observed acting separately.

Once relations were established with the inhabitants of the spiritual world, it became possible for man to follow the soul in its ascending march, in its migrations, in its transformations; one could, at last, study the spiritual element.

Here is what the earlier commentators of Genesis lacked, in order to comprehend it and rectify its errors.

— The spiritual world and the material world being in incessant contact, the two are interdependent; both have their share of action in Genesis.

Without the knowledge of the laws that govern the former, it would be as impossible to constitute a complete Genesis as it would be for a sculptor to give life to a statue.

Only now, although neither material Science nor spiritual Science has said the last word, does man possess the two elements proper to throw light upon this immense problem.

Those two keys were absolutely indispensable to him in order to arrive at a solution, even an approximate one.

[1] [The book “Evolution in Two Worlds” by André Luiz studies this subject in detail.]