religious position" (p. o;. '1 v, .1 Ho ., j^tmine these deu^ tions further than to remark that it seems to me that Dr. McTaggart only succeeds in making his definition of Keligion cover all the systems usually called " religious " by giving the term " harmony " a very vague and elastic sense. Many religious systems do not believe in the existence or present possibility of such a complete harmony between the individual and the Universe as a whole ; some of them hardly believe in its future possibility. In what sense, for instance, can it be said that a Christian who believes in everlasting punishment is or ever will be in a state of harmony with that por- tion of the Universe which consists in the souls condemned to such a fate, or with a Universe which contains such a very unreconciled element ? I sympathise entirely with Dr. McTaggart's main con- clusion that Religion is important, that it must rest upon and in- clude dogmas and (as he shows in the following chapter on " the establishment of Dogma") that there is no way of evading the fact that these dogmas must in the last resort depend upon reasoned metaphysical thinking. (I could, indeed, have wished that Dr. McTaggart had used the word " doctrine " and left the word " dogma " to be used, as it generally is, for a definitely formulated doctrine sanctioned by some kind of authority. But that is a small point.) Neither Science nor Emotion nor Morality will answer the purpose of dogma. Religious questions are essen- tially, in the present state of human thought, " doubtful and con- troversial," but that cannot be helped. The fact that dogmatic Religion must rest upon propositions which are not universally agreed upon does not prove the possibility of an undogmatic Re- ligion which will answer the purpose equally well and which con- tains nothing doubtful or disputable. The fact that a dogmatic Religion demands thought does not show that we must look out ior the true basis of Religion somewhere else than in thought. In these days of Pragmatism, of Voluntarism, of Philosophies which tell us that we may believe just what we like, of Philosophies which pronounce knowledge to be necessarily false, and of Ritschlian and other Theologies which virtually base all religious belief upon -emotion, it is refreshing to meet with a writer who does really believe in human Reason, in the possibility of attaining truth by Tiard and honest thinking, and in the duty of seeking to attain it. In chapter iii. on "Human Immortality," we come to the con- structive part of the book, and yet the argument of the chapter is still mainly negative. Dr. McTaggart's reasons for his own belief in Immortality rest upon the metaphysical system which he has expounded elsewhere. Here he contents himself with meeting objections. This he does largely by a clear and convincing argu- ment in favour of Idealism. If Matter has no independent existence, the soul cannot be one of the activities of its own body. Now that a reaction in favour of Dualism seems to be breaking out in the Iteart of the Idealistic camp, I trust that Dr. McTaggart's succinct argument in this chapter against such a creed will not be over-
