Differences noticeable between the religious and scientific interpretations of certain phenomena are not necessarily fundamentally hostile the one to the other, since each represents an opposing point of view rather than a contradictory likeness of fact. Any system of re[53]flective thought, registered as opinion and propagated as substantial truth, may appear in opposition to any other established line of thought; but neither should be on this account judged as wholly right or wholly wrong, since each may be a perfectly correct impression of the thing seen, if the reflective machinery available has been properly employed. For whether artistic perception be utilised as an aid to the desire so to interpret Nature as to provide an endorsement of psychical apprehension, or whether it be directed towards the production of evidence for the verification of intellectual conjecture, the alternative result of a religious or a scientific interpretation of life is equally dependent upon focus for its representation in kind. Under certain unlike conditions of light and distance, two artists engaged in the representation of the same object produce totally different impressions of the thing seen. Difference of focus in the actual outward vision; difference of personality, whereby difference in the[54] mental powers of registration, reconstruction and expression becomes apparent, are together productive of difference in representation. A discerning critic does not, however, condemn either picture as worthless or incorrect because the one does not resemble the other. He knows that a just opinion of their respective values rests upon his ability to gauge that relative difference of focus which is responsible for their dissimilarity. The worth of his criticism depends upon his capacity so to focus his own point of view as to embrace and reconcile the differences of aspect in the representations submitted to his judgment. Given this ability, he is aware that his perception of the reconciled differences has enlarged his own appreciation of what he is called upon to judge. His criticism becomes his own enlightenment. Thus it appears that true critical appreciation is based upon the focussing of diverging points of view into converging actuality; and only when inquiry is attended with such impartial discernment can elucidation ensue. [55]