현미경(顯微鏡)과 조마경(照魔鏡) — 이해조 소설에서 과학과 유교의 관계

Abstract

The notion that the magical world view is no longer valid, and the belief that science can reveal the truth about human beings and the world is built into the novels of Yi Hae-jo, such as Gumageom (驅魔劒), Ssangogjeog (雙玉笛), Hwasegye (花世界). The recognition of science as a means of escaping from the magical world, and of science as a light for expelling ‘evil spirits’ can also be seen in various articles of the Journal of Gihoheunghaghoe-wolbo (畿湖興學會月報), which he edited. It seems that he had encountered a mechanical cosmology or an evolutionary worldview through articles about Western natural science that were accepted through academic journals. The evolutionary worldview or the techniques of the detective story revealed in his novels shows such an influence. However, his novels do not look at human society from the perspective of a natural scientist, as he studies the object but without a ‘final cause’ or metaphysics. Rather, Yi Hae-jo repeatedly showed how the principle of ‘the rewarding of virtue and the punishment of evil’ is realized in the secular world, using the “rule of heaven” (天理) (which supported the view of the neo-Confucian worldview) actively as the power of the plot in his novels. In the novels of Yi Hae-jo, the theory of response between heaven and man based on the neo-Confucian notion of “heaven” (天) is revealed clearly, and the concept of nature (god) which makes moral judgments and punishes frequently appears. The novels of Yi Hae-jo, in which the worldviews of science and Confucianism are mixed, have significance as a response of Confucian intellectuals to Western natural science.