ANTITHEISTIC THEORIES CONCLUDED

V. SECULARISM

Mr. Holyoake was the editor of The Reasoner, the organ of the Freethinkers of England. He was the acknowledged leader in the propagation of Secularism. With him was associated the famous Mr. Bradlaugh who was a more openly avowed atheist. Mr. Holyoake was more reserved and timid, and assumed merely a skeptical position with regard to the divine existence. He did not deny, he only did not believe in the existence of God. This is also an epitome of Secularism.

Secularists do not absolutely deny the existence of God. They only assert that they have not sufficient evidence. Reason has not yet arrived at ample proof of His existence, nor can it absolutely deny it. Mr. Holyoake in his public debates and discussions maintained the following thesis: "We have not sufficient evidence to believe in the existence of a Supreme Being independent of Nature." So far from denying his existence, he made the following admission that "denying implies infinite knowledge as to the ground of disproof." He did not even hold that we cannot know or prove the existence of God, but that yet we have not proved it, and His existence is uncertain.

The natural, we may say, inevitable influence of such a theory could easily be foretold. Denying all satisfactoy present knowledge of God, all satisfactory knowledge of a future existence goes with it. But this world with all its interests, and the present life, with all its urgent demands, we do know. This is certainly real; therefore it is the part of wisdom to be concerned with the present life. One world and one life at a time. Let us live this life while we have it, and get the best out of it. If there should be another world we will try to get our share of that when we get to it. If there is another-life hereafter we will live it when it comes.

Now this is practical, even though not avowed, Atheism. It tends directly to godless living. Putting the two worlds in the scales, the Secularist decides that the present world weighs much; the future world weighs little or nothing. He regards it as absurd for humanity to sacrifice any enjoyments or advantages on earth for any uncertain or imaginary interests "beyond the grave." God and a future state are so visionary that all faith in them, and concern about them are prejudicial to our present welfare. Therefore dismiss these visionary things from the mind, and give all thought and concern to the present life. "Is not all the talk about a life to come a jangle of vain words? The present is a reality, death a certainty, life a swiftly passing possession. They who enjoy know what they are getting. The rest is dismissed as altogether in the air" (R. A. Wilson in Expositor's Bible.)

Manifestly nothing could be more directly calculated to produce extreme worldliness and irreligion. And let it be understood that these views are not merely theories with these Secularists. They zealously propagate them. On our last visit to England we were informed that in the chief cities of Britain there were large Sabbath schools gathered in halls; in which there was neither a Bible nor a prayer. The lower and more unfortunate classes were here indoctrinated into a life without God, or religious duty, or thought of a future state. Professing to be friends of the poor, these Secularists play upon their unrest and discontent, and prejudices, and poison their minds against Christianity in the interest of Secularism!

It must be more atheistic in heart than in profession or it could not thus mislead and pervert the minds of the people. In a world of sin, with carnality pushing men on into self-indulgence and vice, and neglect of God, such a theory can be no help to the toiling masses. Dark indeed must be their lot when no prayer brings them a sense of nearness to the Most High, and no atoning and sin-pardoning Christ brings them peace with God, and His religion does not guide them into the practical and helpful virtues of Godliness, and no hope of blessedness in a future life gilds the clouds of sorrow and trouble that hang over this. If history proves anything, it proves that faith in Jesus awakens high aims and purposes, preserves from vice and waste, inspires industry and economy, patience and hope, and, above all, opens the heart for the incoming of divine help. On the other hand, Atheism sets all these aside, encourages the incoming of vice and waste, and breeds discontent and despair. Secularism, like every other form of infidelity, is a snare and a curse to the people.

VI. AGNOSTICISM

T. H. Huxley (1825-1895) says: "I invented the title of Agnostic. It came into my head as suggestively antithetic to the 'gnostic' of church history, who professed to know so very much." Agnosticism means, 1. The doctrine that neither the nature nor existence of God, nor the ultimate character of the universe (that is, whether it is material or ideal) is knowable. This doctrine was formulated by Huxley to distinguish his position from Atheism, which positively rejects belief in His existence. 2. It means any doctrine which, while professing a belief in God's existence, denies to a greater or less extent, the knowableness of His nature. Thus Sir William Hamilton and Mansel held that man is compelled to believe in God's infinite being, though he is unable to comprehend it. Spencer's agnosticism is of this type, affirming, as it does, the existence of the unknowable.

These men severally speculated about the "Unconditional," the "Absolute," and the "Unknowable," in a peculiar way. Sir William Hamilton (1788-1856), denied to the unconditioned, and hence to the infinite and absolute, "Causal agency," as being a contradiction to the unconditional, He says: "A cause, exists absolutely under relation. Schelling has justly observed that 'he would deviate as wide as the poles from the idea of the absolute, who would think of defining its nature by the notion of activity.' But he who would define the absolute by the notion of cause would deviate still more widely from its nature; inasmuch as the notion of a cause involves not only a determination to activity, but of a determination to a particular, nay, a dependent, kind of activity-an activity not imminent but transient."

In other words Schellirig's absolute God cannot have activity, and Hamilton's unconditioned God cannot cause anything.

Mansel, (1820-1871), is the expositor of Hamilton, and more fully sets forth the implications of his doctrine of the unconditioned as contradictory to the divine personality. He says: "To conceive the Deity as he is, we must conceive Him as First Cause, as absolute and as Infinite. By the First Cause is meant that which produces all things, and is itself produced by none. By the Absolute is meant that which exists in and by itself, having no necessary relation to any other Being. By the Infinite is meant that which is free from all possible limitation; that than which a greater is inconceivable; and which, consequently, can receive no additional attribute or mode of existence, which it had not from all eternity." " 'What kind of an Absolute Being is that,' says Hegel, 'which does not contain in itself all that is actual, even evil included?' We may repudiate the conclusion with indignation; but the reasoning is unassailable." "A cause cannot, as such, be absolute, the Absolute cannot, as such, be a cause. How can the Infinite become that which it was not from the first? If causation is a possible mode of existence, that which exists without causing is not infinite; that which becomes a cause has passed beyond its former limits."1 "The very conception of a moral nature is in itself the conception of a limit, for morality is compliance with a law; and a law, whether imposed from within or from without, can only be conceived to operate by limiting the range of possible actions." "The only human conception of personality is that of limitation."1 1. Limits of Religious Thought, p. 127.

It will be seen from the above quotations that Mansel's "Absolute, infinite, unconditioned God," is a First Cause who causes nothing, has no morality, and no personality. What logic!

Herbert Spencer (1820-1903) writes in a similar strain and with as little consistency. He says: "Those who espouse this alternative position-of an ultimate personal cause-make the erroneous assumption that the choice is between personality and something lower than personality; whereas the choice is rather, between personality and something higher. Is it not just possible that there is a mode of being as much transcending intelligence and will as these transcend mechanical motion? It is true we are not able to conceive of any such higher mode of being. But this is not a reason for questioning its existence; it is rather the reverse."2

Then he descants on "the impiety of the pious" who meanly worship God as a person, instead of reverently worshiping the Unknowable Absolutel" And yet he admits that toleration of the "impious" creeds is a duty because "these various beliefs are parts of the constituted order of things; and not accidental but necessary parts. We cannot avoid the inference that they are needful accompaniments of human life. From the highest point of view we must recognize them as modes of manifestation of the Unknowable; and as having this for their warrant."3 2. First Principles, p. 109. 3. First Principles, pp. 121, 122

How kind of Spencer to admit that faith in a personal God is necessary, and the impiety of it may be pardoned!

Again he goes on, telling us how to think of the First Cause: "It must be independent. If it is not independent it cannot be the First Cause, for that must be the First Cause on which it depends. . . . But to think of the First Cause as totally independent, is to think of it as that which exists in the absence of all other existences. Not only, however, must the First Cause be a form of being which has no necessary form of being, but it can have no necessary relation within itself. There can be nothing in it which determines change, and yet nothing which prevents change. For if it contains something which imposes such necessities or restraints, this something must be a cause higher than the First Cause, which is absurd. Thus the First Cause must be in every sense perfect, complete, total; including within itself all power, and transcending all law. Or to use the established word, it must be absolute."1 1. First Principles, p. 38.

Truly we have in the above a specimen of sublime logic! Spencer's First Cause exists in the absence of all other existence; and nothing without could impel it to create any other existences; and also nothing within it could "determine" it to do it. Yet the Universe is full of finite existences. No existence could be treated without action. All action must be either spontaneous or necessary, and Spencer denies to his Absolute both forms of action. How then did all these finite existences come to be? We will have him to answer.

Mansel was equally lame in logic when he tried to show that God could not be thought of as a Cause, because as Cause it must be related to effects. He cannot, then, be Creator, because as such there must be a relation between God and the world, and He is Unrelated.

What then, we may ask, is the God of these peculiar agnostic philosophers? Bringing their adjectives together in one comprehensive sentence we truthfully answer: Their God is an "infinite," "unknowable," "unthinkable," "inscrutable," "unrelated," "unconditioned," "impersonal," "absolute," somewhat "without activity," "without morality," and "without personality."

But what is this strange being or thing? Oh, we must not expect to know; we cannot know for he, rather it, is unknowable. But we may be permitted to guess or surmise that this being or thing must be "a bulk God, of infinite magnitude, filling all space" and doing nothing. "If there were such an absolute existence, so unrelated that it could neiher cause nor create anything it would be a dead existence," as substantial and as worthless to man as an imaginary ray of moonshine. 2 2. Miley: Vol. I, p. 143.

And after all this erratic and dreary speculation about the unthinkable and unknowable and unrelated Absolute, Spencer closes his philosophizings with this delightful contradiction of all his agnosticism: "Amid the mysteries which become the more mysterious the more they are thought about, there will remain one absolute certainty that man is ever in presence of an Infinite and Eternal Energy from which all things proceed."

We might be permitted to ask how he arrived at such "absolute certainty" about the "unthinkable and unknowable"? Justice Stephen of U. S. Supreme Court, reviewing him said, "Mr. Spencer's conclusion appears to me to have absolutely no meaning at all. It is so abstract that it asserts nothing. It is like a gigantic soap-bubble, not burst, but blown thinner and thinner until it has become imperceptible."1 1. Nineteenth Century, June, 1884.

Answers

There is manifestly an escape from the philosophical absurdities of these agnostics. Whatever were their purposes in writing (and they differed widely), their theories naturally lead to pantheism or atheism. A being such as they describe, an "unrelated, unknowable somewhat, without activity, morality or personality," makes no appeal, and is of no earthly account, to the man in the street who works for two dollars a day.

In answer to them we reply.

I. They have lost themselves in hair-splitting, philosophical jugglings about the terms, "Absolute," and "Infinite." Their definitions are erroneous, and their inferences false and fatal. There is no such infinite or absolute, as their philosophy describes,-an "infinite, unrelated, space-filling bulk" without activity, or personality. It is no immediate truth of the reason or requirement of the mind. It exists only in their nebulous speculation. "If the absolute be that which is incapable of all relation, then it must be alone; nothing but the Absolute can be actual or possible. Then it can neither know or be known. And if the infinite be all, then, there can be no finite."2 2. Miley: Vol. I, pp. 14S, 146.

When a definition leads to such contradictions and absurdities, the only rational conclusion is that it is wrong, a mess of nonsense!

Martineau well says of Mansel: "If we take the words 'Absolute' and 'Infinite' to mean that he to whom they are applicable chokes up the universe, mental and physical, and prevents the existence of everyone else, then it is nonsense and clear contradiction for any one conscious of his own existence to use them of God at all."2 2. Miley: Vol. I, pp. 14S, 146.

There is, there can be, no such Infinite, Absolute Being. But when we apply these adjectives to a personal God, there is no logical contradiction. It means a personal God with attributes of absolute, infinite perfection. Why may not the Absolute Being be a self-conscious Person? To deny this would be to deny to Him one of the perfections which even finite beings may have. Would the Divine Person, "who filleth the heavens with his glory and whom the heaven of heavens cannot contain" be less in an attribute, than a mere space-filling thing, "without activity, morality or personality"'} The meanest moral being that walks the earth is greater and more important than a universe of dirt. Field very wisely says: "Matthew Arnold's, 'The Eternal not ourselves that makes for righteousness,' is but a clumsy attempt to avoid, by the skilful use of words; the recognition of God as a person; for how can a mere influence, an abstract non-intelligence, make for anything, whether righteousness or unrighteousness?1 1. Handbook oi Christian Theology, p. 20

Our conclusion is, Agnostics are not going to get a personal God Almighty out of His Universe by false definitions, and fog-banks of talk about the unknowable, Infinite and Absolute.

II. God can be known. He is not an unthinkable, unknowable being. Our Lord said: "This is eternal life that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent." Isaiah predicts, "The earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord" (Isa. 11: 9). Paul says that even the heathen knew God, but did not like to retain that knowledge (Rom. 1: 19, 21, 28).

A. Negatively.

1. This does not mean that we can know every thing about God. It takes the Infinite One to Know all about Himself.

2. It does not mean that He can be comprehended. To comprehend is to have exhaustive knowledge. It means to know an object in all its qualities and relations. We do not know electricity or vital force, or the most common things about us in that sense. God is past finding out. Knowledge, however can be real, when it is not complete. We may know a railroad engine, even though we do not know its horse-power, or speed, or weight, or its cost, or its maker, or how long it has been used, or how long it will last, or many other facts about it. Yet our knowledge of the engine is real knowledge. And as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are God's ways higher than our ways and "past finding out," and "His" thoughts are higher than our thoughts." Yet still we know that He is a personal, thinking, willing, feeling, loving, holy Being. We "know only in part," but we do know God.

B. Positively. We can know God.

1. By the natural working of our own minds. We intuitively think of Him as the First Cause, and refer to Him every attribute manifested in His works. We are His children, and creation, and consequently, we are like Him. We, therefore, ascribe to Him all the rational and moral attributes of our own natures, exalted to an infinite degree. If we are like God, He is like us. This is precisely the argument Paul made on Mars' Hill to the Athenians. It is incomparably more rational than the hazy speculations of the Agnostics. He said; "Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device." In like manner we should conclude, that He is not a mere spatial being, "unthinkable" and "unknowable," "without parts or qualities or personality," a mere abstraction, - a name for the order of the Universe, - an "inscrutable force." If we are his children, He is our Father, attributes we share, and of whose nature we partake.

Hamilton, in his speculations, arrived at this absurd conclusion: "The last and highest consecration of all true religion must be an altar: 'To the unknown and unknowable God.'1 If this were true, then St. Paul should have been instructed by the idolatrous Athenians, instead of preaching to them. Manifestly the great Apostle had not attained to this high agnosticism. In his sermon there was not a word about an "unthinkable infinite," or an "absolute, spacefilling blank," or an "inactive, inscrutable force," that could not be "started to action by anything outside of itself or within itself"! He preached to them about a personal God, Creator and Lord of all, whose offspring we are.2 He preached good sense. 1. Hamilton: Discussions, p. 22. 2. Miley: Vol. I, pp. 152, 153, and Acts 17: 22-31.

2. It is the law of our nature to think in this way. The heathen have thought in this way. In all forms of polytheism, the gods of the people have been magnified human beings, with intelligence and personality. Such thinking would have been correct, if they had thought of one only God, as a spiritual being, infinite in all attributes.

We know that we are led to think of God in this way. We have a firm conviction that God is what he has revealed Himself to be in our intuitions, and in His manifestations of Himself; just as we believe the external world is real, as we take it to be. The foundation of out confidence is our faith in the veracity of consciousness, and the laws of belief which God has impressed upon our nature. Philosophers explain away both the external world and God; but the common sense of mankind holds fast to its primal beliefs, undisturbed by these speculations.

3. Our moral nature demands this idea of God. Men are conscious of their accountability to a superior being, who knows the character and conduct of men, and who has the purpose and the power to reward or punish them according to their desert. Therefore, we cannot help concluding that the God who reveals himself in our nature, is a moral being like ourselves, who thinks and wills and acts; who rewards and punishes. That is, He is a person, with moral attributes,-intellect, sensibility and free-will. This revelation of God must be true, and we can know what God is, or our own nature is an organized falsehood.

4. Our religious nature witnesses to such a God.

Man has the instinct of worship. To worship means to express our gratitude for blessings, and to acknowledge our dependence, and to pray for the continuance of loving favors, to thank, and pray and praise and adore.

But who prays to space-filling, dead matter? Who praises the winds or clouds? Who loves "inscrutable force"? Our religious nature demands for its object of worship a Being like ourselves only infinitely exalted: one who knows our needs, and sympathizes with us in our sorrows, and forgives our sins,-one who can hear our confessions and praises and prayers; who can know and be known; who can love and be loved. There must be such a Being for us to worship, or our nature is an unaccountable deception.

5. The results of the opposing theories make them naturally abhorrent to the mind. If we are not warranted in referring to God the attributes of our own nature, then practically we have no God. An "unknown" and "unknowable" and "unrelated" God is to us no God, a veritable nothing. Says Dr. Hodge: "It is a historical fact that those who reject this method of forming our idea of God, who deny that we are to refer to Him the perfections of our own nature, have become atheists. They take the word 'spirit' and strip from it consciousness, intelligence, will and morality; and the residue, which is 'blank nothing,' they call God.'1 1. Hodge: Vol. I, p. 343.

6. Creation and Providence reveal such a personal God. We must refer to a cause such attributes as are necessary to fully account for the effects. If the effects manifest intelligence, will, power, and moral excellence, they must belong to the cause. If the effects are infinitely vast in extent, and extended in time then there must be an Infinite Moral Being, impressing His personality upon all His works.

7. The Scriptures fully support such a conception of God. He ascribes to himself the perfections of our nature in an infinite degree. He lives, acts, creates, thinks, reasons, wills, feels, loves and hates, like ourselves. "We are self-conscious; so is God. We are spirits; so is He. We are voluntary agents; so is God. We have a moral nature, though it is marred by sin; God has moral excellence in infinite perfection. We are persons; so is God, ... He is our ruler and Father, with whom we can commune. His favor is our life, and His loving kindness better than life. This sublime revelation of God in His own nature and His relation to us is no delusion. It makes God known to us as He really is. We therefore know God, although no creature can understand the Almighty unto perfection."1 "The theory, therefore of Hamilton and Mansel as to the knowledge of God is suicidal. It is inconsistent with the veracity of consciousness, which is the fundamental principle of their philosophy. . . . God has not so constituted our nature as to make it of necessity deceptive. The senses, reason and conscience, within their appropriate spheres, and in their normal exercise, are trustworthy guides. Their combined spheres comprehend all the relations in which we, as rational creatures, stand to the external world, to our fellow men and to God." 1. Hodge: Vol. I, pp. 344, 34S.

Miley's conclusion is: "There is no such Infinite as this agnosticism maintains; no demand for it in reason; no proof of its existence; no use for it in the universe. Most of all is God not such an Infinite, God, the true Infinite, is a personal being, with the attributes of personality, in absolute perfection. The essential attributes of all personality, intellect, sensibility and will, are realities known in our own consciousness. That these attributes are infinite in God does not render them unthinkable or unknowable. Through his moral government and providential agency, God is truly know-able. . . . When the false Infinite is replaced with the true, the personal God, the Infinite is manifestly, thinkable and knowable."2 2. Miley: Vol. I, pp. 154, 155.

Field well says: "The conclusion appears inevitable, that the First Cause of all things must be personal, that there is behind ourselves and all things that we see and know, a Mind, a Reason, a Will, like our own only incomparably greater. The evidence of this is seen in the works of nature, in the common consent of mankind, is felt in man's inner consciousness, and in his sense of moral accountability. The God of the Scriptures, and the First Cause of true science are One!"3 3. Field's Handbook of Theology, p. 22,