Part 7 (1/2)
”ULTIMATE RELIGIOUS IDEAS.”
The summing up of certain reflections with which this chapter opens, concludes thus: ”But that when our symbolic conceptions are such that no c.u.mulative or indirect processes of thought can enable us to ascertain that there are corresponding actualities, nor any predictions be made whose fulfilment can prove this, then they are altogether vicious and illusive, and in no way distinguishable from pure fictions,”--p. 29. So far very good; but his use of it is utterly unsound. ”And now to consider the bearings of this general truth on our immediate topic--Ultimate Religious Ideas.” But this ”general truth” has _no_ bearings upon ”ultimate religious ideas”; how then can you consider them? _No_ ideas, and most of all religious ideas, are conceptions, or the results of conceptions--or are the products of ”c.u.mulative or indirect processes of thought.” They are not results or products _at all_. They are organic, are the spontaneous presentation of what is inborn, and so must be directly seen to be known at all. Man might pile up ”c.u.mulative processes of thought” for unnumbered ages, and might form most exact conceptions of objects of Sense,--conceptions are not possible of others,--and he could never creep up to the least and faintest religious idea.
On the next page, speaking of ”suppositions respecting the origin of the Universe,” Mr. Spencer says, ”The deeper question is, whether any one of them is even conceivable in the true sense of that word. Let us successively test them.” This is not necessary. It has already been _demonstrated_ that a conception, or any effort of the Understanding, cannot touch, or have relation to such topics. But it does not follow, therefore, that no one of them is cognizable at all; which he implies.
Take the abstract notion of self-existence, for example. No ”vague symbolic conceptions,” or any conception at all, of it _can be formed_.
A conception is possible only ”under relation, difference, and plurality.” _This_ is a pure, simple idea, and so can only be known in itself by a seeing--an immediate intuition. It is seen by itself, as out of all relation. It is seen as simple, and so is learned by no difference. It is seen as a unit, and so out of all plurality. The discursive faculty cannot pa.s.s over it, because there are in it no various points upon which that faculty may fasten. It may, perhaps, better be expressed by the words pure independence. Again, it is _not_ properly ”existence without a beginning,” but rather, existence out of all relation to beginning; and so it is an idea, out of all relation to those faculties which are confined to objects that did begin. Because we can ”by no mental effort” ”form a conception of existence without a beginning,” it does not follow that we cannot _see_ that a Being existing out of all relation to beginning _is_. ”To this let us add”
that the intuition of such a Being is a complete ”explanation of the Universe,” and does make it ”easier to understand” ”that it existed an hour ago, a day ago, a year ago”; for we see that this Being primarily is _out of all relation to time_, that there is no such thing as an ”infinite period,” the phrase being absurd; but that through all the procession of events which we call time he _is_; and that before that procession began--when there was no time, he was. Thus we see that all events are based upon Him who is independent; and that time, in our general use of it, is but the measure of what He produces. We arrive, then, at the conclusion that the Universe is not self-existent, not because self-existence cannot be object to the human mind, and be clearly seen to be an attribute of one Being, but because the Universe is primarily object to faculties in that mind, which cannot entertain such a notion at all; and because this notion is _seen_ to be a necessary idea in the province of that higher faculty which entertains as objects both the idea and the Being to whom it primarily belongs.
The theory that the Universe is self-existent is Pantheism, and not the theory that it is self-created, though this latter, in Mr. Spencer's definition of it, seems only a phase of the other. To say that ”self-creation is potential existence pa.s.sing into actual existence by some inherent necessity,” is only to remove self-existence one step farther back, as he himself shows. Potential existence is either no existence at all, or it is positive existence. If it is no existence, then we have true self-creation; which is, that out of nothing, and with no cause, actual existence starts itself. This is not only unthinkable, but absurd. But if potential existence is positive, it needs to be accounted for as much as actual. While, then, there can be no doubt as to the validity of the conclusions to which Mr. Spencer arrives, respecting the entire incompetency of the hypotheses of self-existence and self-creation, to account for the Universe, the distinction made above between self-existence as a true and self-creation as a pseudo idea, and the fact that the true idea is a _reality_, should never be lost sight of. By failing to discriminate--as in the Understanding he could not do--between them, and by concluding both as objects alike impossible to the human intellect, and for the same reasons, he has also decided that the ”commonly received or theistic hypothesis”--creation by external agency--is equally untenable. In his examination of this, he starts as usual with his ever-present, fallacious a.s.sumption, that this is a ”conception”; that it can be, _is_ founded upon a ”c.u.mulative process of thought, or the fulfilment of predictions based on it.”
These words, phrases, and notions, are all irrelevant. It is not a conception, process, or prediction that we want; it is a _sight_. Hence, no a.s.sumptions have to be made or granted. No ”proceedings of a human artificer” _can in the least degree_ ”vaguely symbolize to us” the ”method after which the Universe” was ”shaped.” This differed in _kind_ from all possible human methods, and had not one element in common with them.
Mr. Spencer's remarks at this point upon s.p.a.ce do not appear to be well grounded. ”An immeasurable void”--s.p.a.ce--is not an ent.i.ty, is _no_ thing, and therefore cannot ”exist,” neither is any explanation for it needed. His question, ”how came it so?” takes, then, this form: How came immeasurable nothing to be nothing? Nothing needs no ”explanation.” It is only _some_ thing which must be accounted for. The theory of creation by external agency being, then, an adequate one to account for the Universe, supplies the following statement. That Being who is primarily out of all relation, produced, from himself, and by his immanent power, into nothing--s.p.a.ce, room, the condition of material existence,--something, matter and the Universe became. ”The genesis of the universe” having thus been explained and seen to be ”the result of external agency,” we are ready to furnish for the question, ”how came there to be an external agency?” that true answer, which we have already shadowed forth. That pure spiritual Person who is necessarily existent, or self-existent, _i. e._ who possess pure independence as an essential attribute, whose being is thus fixed, and is therefore without the province of power, is the external agency which is needed. This Person, differing in kind from the Universe, cannot be found in it, nor concluded from it, but can only be known by being seen, and can only be seen because man possesses the endowment of a spiritual _Eye_, like in kind to His own All-seeing eye, by which spiritual things may be discerned. This Person, being thus seen immediately, is known in a far more satisfactory mode than he could be by any generalizations of the Understanding, could he be represented in these at all. The knowledge of Him is, like His self, _immutable_. We KNOW that we stand on the eternal Rock. Our eye is illuminated with the unwavering Light which radiates from the throne of G.o.d. Nor is this any hallucination of the rhapsodist.
It is the simple experience which every one enjoys who looks at pure truth in itself. It is the Pure Reason seeing, by an immediate intuition, G.o.d as pure spirit, revealed directly to itself. It is, then, because self-existence is a pure, simple idea, organic in man, and seen by him to be an attribute of G.o.d, that G.o.d is known to be the Creator of the Universe. Having attained to this truth, we readily see that the conclusions which Mr. Spencer states on pages 35, 36, as that ”self-existence is rigorously inconceivable”; that the theistic hypothesis equally with the others is ”literally unthinkable”; that ”our conception of self-existence can be formed only by joining with it the notion of unlimited duration through past time”; so far as they imply our dest.i.tution of knowledge on these topics, are the opposite of the facts. We _see_, though we cannot ”conceive,” self-existence. The theistic hypothesis becomes, therefore, literally thinkable. We see, also, that unlimited duration is an absurdity; that duration must be limited; and that self-existence involves existence out of all relation to duration.
Mr. Spencer then turns to the nature of the Universe, and says: ”We find ourselves on the one hand obliged to make certain a.s.sumptions, and yet, on the other hand, we find these a.s.sumptions cannot be represented in thought.” Upon this it may be remarked:
1. What are here called a.s.sumptions are properly a.s.sertions, which man makes, and cannot help making, except he deny himself;--necessary convictions, first truths, first principles, _a priori_ ideas. They are organic, and so are the foundation of all knowledge. They are not results learned from lessons, but are _primary_, and conditional to an ability to learn. But supposing them to be a.s.sumptions, having, at most, no more groundwork than a vague guess, there devolves a labor which Mr. Spencer and his coadjutors have never attempted, and which, we are persuaded, they would find the most difficult of all, viz., to account for the fact of these a.s.sumptions. For the question is pertinent and urgent;
2. How came these a.s.sumptions to suggest themselves? Where, for instance, did the notion of self come from? a.n.a.lyze the rocks, study plants and their growth, become familiar with animals and their habits, or exhaust the Sense in an examination of man, and one can find no notion of self. Yet the notion is, and is peculiar to man. How does it arise? Is it ”created by the slow action of natural causes?” How comes it to belong, then, to the rudest aboriginal equally with the most civilized and cultivated? Was it ”created” from nothing or from something? If from something, how came that something to be? We might ask, Does not the presentation of any phenomenon involve the actuality of a somewhat, in which that phenomenon inheres, and of a receptivity by which it is appreciated? Does not the fact of this a.s.sumption, as a mental phenomenon, involve the higher fact of some mental ground, some form, some capacity, which is both organic to the mind, and organized in the mind, in accordance with which the a.s.sumption is, and which determines what it must be? Or are we to believe that these a.s.sumptions are mere happenings, without law, and for which no reason can be a.s.signed? Again we press the question, How came these a.s.sumptions to suggest themselves?
3. ”These a.s.sumptions cannot be represented in thought.” If ”thought” is restricted to that mental operation of the Understanding by which it generalizes in accordance with the Sense, the statement is true. But if it is meant, as seems to be implied, that the notions expressed in these a.s.sumptions are not, cannot be, clearly and definitely known at all by the mind, then it is directly contrary to the truth. The ideas presented by the phrases are, as was seen above, clear and definite.
Since Mr. Spencer has quoted _in extenso_, and with entire approbation, what Mr. Mansel says respecting ”the Cause, the Absolute, and the Infinite,” we have placed the full examination of these topics in our remarks upon Mr. Mansel's writings, and shall set down only a few brief notes here.
Upon this topic Mr. Spencer admits that ”we are obliged to suppose _some_ cause”; or, in other words, that the notion of cause is organic.
Then we must ”inevitably commit ourselves to the hypothesis of a First Cause.” Then, this First Cause ”must be infinite.” Then, ”it must be independent;” ”or, to use the established word, it must be absolute.”
One would almost suppose that a _rational_ man penned these decisions, instead of one who denies that he has a _reason_. The illusion is quickly dispelled, however, by the objections he lifts out of the dingy ground-room of the Understanding. It is curious to observe in these pages a fact which we have noticed before, in speaking of Sir William Hamilton's works, viz.: how, on the same page, and in the same sentence, the workings of the Understanding and Reason will run along side by side, the former all the while befogging and hindering the latter. Mr.
Spencer's conclusions which we have quoted, and his objections which we are to answer, are a striking exemplification of this. Frequently in his remarks he uses the words limited and unlimited, as synonymous with finite and infinite, when they are not so, and cannot be used interchangeably with propriety. The former belong wholly in the Sense and Understanding. The latter belong wholly in the Pure Reason. The former pertain to material objects, to mental images of them, or to number. The latter qualify only spiritual persons, and have no pertinence elsewhere. Limitation is the conception of an object _as bounded_. Illimitation is the conception of an object as without boundaries. Rigidly, it is a simple negation of boundaries, and gives nothing positive in the Concept. Finity or finiteness corresponds in the Reason to limitation in the Sense and Understanding. It does not refer to boundaries at all. It belongs only to created spiritual persons, and expresses the fact that they are partial, and must grow and learn. Only by its place in the ant.i.thesis does infinity correspond in the Reason to illimitation in the lower faculties. It is _positive_, and is that quality of the pure spirit which is otherwise known as _universality_.
It expresses the idea of _all possible endowments in perfect harmony_.
From his misuse of these terms Mr. Spencer is led to speak in an irrelevant manner upon the question, ”Is the First Cause finite or infinite?” He uses words and treats the whole matter as if it were a question of material substance, which might be ”bounded,” with a ”region surrounding its boundaries,” and the like, which are as out of place as to say white love or yellow kindness. His methods of thought on these topics are also gravely erroneous. He attempts an a.n.a.lysis by the logical Understanding, where a synthesis by the Reason is required,--a synthesis which has already been given by our Creator to man as an original idea. It is not necessary to examine some limited thing, or all limited things, and wander around their boundaries to learn that the First Cause is infinite. We need to make no discursus, but only to look the idea of first cause through and through, and thoroughly a.n.a.lyze it, to find all the truth. By such a process we would find all that Mr.
Spencer concedes that ”we are obliged to suppose,” and further, that such a being _must be_ self-existent. And this conviction would be so strong that the mind would rest itself in this decision: ”A thousand phantasmagoria of the imagination may be wrong,” says the soul, ”but this I know must be true, or there is no truth in the Universe.”
One sentence in the paragraph now under consideration deserves special notice. It is this. ”But if we admit that there can be some thing uncaused, there is no reason to a.s.sume a cause for anything.” This ”a.s.sumes” the truth of a major premise all _things_ are substantially alike. If the word ”thing” is restricted to its exact limits,--objects of sense,--then the sentence pertains wholly to the Sense and Understanding, and is true. But if, as it would seem, the implication is meant that there are no other ent.i.ties which can be object to the mind except such ”things,” then it is a clear _pet.i.tio principii_. For the very question at issue is, whether, in fact, there is not one ent.i.ty--”thing”--which so differs in kind from all others, that it is uncaused, _i. e._ self-existent; and whether the admission that that ent.i.ty is uncaused does not, because of this seen difference, satisfy the mind, and furnish a reasonable ground on which to account for the subordinate causes which we observe by the Sense.
In speaking of the First Cause as ”independent,” he says, ”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.” We cannot criticize this better, and mark how curiously truth and error are mixed in it, than by so parodying it that only truth shall be stated. The First Cause possesses within himself all possible relations as belonging to his necessary ideals. Hence, change, in the exact sense of that term, is impossible to him, for there is nothing for him to _change to_. This is not invalidated by his pa.s.sing from inaction to action; for creation involves no change in G.o.d's nature or attributes, and so no real or essential change, which is here meant. But he is the permanent, through whom all changes become. He is not, then, a _simple_ unit, but is an organized Being, who is ground for, and comprehends in a unity, all possible laws, forms, and relations, as necessary elements of his necessary existence,--as endowments which necessarily belong to him, and are conditional of his pure independence. Hence, these restraints are not ”imposed” upon him, except as his existence is imposed upon him.
They belong to his Self, and are conditional of his being. So, then, instead of ”transcending all law,” he is the embodiment of all law; and his perfection is, that possessing this endowment, he accords his conduct thereto. A being who should ”transcend all law” would have no reason why he should act, and no form how he should act, neither would he be an organism, but would be pure lawlessness or pure chaos. Pure chaos cannot organize order; pure lawlessness cannot establish law; and so could not be the First Cause. As Mr. Spencer truly says, ”we have no alternative but to regard this First Cause as Infinite and Absolute.”
And now having learned, by a true diagnosis of the mental activities, that the positions we have gained are fixed, final, irrevocable; and further, that they are not the ”results” of ”reasonings,” but that first there was a seeing, and then an a.n.a.lysis of what was seen, and that the seeing is _true_, though every other experience be false; we _know_ that our position is not ”illusive,” but that we stand on the rock; and that what we have seen is no ”symbolic conception of the illegitimate order,”
but is pure truth.
For the further consideration of this subject, the reader is referred back to our remarks on that pa.s.sage in Mr. Mansel's work, which Mr.
Spencer has quoted.
A few remarks upon his summing up, p. 43 _et seq._, will complete the review of this chapter. ”Pa.s.sing over the consideration of credibility, and confining ourselves to that of” consistency, we would find in any rigorous a.n.a.lysis, that Atheism and Pantheism are self-contradictory; but we _have found_ that Theism, ”when rigorously a.n.a.lyzed,” presents an absolutely consistent system, in which all the difficulties of the Understanding are explained to the person by the Reason, and is entirely thinkable. Such a system, based upon the necessary convictions of man, and justly commanding that these shall be the fixed standard, in accordance with which all doubts and queries shall be dissolved and decided, gives a rational satisfaction to man, and discloses to him his eternal REST.
In proceeding to his final fact, which he derives as the permanent in all religions, Mr. Spencer overlooks another equally permanent, equally common, and incomparably more important fact, viz: that Fetis.h.i.+sm, Polytheism, Pantheism, and Monotheism,--all religions alike a.s.sert _that a G.o.d created the Universe_. In other words, the great common element, in all the popular modes of accounting for the vast system of things in which we live is, _that it is the product of an agency external to itself, and that the external agency is personal_. Take the case of the rude aboriginal, who ”a.s.sumes a separate personality behind every phenomenon.” He does not attempt to account for all objects. His mind is too infantile, and he is too degraded to suspect that those material objects which appear permanent need to be accounted for. It is only the changes which seem to him to need a reason. Behind each change he imagines a sort of personal power, superior to it and man, which produces it, and this satisfies him. He inquires no further; yet he looks in the same direction as the Monotheist. In this crude form of belief, which is named Fetis.h.i.+sm, we see that essential idea which can be readily traced through all forms of religion, that some _personal_ being, external, and superior to the things that be, produced them. Nor is Atheism a proper exception to this law. For Atheism is not a religion, but the denial of all religion. It is not a doctrine of G.o.d, but is a denial that there is any G.o.d; and what is most in point, it never was a _popular_ belief, but is only a philosophical Sahara over which a few caravans of speculative doubters and negatists wander.
Neither can Hindu pantheism be quoted against the position taken: for Brahm is not the Universe; neither are Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva. Brahm does not lose his individuality because the Universe is evolved from him. _Now_ he is thought of as one, and the Universe as another, although the Universe is thought to be a part of his essence, and hereafter to be reabsorbed by him. _Now_, this part of his essence which was _produced_ through Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva, is _individualized_; and so is one, while he is another. Thus, here also, the idea of a proper external agency is preserved. The facts, then, are decisively in favor of the proposition above laid down. ”_Our_ investigation”
discloses ”a fundamental verity in each religion.” And the facts and the verity find no consistent ground except in a pure Theism, and there they do find perfect consistency and harmony.