Table of Contents Preface It is the intent of this work to show to the rational skeptic, beyond a reasonable doubt, the existence of God. The first part of this work, containing the excellent work of Brownlow Maitland, is geared to this purpose and should adequately accomplish its end. If you are afraid to know or understand the truth of the matter, then do not open its pages, for you will find yourself in the position of having to make a choice once having digested what is contained herein. The second part of this booklet is designed to point one in the right direction when once the matter of the existence of God has been accepted and conclusively settled in the mind. This is a necessary step in a subject as profound as this, for once the idea has been accepted, the identity of God becomes the next issue to be grappled with. Finally, direction is given concerning what one is to do about it since this work would not be complete otherwise. It is the sincere hope of this editor that this work will be of great utility to anyone who is seeking to settle this issue, and that it will enlighten those who have already settled the matter for themselves. Orin L. Moses III, The Blizzard of '96 The method followed in this argument is that of consciousness as distinguished from that of logic; and the steps by which the theistic conclusion is reached are these: Through direct consciousness of himself man discovers that he has a permanent personality, is endowed with will, intelligence, moral tendencies, and spiritual affections. Through consciousness, developed through observation and experience, he learns that he is surrounded by an external universe, and is related to other persons very much similar to, yet different from himself. Through consciousness, further developed by reflection on himself and the universe, he attains the conviction that over all is a supreme being, having absolute will, infinite intelligence, perfect integrity, and flawless loving care. It is contended that the results of consciousness rest on the same basis and stand or fall together. If the basic consciousness of ones human self is denied, all the rest vanish with it. If, on the other hand, it is accepted, it carries all the rest in its train. Therefore, it is from an awareness of himself and his surroundings that a man arises to the awareness of God. Belief in God is the fruit of belief in the humanity of man; Atheism and agnosticism are the virtual denial of his humanity. The breadth of the method to be pursued in this inquiry, and of the field from which evidence is to be gathered, must be in due proportion to the magnitude of the subject. The unrivalled stupendousness and fruitfulness of the idea of God demands a treatment which shall embrace the whole nature, consciousness, and relations of mankind, and which can no more be contracted within the limits of mere logical demonstration, than Art can be dealt with by a carpenter’s rule, or Morality by the science of number. It is true, indeed, that a practical conviction of this kind may not be able to justify itself formally in the eyes of the mere logician, but at the bar of the higher reason it will be vindicated on the surer ground of experience. To the practical judgement of mankind the experience of supreme fitness, and of inexhaustible fertility in the production of beneficial results, is in general far more convincing than the formal demonstrations of argument; and from that judgement, at least in the moral and spiritual domain, there is no appeal. If thoughtful and earnest men come to feel that the idea of God is in harmony with all the higher aspirations and instincts of their nature, and exerts over the whole of human life an ennobling and cleansing influence, they will hold the idea as substantially verified, and make little account of any theoretical objections which may be urged against it, or any deficiencies that logical subtlety may discover in the structure of the arguments employed in its vindication. In this view of the proper method to be followed in our inquiry there is, indeed, one obvious and momentous assumption, without which it would be untenable, - the assumption of our humanity. Were this denied, to discuss questions of truth, morality, or religion would be an absolute waste of time. To a creature which is nothing but a material organism, or animated automaton, without personality, will, moral consciousness, or spiritual intuition, such questions have no meaning and bear no relation. Call our higher nature by what name we will, mind or reason, soul or spirit, we must believe in it, and in its superiority to matter and animal existence, before it is possible for us to make a single step towards believing in eternal truth and goodness. It is only from ourselves that we can rise to God. If our consciousness of personality and will, our intuitions of right and duty, our aspirations after purity and truth, are thrust aside as untrustworthy and illusive, there will remain absolutely nothing wherein the belief in God can root itself within us. The universe might throb and glow with his presence throughout all its provinces, but we would remain unconscious of him. At the basis, then, of our inquiry lies the assumption that man is human; that is, a person, endowed with reason, will, moral and spiritual affections, whose consciousness of mysterious superiority to the physical world and its organisms represents a real and ultimate fact of being. With any one who refuses to admit this assumption, and denies the witness borne by his consciousness to his possession of human personality and reason, we do not pretend to argue. Let us pause for a moment to inquire on which side the burden of proof may fairly be considered to lie. Naturally, one would at first reply, on the side of the theist. He asserts the fact of God’s existence, and therefore is bound to furnish proof of his assertion; the practical atheist asserts nothing but his own ignorance, and waits to be convinced if possible. No doubt this would be a just and complete assignment of the burden of proof, if atheism had been in general possession of the field of thought, and theism were some novel theory started by individual minds to displace old and universal opinion. But the real position of the antagonistic views towards each other is exactly the reverse. Theism has been in general possession of the world; it is atheism which is the exceptional opinion, propounded here and there by individual minds to bring about a revolution in the established belief of mankind. This undoubtedly in some measure shifts the burden of proof. A belief which antedates historical records, and in some form or other has reigned almost universally over human minds, and has been identified with almost all that has been most elevated in thought and most virtuous in practice, among all races and tribes of humanity, has on its side a fair presumption of truth. The atheist or agnostic says, “You form an idea of God, but of any corresponding objective reality you confess yourselves unable to formulate a proof. Why not resign yourselves to the inevitable inference, that the God of your conception is nothing but the offspring of your idealizing faculty, without substance or independent existence; and that if there should chance to be any real God behind the universe, at least he lies altogether beyond the reach of your faculties, and outside the possibilities of human knowledge.” If this accusation were just, the controversy would be ended, and to try other methods of finding God, after failure of the logical and demonstrative methods, would be a waste of time and labor. To justify, therefore, our perseverance in the search, we must show that this view of the necessary limits of human knowledge is unsound, and contradicts both experience and reason. We affirm it to be so on this distinct ground, that the principle which it embodies would, if accepted, make a clean and absolute sweep of all human knowledge whatsoever. This statement we proceed to justify. The principle against which we protest may be expressed as follows: - ‘Knowledge must be based on logical proof; the knowable and the demonstrable are identical; whatever cannot be shown by strict inductive reasoning to exist must be dismissed from the region of science, and consigned to the dream-land of the speculative imagination.’ Our contention is that as soon as this principle, which is really the stronghold of agnosticism, is tried at the bar of the practical reason, and brought face to face with the realities of human life, it must be convicted of monstrous absurdity. Nothing is more certain than that every train of reasoning must have some premiss from which to start. Arguments cannot sustain themselves in the air, without any basis to rest upon, real or assumed. Logical processes without materials to work upon can no more bring forth results in the shape of knowledge, than a mill can grind out flour without being supplied with grist. We fetch the indispensable premisses to set our arguments agoing from the primitive elements of thought, the starting-points of knowledge, the foundation of all the science of which man is capable. And they were not the result of any sort of reasoning. If they are trustworthy and true, then we possess real knowledge which was not derived from reasoning, and is not capable of logical demonstration. If they are not trustworthy and true, then none of our pretended knowledge is trustworthy and true, for upon them every particle of it ultimately depends; in a word, it is not knowledge at all. So we are driven perforce to choose between these alternatives; either we know nothing at all, or we know more than we can prove. We are human beings who have other inlets of knowledge than the logical understanding, and who certainly know more than we can rigorously prove. Our entire lives rest on principles and facts which come to us through no process of reasoning, but by intuition and perception, and the lessons of experience; on these we act without troubling ourselves about demonstrations and reasoned proofs, and it is only by accepting them as trustworthy and true that we live human lives, and escape herding with the beasts or the insane. Through the same inlets of knowledge, then, it may be that God will be revealed to us; and till we have sought him through these we should be less human if we abandoned the search for him, and resigned ourselves to drag on a dreary existence in the inhospitable deserts of atheism. Prior to and beneath all our logical processes there are beliefs and convictions which spring up in the human consciousness, and are the only possible foundation of all our knowledge. They are felt to be true, though formally to prove them true is impossible. We take them on the veracity of our consciousness, and build our life upon them without hesitation or distrust. They may be called instinctive or intuitive, to indicate their being rooted in our mental constitution, and to distinguish them from beliefs which are attained through logical processes. Or they may be fitly called primary beliefs of the reason, as being convictions which approve themselves to the rational faculty of man in general by their own fitness, and are the basis on which it erects the superstructure of acquired knowledge. Now these primary or instinctive beliefs must be held to be indisputable, because they form the only barrier between our minds and the bottomless gulf of absolute and universal skepticism. If then theism can establish its right to be considered one of their number, it will be proved in its only practicable sense, and will rest on the same foundation as the most certain parts of our knowledge. The proof, therefore, which we shall endeavor to draw out on behalf of theism will consist of various arguments, all directed to show that belief in God is entitled to be considered one of the primary, instinctive or intuitive beliefs of the human reason. Our position therefore is this: that if the belief in God can be shown to be a primary, instinctive, and practically universal belief of the reason, - a belief growing up of itself, so to speak, in the consciousness, and continually deriving nourishment from experience and reflection, - it will need no further justification. Being such, it would justify itself. Throughout the inquiry which we are about to make into the title of theistic belief to be ranked among the great primary beliefs of the reason, the importance of the fact will be manifest to which attention was directed at the outset; the fact that the idea of God is supreme in the whole field of thought, and touches human nature at every point with a unique and sovereign authority. For it follows that if the idea is a true one, and the being who is portrayed in it really exists and stands to mankind in this supreme and universal relation, every part of human nature and life will be affected by his existence, and may be expected to exhibit traces of his presence and action, and thus to bear witness that he really is. We have accepted through observation and verification the law of gravitation as one of the most certain facts of the material universe. Though it cannot be seen, it can be aptly demonstrated to exist by virtue of its effects. Now let us conceive a similar method of verification applied to the idea of God. We possess the idea of God as with gravitation. And in consequence of its character of supremacy and universality, as with gravity, it is as applicable to every part of man’s consciousness and experience, as the idea of gravitation is to every part of the substance of the material universe. Just then, as the influence and effect of gravitation are traceable everywhere in nature; so, if God be a fact, the impress and consequences of his being ought to be traceable in man, and each province of human thought and knowledge, emotion and action, should yield evidence of his sovereign presence and operation. Hence in our search for tokens of God and evidences of his being, we are not limited to any one domain of experience, or any single province of human consciousness. Whatever man knows, whatever he perceives and feels, whatever experience the individual or the race has passed through - all is pertinent to the subject; in all, if God really is, we may hope to find some sign, more or less appreciable, of his existence. As a preliminary to this search, it will be helpful if we can form some antecedent notion of the kinds of evidence we might expect to discover, supposing the existence of God to be a supreme fact. Given man on one side, and God on the other, of what character would the result in the human consciousness probably be? How would the fact of God’s existence be likely to make itself felt by man? By what inlets might we expect that infinite spiritual reality to enter into human thought and experience? We look into ourselves, and are in the first place conscious of an efficient Will. We originate volitions, and execute them; we are sensible of effort as a cause, and we observe effects following our efforts, trains of consequences originated and set in motion by them. Thus we learn that our will is a true cause, and that productive energy is an attribute of our personality. Next we are conscious of Intelligence. We discern the difference between order and disorder, between chaos and cosmos, between haphazard and juxta-position and methodical arrangement. We contrive and adapt; we design mechanical structures of which the several parts conspire to an end; we conceive purposes, and carry them out by appropriate means; we perceive fitnesses in the collocation of parts, and beauty in harmonies of form and color; we draw inferences, we comprehend and interpret. Thus we realize that to our personality belongs Mind, the faculty which foresees, purposes, and understands. Further, we are conscious of a Moral element in our nature. Right and wrong are not unmeaning words to us, but express tense, commanding realities. The law of duty asserts its sovereign rights in our hearts, even when we disobey and defy it. We are not ignorant of the satisfactions of conscious rectitude, nor of the shame of self-reproach and guilt. We cannot rid ourselves of the sense of responsibility, without degrading ourselves below the level of humanity. In the midst of our passions sits consequence in mysterious supremacy, with the terrible scourge of remorse to avenge its slighted authority. We cannot refuse our approbation to truth and goodness, nor withhold our condemnation from meanness, falsehood, and injustice. Thus we know ourselves to be moral, responsible beings, with a moral law of supreme authority and sacredness impressed upon and energizing within our personality. Lastly, we are conscious of an element in our nature which transcends even the moral element, and may be distinguished as Spiritual. It is this which soars highest, and reaches out farthest. It refuses to be satisfied with what is finite and transient, and strives to apprehend the infinite and the eternal. It is this which humanizes our affections, lifting them out of the sphere of instinct into the region of spirit. By this our emotions of hope and desire and love are purged from the grossness of the carnal, and transmuted into spiritual forces, the springs of purest and holiest action. It is this which is the seat of religion. It frames the idea of God, and prompts us to humbly adore him, and to seek in him the completion and repose of our being. Mysterious and undefinable, it pervades our nature, elevating our instincts, supplementing our intelligence, and touching our morality with the light and warmth of religion. It is that part of our being which most begets in us a vague sense of some divine kindred and everlasting destiny; and by our consciousness of it we complete the idea of our personality, and conceive ourselves to be spiritual beings. Such is man, as discovered to himself by reflection on the several chief parts of his consciousness. Man finds himself to be a person, endowed with these four cardinal elements of being; an efficient Will, originating and acting; an intelligent Mind, comprehending, designing, and interpreting; a Morality, discerning between right and wrong, enforced by the sacred authority of conscience, and accompanied by a sense of responsibility; and a Spiritual faculty, which strives to apprehend the infinite, exalts the emotions and affections above the region of carnality and its instincts, and reaches out after an ideal perfection and satisfaction in God. Such is man, knit together in fellowship with his fellow-men, and environed by the splendors and harmonies, the adaptations and utilities, of the physical universe. Over against this portraiture of man we are now to set the accepted idea of God. Of this idea of God the first feature is omnipotent Will, energizing in production and government and accomplishment of purpose, throughout all the realms of the universe. The next is infinite Intelligence, the principle of all order, the skill of all design, the perception of all existence and all possibility, the perfection of foresight, knowledge, and wisdom. Thirdly comes Moral perfection; infinite righteousness, purity, and truth; unchangeable steadfastness of character, in which is no vacillation nor hint of reneging, absolute good, wherein is no evil at all. Lastly, as the summit and crown of divine excellence, comes the attribute of Fatherliness; inexhaustible richness of goodness, tenderness, and loving care. These four features or attributes, Will, Mind, Moral perfection, loving Fatherhood, in their highest conceivable development, centered in an infinite, eternal, spiritual Personality, make up the Christian idea of God. We are about to imagine this idea actually realized in a supreme being, and to consider in what ways the fact of his existence would, in that case, be likely to be borne in on the human consciousness. The constitution of our minds is such as to prevent our resting satisfied with tracing events back to merely physical causes. However far back we return in the line of causation, our minds refuse to consider a physical cause as a true or real cause. Each physical antecedent requires another to precede it, and that again another; and as long as we continue in this line of physical events, each of which is in turn an effect and a cause, we feel that we have not reached a real origin. An origin of a series must lie outside of the series; for if
it lie within the series, and be one of its component parts, we immediately look beyond
for a predecessor to it, and it ceases to be regarded as an origin. The true origin
therefore of every succession of physical causes and effects must lie outside of the
series, and within our experience there is nothing which realizes this condition except an
act of Will. A volition is accepted by our minds as a true origin, a real cause; but we
know of nothing else that can be placed in the same category. Every series of physical
events which are able to trace back to an originating cause runs back into a volition.
Where we cannot arrive at an originating volition, the series stretches back indefinitely,
and so far as we can imagine, for ever. This conception of volition as the only real
cause, this refusal to rest in any merely physical antecedent as a true origin, is a
primary law of our thought. However it became impressed on our minds, there it certainly
is; and when clearly set before us we cannot help thinking in accordance with it. A murderer is held responsible because his will set in motion a train of physical causes, at the end of which is the resultant murder of the victim. The ineradicable idea of responsibility rests entirely on the conception of volition as the true cause of events. On no other basis can justice be administered, or moral blame or praise be bestowed. Let it be shown that a manslayer exercised no volition in his deed, but was coerced into doing it by a superior force, and he is held excused; in that case he was not the cause of the act but only one of its physical antecedents, and the inquiry for the true cause passes beyond him to seek a remoter origin of the action. Volition and responsibility are inseparably connected. Will it be urged in objection that volition itself is not free, but as much necessitated by antecedent causes as physical events are, and is therefore no more a true origin than they are? If that be the case, responsibility is altogether at an end. The crime may be horrible, the judge corrupt, the witnesses perjured, the jury bribed; but it is all necessitated, and blame would be ridiculous. No, on the same line of denial of our primary consciousness, there would be no one to be blamed; criminal and victim, judge and counsel, witnesses and jury-men, would melt away into shadows, and human life and action be dissolved in a dream! Now in the light of this instinctive belief of our reason, that volition alone really originates, we look out on the universe. We perceive it to be a vast assemblage of physical phenomena of the most complex kind. Now when we ask, as our minds compel us to ask, " Where did it come from?" science attempts to supply the answer. She points back to preceding phenomena, and to phenomena antecedent to that; and so leads us back through vast cycles of time, the complexity of it growing less the further we recede into the past until at last she lands us in a uniform "cosmic vapor" . There is her limit. Having reached that she has done all that she can. If we Question her again she is dumb. Not being satisfied we continue to ask, "From where did the cosmic vapor come?" And science failing us, we look at it in the light of the basic instincts of our reason and try what we can to make of it. In doing so, two alternatives force themselves on our minds for choice; either it was from eternity, or it had a beginning. If it was from eternity, we cannot help thinking that it would never have ceased to be what it was, unless some external power had interfered with it; for if an eternal past had rolled over it without any change occurring, nothing more could be expected from an eternal future; all possibilities would have been already exhausted. But as we see that this mysterious vapor did not continue to be a vapor, but that it at some definite moment in time began to organize itself into a magnificent orderly system, we are confined to the conclusion that even if it were eternal, some outside power must have taken it in hand, given it the impulse of change, and started it on the new function of organizing itself into a universe of complex being. If, on the other hand, it was not eternal, but had a beginning in time, then again, some external power must be conceived as originating it. Look then at this primordial vapor as we may, whether we perceive it as eternal or beginning in time, our reason compels us to assume something else besides it; something which was not it or any part of it, as the necessary antecedent condition of its having begun to form itself into an organized universe. The ultimate question, therefore, to which we are driven back, relates to the nature of this something, which must have stood at least outside, if not prior to, the cosmic vapor, to set it going on its tremendous function of giving birth to the physical universe. It could not have been a physical cause; for in the first place, science would then have led us beyond the vapor to that antecedent fact, and we would only have had to put our question a step back and ask "From where did that come ?" Secondly, we can see that our minds cannot rest on a physical antecedent as its true cause or origin. But if not a physical cause, then what ? Science and logic can make no reply; the case is beyond them. But out of our consciousness, developed in our experience of life and reality, an unmistakable answer comes, and that answer is: "A Volition!" We know of nothing else which can really originate a series of physical phenomena. We are confined to a volition as the cause unless we choose to deny the veracity of our consciousness and accept the alternative of absolute skepticism. However, a volition implies a personal agent, and so we bring our own experience of causation into contact with the universe, and we are led straight to the concept of a personal God as its originating cause. As a matter of history, mankind generally in proportion to their light and knowledge have entertained this conviction, and been led instinctively to attribute personality to the power which lies behind the universe. Reflection shows the conviction to have its roots in the depths of the human consciousness, where all ultimate truths take their rise. Whence we draw the inference that belief in God as the originating Cause of the universe is one of those primary beliefs of the reason which justify themselves. We go on now to the next branch of our argument, and inquire whether the same rank may not be justly assigned to the conception of God as the intelligent Artificer of nature. Within the sphere of human activity and experience, order, contrivance, and adaptation irresistibly impress us with the conviction that intelligence has been at work in their production. A very slight degree of any of these features is sufficient for the purpose. A Druidicial circle of stones is as convincing as a Gothic cathedral. So long as the mechanism of arrangement or fashioning is of the kind which we know men to be accustomed to produce, we draw our inference of intelligent purpose or design with absolute confidence. It rests of course upon an assumed analogy. We are conscious of an intelligence in ourselves by the action of which things are produced; we know of no other cause whatsoever, besides intelligence, which ever originated such things; and hence, whenever we meet with such things, we leap instinctively to the conclusion that they are the offspring of minds like our own. So the habit of inferring mind from the phenomena of order, contrivance, and adaptation grows upon us and roots itself in us as the result of a basic constitutional tendency or principle of our thought. Now that nature is full of arrangements and organisms which exhibit, or at least suggest to our minds, order, contrivance, and adaptation, no one disputes. Earth, air, and sea are thronged with them. By their complexity, their delicacy of construction, their fitness for their peculiar uses and environments, multitudes of them extort our warmest admiration. The exquisite mechanism of an eye, an ear, or a hand is a standing marvel. The natural world is not a chaos of multitudinous accidents, but an orderly interdependent system. Its wonders of harmony, beauty, mutual relation, and useful provision are inexhaustible. If mind be concerned in its production at all, it is manifestly saturated, so to speak, with mind of the highest order. It glows with the light of intelligence throughout all of its kingdoms. All this is beyond question. It is allowed on every side by believer and skeptic, by theist and atheist, alike. The sole question which arises concerns the originating cause of these countless and elaborate organisms and interdependent relationships. Are we really compelled to consider them as the offspring of mind, or can they be satisfactorily accounted for without mind? That in one principal feature they strongly resemble the works of human intelligence is undeniable; for they exhibit that combination of parts and forces conspiring to definite ends, which is the essential characteristic of all art and mechanism produced by human hands. But in another respect they undoubtedly differ from all the works of man. They seem to spring forth of themselves by an imperceptible process, yet constrained by the limitation common to each individual thing. It is a principle governing all things seemingly apart from intelligence, yet intelligently implemented. Evolution falls far short of explaining satisfactorily how so many interdependencies and relationships can be accounted for since it is based upon random chance and spontaneity. The cause must be Mind, for it is not an eternal chaos, a drear waste of unchanging, stagnant, formless matter that we are contemplating; but a growing, progressive cosmos, an unfolding universe of harmony and order, teeming with adaptation and contrivance, mechanism and adjustment. Of such things we cannot think without being impressed with the idea of design, nor even speak without employing language which implies intention and purpose. Who really doubts, except it be under the stress of some rigorous and tyrannical theory, that the eye was intended for seeing, the lung for breathing, the fins for swimming, the maternal instinct for rearing progeny? Or who can avoid using such language without being conscious of a pedantic and unnatural self-restraint? We know that within our own sphere of action, mind, and mind alone, originates contrivances, adjustments, mechanisms, relations of use and beauty. Of any other cause which can originate such things here or elsewhere we are as ignorant, and even as unable to conceive, as of a new bodily sense, or of a world where two straight lines can enclose a space. And thus the conviction grows up within us, as a primary or instinctive belief of the reason, that order, contrivance, and adaptation indicate the action of intelligence; and from the contemplation of such phenomena we spring, and human reason has always sprung, to the conception of an originating Mind. Here then is the goal to which the consciousness of designing intelligence brings us, and has brought the world in general, when contemplating the order and mechanism of nature. It is a supreme Mind as the Artificer of the universe. But that again is what we mean by the awful name God. That there is in human nature a distinct and imperial moral faculty we cannot doubt. It proclaims itself in our moral judgments; it speaks authoritatively in the voice of our conscience; it charges home on us the responsibility of our actions; it lashes our disobedience with the scourges of shame and remorse; it raises before us dreadful visions of retribution. Over our entire being it claims rightful and supreme rule, and sits enthroned as a lawful sovereign in the midst of our various appetites, passions, and powers. That this mysterious and sacred inmate of our hearts has in all ages led mankind to believe in an external reality corresponding to it, namely, in an objective moral law, and a Supreme Power which enforces it, is an undeniable fact of history. For our present purpose, the value of the fact lies in this: that it leads us to view this inference as being of the nature of a basic intuition of the reason; for if it is so, it becomes a valid witness for the existence of God. Of course, to the mere logician, bent on weaving demonstrations of syllogistic processes out of axiomatic premises, our moral nature is a purely subjective thing from which nothing external to itself can be legitimately inferred. But to us who are looking for those primary intuitive or instinctive beliefs which underlie all possible logical proof, the real question is whether, as a matter of fact and human experience, the consciousness of a moral nature does not beget the conviction of an objective moral law, and a Supreme Lawgiver. Right and Wrong, are they truly irreconcilable extremes? Do they confront each other eternally at opposite poles of rational existence? Whatever speculative philosophers may argue, to these questions the great heart of humanity returns an unwavering reply in the affirmative. There is no language in which the word “ought” is destitute of a solemn meaning, or the word “duty” has ceased to carry with it a sacred imperative. Never has there been a society constructed on the principle that moral differences are mere figments of the imagination, or products of custom or fashion; never a religion which dispensed with a distinction between moral good and evil. If ever there have existed individual human beings, who denied their possession of any faculty which witnessed for right and protested against wrong, they are held by the general verdict of the race to have been but distorted and monstrous specimens, in whom the noblest element of humanity was deficient. Concurrently with the conviction of an eternal, irreconcilable opposition between right and wrong, there has always existed in the human heart a sense of responsibility. Moral judgement carries with it a felt authority and sanction. It differs essentially from the judgments of the intellect in having self-approval and shame for its ministers. When it has pronounced on the rightness of an action in the existing circumstances, we feel that we are summoned to perform that action. We cannot put the decision aside as one with which we have no practical concern. It haunts us, it presses in on us, it demands our obedience; and if we refuse to obey, we experience a sensation of uneasiness, self reproach, and shame. Hence arises the consciousness of responsibility. When we know what is right, we cannot help feeling accountable for neglecting to do it; whatever ill consequences follow from our disobedience to the sacred voice within, we recognize that they are justly chargeable upon us; we cannot repudiate them; responsibility for them is a burden from which there is no release. Nor is that all. The sense of responsibility irresistibly forces on us the idea of a tribunal at which we must answer, an objective moral law which lies upon us, and is armed with retributive sanctions. The history of all nations shows that the human mind has never been able to restrict the idea of moral responsibility to a purely subjective conception; the advance to an external authority, commanding and enforcing its commands, has been found inevitable, and is thus proven to be rooted in the constitution of our nature - in other words - to be instinctive. In whatever form the conception has embodied itself; whether of a Nemesis that dogs the heels of guilt, or a Tendency that works in favor of virtue, or an “Eternal not-ourselves that makes for righteousness,” or a Judge at whose bar the disembodied soul is arraigned after death, or a supreme moral Governor of the universe; the substance of it has been that there really is outside us, and independent of us, a moral law under which we live, and an administration of justice which somehow, whether in this or a future life, or in both, takes cognizance of human actions and is armed with the power of retribution. The law within the breast has always been more or less distinctly regarded as the reflection of a law which is outside and above; the voice of conscience within as the echo of a sovereign voice without; the sense of guilt and shame as the shadow of an avenging power, to which moral agents are accountable for their deeds. All this is plain matter of fact, independent of any speculations as to its origin or significance. An ineradical sense of antagonism between Right and Wrong, and of human responsibility, giving birth to the conception of an external Moral Law and Tribunal of Justice, is a primary fact of human nature. Doubtless it is very possible to put this fact into the alembic of critical analysis, and resolve it into its supposed elements, till all that is significant in it seems to disappear, and nothing worth noting is left behind. There are no moral or spiritual facts which may not be got rid of in this way, and the process may easily be continued till human nature is stripped of everything that honorably distinguishes it from the beasts of rapine. Mankind have only to be portrayed in an imaginary primitive condition, just emerging from the bestial stage, and beginning to live in rude communities, ignorant of everything but how to provide a scanty sustenance for their bodily life. Moral distinctions would at first be as foreign to them as to tigers and rattlesnakes. But some actions would soon be found to promote the well-being of the nascent tribe, others to be adverse to it; and accordingly the former would be approved and rewarded, the latter censured and punished. Then the word Right would be invented to describe those, the word Wrong these. So as time ran on, and succeeding generations inherited the gradually accumulated experience of their forefathers, ideas of rightness and wrongness would be formed, and grow into force and completeness; virtue would mean what benefited the social life, vice what harmed it; and thus the whole genesis of morality, conscience, responsibility, awe of a supreme moral Power, would be accounted for as easily and thoroughly as the art of building houses or weaving cloths. Morality is a fact, a transcendent fact, rooted in the very depths of our nature, and filling our minds with awe at the grandeur and sacredness of its presence. We cannot help asking whence it came, and what it means; and from one quarter only can we conceive of an answer being returned in which reason can rest contented. If we might be allowed to imagine a being of infinite righteousness whose creatures we are, and who has placed this faculty in us as a witness to himself, and to make us capable of being the subjects of his moral rule, then everything connected with our consciousness of morality would be amply explained. The faculty would be his gift, conscience his voice within us, the moral law his law, responsibility the shadow of his authority over us, retribution his righteous judgement. Here, then, we are in the presence of a conjunction of particulars which merits our closest attention. First, a grand elementary fact of our humanity; secondly, one and only one conceivable way of satisfactorily accounting for it, but that way entirely and absolutely sufficient; and lastly, an instinctive acceptance of that explanation as to the true one by mankind generally, in proportion as the development of their faculties has enabled them to reflect upon and interpret the phenomena of their moral consciousness. If such a combination of particulars does not entitle the belief in an objective moral law, and a supreme lawgiver by whom it is enforced, to be reckoned among the primary beliefs of human reason, to discover any such beliefs would seem impracticable. Our next consideration is the extreme difficulty of justifying the sense of responsibility, except by referring it to a sovereign authority to whom we are accountable. In our experience a feeling of responsibility can only be directed towards persons alone, and cannot be drawn out towards impersonal things. To say that we owe a duty to a physical law would be an abuse of language. If I thrust my hand heedlessly into a fire, I am burnt and must suffer; but to say I have broken a moral obligation towards the fire would be absurd. Moral responsibility, as it is a feeling which can arise in none but persons, so also can it be felt towards none but persons. To be responsible to myself is like owing a debt to myself. It has no significance. The responsibility of man to man springs out of voluntary engagements. If they are broken, the person who fails in performance feels that the sufferer has a right to complain, and to exact compensation or inflict proportionate punishment. That is all. But the willful base betrayer of trust might dismiss this and think none the worse of himself. The responsibility in theory would be discharged and done with. But the facts are terribly otherwise. He bears to the grave the crushing sense of responsibility. His interpitude haunts him, abases him, fills him with a sense of unworthiness, stings him with remorse. This surely is something very different from the feeling that his fellow man has a right to complain of his failure to fulfil a contract. Perhaps it will be said that the feeling of having offended against a moral law is what creates the shame and self-reproach. Most true; but what does this mean? If the moral law were purely subjective, a rule of conduct without extrinsic force, and existing nowhere but in the individual’s mind, the obligation to obey it would simply be an obligation to himself, and of such an obligation the practical effect, as we have already seen, would be nugatory. If, on the other hand, the law were really objective and had force and reality independently of the individual’s mind, still as long as it remained impersonal, even if we could conceive of such a thing as an impersonal obligatory law, it could not evoke any real sense of responsibility, for it is only to persons that we can feel that sense of obligation out of which responsibility emerges. So that the explanation, to be satisfactory, must bring us round to the conception of a person above us, to whom we are accountable, and whose will expresses and enforces the eternal law of morality. No one can doubt that this conception, if it could be entertained, would supply a full and adequate reason for that urgent and haunting sense of responsibility which clings to us like our shadow. If indeed there be a holy God who created us moral beings, and rules us by moral law, the natural and appropriate response of our hearts to that tremendous reality is an ineradicable and dominant conviction that to him we must give account. And inasmuch as mankind have been led by reflection on, or at any rate by the working of, their consciousness of responsibility to entertain this conception, we argue that it really is a genuine product of their mental constitution, and therefore that belief in a supreme moral governor may justly be ranked among the primary beliefs of the reason. There are three leading theories of morality expounded by systematic writers on ethics: Hedonism is the science of pleasure; the rule of conduct is the maxim of doing always what will yield one’s self the greatest total amount of gratification. Utilitarianism, or altruism is the rule of conduct or maxim of doing always that which will produce the greatest happiness to the greatest number of persons. The Intuitional rule of conduct is the maxim of always obeying the intuitive sense of right which dwells in every human being. By none of these theories of ethics is a sufficient working force of morality supplied. Yet morality has ever worked, and continues to work; its triumphs are the glory of human nature. Whence then does it fetch that motive of force, of which none of the theories can give an explanation? Not from earth, but from heaven. The soul springs up from its own moral consciousness to the conception of an infinitely righteous will, supreme over all things, and sure to bring about a final coincidence of well-being with well-doing. Instinctive belief in a holy God solves the difficulty and supplies the force. Assume his existence and rule, and the inference is inevitable that it must go well with the righteous. Sufferers for conscience have the Lord of the universe on their side. Ignominy, privation, torture, death itself, may be their lot here; but they can afford to smile at their losses, as they “commit the keeping of their souls to Him in well doing, as unto a faithful Creator.” We can see the uniqueness and grandeur of the moral faculty existing in man as an essential part of his constitution, and manifesting itself in a recognition of the eternal distinction between right and wrong in the voice of conscience, the sense of responsibility, the passion of remorse, and the fear of retribution. In all ages and among all nations, in proportion to men's growth and culture in the higher attributes of humanity, this faculty has led them to the concept of an objective moral law under which they were placed, and of a Supreme Moral Governor to whom they were accountable. While this concept affords an adequate explanation of the origin of the faculty, of the sense of responsibility to which it gives birth, and of the force by which it wins its practical triumphs; of these great facts of human nature reason discovers no other solution which can be pronounced adequate. Here then we find ourselves in the face of a belief in a Supreme Righteous Lawgiver characterized by these three features: it has its roots in one of the most noblest elements of human nature; it has sprung up with scarce an exception, wherever any tolerable degree of civilization has prevailed; and it is shown by reflection to be in entire harmony with the demands of reason. But such a Lawgiver is what we mean by the awful name - God. The conclusion seems inevitable, that belief in God, as the Supreme Lawgiver to whom we are responsible, is really one of those primary, intuitive beliefs which justify themselves by their very existence. There are aspirations in us which stretch forth towards the infinite; affections which transcend calculation; religious emotions which struggle to pour themselves out to a supreme Personality in boundless adoration, self-abasement, trust, self-sacrifice, and love. These are the signs and witness of this soaring faculty, the actings by which its existence and nature are revealed. That these point to a real and definite element of our personality seems unquestionable. With neither our animal instincts nor our logical understanding have they anything in common; nor can they be, without violence to facts, identified even with the action of our moral faculty. For the facts of consciousness to which this latter endowment of our being gives birth, the perception of right, the authority of conscience, the sense of duty and responsibility, the satisfaction derived from conscious integrity, although they may often appear to emerge within the peculiar sphere of spiritual feeling, and be almost inextricably intertwined with the more vivid emotions kindled by the religious sentiment, yet in themselves differ essentially from those in which the spiritual faculty displays its characteristic properties. The reverential submissions of the will to the supreme Ruler and Judge is a feeling that lies a long way apart from those fervent religious emotions of which the human spirit is conscious towards the supreme Goodness, and which can only utter themselves inarticulately in ecstacies of gratitude and love, worship and praise. It is the spiritual element in man which kindles morality into a burning aspiration for unstained purity and unbounded perfection; impels the soul towards the infinite and eternal, and both craves and finds in God the object of its affections and hopes, its center of repose and its everlasting portion. Now when this faculty falls into the hands of the hostile analyst it may easily share the fate which we saw befall the moral consciousness, and like that seem to evaporate and disappear in the crucible of critical examination; and all the more readily because of its more ethereal texture, and its operation being in a sphere which lies more out of the way of busy social life. A great solvent of it is found in the idealizing faculty, and by a free use of this the process of disintegrating all that is spiritual in human nature goes on with marvelous ease and success, till a bare residuum of gross and earthy material is all that is left behind. Now, we do not doubt that to persons in whom the religious sentiment is dormant and inoperative, an explanation of this kind of the genesis of spiritual feeling may seem plausible, perhaps even convincing. Unconscious themselves of any yearnings after God, any soaring away of the heart to find elevation and repose in a Being of infinite goodness, it may appear reasonable to them to think that such feelings, when alleged to exist in others, are fanciful, morbid, or even hypocritical. No argumentation can be too flimsy, no explanation too meager, to dispose satisfactorily of even the plainest facts in the estimation of persons who possess no faculty for understanding them. But to those who know by experience what religion is, whose souls are on fire with a passionate longing for God, and are thrilled with the joy of communion with him in his goodness and love, it is really impossible that any explanation of any kind should fail to appear infected with the taint of flagrant absurdity and baselessness. What, while they are feeling God within themselves as the unfailing source of their strength and peace and hope; while they are perceiving him by a spiritual intuition as vividly as their eyes discern the brightness of the sun, or their ears hear the deep roll of thunder; while he is more real to them than even a friend, or child, or wife, and their whole being so centers consciously in him and reposes upon him, that to snatch him from them would leave a void and desolation in their hearts, more drear and dark than if the world were blotted out around them; to tell these God-seeing, God-filled souls with a jaunty air that all this is but a baseless dream, and they are but weaving webs of idle fancies, and constructing a romance of the imagination by idealizing the ordinary relations of social life: - why, one might as well expect them to believe that they themselves are but bubbles dancing on the foaming stream of time, or shadows flickering across the infinite void; that all existence is a dream, and everything is nothing! But such intense religious emotions, such vivid realizations of spiritual things as these to which we are appealing, are they indeed well enough established facts of human experience to warrant our inference from them of a real and distinct spiritual element in human nature? Exceptional phenomena fail to afford a sufficiently secure basis of induction. They may possibly be misinterpreted, and the generalization from them run in an erroneous direction. We need a wide array of facts to allow us to feel safe in our inference. Here, then, we are thrown back on the historical development of the religious instinct, and to make our conclusions sure we must feel our way along this line of human growth That religion is indigenous to human nature, and springs up in it by natural growth as a legitimate and normal product of its unfolding faculties and properties, may fairly be taken as certain. If religion does not have this native character, but is something artificial and alien, it would be difficult to alight upon any one property or affection exhibited by man against which the same charge might not be brought. No nation has ever existed in historic times without a religion. Not even the most barbarous tribes have failed to entertain a religion as soon as their minds began to expand with culture, and human thoughts to predominate over mere animal instincts. Hence religion may be confidently said to be native to human nature, and to exist in even the lowest and rudest specimens of mankind, as a germ which only needs opportunity to grow and manifest itself. Next, it may be affirmed that the essence of religion is the sense of a relation to a superhuman personality. How can it be otherwise? Religion implies worship, trust, reverence, prayer; these must have an object, and that object must be of the nature of a person. At times indeed men have conceived themselves to be subject to some impersonal fate, destiny, or force; but that has never been the object towards which their religious emotions have gone out. The beings whom they have worshipped have been beings from whom they hoped to obtain help in their struggle against the blind, impersonal power; personal beings whose wills might be moved by sacrifice, prayer, or worship. Unless there is a person to be worshipped, as well as a person to offer the worship, religion is a name without signification or substance. Further, it is historically true of all religions which have laid hold of the human heart and been efficacious to restrain and guide it, that their strength has been in proportion to the vividness with which they led men to realize their relation to a Superhuman Personality. So far as those religions that were the mere creations of poetical fancy, philosophic thought, or mere mortals; they were inefficient, ineffective, and barren. But the element in religion whereby it spoke to the universal conscience, and awoke in it the sense of being face to face with the awful unseen Personality, it swayed the hearts of men, and was fruitful of moral results. Our glance back has shown us that when religions have been practical forces in the world, more or less vivid emotions toward the object of worship have been their legitimate effect, and the measure of their vital affinity to human nature. But we still want more definite examples of the development of a consciousness of God, to illustrate the working of the spiritual faculty under favorable conditions. For these examples we may go at once to the two great and closely connected faiths, Judaism and Christianity, which in force and fruitfulness have immeasurably surpassed all others. It is true that none of the great Gentile religions which have really swayed the souls of men has been entirely destitute of witness to the spirituality of human nature. In the records of them all may be traced aspirations towards the Absolute and Infinite, yearnings for God, a consciousness of vital relation to him, a sense of his being man’s center of repose and source of blessedness. But in comparison with the testimony borne by the sacred literature both of Israel and Christendom, and by the history of the Christian church, all other witness is meager and scarcely noticeable. It is in this line of religious growth alone that the spiritual instinct has had free development, and risen into commanding and unrivalled supremacy. Take Jesus Christ of the Gospels. For our present purpose it does not matter whether his matchless character is considered historical, or merely ideal. For even if ideal, it is the ideal which has been accepted by Christendom, that is by all the most energetic and enlightened nations of the world, as exhibiting the perfect pattern to which every human being should aim at being conformed. The Christian idea, therefore, of man - that is, let us remember, the idea of man which has rooted itself universally among all the leading, imperial races of mankind - is not the agnostic idea of a being limited to the relations and experiences of this visible world; but of a being in direct and supreme relation to a heavenly Father, and living his entire life in the consciousness of that relation. A man without the consciousness of God is, in the estimate of the universal mind of Christendom, as distant and alien from the true ideal of humanity, as a man destitute of reason and motivated only by the mere instincts of animal life. In the face of this mighty development of the religious instinct or sentiment among the choice and foremost races of mankind, - a development which may truly be said to have been an efficient cause rather than a mere accompaniment of their civilization, - it seems impossible with any show of reason to deny to human nature an indigenous faculty for religion, a faculty which reaches out instinctively beyond time and senses to find the eternal and infinite, and fastens itself on the idea of a fatherly God as the goal of its aspirations and the satisfaction of its desires. Who that fairly ponders on the prevalence and practical working of Judaism and Christianity can seriously account for the phenomena on any other hypothesis than the existence in man of this spiritual sense, tendency, or consciousness, as an essential, native element of his humanity? To say that there have been tribes of men who exhibited no signs of possessing it, or even that there may possibly have been an early stage in the evolution of the human race in which the faculty had not yet come into being, does not really touch the root of the question at all. The most thorough-going evolutionist, who is driven by the exigencies of his theory to entertain the notion, in the teeth of all moral evidence, of the slow growth of the beast into the human being, must, if he still allows himself to think, be aware of the absurdity of denying a faculty to the mature man, because it had not appeared when he was still half beast and but half man. Wherever human nature is not manifestly maimed, incomplete, crushed under barbarism and ignorance - that is, wherever it is allowed to be human nature - there this spiritual faculty, in fuller or scantier degree, manifests itself in yearnings after the unseen in the consciousness of relation to a Superhuman Personality, in religious emotions, and in acts of worship and thanksgiving. And we know too that in proportion as human nature has unfolded its higher properties, and advanced in the direction of its ideal type, in the same degree has the spiritual faculty invariably come out in greater force, and played a more dominant part in human life. These are the facts with which our induction must deal; and from these we cannot but draw the conclusion, that just as certainly as man has a reasoning faculty, an aesthetic faculty, and a moral faculty, so surely does he also possess a spiritual faculty, by which he forms conceptions of God, yearns to know God, becomes conscious of God, and seeks repose in God’s fatherly goodness and love. Now it is true that this is purely a subjective conclusion, and that no logic can possibly carry us on from it to the objective fact of a real God who corresponds to the spiritual faculty in man. But it is no such logical bridge from the subjective to the objective that our argument requires. Again and again we have insisted that the whole of the practical knowledge on which human life is based rests on no logical foundation, but on the trustworthiness of our instinctive consciousness and intuitive perceptions. We do trust these, and it is only through trusting them that we are enabled to live human lives. We have no other ground for our belief in the physical world, in our fellow man, or even in our own permanent personality. Domestic, social, national life, the administration of justice, the acquisition of knowledge, the pursuit of art, the entire fabric of civilization, rest on these primary instinctive perceptions, and the beliefs of the reason in which they embody themselves. Why then should we begin to distrust our consciousness, and cast doubts on its veracity, as soon as it begins to witness to us concerning the existence of God? If our souls are conscious of him, why should we not believe that he really exists just as much as we believe that other minds and other objects exist solely because we are conscious of them? If we begin to doubt here, where shall our doubting end? Experience proves that there is a vision of God by the purified soul, just as truly as there is a vision of the beauteous face of nature by the sensitive eye; why stigmatize one as a figment of the imagination, while confessing the other to be a reality of practical experience and common sense? By tracing the elements and workings of the religious instinct, we reach the broad fact that a consciousness of God is one of the primary and fundamental intuitions of human nature. Whence the conclusion follows that the belief in God to which it has given rise among mankind is another one of those primary beliefs of the reason which underlie all logical proof, and justify themselves by their very existence. Having now pursued our inquiry along several independent lines, and found ourselves led by each to the same conclusion, it remains for us briefly to notice how greatly the argument is augmented by the convergence of its several branches, and what a high degree of moral probability is thereby imparted to the result. The force which is given to testimony by the coincidence and mutual support of independent witnesses is familiar to every one who has any practical acquaintance with the laws of evidence. A single witness may not improbably be mistaken or false, but that two independent witnesses should concur in the same error or falsehood is extremely unlikely; and with every addition to the number of independent witnesses the improbability of their all agreeing in the same mistake or lie is enormously increased, and soon reaches what we call moral impossibility. The same principle holds good in all investigations into the truth of things: the most surely established facts derive their moral certainty from the coincidence, or convergence, as it has been called, of diverse and independent proofs. The result of our investigation has been the discovery of four different lines of evidence, each of which conducts us to God. Viewing the universe in the light of our own consciousness of originating will, the existence of a Supreme Volition is borne in on our minds as the only conceivable cause of its existence. Viewing nature in the light of our own consciousness of designing intelligence, the existence of a Supreme Mind is borne in on our minds as the only conceivable source of its order, its organisms, and its relationships. Viewing our own moral faculty as revealed to us by our consciousness, and through observation of its various manifestations, the existence of a Supreme Righteous Lawgiver to whom we are accountable is borne in on our minds as the only sufficient explanation of the voice of conscience, the sense of responsibility, and the working force of the moral sentiment. Viewing our own spiritual faculty, as revealed to us in our consciousness, through the aspirations which reach out towards the infinite, the affections which yearn for a Supreme Object, and the intuitions which realize the infinite and adorable Goodness, the existence of a Heavenly Father is borne in on our minds as the only satisfactory means of accounting for the phenomena of the spiritual life of mankind. Here are four separate lines of evidence, originating in as many distinct branches of our consciousness, and leading through the observation of different classes of phenomena to the same great conclusion, namely, that God is. For will, intelligence, morality, and spirituality, taking them in the senses in which they are usually defined, are attributes essentially different from one another, each giving rise to its own series of effects by which our personality exhibits its properties. If then, each by itself is a witness, more or less definite and forcible, by which the existence of God is attested, their agreement in leading to a common conclusion is the convergence of four independent witnesses, and the result has the moral force which we have seen to arise from such a coincidence of testimony. But the skeptic is not satisfied. He asks for more direct and palpable proof than what is the unfolding of our consciousness. They claim it as subjective fanciful thinking. Here is the unreasonableness of agnosticism. Evidence which in every other province of life is considered sufficient is in this debate about the basis of religion set aside as of no cogency, and a demand is made for proof of a kind which in the nature of things is unattainable. Sensory proof of God is in the nature of things impossible, and therefore the demand for it must be pronounced unreasonable. Putting aside then the claim of the determined skeptic for either logical demonstration or perceptible manifestation of God as inapplicable and unmeaning, it only remains to fall back on the indirect evidence for God which comes through our consciousness. To enable us fairly to estimate the force of this, two considerations must be borne in mind. First, that it really is on evidence of this kind that the whole of our practical knowledge is based. There is not a single object outside a man’s personality, of the existence of which he is certified either by logical proof or indirect perception. Of his own sensations, feelings, emotions he has direct knowledge, but of nothing else whatsoever. It is from these that he leaps by an instinctive inference to the belief of a world outside him, of fellow men like himself, and even of the identity and permanence of his own individual self. By an instinctive inference, we repeat, not by a process of logic; that certain fact is the key of our whole position. These primary beliefs are utterly incapable of demonstration; they spring up of themselves in the mind; they are intuitive, indigenous, the offspring of a rational instinct, but no logical justification of them is possible. Yet they are practically irresistible, and no sane person refuses to act upon them. If a metaphysician questions them speculatively in his closet, he does not the less make them the basis of his life, as soon as he steps out to converse with his family or mix with the world. Illogical they are, but inevitable, and ineradically rooted in human nature. If then it can be shown that belief in God springs up in a similar way, and rests substantially on the same foundation of instinctive inference, it will need no further justification, and the charge brought against it of lacking logical demonstration will be irrelevant. And secondly, we have before us ample evidence that belief in God actually has that relation to the human mind which we call instinctive or intuitive, in that it springs up or roots itself universally in the consciousness, and takes ever firmer hold in proportion to the growth of man in the higher characteristics of humanity. Moreover, we find that, in seeking for a rational ground for the belief, it is not along one line only, but along four distinct and independent lines that our minds advance to the assured possession of it. From our own consciousness of will we infer a Supreme Originating Will; of intelligence, a Supreme Constructing Mind; of morality, a Supreme Righteous Lawgiver; of spirituality, a Supreme Father. Thus the instinctive inference of a personal God is woven of four separate strands; the evidence is the coincident testimony of four independent witnesses; the proof is the combination and convergence of four distinct lines of induction. And our conclusion is, that belief in God rests on as trustworthy and practically sure a foundation as any of those primary instinctive beliefs of the reason on which all mankind habitually rely and act. Brownlow Maitland In light of all of the preceding, as expounded by Brownlow Maitland, evidencing the existence of God, no one can, in all honesty, resist the implications of such induction. Indeed, it becomes an imperative that we investigate further into the matter in order to come to a knowledge of the specifics necessary to achieve closure. In doing so we will first take a look at some of the many so-called 'gods' prevalent today in order to establish what God is not, and then we will take a closer look at what remains after our examination for legitimacy is concluded; for the natural tendency in thought progression leads us, of necessity, to the specific identification of such a phenomena of this magnitude and significance. First there is the 'god' of the New Age Pantheists - those who worship the creation and all that is a part of it. These say that the trees are God, a rock is God, animals are God, and so on ad-infinitum until they even arrive at the bold assertion that even man is God; and by virtue of their twisted reasoning they conclude that we all are Gods unto ourselves. This is one of the driving forces fueling the environmental movement, which asserts that we are a plague that is pillaging the earth. It also is behind the nihilistic scourge which is ravaging the integrity of western civilization. If everything is God, then where is the advantage of being designated 'God'? Any rational mind would reject such folly since it is very evident that none of these things have any power over their own destinies. Timber can be cut and utilized, rocks can be broken, animals have their various uses and are so used, - and even man can be killed. These things are not God. Only those of reprobate mind will dogmatically assert that they are. It is clearly evident that the Creator and that which is created are not synonymous. The Creator stands quite apart from that which he has created. The veracity and trustworthiness of our consciousness, as far as the sane, rational specimens of our species are concerned, will demonstrate to us this very evident principle with this example: Man creates an automobile; that does not make the automobile man. The automobile though does testify to the alternate existence of man as its creator by virtue of its very own existence. Likewise the creation. By virtue of its very existence it does testify to the existence of its creator, but it is not the creator himself, nor any part thereof. While on the subject of creation, there are those who desperately cling to the theory of evolution as if it were their God; for in doing so, if they can satisfactorily prove to themselves, and to others - safety in numbers - , that God does not exist, then they can in their own minds, eradicate the accountability factor in life. Each man therefore becomes a law unto himself, and does that which seems right in his own eyes. Thus you have antinomians, atheists, agnostics, environmentalists, criminals, socialists, and humanists - all ostensibly unaccountable to the creator who made them. As Margaret Thatcher once said, " Some of the worst crimes in history have been committed by those who have exercised their liberty without a sense of responsibility or accountability." Evolution should not be graced with the honor of being called a theory, for a theory has material facts which can adequately be demonstrated to substantiate it. Evolution has none, and therefore should be called a hypothesis. It is merely a 'science' of speculation; thus it has no business being taught in our educational institutions as 'fact' without substantiation. No wonder western civilization has such difficulty keeping its populace in line; for teaching our young that they are the animalistic results of a series of chance accidents will result in their living their paltry existence as mere animals with animal instincts. Besides, it takes more faith to believe in the multitudinous 'accidents' of the hypothesis of evolution, than it does to believe in a real God as the creator of the universe and all that is in it. Next there are those who worship - reverence the worth of - man made items of silver, gold, metal, wood, and stone. These are basically called materialists. These are they who pay homage to that which they have made with their own hands, or purchased by means of their labors, or acquired through the efforts of their own ingenuity. To worship an image or idol is called idolatry. It means to reverence the worth of an object, attributing to it a value which far exceeds its own intrinsic worth, and doing service to such based upon one's own subjective estimation of it. A carved image of something imagined to be in heaven, on earth, in the sea, or in the spirit world, is still a carved image, made by the hands of men, drawn from their finite imaginations, made of the materials of the earth. If these things were created by men, would not rather the men be gods over them by being their creators? To bow down to and serve such things is of the utmost folly, and unbecoming of the human creature - the crowning glory of the creation of God. Things such as these have no consciousness, no will, or intelligence; they are dumb and blind and therefore are not worthy. These are not God. Men of greater intelligence also fit into this category of idolatry. There are those who reverence the worth of, and pay homage to money, sports, heroes, celebrities, machines, tools, buildings, beauties, systems, ideas, philosophies, nature, the environment, animals, and even themselves. These things have their places, their uses, their functions; but they are not to be worshiped and served by men, but rather are there to serve men as they have need. Men are possessed of intelligence, consciousness, and will, and are the creators of many things suited to their purposes and needs. By virtue of this fact then, would not that which has been created be subject to the one who has created it? If, as we have seen, man has been created by God, would not then man be subject to his creator? If this is true then, why do men subject themselves to, and become slaves to that which they have made, rather than to the One who has made them? We have seen that the man who creates stands quite apart from that which he has created, and therefore, that which has been created, lacking consciousness, will, and intelligence, is not worthy of worship by the one who has created it. To admire, appreciate, and care for what one has made or acquired is one thing, but to worship it is quite another. That which is created by man is not God. To enslave oneself to it is the utmost in folly. It has been said, "May the Force be with you." Is God some nebulous, indefinite, undefinable force in which we can rest our well being? Don't even entertain such a fallacy! By definition, "force", being used as a noun, has reference to strength or energy of body or mind; active power; vigor; might; often an unusual degree of strength or energy; capacity of exercising an influence or producing an effect; especially, power to persuade, or convince, or impose obligation; pertinency; validity; special signification; as, the force of an appeal, an argument, a contract, or a term. Does this sound nebulous? It would appear that in order to affect, by the definition of a force, consciousness, will, and intelligence would be a prerequisite to its very function. These three things indicate a being. A being is not a nebulous force. A being, through exercise of its consciousness, will, and intelligence, can produce the effects of our definition of a force. This action of the attributes of a being makes a force a created thing, and not an authority in and of itself directing the affairs of men, and likewise being manipulated by them. God is not a force, nor then is the "Force" God. Being a created thing through the outworkings of consciousness, will, and intelligence, a force brings us around again to the unmistakable conclusion that a Being is implied by its very existence, and that being is what is called God. Now there are those who call upon the stars for guidance in their everyday affairs. This is folly of the silliest kind; for the stars are created things which again testify of that God who is their creator. Only consciousness, will, and intelligence, are capable of communicating divine will and purpose to mankind, of which the stars have none. Rather, call upon the Creator of the stars for guidance in everyday living, and do not entertain horoscopes, for this is the utmost in deception, to yourself, and from those who promote it. The stars are not God; only one of the many manifestations that testify of his existence. Through psychics many people call upon Satan for demonic revelations and manifestations as their God. This is folly of the basest sort, for Satan and his cohorts are in active opposition to God, his plan, his purposes, and all that he desires of his people. Satan is not the opposite of God. He isn't even in the same league as God. Satan is more like the opposite of the angel Michael. Satan is a created being, a fallen angel, if you will, and demons are also fallen angels, those who rebelled with him, and are lined up under his authority to do his bidding in active opposition to God, according to God's permissive will. God could pull the plug on them any time he chooses, if he so desires, but he has a plan and purpose to be fulfilled, which includes allowing them to wreak havoc in this world, in order to put his people to the test for the purpose of approval, and to serve as a scourge to those who follow Satan as well. Does not the existence of evil declare the alternate existence of good? Since God is the ultimate Creator and has created all things for his good pleasure, does it not stand that Satan, a created being, is under God's permissive will at the present, and that all rebellion in the end will be crushed by the almighty God? Rather, call upon the God who made the angels who rebelled of their own free will after having seen God firsthand, and consider their fate, while thinking of the blessedness of those who did not rebel, and that those who seek after God and find him, will be like them in the end. Enough of that which is not God! We have not yet brought out what God is. Well, God is God ! That is about all that can be said at this time with any validity. We have nothing within the realm of our experience with which to compare him and say, "This is what God looks like." God is unique, one of a kind. We only know him by his revealed attributes, and these only by his own revelation of himself to mankind. Being God he has the prerogative to do as he pleases, and that includes the method by which he choses to let himself be known by us, and the extent to which he will allow himself to be known. We are first introduced to the concept of God as we view the creation and its interdependent relationships and workings, and wonder who made all of it to work so precisely together for the benefit of all things apparent. But we will delve into this later. God has revealed himself to man in many different ways in the past. The first was personal interaction with the first of his creation; then later came theophanies, where God would appear in human form as the Angel of the Lord to those who followed his ways; he revealed his will in dreams to many different kinds of people who had enough respect left for God that they would do his bidding; he also did many miraculous signs and wonders, both to effect his will upon those who resisted him, and to engender the obedience and respect of his people who were called out by him as his chosen instruments for the execution of his will upon the earth and among men. He called out and established a nation after his own name, and dealt with them as his own chosen people, disciplined them when they were disobedient, and blessed them when they were true and obedient. He established among them a priesthood, a law, and prophets, who not only foretold future events, but also rebuked his people for their transgressions, and pronounced either evil or good according to their manner of life, being God's spokesmen upon earth. They foretold how God would finally reveal himself in a manner which mankind could comprehend, in a manifestation of his own essence that would once and for all affect his will among men for all time. Where can one find all of the information pertaining to these events in order to come to an accurate understanding of God as he has revealed himself, and in order to learn and do his will? It has all been recorded and preserved in a book we call the "Holy Bible". Bible, from the Greek word for book - biblios; and Holy, meaning consecrated, set apart from that which is common or profane. We have seen how through consciousness one can become aware of the existence of God. This we will call, for want of a better term, "God awareness". What one is to do when once this point is reached through the various workings and processes of human consciousness is to respond to this God awareness with positive volition. Generally the most common and natural response to the discovered phenomena of God is a desire to know him. What is God ? If he is a person, who is God? What is he like? Why did he make all of this? Where is he? When and how can I see him? How can I know him? All of these questions have answers which are arrived at through the perceptiveness of our mind, and the response of our will. Our response is to be an act of positive volition in the active mode which is called "seeking after God". The revelation of God's essence is his part, but the seeking after him is our responsibility, and all persons have equal access and opportunity. We have seen that the existence of God is evidenced by that which he has made - the creation - which adequately testifies to the existence of an intelligent artificer. Everything has a specific purpose, function, and definition, and marked similarities which point to the same mind behind them all, not only in design, but also in operation. Nature has a marked diversity as well as a uniformity and interdependence, the balance of which is intelligently calculated and skillfully implemented. Only a real God could be the uncaused cause that caused this remarkable effect we call the creation, or nature, or the universe even. This is what is known as "General Revelation", God revealing himself by means of that which he has made - that which we perceive by means of our consciousness as being made by a Supreme Being greater than ourselves. This is God awareness via. the general revelation of God. What we have here is God's responsibility towards us as his created beings. If he expects or demands anything of his created beings, he must make himself known to them, and this is the initial stage of the revelation of God. He cannot just come out in a great big splash of glory and show himself to us because he knows, in seeking our highest good, that we could not endure in our present state, to behold the majesty of God and live. Now our response to this revelation of the existence of God is to be a desire to know him, to have intimate fellowship with him, to desire to do what pleases him, and to obtain his approval and blessing. This comes about when we realize our relative insignificance in the great scheme of things which have been created, and his great magnificence as evidenced by all that he has made. He is infinite, we are finite; he is without beginning or end, the whole of our experience is the opposite; our powers are limited in scope, his are unlimited as seen in his mighty creative abilities. Apart from a relationship with God, the existence of man is a meaningless exercise in futility. Puny |
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