Page:Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion volume 1.djvu/106

 of the other divisions of philosophical study, and it is thus a result. From the philosophical point of view we are here already in possession of a result flowing from premises previously established, which now lie behind us. We may, nevertheless, turn for aid to our ordinary consciousness, accept data assumed in a subjective way, and make a beginning from there.

The beginning of religion is, similarly with its general content, the as yet undeveloped conception of religion itself; namely, that God is the absolute Truth, the Truth of everything, and that religion alone is absolutely true knowledge. We have thus to begin by treating—

A.

GOD.

For us who are already in possession of religion, what God is, is something we are familiar with—a substantial truth which is present in our subjective consciousness. But scientifically considered, God is at first a general, abstract name, which as yet has not come to have any true value. For it is the Philosophy of Religion which is the unfolding, the apprehension of that which God is, and it is only by means of it that our philosophical knowledge of His nature is reached. God is this well-known and familiar idea—an idea, however, which has not yet been scientifically developed, scientifically known.

Having thus referred to this development, which has its justification in philosophical science itself, we shall, to begin with, accept as a simple statement of fact the assertion that the result of philosophy is that God is the absolutely True, the Universal in and for itself, the All-comprehending, All-containing, that from which everything derives subsistence. And in regard to this assertion we may also appeal in the first place to religious consciousness, where we find the conviction that God is