Page:Lectures on the Philosophy of Religion volume 3.djvu/209

 content for itself, can and should have an interest for us when we are clear about the thing itself, and that thing which we have got to consider here deserves above anything else to be taken up for itself, apart from any interest which might otherwise attach to it by its being connected with material lying outside of it. To occupy ourselves too exclusively with the historical element in subjects which are in themselves eternal truths for Spirit, is a proceeding rather to be disapproved of, for it is only too frequently an illusion which deceives us as to what is of real interest. Historical study of this kind has the appearance of dealing with the Thing or actual reality; while, on the contrary, we are as a matter of fact dealing with the ideas and opinions of others, with external circumstances, with what, so far as the actual reality is concerned, is past, transitory, and vain. We may certainly meet with historically learned persons who are what is called thoroughly conversant with all the details of what has been advanced by celebrated men, Fathers of the Church, philosophers, and such like, regarding the fundamental principles of religion, but who, on the other hand, are strangers to the true object or Thing itself. If such people were to be asked what they considered to be the reality and the grounds of their conviction regarding the truth they possessed, they would very likely be astonished at such a question as something which did not concern them here, their real concern being, on the contrary, with others, with theories and opinions, and with the knowledge not of something actual but of theories and opinions.

It is the metaphysical proofs which we are considering here. I make this further remark inasmuch as it has been the custom to deduce a proof of the existence of God, ex consensu gentium, a popular category over which Cicero long ago waxed eloquent. The knowledge that all men have imagined, believed, known this, carries with it a tremendous authority. How could any man resist it and say, I alone contradict all that all men picture to