Page:Philosophical Review Volume 2.djvu/394

380 ,' 'Theism' and 'Agnosticism.' Spinoza is taken as the representative pantheist, and his view of the world is presented as well as could be expected in the space of seven pages. Speculatively this theory is most unsatisfactory, because, on the principle of determinatio negatio est, it does not allow the ascription of personality to God. Against this view are brought the arguments of Lotze that limitation by a non-self is not an indispensable condition of self-consciousness, but only a characteristic of a finite consciousness due to its very finitude. "That to which we tend, but never reach, God has in perfection and from eternity, a self-consciouness absolutely independent of outside stimulus, infinite in contents, and utterly unaffected by limits of time and space" (p. 84). As to the doctrine of creation, this need not be insisted on by the theist, provided only the absolute dependence of the world on God be otherwise assured. Ethically, too, pantheism, whether in the Spinozistic or the Hegelian form, fails to satisfy the Christian standard. It degrades man, for with the personality of God falls that of man too. Moral distinctions become purely relative. Human freedom, responsibility, and immortality vanish.

In the chapter on the materialistic theory the distinction between science and materialism is clearly and accurately drawn. With science as such Christianity has no quarrel. Let the physicist prove the mechanical working of natural laws and the evolutionist that man himself, body and mind, is a natural development from the inorganic. "This view may eliminate miracle, or the purely supernatural, but not the divine activity which underlies the whole" (p. 107). Most of the material for the statement of the materialistic theory is drawn from Strauss and Lange. Some attention is also given to the "prudent or moderate materialism" of Bain's double-faced unity, Clifford's mind-stuff, and Huxley's conscious automata. Our author would have served his practical purpose much better, if he had devoted to a discussion of the different forms of the double aspect theory so prevalent now, most of the space given to the dogmatic materialism of Moleschott and Vogt, in which nobody at the present time believes. Agnosticism, as represented by Spencer and Fiske, is very briefly discussed. Then follows a statement of the cosmological, teleological, and ontological arguments, the Kantian argument from the moral consciousness, and the Hegelian argument from the nature of self-consciousness. But as none of the arguments seem absolutely demonstrative, it is proposed that we assume as a datum that God is, and restrict our inquiries to what he is. From the fact of man's position at the head of creation as taught by evolutionists, it may reasonably be inferred that in man there is a revelation of God as a Being possessing mind and guided by purpose, and again from the teaching of science that all physical forces are convertible into each other it may be inferred that the ultimate force, the Power that is at work in the universe is not unlike the form of power with which we are most familiar in ourselves – will-power. From the moral nature of the highest creature, is argued the moral nature of the Creator. It is frankly acknowledged that these results are