Christianity and Greek Philosophy Part 22

That this connection is "not perceptible to human observation," if by this our author means "not perceptible to sense," we readily admit. No one ever a.s.serted it was perceptible to human observation. We say that this connection is perceptible to human _reason_, and is revealed in every attempt to think about, and seek an explanation of, the phenomenal world. The Phenomenal and the Real, Genesis and Being, s.p.a.ce and Extension, Succession and Duration, Time and Eternity, the Finite and the Infinite, are correlatives which are given in one and the same indivisible act of thought. "The conception of one term of a relation necessarily implies that of the other; it being the very nature of a correlative to be thinkable only through the conjunct thought of its correlative; for a relation is, in truth, a thought one and indivisible; and whilst the thinking of one relation necessarily involves the thought of its two terms, so it is, with equal necessity, itself involved in the thought of either."[367] Finite, dependent, contingent, temporal existence, therefore, necessarily supposes infinite, self-existent, independent, eternal Being; the Conditioned and Relative implies the Unconditioned and Absolute--one is known only in and through the other.

But inasmuch as the unconditioned is cognized solely _a priori_, and the conditioned solely _a posteriori_, the recognition by the human mind of their necessary correlation becomes the bridge whereby the chasm between the subjective and the objective may be spanned, and whereby Thought may be brought face to face with Existence.

[Footnote 367: Hamilton's "Metaphysics," vol. ii. pp. 536, 537.]

The reverence which, from boyhood, we have entertained for the distinguished author of the "Inst.i.tutes" restrains us from speaking in adequate terms of reprobation of the statement that "the _First Cause_"

may be known, and yet not conceived "as eternal, self-existent, immortal, and independent". Surely that which is the ground and reason of all existence must have the ground and reason of its own existence in itself. That which is _first_ in the order of existence, and in the logical order of thought, can have nothing prior to itself. If the supposed First Cause is not necessarily self-existent and independent, it is not the _first_; if it has a dependent existence, there must be a prior being on which it depends. If the First Cause is not eternal, then prior to this Ultimate Cause there was nothingness and vacuity, and pure nothing, by its own act, became something. But "_Ex nihilo nihil_" is a universal law of thought. To ask the question whether the First Cause be self-existent and eternal, is, in effect, to ask the question "who made G.o.d?" and this is not the question of an adult theologian, but of a little child. Surely Mr. Watson must have penned the above pa.s.sage without any reflection on its real import[368].

[Footnote 368: In an article on "the Impending Revolution in Anglo-Saxon Theology" Methodist Quarterly Review, (July, 1863), Dr. Warren seems to take it for granted that the "aiteological" and "teleological" arguments for the existence of G.o.d are utterly invalidated by the Dynamical theory of matter. "Once admit that _real power_ can and does reside in matter, and all these reasonings fail. If inherent forces of matter are competent to the production of all the innumerable miracles of movement in the natural world, what is there in the natural world which they can not produce. If all _the exertions of power_ in the universe can be accounted for without resort to something back of, and superior to, nature, what is there which can force the mind to such a resort?" (p.

463). "Having granted that _power_, or _self-activity_, is a natural attribute of all matter, what right have we to deny it _intelligence_?"

(p. 465). "_Self-moving matter must have thought and design_" (p. 469).

It is not our intention to offer an extended criticism of the above positions in this note. We shall discuss "the Dynamical theory" more fully in a subsequent work. If the theory apparently accepted by Dr.

Warren be true, that "_the ultimate atoms of matter are as uniformly efficient as minds_, and that we have the same ground to regard the force exerted by the one _innate_ and _natural_ as that exerted by the other" (p. 464), then we grant that the conclusions of Dr. Warren, as above stated, are unavoidable. We proceed one step farther, and boldly a.s.sert that the existence of G.o.d is, on this hypothesis, incapable of proof, and the only logical position Dr. Warren can occupy is that of spiritualistic Pantheism.

Dr. Warren a.s.serts that "the Dynamical theory of matter" is now generally accepted by "Anglo-Saxon _naturalists_." "One can scarcely open a scientific treatise without observing the altered stand-point"

(p. 160). We confess that we are disappointed with Dr. Warren's treatment of this simple question of fact. On so fundamental an issue, the Doctor ought to have given the name of at least _one_ "naturalist"

who a.s.serts that "the ultimate atoms of matter are as uniformly efficient as minds." Leibnitz, Morrell, Ulrici, Hickok, the authorities quoted by him, are metaphysicians and idealists of the extremest school.

At present we shall, therefore, content ourselves with a general denial of this wholesale statement of Dr. Warren; and we shall sustain that denial by a selection from the many authorities we shall hereafter present. "No particle of matter possesses within itself the power of changing its existing state of motion or of rest. Matter has no spontaneous power either of rest or motion, but is equally susceptible to each as it may be acted on by _external_ causes" (Silliman's "Principles of Physics," p. 13). The above proposition is "a truth on which the whole science of mechanical philosophy ultimately depends"

(Encyclopaedia Britannica, art. "Dynamics," vol. viii. p. 326). "A material substance existing alone in the universe could not produce any effects. There is not, so far as we know, a self-acting material substance in the universe" (M'Cosh, "Divine Government, Physical and Moral," p. 78). "Perhaps the only true indication of matter is _inertia_." "The cause of gravitation is _not resident_ in the particles of matter merely," but also "_in all s.p.a.ce_" (Dr. Faraday on "Conservation of Force," in "Correlation and Conservation of Force." (p.

368). He also quotes with approbation the words of Newton, "That gravity should be innate, inherent, and essential to matter, is so great an absurdity, that I believe no man who has in philosophic matters a competent faculty of thinking can ever fall into it" p. 368). "The 'force of gravity' is an improper expression" (p. 340). "Forces are transformable, indestructible, and, _in contradistinction from matter_, imponderable" (p. 346). "The first cause of things is Deity" (Dr. Mayer, in "Correlation and Conservation of Force," p. 341). "Although the word _cause_ may be used in a secondary and subordinate sense, as meaning antecedent forces, yet in an abstract sense it is totally inapplicable; we can not predicate of any physical agent that it is abstractedly the cause of another" (p. 15). "Causation is the _will_," "creation is the act, of G.o.d" Grove on "Correlation of Physical Forces," (p. 199).

"Between gravity and motion it is impossible to establish the equation required for a rightly-conceived _causal_ relation" ("Correlation and Conservation of Force," p. 253). See also Herschel's "Outlines of Astronomy," p. 234.

It certainly must have required a wonderful effort of imagination on the part of Dr. Warren to transform "weight" and "density," mere pa.s.sive affections of matter, into self-activity, intelligence, thought, and design. Weight or density are merely relative terms. Supposing one particle or ma.s.s of matter to exist alone, and there can be no attractive or gravitating force. There must be a cause of gravity which is distinct from matter.]

3d. The validity of "_the principle of unity_" is also discredited by Watson. "If, however, it were conceded that some glimmerings of this great truth, the existence of a First Cause, might, by induction, have been discovered, by what means could they have demonstrated to themselves that the great collection of bodies which we call the world had but _one_ Creator."[369]

[Footnote 369: "Inst.i.tutes of Theology," vol. i. p. 275.]

We might answer directly, and at once, that the oneness or unity of G.o.d is necessarily contained in "the very notion of a First Cause"--a _first_ cause is not many causes, but _one_. By a First Cause we do not, however, understand the first of a numerical series, but an ????--a principle, itself unbeginning, which is the source of all beginning. Our categorical answer, therefore, must be that the unity of G.o.d is a sublime deliverance of reason--G.o.d is one G.o.d. It is a first principle of reason that all differentiation and plurality supposes an incomposite unity, all diversity implies an indivisible ident.i.ty. The sensuous perception of a plurality of parts supposes the rational idea of an absolute unity, which has no parts, as its necessary correlative. For example, extension is a congeries of indefinitesimal parts; the continuity of matter, as _empirically_ known by us, is never absolute.

s.p.a.ce is absolutely continuous, incapable of division into integral parts, illimitable, and, as _rationally_ known by us, an absolute unity.

The cognition of limited extension, which is the subject of quant.i.tative measurement, involves the conception of unlimited s.p.a.ce, which is the negation of all plurality and complexity of parts. And so the cognition of a phenomenal universe in which we see only difference, plurality, and change, implies the existence of a Being who is absolutely unchangeable, identical, and one.

This law of thought lies at the basis of that universal desire of unity, and that universal effort to reduce all our knowledge to unity, which has revealed itself in the history of philosophy, and also of inductive science. "Reason, intellect, ????, concatenating thoughts and objects into system, and tending upward from particular facts to general laws, from general laws to universal principles, is never satisfied in its ascent till it comprehends all laws in a single formula, and consummates all conditional knowledge in the unity of unconditional existence." "The history of philosophy is only the history of this tendency, and philosophers have borne ample testimony to its reality. 'The mind,' says Anaxagoras, 'only knows when it subdues its objects, when it reduces the many to the one.' 'The end of philosophy,' says Plato, 'is the intuition of unity.' 'All knowledge,' say the Platonists, 'is the gathering up into one, and the indivisible apprehension of this unity by the knowing mind.'"[370]

[Footnote 370: Hamilton's "Metaphysics," vol. i. pp. 68, 69.]

This law has been the guiding principle of the Inductive Sciences, and has led to some of its most important discoveries. The unity which has been attained in physical science is not, however, the absolute unity of a material substratum, but a unity of _Will_ and of _Thought_. The late discovery of the monogenesis, reciprocal convertibility, and indestructibility of all Forces in nature, leads us upward towards the recognition of one Omnipresent and Omnipotent Will, which, like a mighty tide, sweeps through the universe and effects all its changes. The universal prevalence of the same physical laws and numerical relations throughout all s.p.a.ce, and of the same archetypal forms and teleology of organs throughout all past time, reveals to us a Unity of Thought which grasps the entire details of the universe in one comprehensive plan.[371] The positive _a priori_ intuitions of reason and the _a posteriori_ inductions of science equally attest _that G.o.d is one_.

[Footnote 371: We refer with pleasure to the articles of Dr. Winch.e.l.l, in the North-western Christian Advocate, in which the _a posteriori_ proof of "the Unity of G.o.d" is forcibly exhibited, and take occasion to express the hope they will soon be presented to the public in a more permanent form.]

4th. By denying that man has any intuitive cognitions of right and wrong, or any native and original feeling of obligation, Mr. Watson invalidates "the moral argument" for the existence of a Righteous G.o.d.

"As far as man's reason has applied itself to the discovery of truth or _duty_ it has generally gone astray."[372] "Questions of morals do not, for the most part, lie level to the minds of the populace."[373] "Their conclusions have no _authority_, and place them under no _obligation_."[374] And, indeed, man without a revelation "is without _moral control_, without _principles of justice_, except such as may be slowly elaborated from those relations which concern the grosser interests of life, without _conscience_, without hope or fear in another life."[375]

[Footnote 372: "Inst.i.tutes of Theology," vol. ii. p. 470.]

[Footnote 373: Ibid., vol. i. p. 15.]

[Footnote 374: Ibid., vol. i. p. 228.]

[Footnote 375: Ibid., vol. ii. p. 271.]

Now we shall not occupy our s.p.a.ce in the elaboration of the proposition that the universal consciousness of our race, as revealed in human history, languages, legislations, and sentiments, bears testimony to the fact that the ideas of right, duty, and responsibility are native to the human mind; we shall simply make our appeal to those Sacred Writings whose verdict must be final with all theologians. That the fundamental principles of the moral law do exist, subjectively, in all human minds is distinctly affirmed by Paul, in a pa.s.sage which deserves to be regarded as the chief corner-stone of moral science. "The Gentiles (????, heathen), which have not the written law, do by the guidance of nature (reason or conscience) the works enjoined by the revealed law; these, having no written law, are a law unto themselves; who show plainly the works of the law written on their hearts, their conscience bearing witness, and also their reasonings one with another, when they accuse, or else excuse, each other."[376] To deny this is to relegate the heathen from all responsibility. For Mr. Watson admits "that the will of a superior is not in justice binding unless it be in some mode sufficiently declared." Now in the righteous adjudgments of revelation the heathen are "without excuse." The will of G.o.d must, therefore, be "sufficiently declared" to const.i.tute them accountable. Who will presume to say that the shadowy, uncertain, variable, easily and unavoidably corrupted medium of tradition running through forty muddy centuries is a "sufficient declaration of the will of G.o.d?" The law is "written on the heart" of every man, or all men are not accountable.

[Footnote 376: Romans, ch. ii. ver. 14-15.]

Now this "law written within the heart" immediately and naturally suggests the idea of a Lawgiver who is over us. This felt presence of Conscience, approving or condemning our conduct, suggests, as with the speed of the lightning-flash, the notion of a Judge who will finally call us to account. This "accusing or excusing of each other," this recognition of good or ill desert, points us to, and constrains us to recognize, a future Retribution; so that some hope or fear of another life has been in all ages a universal phenomenon of humanity.

It is affirmed, however, that whilst this capacity to know G.o.d may have been an original endowment of human nature, yet, in consequence of the fall, "the understanding and reason are weakened by the deterioration of his whole intellectual nature."[377] "Without some degree of education, man is _wholly_ the creature of appet.i.te. Labor, feasting, and sleeping divide his time, and wholly occupy his thoughts."[378]

[Footnote 377: "Inst.i.tutes of Theology," vol. i. p. 15.]

[Footnote 378: Ibid., vol. i. p. 271.]

We reverently and believingly accept the teaching of Scripture as to the depravity of man. We acknowledge that "the understanding is darkened" by sin. At the same time, we earnestly maintain that the Scriptures do not teach that the fundamental laws of mind, the first principles of reason, are utterly traversed and obliterated by sin, so that man is not able to recognize the existence of G.o.d, and feel his obligation to Him. "_Though they_(the heathen) _knew G.o.d_ (d??t? ????te?), they did not glorify him as G.o.d, neither were thankful, but became vain in their imagination, and their foolish hearts were darkened. They changed the truth of G.o.d into a lie, and wors.h.i.+pped and served the creature _more_ than the Creator."

"And as they did not _approve of holding G.o.d with acknowledgment_, G.o.d delivered them over to an unapproving mind, to work those things which are not suitable." After drawing a fearful picture of the darkness and depravity of the heathen, the Apostle adds, "Who, _though they_ KNOW _the law of G.o.d_, that they who practise such things are worthy of death, not only do them, but even are well pleased with those who practise them."[379] The obvious and direct teaching of this pa.s.sage is that the heathen, in the midst of their depravity and idolatry, are not utterly ignorant of G.o.d; "they _know_ G.o.d"--"they _know_ the law of G.o.d "--"they wors.h.i.+p Him," though they wors.h.i.+p the creature _more than_ Him.

They know G.o.d, and are unwilling to "acknowledge G.o.d." "They know the righteousness of G.o.d," and are "haters of G.o.d" on account of his purity; and their wors.h.i.+pping of idols does not proceed from ignorance of G.o.d, from an intellectual inability to know G.o.d, but from "corruption of heart," and a voluntary choice of, and a "pleasure" in, the sinful practices accompanying idol wors.h.i.+p. Therefore, argues the Apostle, they are "without excuse." The whole drift and aim of the argument of Paul is, not to show that the heathen were, by their depravity, incapacitated to know G.o.d, but that because they knew G.o.d and knew his righteous law, therefore their depravity and licentiousness was "inexcusable."

[Footnote 379: Romans, ch. i. ver. 23-32.]

We conclude our review of opposing schools by the re-affirmation of our position, _that G.o.d is cognizable by human reason._ The human mind, under the guidance of necessary laws of thought, is able, from the facts of the universe, to affirm the existence of G.o.d, and to attain some valid knowledge of his character and will. Every attempt to solve the great problem of existence, to offer an explanation of the phenomenal world, or to explore the fundamental idea of reason, when fairly and fully conducted, has resulted in the recognition of a Supreme _Intelligence_, a personal _Mind_ and _Will_, as the ground, and reason, and cause of all existence. A survey of the history of Greek Philosophy will abundantly sustain this position, and to this we shall, in subsequent chapters, invite the reader's attention.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE PHILOSOPHERS OF ATHENS.

PRE-SOCRATIC SCHOOL.

SENSATIONAL: THALES--ANAXIMENES--HERAc.l.i.tUS--ANAXIMANDER--LEUCIPPUS--DEMOCRITUS.

"Then certain philosophers of the Epicureans and of the Stoics encountered Paul."--Acts xvii. 18.

"Plato affirms that this is the most just cause of the creation of the world, that works which are good should be wrought by the G.o.d who is good; whether he had read these things in the Bible, or whether by his penetrating genius he beheld _the invisible things of G.o.d as understood by the things which are made_"--ST. AUGUSTINE, "De Civ. Dei," lib.

xi. ch. 21.

Of all the monuments of the greatness of Athens which have survived the changes and the wastes of time, the most perfect and the most enduring is her philosophy. The Propylaea, the Parthenon, and the Erechtheum, those peerless gems of Grecian architecture, are now in ruins. The magnificent sculpture of Phidias, which adorned the pediment, and outer cornice, and inner frieze of these temples, and the unrivalled statuary of G.o.ds and heroes which crowded the platform of the Acropolis, making it an earthly Olympus, are now no more, save a few broken fragments which have been carried to other lands, and, in their exile, tell the mournful story of the departed grandeur of their ancient home. The brazen statue of Minerva, cast from the spoils of Marathon, which rose in giant grandeur above the buildings of the Acropolis, and the flas.h.i.+ng of whose helmet plumes was seen by the mariner as soon as he had rounded the Sunian promontory; and that other brazen Pallas, called, by pre-eminence, "the Beautiful;" and the enormous Colossus of ivory and of gold, "the Immortal Maid"--the protecting G.o.ddess of the Parthenon--these have perished. But whilst the fingers of time have crumbled the Pentelic marble, and the glorious statuary has been broken to pieces by vandal hands, and the gold and bra.s.s have been melted in the crucibles of needy monarchs and converted into vulgar money, the philosophic _thought_ of Athens, which culminated in the dialectic of Plato, still survives. Not one of all the vessels, freighted with immortal thought, which Plato launched upon the stream of time, has foundered. And after the vast critical movement of European thought during the past two centuries, in which all philosophic systems have been subjected to the severest scrutiny, the _method_ of Plato still preserves, if not its exclusive authority unquestioned, at least its intellectual pre-eminence unshaken. "Platonism is immortal, because its principles are immortal in the human intellect and heart."[380]

[Footnote 380: Butler's "Lectures on Ancient Philosophy," vol. ii. p.

9.]

Philosophy is, then, the world-enduring monument of the greatness and the glory of Athens. Whilst Greece will be forever memorable as "the country of wisdom and of wise men," Athens will always be pre-eminently memorable as the University of Greece. This was the home of Socrates, and Plato, and Aristotle--the three imperial names which, for twenty centuries, reigned supreme in the world of philosophic thought. Here schools of philosophy were founded to which students were attracted from every part of the civilized world, and by which an impulse and a direction was given to human thought in every land and in every age.

Standing on the Acropolis at Athens, and looking over the city and the open country, the Apostle would see these _places_ which are inseparably a.s.sociated with the names of the men who have always been recognized as the great teachers of the pagan world, and who have also exerted a powerful influence upon Christian minds of every age. "In opposite directions he would see the suburbs where Plato and Aristotle, the two pupils of Socrates, held their ill.u.s.trious schools. The streamless bed of the Ilissus pa.s.ses between the Acropolis and Hymettus in a south-westerly direction, until it vanishes in the low ground which separates the city from the Piraeus." Looking towards the upper part of this channel, Paul would see gardens of plane-trees and thickets of angus-castus, "with other torrent-loving shrubs of Greece." Near the base of Lycabettus was a sacred inclosure which Pericles had ornamented with fountains. Here stood a statue of Apollo Lycius, which gave the name to the _Lyceum_. Here, among the plane-trees, Aristotle _walked_, and, as he walked, taught his disciples. Hence the name Peripatetics (the Walkers), which has always designated the disciples of the Stagirite philosopher.

On the opposite side of the city, the most beautiful of the Athenian suburbs, we have the scene of Plato's teaching. Beyond the outer Ceramicus, which was crowded with the sepulchres of those Athenians who had fallen in battle, and were buried at the public expense, the eye of Paul would rest on the favored stream of the Cephisus, flowing towards the west. On the banks of this stream the _Academy_ was situated. A wall, built at great expense by Hipparchus, surrounded it, and Cimon planted long avenues of trees and erected fountains. Beneath the plane-trees which shaded the numerous walks there a.s.sembled the master-spirits of the age. This was the favorite resort of poets and philosophers. Here the divine spirit of Plato poured forth its sublimest speculations in streams of matchless eloquence; and here he founded a school which was destined to exert a powerful and perennial influence on human minds and hearts in all coming time.