ARCHBISHOP VAUGHAN'S THIRD LECTURE : " GOD."

New Zealand Tablet, Volume VI, Issue 315, 2 May 1879, Page 5

ARCHBISHOP VAUGHAN'S THIRD LECTURE : " GOD."

Last Sunday evening I did what I could to lead you to the threshold of the great truth regarding man's intimate communication with God, on which so much depends in the Christian scheme. I showed you by means of several arguments that man differs radically and in kind from brute boasts ; that this fundamental difference springs from his spiritual nature ; and that that nature is so fashioned that it spontaneously tends towards something higher, purer, more perfect than itself. I pointed out the fact that man is essentially religious ; and that he possesses a moral no less tban an intellectual nature ; and that his intellect, his reason, and his heart, all three, point with a straight finger towards this profound and universally-received conclusion, namely, — that the very fact -of man existing as man leads on to a reasonable belief in a Personal God, a Creator, and a Sovereign Ruler of the Universe. Having thus carried my reasoning along so far, it now remains for me to complete the train of thought with which 1 began ; and to unfold before the oye of your intellect those positions which show how the mind of man comes into communication with that of God, ; and which tend towards proving that not only does man yearn and hold out the hands of his soul towards his Maker, but that that same ilaker, in return, enters into communication with His creature, and offers him sufficient motives for believing, with an absolute and sovereign certainty, in His existence as a Personal, All-holy, and Allwi«; Creator. And it is quite necessary to insist upon this great primary truth with all the earnestness and all the argument at our command ; for, in the present age, when the very foundations «f leligion are scanned anew and tested ; when men feel as little remorse in denying the existence of God as they do in denying the existence of the man in the moon ; when no dogma, however sacred or venerable is treated with the slightest reverence or respect, but all have to be put in the witness-bos, and bullied and brow-beaten by the brazen, self-sufficient votaries of a n gative religion ; when nothing is safe from narrow brains and profane hands and tongues — from the worry of a shallow philosophy ; in such a condition of affairs as this, it is absolutely necessary to meet our opponents with boldness as well as logic, and to state, in the most unmistakeable tennß, the thesis which we are combating, and the thesis, on the other hand, that we have undertaken to defend. Allow me, therefore, to state the thesis that I am joining issue on, as drawn out by one of the ablest philosophers belonging to the Religion of Denial ; so that there way be no misunderstanding regarding the intellectual position assumed by our opponents — no doubt as to the opponents with whom Me are contending, and as to the character of that doctrine which they are endeavouring to push amongst the people, " Inexorable logic," says this exponent of the Religion of Denial, "has forced us to conclude that, viewing the question as to the existence of God only by the light which modern science has shed upon it, there no longer appears to be any semblance of an argumeut in its favour. ThcTe can be no longer any more doubt that the existence of God is wholly unnecessary to explain any of the phenomena of the universe, than there is a doubt that if I leave go (Sic) of my pen, it will fall to the table The knowledge that a Deity is Superfluous, as an explanation of anything, being grounded on the doctrine of the persistence of force, is groui.ded on an a priori necessity of reason — i.e., if this fact were not so, our science, our thought, our very existence itself, would be scient.fically impossible," (" A Candid Examination of Theism, by Physu us," p. 64. Here, then, is a categorical and clear statement opposing a primary truth of Christianity. Here the existence of God is denied boldly, and without circumlocution, whilst it is asserted, moreover, that tid God exist, man could not exist ; that •' our science, our thought, our very existence itself would be scientifically impossible."

We could not possibly find or invent a thesis more antagonistically opposed to our own contention. Our adversaries say that if Gad existed man could not possibly live or move or have any being ; we contend the reverse : that if man exists, as was explained last-Sunday, possessing the gifts and faculties which I then ascribed to him, that if such be the case, God does exist, and can be shown to every rational creature by means of sufficient proof, to be the Personal God and the Creator of the Universe. True, we should prefer by far to be "allowed to love and adoie our Master in peace ; but the world will not let us ; there is a propaganda of Denial around us ; and we must, therefore, rouse ourselves up ; and, however grating to the feelings, enter into the arena with our opponents, and defend, with the weapons of logic and philosophy, the great primary truth of our religious teachings. " It is hard," says Janet, " to see the noblest beliefs of humanity weighed in the balance of a subtle dialectic. Of what use is philosophy, we arc a»ked, but to observe what is clear, and to shake what is defended 1 It has been thought by some a sufficient praise of such spiritualistic philosophy to say : It docs not hinder us from believing in God. In this order of ideas it seems that demonstration weakens rather than proves, affords more doubt than light, and teaches us to dispute rather than to decide. We arc sensible," continues Janet, "as any of this anxiety and trouble ; and the fact mcutioucd, which is nothing bat the truth, is one of the proofs of the feebleness of the human mind. But it is also precisely part of the greatness of the human mind to learn to consider vigorously and calmly its natural condition, and courageously to seek to remedy it. We distinguish for our part, even in the order of Nature, two things — Faith and Science, the object of the one being to supplement the other. There is a natural, practical, and moral faith in the existence of a Deity, which no demonstration can equal, to which no reasoning is adequate. 'A single sigh towards the future and the better,' it is admirably said by Heinstcrhiiys, 'is more than geometrical demon* stration of the Deity.' But if the soul needs to believe, it also needs to know ; it will try to unfold the causes of things by the laws of reason ; and it is one of the strongest temptations of the human mind to equalize its knowledge with its faith, files qvtcrens intvUeeturn. Heuce the necessity of applying the abstract and discursive methods of science to what it would seem ought only to be an object of love and hope. ... As a philosopher, I am bound to but one thing ; to admit as true what appears to me evident, nothing more. That there should be a very great difference between the demonstrations of Science and the instincts of Faith, is self-evident ; for an adequate demonstration of the Deity, of His existence and essence, would imply a reason adequate thereto, The absolute reason can alone know the absolute bving us be is. If, then, Faith, anticipating this impossible knowledge, gives us moial certainty, Science can only give a relative approximate knowledge, subject to revision in another state of knowledge, bnt which for us is the mode of representation the most adequate to which we could attain. When Bacon says that we only know God by a refracted ray (radio rrfraeto), this expression admired by all, just means that the idea we have of Him is inadequate, without, however, being untrue — as the projection of a circle is not a circle, although it faithfully reproduces all its parts. (" Final Causes," book it, page 319). Let me now enter into this most important subject on which the great fabric of our Arguments so much depends — the existence of God. I will bring before your notice the two principal proofs which have been the solace and satisfaction of every character of mind in every age of the world : the proof from the world without you, and the proof drawn from the world within. I will then proceed to present to your consideration the united force of the illumination and evidence in support of this thesis, which, it appears to me, bears with such irresistible pressure upon the whole of one's being as a man, that it is impossible to resist its collusiveness without doing violence to the deepest instincts and highest faculties of one's nature. Before, however, entering on the proof drawn from the external world, allow me to observo that the weight of its testimony comes all the more powerfully on the mind if some simple and intelligible object is examined which lies within the range of easy observation. Take, for example, out of the myriad objects we could select, the eye and the voice of man ; and from their examination you may infer what must be the skill, wisdom, and resource of Him who created the whole universe, supports if, and orders it according to established law. Indeed the more minute the object scrutinized, so much the more cause for wonder does it present : a universe or a drop of water equally witnesses to evidences of design surpassing the power aDd intelligence of man. Now, take the case of the human eye. "In the construction of this organ," says Trendelenburg, " we must either admit that light has triumphed over matter and has fashioned it, or else it is the matter itself which has become the master of the light. This is at least what should result from Ihe law of efficient causes, but neither the one or the other of these two hypotheses takes place in reality. No ray of light falls within the secret depths of the maternal womb, where the eye is formed. Still less could inert matter, which is nothing without the energy of light, be capable of comprehending it. Yet the light and the eye are made the one for the other, and in the miracle of the eye resides the latent consciousness of the light. The moving cause, with its necessary development, is here employed for a higher service. The end commands the whole, and watches over the execution of tbe parts : and it is with the aid of the end that the eye becomes ' the light of the body.' " (" Logiscbe Uutersuchungen," torn, ii., chap, ix., p. 4.) Even the supposed imperfections of the eye are in reality advantageous. '• The appropriateness of the eye," says Helmholtz, " to its end exists in the most perfect manner, and is revealed even in the limit given to its defects. A reasonable man will not take a razor to cleave blocks ; in like manner every useless refinement in the optical use of the eye, would have rendered that organ more delicate and slower in its application." (" ilevue des cours publics scientifiques," Ire aerie, t. vi., p. 219.) Now take the voice of man : " In stud} ing tbe voice of man," says Miiller, " one is struck with the infinite art with which the organ which produces it is c.nstructed. No instrument of music is at all comparable to this ; for organs and pianos, despite all their resources,

are imperfect in other respects. Borne of these instruments, like mouth-pipes, do not permit us to pass from piano to forte ; in others, as iv all those which are played by percussion, there are no means of maintaining the sound. The organ has two registers— that of the mouth-pipes and that of the reed-pipes — in this point of view resembling the human voice, with its chest register and falsetto. But none of these instruments combines all advantages like the human voice. The vocal organ has, above them all, the advantage of being able to pive all the sounds of the musical scale, and all their shades, with a single mouth-pipe, while the most perfect of reed instruments requires a separate pipe for each sound." (" Manuel," torn, ii., chap, ii., p. 197.) Now, permit me to bring before your notice the arguments of men of great ability, of high education, of diverse mind and bias, and living in various ages of the world, in support of my thesis based upon such marks of design as these. " If one woie tofind on a desert island." says Fenelon, "a beautiful maible statue, he would doubtless at once say : " There ha»-e formerly Lec-n men heTe : I recognise the hand of a talented sculptor."' _ " These words," said Janet, " have had in recent times a curious justification. What has been found, not in a desert island, but in antediluvian deposits, is not marble statues, nor magnificent palaces, but tools, and the indcst possible hatchets as at least is supposed, stones cut in an awkward manner, such as can even sometimes be met with when rocks are broken. And yet, however rude this work may be, the fact that such stones have been met with in gient numbers has sufficed to lead to the conclusion lhat they cannot be "a freak of Nature. That mass of objects collected in the same place, cut in the same manner, indicates a relation of finality ; they are no longer stones, they aic instrument* — that is to say, objects detained to cut, to pierce, to strike, to produce this or that effect. This induction does not raise the shadow of a doubt, and yet if a coincidence of unknown causes has been able to produce the wing of the bird so marvellously adapted for flying, why should not another coincidence of unknown causes have been able to produce this heap of rude stones, so imperfectly adapted to their object ?"' (" Final Cause?."' book 1., chap, i., p. 30 ) So far for Fenelon. tbe Catholic philosopher ; now- turn in quite another direction. Open the profoundest of Moliere's comedies, "Lc festin de Pierre"' (Act iii., scene 1), and and you will hear the good Sganarelle draw out one of the most powerful evidences regarding a Supreme Being, and one of the most ancient that has ever impressed the mind of the philosopher. In trying to conveit the unbelieving Don Juan, he snys to him ; •' I have not studied like you, thank God, and no one could boast of ever having taught me anything ; but with my small sense, my small judgment, I see things better than books, and understand very well that this world is not a mushroom that has come of itself in a night. 1 would ask you — who has made these trees, these rocks, this caith, and yonder sky above? and whether all that has made itself. , . . Can you see all the inventions of which the human machine is composed, without admiring the way in which it is fcrranged, one part with another — these nerves, bones, veins, arteries, these . . . lungs, this heart, this liver, and all these other ingredients that are there ? My reasoning is that there is something wondeiful in man. whatever you may say, and which all the savants cannot explain." Though put into the mouth of a valet, tbis great argument was handled at Athens ages ago by the clear and logical mind of Socrates, Fenelon develops it in bis beautiful treatise on the "Existence of God," whilst Cicero lias handled the same subject from a pagan standpoint in his "De Natura Deorum," and Kant can never criticize it without treating it, especially as developed by the French divine, with the most respectful sympathy. »So far for Moliere. Let us now take a renowned mathematician and astronomer, I refer to the illustrious Kepler. This great thinker was one of those chosen scientific men whose minds seem to expand with religious feeling in proportion as they advance in the course of scientific discovery. The realm of science with him not only harmonized with, but witnessed to the kingdom of religion. He, like most thinkers of his day, engaged his keen and powerful intellect in trying to solve the theory of atoms and their combinations. He passed many days together in such meditations as these. On one occasion, after he had been engaged for many hours in endeavouring to solve the great problem, the dinner-bell rang ; and having sat down to table with Barbara his wife, the salad was put upon the table. With his mind full of the subject of bis meditations, and feeling that there was, after all, but one reasonable way for accounting for the order, and beauty, and oneness, yet variety, of the world spread out beneath his feet, he suddenly stopped eating and said to his wife : " Dost think," 6aid he, that if from the creation plates of tin, leaves of lettuce, grains of salt, drops of oil and vinegar, and fragments of hard-boiled eggs were floating in space in all directions and without order, chance could assemble them to-day to form a salad?" " Certainly not so good a one," she replied, "nor so well seasoned as this 1" (See Bertrand, " Les fondateurs de l'astronomie moderne," p, 154.) Evidently, the profoundest thought of the great astronomer, and the natural light of reason in a woman's mind, led straight to one distinct conclusion. Now, leave the profound philosopher and the woman, and take a little child, and see how his mind would be affected. Let me select, however an intelligent child, the son of a keen Scotch philosopher. I refer to Beattie. This able man had a boy, and when the child was between rive and six years of age, in fact, just arriving at the use of reason, his father was anxious to instruct him in religion, and bring before his opening intelligence the fact of the existence of God. The canny Scotchman thought of a clever expedient of bringing home to the child's mind the great truth on which all happiness is based. lie went one day quietly to the child's little garden, and sowed some mustard and cress seed there, and so disposed of it that it should, whin grown up, exhibit the three initial letters of the child's name. But to give the account in the father's words : " Ten days after," says Beattie, " the child came running to me all amazed, and told me that his name had grown in tbe garden. I smiled at these words, and appeared not to attach much importance to what he had said. But he insisted on taking me to see what had happened, ' Yes," said I. in

coming to the place, ' I sec well enough that it is so ; b.it there is nothing wouderful in thin, it is a mere accident,' and went away. But he followed me, and walking beside me, said very seriously : 'That "cannot be an accident. Some one must have prepared the seed, to produce this result.' Perhaps these were not his very words, but this was the substance of his thought. ' You think, then,' said Ito him, 'that w hat here appears as regular as the letters of your name, cannot be produced by chance?' 'Yes,' he said firmly, ' I think so.' 4 Well, th<*n, look at yourself, consider your hands and fingers, your legs and feet, and all your members, and do they not seem to you regular in their appearance, and useful in their service? Doubtless they do.' ' Can (hey, then, be the result of chance?' 'No.' replied he, ' that cannot be ; some one must have made me them.' ' And who is tl at some one V I asked him. He replied that he did not know. I then make known to him the name of the great Being who made all the world, and regarding His Nature I gave him all the instruction adapted to his age. The lesson struck him so profoundly, that he has never forgotten cither it or the circumstance that was the occasion of it." Now let us shift the scene again : lot us leave the pure atmosphere of Beattie's home, ami plunge for a moment, in imagination, into the brilliant and depraved society of Parisian Atheists who, in the clays when Atheism was rampant in France, frequented the drawing-room of Baron d'Holbach. One of the frequenters of that drawing-room and society, the Abbu Galiani, was one of the most gifted of the cltrgy of that day, and renowned through society as a remarkably witty improvisators But I will allow Abb 6 Morellet to give bis own version of tbe matter. " After dinner and coffee," says Morellet, " the Abbe sits clown in an arm chair, his legs crossed like a tailor, as was his custom, and, it being warm, he takes his wig in one hand, and gesticulating with the other, commences nearly as follows : ' I will suppose, gentlemen, that he amoug you who is most fully convinced that the "world is the effect of chance, is playing with three dice, I do not say in a gambling-house, but in the best house in Paiis — his antagonist throws sixes once, twice, thrice, four times — in a word, constantly. However short the duration of the game, my friend Diderot, thus losing his money, will unhesitatingly say, without a moment's doubt, " The dice are loaded ; this is a gamblitighousc !" What, then, philosopher? Because ten or a dozen throws of the dice have emerged fiom the box so as to make you lose six francs, you believe firmly that this is in consequence of an adroit manoeuvre, an artifical combination, a well-planned loguery ; and j r et seeing in this universe so prodigious a number of combinations, thousands of times more difficult and complicated, more sustained and useful, ice, do you not recognise the skill and intelligence of Him in whose hands are the ends of the earth, and who has ordered all things in number, in weight and measure V Feuelon the Catholic Divine, Tillotson the Protestant, and Cicero the Pagan orator and philosopher, are convinced by, and make use of the same character of proof. Possibly Fenelon borrowed much of his Treatise from the De Natura Deo rum ; anyhow, both he and Cicero, to show the absurdity of the supposition that the world came together by a fortuitous concourse of atoms, ask the pertinent question whether the throwing of four-and-twenty letter 3 of the alphabet together would ever result in tbe formation of one single verse of the Iliad ? While Tillotson asks, "If twenty thousand blind men were to set out from different places in England remote from each other, what chalice would there be that they would end by meeting, all arranged in a, row, upon Salisbury Plain?" Kant, the great German philosopher, who perhaps has exerted a greater swayover English thought tban any other modern thinker, throws bis proofs of God's existence and unity iuto a four-fold division in the following order : first, he maintains, there are everywhere in the world manifest signs of an order regulated by design ; secondly this harmonious order docs not necessarily belong to the things of the world, but only contingently, that is, it must have been produced ab extra, from ontsi'le ; thirdly, therefore, there must exist one sublime wise cause, which must have produced the world as an Omnipotent Being, not i>< ting blindly, but freely and intelligently ; and, finally, and fouilLJy, he deduces the unity of this cause from that of the relations of the parts of the world looked upon as the different pieces of a work of art. Janet shows, with great clearness of illustration, what we should have to admit did Me refuse to admit the existence of an intelligent Creator. "If the elements of things," he says, "be conceived as mobile atoms, moving in all possible directions, and ending by lighting on such a happy combination as results in a planetary globe, a solar system, or an organized body, it will have to be said as well that it is in viitue of a happy combination that the atoms have ended by taking the form of a human brain, which, by the mere fact of that combination, became fit for thought. Now what is this but to say that letters thrown haphazard might form, the Iliad in their successive throws, since the Iliad itself is only one of the phenomena produced by the thinking activity ? But the human mind, whether ia the arts or in the sciences, has produced, and will produce, similar phenomena without end. It would not then be a single verse, a single poem, it would be all thought, with all its poems, and all its inventions, which would be the result of a happy throw." (" Final Causes," book i., chap, v., p. 152.) Let us now turn to the proof of God's existence from the world within, and I begin by bringing before you the views of one of tbe most subtle thinkers of the present age, and one of the most conscientious ; a man who lias passed a long life in the consideration of the gravest religious problems. I refer to Dr. Newman, of the London Oratory. Fortunately, in his " Apologia," he has been, through accident, forced, if I may so speak, to make his interior mind and spirit known, as it otherwise never would have been. There are two remarkable and profound observations regarding his view of the existence of God, in the " Apologia ;" and in the " Grammar of Assent" he draws out, what evidently for him is the most cogent proof amongst so many of the Theist's Doctrine. In his early yonth he said he was led to " rest in the thought of two and two only absolute and luminously self-evident beings, himself and his Creator." (Apologia, p. 4.) "Of all points of faith," he says further on, " the being of a God is, to my own apprehension, encompassed with most difficulty, and yet borne in upon our minds with most power. ' Further on

again : " Starting then with the being of a God (which, as I have said, is as certain to me as the certainty of my own <xiitcnce, though when I try to put the grounds of that ceitainty into logical shape, I find a difficulty in doing so in the mode and figure to my satisfaction), I look out of myself into the world of men." (Ibid p. 241.) Iv the " Grammar of Assent"' he dedicates a section to show Low mnn gives a real a.v-eut to the existence of God. He says : " What Lini directly aiming at, is t > explain how we gain an image of God and give a real assent to tbc proposition that He exists. And next, in order to do this, of course I must stait from some first principle— and that first principle, which I assume— and shall not attempt to prove— is tl>at we have naturally a conscience. . . . This being taken for granted, I shall attempt to show that in this special feeling, which follows on the commission of what we call right and wrong, lie the | materials for the real apprehension of a Divine Sovereign Judge. . . . . If, as i 3 the case, , we feel rcsponsibilit}-, are ashamed, are frightened, at transgressing the voice of conscience, this implies that there is One to whom we are ashamed, whose claims upon us we fear. RTf, pn doing wrong, we feel the same tearful, broken-hearted sorrow ; 'hich overwhelms us on hurting a motber ; if, on doing right, we enjoy the same sunny serenity of mind, the same soothing, satisfactory delight which follows on our receiving praise from a father, we certainly have within us the image of some person, to whom our love and veneration look, in whose smile we find our happiness, for whom we 3'carn, towards whom we direct our pleadings, iv whose anger we arc troubled ami waste away. These feelings in us are such as require for their exciting cause an intelligent being ; we arc not affectionate towards a stone, nor do we feel shame before a horse or dog ; we have no remorse or compunction on breaking mere human law ; yet so it is, conscience excites all these painful emotions, confusion, forboeling, splf-conclemnation ; and, on the other band, it sheds upon us a deep peace, a sense of security, a resignation, and a hope, which there is no sensible, no earthly object to elicit. ' The wicked flees, when no one pnrsucth,' I hen why elocs he flee ? whence his terror ? Who is it that he sees in solitude, in elarknsss, in the hidden chambers of his heart ? If the cause of these emotions does not belong to this visible world, the Object to which his pcic option is directed must be Supernatural and Divine ; and thus the phenomena of conscience, as a dictate, avail to impress the imagination with the picture of a Supreme Governor, a Judge, holy, just, powerful, all-seeing, retributive, and is the creative principle of lleligion, as tlu moral sense is the principle of Ethics." ("Grammar of 'Assent," p. 10(».) Here is the great argument and proof or witness to tlic existence of a Personal God, which has not only so deeply pressed in upon tlic mind of John Henry Newman, but may be said to have bjen the mainspring of all the greatness and the heroism of the saints. Their actual lives, the labours and sufferings, the martyrdoms and deaths, the heart-sacrifices and life-long self-oblations of them, which we read of in their annals, all clown the ages, fro:n the first till now — tbojc overwhelming practical testimonies to their intense convictions tc.id to impress the mind with some sort of notion of tbc force with which the intuitions of their conscience cainc home to their spirits. Even in the earliest days of childhood, this voice in the boul, witnessing to a higher Deing than mau himself, produces an effect, which remains after the child has grown to manhood, and can look back upon his past personal history, and analyze the feelings of bis h'.irt. These I impressions aic beautifully brought out by Henry Vauglian, when he ' says :— H.inpy tlio~o early da} •„ when 1 ! Mimed in my Angel infancy ; ' IScforcl taught mj toiifmo to wound Alj conscience with a sinlnl sound : | Or hurt the black art to ilwpenaC ! A several sin to everr hcn»e ; lint felt through all thi, fleshly die« ISritrht M loots of cverlnitiii'riie-. 3 . So far for Dr. Newman regarding the existence of God, I must now beg of you to place yourselves in very different company — iv the company of one as different in intellectual make from Newman as well could be conceived — in the company of David Hume, thn sceptic jiar crcrllenrr. That Hume would search out every possible objection to the doctrine of God's existence anel man's motives for believing in it as he docs, is inevitable, when we consider the bias and the build of Hume's mind. -He stands out as affording one of the most remarkable instances of the deep truth contained in the utterance of Dr. Newman, when he says that whilst the existence of God is a luminous and self-evident truth, of which he feels as certaiu as of his own existence, that whilst that truth is " borne in upon our minds with most power, 1 ' still "it is encompassed with most difficulty." Like all great fundamental propositions, this one, though relentless in the grasp with which it seizes and holds the mind prisoner. — still, that same mind which, through its very constitution, is here compelled to give an absolute assent, on account of its limited calibre,— -is incapable of explaining every difficulty away. Now, David Hume did all that human ingenuity could possibly do to discover difficulties, and marfehal them to the veiy best advantage. He was not a man to accept any proposition that he was not forced to accept through the sheer pressure of evidence, or through that bright illumination which springs from a primary truth. As for his difficulties, those arc known to most persons who have studied his works. My question is : What was the decision he came to in spite of Mich difficulties ? What is his distinct teaching, representing the residue of his thought, after he had skimmed away whatever ho considered untenable through the pressure of arguments appealing from the opposite side ? — But before I place his conclusion before you. permit me to make one short digression which will explain his position, and account for the fact that a man may firmly believe a thing, and yet be conscious of the difficulties connected with that belief — that a man may possess that iron grasp on truth which would make him a ready martyr, and yet be absolutely unable to explain away every difficulty that presented itself, as accompanying that absolute conviction. To my mind one of the most useful and Inminous utterances ever given forth by Dr. Newman is contained in the following passage from the " Apologia"' :—": — " Many persons," he says, " are very sensitive of the elifficultie3 of religion ; I am as sensitive of them as any one ; but 1 have never been able to see a connection between apprehending Ihost,

difficulties, however keenly, and multiplying them to any extent, and on the other hnnd doubting (he doctrines to which they arc attached. Ten thousand difficult')* x ih> not thole one (limit, as I iii.derstanel the subject ; difficulty and doubt nrciueommcnbuinto. There of course may be difficulties in'the evidence ; but lam {-peaking of difficulties intrinsic to the doctrines themselves, or ns to their lelatiouswith each other. A man may be annoyed tlmt he cannot voik out a mathematical problem, of which the. answer is or is not given to him, without doubting that it admits of an answer, or that a certain particular answer is the true one." Then he continues. •• Of all the points of of faith, the being, of a God is, to my own apprehension, encompassed with most difficulty, and yet is borne in upon our minds with most power." (" Apologia," chap, v., p. 238.) Now after exhausting all his difficulties and marshalling them against the proofs we possess, or icasons we have, for believing in the existence of God, Hume still publishes to the world, in his " Natural Hibtoiy of Religion" (1757), the following conclusions, -which become cxces&ivcly valuable when the character of the wnter's mind and his strong bias in the opposite direction arc taken into account. He says ; " The whole frame of nature bespeaks an Intelligent Author ; and no rational inquirer can, after serious refection, xn*j/end 7ti.i belief for a moment with regard to the primary principle of genuine Theism and religion." . . . "Were men led into the apprehensiou of invisible intelligent power, by a contemplation of the works of nature they could never possibly entertain any conception but of one single Being, who bestowed existence and order in this vast machine, and adjusted all its parts according to one regular plan or connected system, For though, to persons of a certain turn of mind, it may not appear altogether absurd, that several independent beings, endowed with superior wisdom, might conspire in the contrivance and execution of one regular plan, yet is this a merely arbitrary supposition, which, even if alloweel possible, must be confesseel neither to be supported by probability nor necessity. All things in the universe are evidently of a piece. Everything is adjusted to everything. One design prevails throughout the whole. And this uniformity leads the mind to acknowledge one Aut'ior ; bjra jsc the conception of different authors, without any distinction of attributes or operations, serves only to give perplexity to the imagination, without bestowing any satisfaction on the understanding." (" Natural History of Religion," iv., 43.*), 442.) J ° ' Philo is made, in Hume's " Dialogues," to finish thus :— " If the whole of Natural Theology, as some people seem to maintain, resolves itself into one simple, though somewhat ambiguous, at least undefined proposition— That the cause or causes of order in the universe probably bear some remote analogy to human intelligence ; if this proposition be not capable of extension, variation, or more particular explication ; if it affords no inference that affects human life, or can be tbc bourcc of any action or forbearance ; and if the analogy, imperfect as it is, can be carried no further than to tlic human intelligence, and cannot be transferred, with any appearance of probability to the other qualities of the mind ; if this really be the case, what can the most inquisitive, contemplative, anel religious man do more than give a plain, philosophical assent to the proposition, a,s often ns it occurs, and believe thai the arguments on which it is established exceed the objections which lie against it 1 Some astonishment inelccd will naturally arise from the greatuess of the object; some nielancho'y from its obscurity ; some c jmtempt of human rensjn, that it can give no solution more satisfactory with le^ard to so extraordinary and magnificent a question. But, believe mo, Ckanthes, the mo-st natural sentiment which a well-disposed mind will feel on this occasion, is a longing dcsiie and expectation that Heaven would please to dissipate, at least alleviate, this profound ignoraucc, by affording sonic more particular revelation to mankind, and making discoveries of the nature, attributes and operations of the Divine Object of our faith."' (•' Dialogues," ii. p. .54 7-8.) Finally, Pbilo, whilst, ir. thu <% Dialogues " pushing Scepticism to its utinobt limits, is compelled to say, in spite of the mass of objections urged tbo other way, that '• where reasonable men "" — to whom alone I am addressing myself — " treat these subjects, the question can never be concerning the living but only the Nature of the Deity. The former truth, as you will observe, is unquestionable and self-echient. Nothing exists without, a cause, and the original Cause of this universe . . . we call God, and piously ascribe to him every species of perfection." — (Ibid ii. p. 43!).) It was the light of the self-evident truth in the conscience of Kirkman that made him exclaim with as eleep a philosophy as feeling : Through the Infinite I cannot think ; but upwards, still upwards, towards it my toul can soar, scorning the finite. That Infinite scientifically I cannot know ; but the lufinite is my cause. Believing and adoring, I affirm Him with a boldness and a conviction surpas&ing all that I can feel or utter oa my themes of finite science. My Cause lives — tlie infinite Life. My Cause thinks, knows, and works— the infinite Intuition, Counsel, and Energy works in the full harmony of victorious science in every point and line of force, iv every throb of consciousness — never absent uor forgetting, never pausing nor weary. Ami my Cause loves— the infinite love." (" Philosophy without Assumptions," p. 2G2.) Again, " Nowif the child, when he becomes a man, should ask himself, ' What are those wondrous workings ?' may be not bo pardoned if, despising the dogmas of mock science, and reasoning only from what he knows, he compares these energies v>ith the only force of which he is master — his own will-force ? . , . What can balance will but will ? What can be measured by will but will ? What can combine and harmonise with will but will ? What can have equivalence and real relation in thought and act to will but will? When a man has dared to doubt, and, doubting, to think boldly up to this point, you might as well beseech this stone, falling freely, not to rush towards the earth's centre, as try to prevent that soul from bursting out, like the smitten unbeliever in Bethel. ' Surely God is in this place, and I knew it not.' I glory in believing that all those forces are manifestations of the conscious present working 1 will of the God in whom I live and move and have my being — F — O — R — C — E spells will." (Philosophy without Assumptions," p. 263.) ( Conclusion, next ?m?t.)