We have a positive concept of a thing when we think of it by the qualities of which it is the complement. But as the attribution of qualities is an affirmation, as affirmation and negation are relatives, and as relatives are known only in and through each other, we can not, therefore, have a consciousness of the affirmation of any quality without having, at the same time, the correlative consciousness of its negation. Now the one consciousness is a positive, the other consciousness is a negative notion; and as all language is the reflex of thought, the positive and negative notions are expressed by positive and negative names. Thus it is with the Infinite. [338] Now let us carefully scrutinize the above deliverance. We are told that "relatives are known only in and through each other;" that is, such relatives as finite and infinite are known necessarily in the same act of thought. The knowledge of one is as necessary as the knowledge of the other. We can not have a consciousness of the one without the correlative consciousness of the other. "For," says Hamilton, "a relation is, in truth, a thought, one and indivisible; and while the thinking a relation necessarily involves the thought of its two terms,, so it is, with equal necessity, itself involved in the thought of either." If, then, we are conscious of the two terms of the relation in the same "one and indivisible" mental act--if we can not have "the consciousness of the one without the consciousness of the other"--if space and position, time and succession, substance and quality, infinite and finite, are given to us in pairs, then 'the knowledge of one is as necessary as the knowledge of the other,' and they must stand or fall together. The finite is known no more positively than the infinite; the infinite is known as positively as the finite. The one can not be taken and the other left. The infinite, discharged from all relation to the finite, could never come into apprehension; and the finite, discharged of all relation to the infinite, is incognizable too. "There can be no objection to call the one 'positive' and the other 'negative,' provided it be understood that each is so with regard to the other, and that the relation is convertible; the finite, for instance, being the negative of the infinite, not less than the infinite of the finite." [339]
[Footnote 338: ][ (return) ] Logic, p. 73.
[Footnote 339: ][ (return) ] Martineau's "Essays," p. 237.
To say that the finite is comprehensible in and by itself, and the infinite is incomprehensible in and by itself, is to make an assertion utterly at variance both with psychology and logic. The finite is no more comprehensible in itself than the infinite. "Relatives are known only in and through each other." [340]] "The conception of one term of a relation necessarily implies that of the other, it being the very nature of a relative to be thinkable only through the conjunct thought of its correlative." We comprehend nothing more completely than the infinite; "for the idea of illimitation is as clear, precise, and intelligible as the idea of limitability, which is its basis. The propositions "A is X" "A is not X," are equally comprehensible; the conceptions A and X are in both cases positive data of experience, while the affirmation and negation consist solely in the copulative or disjunctive nature of the predication. Consequently, if X is comprehensible, so is not--X; if the finite is comprehensible, so is the infinite." [341]
Whilst denying that the infinite can by us be known, Hamilton tells us he is "far from denying that it is, must, and ought to be believed." [342] "We must believe in the infinity of God." "Faith--belief--is the organ by which we apprehend what is beyond knowledge." [343] We heartily assent to the doctrine that the Infinite Being is the object of faith, but we earnestly deny that the Infinite Being is not an object of knowledge. May not knowledge be grounded upon faith, and does not faith imply knowledge? Can we not obtain knowledge through faith? Is not the belief in the Infinite Being implied in our knowledge of finite existence? If so, then God as the infinite and perfect, God as the unconditioned Cause, is not absolutely "the unknown."
[Footnote 340: ][ (return) ] Hamilton's "Logic," p. 73.
[Footnote 341: ][ (return) ] North American Review, October, 1864, article "Conditioned and the Unconditioned," pp. 441, 442.
[Footnote 342: ][ (return) ] Letter to Calderwood, Appendix, vol. ii. p. 530.
[Footnote 343: ][ (return) ] "Lectures on Metaphysics," vol. ii. p. 374.