Christianity and Greek Philosophy / or, the relation between spontaneous and reflective thought in Greece and the positive teaching of Christ and His Apostles

by B. F. Cocker

[Footnote 230: ][ (return) ] Ibid., vol. i. p. 253.

[Footnote 231: ][ (return) ] Ibid., vol. i. p. 246.

[Footnote 232: ][ (return) ] Ibid., vol. i. pp. 243, 244.

[Footnote 233: ][ (return) ] "Logic," bk. i. ch. iii. § 3.

And now that matter, as a real existence, has disappeared under Mr. Mill's analysis, what shall be said of mind or self? Is there any permanent subject or real entity underlying the phenomena of feeling? In feeling, is there a personal self that feels, thinks, and wills? It would seem not. Mind, as well as matter, resolves itself into a "series of feelings," varying and fugitive from moment to moment, in a sea of possibilities of feeling. "My mind," says Mill, "is but a series of feelings, or, as it has been called, a thread of consciousness, however supplemented by believed possibilities of consciousness, which are not, though they might be, realized." [²³⁴]

[Footnote 234: ][ (return) ] "Examination of Sir Wm. Hamilton's Philosophy," vol. i. p. 254.

The ultimate fact of the phenomenal world, then, in the philosophy of Mill, is neither matter nor mind, but feelings or states of consciousness associated together by the relations, amongst themselves, of recurrence, co-existence, and resemblance. The existence of self, except as "a series of feelings;" the existence of any thing other than self, except as a feigned unknown cause of sensation, is rigorously denied. Mr. Mill does not content himself with saying that we are ignorant of the nature of matter and mind, but he asserts we are ignorant of the existence of matter and mind as real entities.

The bearing of this doctrine of Idealism upon Theism and Theology will be instantly apparent to the reader. If I am necessarily ignorant of the existence of the external world, and of the personal ego, or real self, I must be equally ignorant of the existence of God. If one is a mere supposition, an illusion, so the other must be. Mr. Mill, however, is one of those courteous and affable writers who are always conscious, as it were, of the presence of their readers, and extremely careful not to shock their feelings or prejudices; besides, he has too much conscious self-respect to avow himself an atheist. As a speculative philosopher, he would rather regard Theism and Theology as "open questions," and he satisfies himself with saying, if you believe in the existence of God, or in Christianity, I do not interfere with you. "As a theory," he tells us that his doctrine leaves the evidence of the existence of God exactly as it was before. Supposing me to believe that the Divine mind is simply the series of the Divine thoughts and feelings prolonged through eternity, that would be, at any rate, believing God's existence to be as real as my own [²³⁵]. And as for evidence, the argument of Paley's 'Natural Theology,' or, for that matter, of his 'Evidences of Christianity,' would stand exactly as it does.

The design argument is drawn from the analogies of human experience. From the relation which human works bear to human thoughts and feelings, it infers a corresponding relation between works more or less similar, but superhuman, and superhuman thoughts and feelings. If it prove these, nobody but a metaphysician needs care whether or not it proves a mysterious substratum for them. [²³⁶] The argument from design, it seems to us, however, would have no validity if there be no external world offering marks of design. If the external world is only a mode of feeling, a series of mental states, then our notion of the Divine Existence may be only "an association of feelings"--a mode of Self. And if we have no positive knowledge of a real self as existing, and God's existence is no more "real than our own," then the Divine existence stands on a very dubious and uncertain foundation. It can have no very secure hold upon the human mind, and certainly has no claim to be regarded as a fundamental and necessary belief. That it has a very precarious hold upon the mind of Mr. Mill, is evident from the following passage in his article on "Later Speculations of A. Comte." [²³⁷] "We venture to think that a religion may exist without a belief in a God, and that a religion without a God may be, even to Christians, an instructive and profitable object of contemplation."