Orthodoxy: Its Truths And Errors

by James Freeman Clarke

And as regards his trilemma concerning Deity, that also fails in the failure of his thesis that eternal duration is inconceivable. His argument against the self-existent Deity, only rests on that assumption which we have shown to be untenable.

But Mr. Spencer, who is not a theologian, is at this point reënforced by Mr. Mansel, on whose former work, “The Limits of Religious Thought,” we proceed to offer some criticism. This also is an argument for nescience in theology, in the presumed interests of revelation. Mr. Martineau has ably shown the weakness and the dangerous tendency of this whole argument of Mansel, in an article to which we earnestly refer our readers.

The work of Mr. Mansel is a desperate attempt to save Orthodox doctrines from the objections of reason, not by replying to those objections and pointing out their fallacy, but by showing that similar objections can be brought against all religious belief. For example, when reason objects to the Trinity, that it is a contradiction, Mr. Mansel does not attempt to show that it is not a contradiction, but argues that our belief in God is another contradiction of the same kind. His inference therefore is, that as we believe in God, notwithstanding the contradiction, we ought to believe in the Trinity also, notwithstanding the contradiction. If we believe one, we may believe both.

But this is a dangerous argument; since it is evident that one might reply, that there remains another alternative; which is, to believe neither. If Mr. Mansel succeeds in convincing his readers, the result may be a belief in the Trinity, or it may be a disbelief in God altogether; one of two things—either a return to Orthodoxy, or a departure from all religion. Either they will renounce [pg 445] reason in order to retain religion, or they will renounce religion in order to retain reason.

At the very best, also, the help which this argument offers us is to be paid for somewhat dearly. It proposes to save Orthodoxy by giving up the use of reason in religion. Mr. Mansel would say, “by giving up the unlimited use of reason;” but, as we shall presently see, this comes very much to the same thing at last.

What, then, is the nature of Mr. Mansel's argument? It is an argument founded upon Sir William Hamilton's philosophy of the Unconditioned. Now, this has been generally considered the weak side of Hamilton's system. According to him, the unconditioned is inconceivable: in other words, of the Absolute and Infinite we have no conception at all. But this denies to man the power of conceiving of God, and so leads directly to Atheism. This charge has already been brought against Hamilton's philosophy, in various quarters; for example, in the “North British Review ” for May, 1835. But we will not here attempt any examination of Hamilton's theory, but confine ourselves to Mr. Mansel.

The argument of Mansel is this (p. 75): “To conceive the Deity as he is, we must conceive him as First Cause, as Absolute, and as Infinite. By the First Cause is meant that which produces all things, and is itself produced of none; by the Absolute is meant that which exists in and by itself, having no necessary relation to any other being; by the Infinite is meant that which is free from all possible limitation.”

Having thus defined the Deity as the First Cause, the Absolute, and the Infinite, Mansel goes on to show that these ideas are mutually contradictory and destructive. A First Cause necessarily supposes effects, and therefore cannot be absolute: nor can the Infinite be a person; for personality is a limitation. By a course of such arguments as these, Mansel endeavors to show that the reason is as incapable of conceiving God as it is of conceiving the Trinity, the Atonement, or any other Orthodox doctrine; and since we do not renounce our belief in God because of these contradictions, neither ought we, because of similar contradictions, to renounce our belief in the Trinity.

Such is the substance of Mansel's statement, though the arguments by which it is proved are varied with great ingenuity and to great extent. This course of thought is by no means original, either with Mr. Mansel or Sir William Hamilton. A far greater thinker than either of them (Immanuel Kant) had long before [pg 446] shown the logical contradictions of the understanding in what he called the Antinomies of the pure reason. But the important question is, If the reason contradicts itself thus in its conception of Deity, how are we to obtain a ground for our belief in God? Mansel answers, “Through revelation; that is, through the direct declarations of Scripture.” This he calls faith. We are to believe in a personal God on the ground of a Bible confirmed by miracles.

This result is so strange, that it may well seem incredible. Yet we cannot think that we have misrepresented the tendency of the argument; though, of course, we have given no ideas of the acuteness and flexibility of the reasoning, the extent of the knowledge, and mastery of logic, in this work. That such a position should be taken by a religious man, in the supposed interest of Christianity, is sufficiently strange; for it seems to us equally untenable in its grounds, unfounded in its statements, empty of insight, destructive in its results. We will add, very briefly, a few of the criticisms which occur to us.