For the further consideration of this subject, the reader is referred back to our remarks on that passage in Mr. Mansel's work, which Mr. Spencer has quoted.
A few remarks upon his summing up, p. 43 et seq., will complete the review of this chapter. "Passing over the consideration of credibility, and confining ourselves to that of" consistency, we would find in any rigorous analysis, that Atheism and Pantheism are self-contradictory; but we have found that Theism, "when rigorously analyzed," presents an absolutely consistent system, in which all the difficulties of the Understanding are explained to the person by the Reason, and is entirely thinkable. Such a system, based upon the necessary convictions of man, and justly commanding that these shall be the fixed standard, in accordance with which all doubts and queries shall be dissolved and decided, gives a rational satisfaction to man, and discloses to him his eternal Rest.
In proceeding to his final fact, which he derives as the permanent in all religions, Mr. Spencer overlooks another equally permanent, equally common, and incomparably more important fact, viz: that Fetishism, Polytheism, Pantheism, and Monotheism,—all religions alike assert that a god created the Universe. In other words, the great common element, in all the popular modes of accounting for the vast system of things in which we live is, that it is the product of an agency external to itself, and that the external agency is personal. Take the case of the rude aboriginal, who "assumes a separate personality behind every phenomenon." He does not attempt to account for all objects. His mind is too infantile, and he is too degraded to suspect that those material objects which appear permanent need to be accounted for. It is only the changes which seem to him to need a reason. Behind each change he imagines a sort of personal power, superior to it and man, which produces it, and this satisfies him. He inquires no further; yet he looks in the same direction as the Monotheist. In this crude form of belief, which is named Fetishism, we see that essential idea which can be readily traced through all forms of religion, that some personal being, external, and superior to the things that be, produced them. Nor is Atheism a proper exception to this law. For Atheism is not a religion, but the denial of all religion. It is not a doctrine of God, but is a denial that there is any God; and what is most in point, it never was a popular belief, but is only a philosophical Sahara over which a few caravans of speculative doubters and negatists wander. Neither can Hindu pantheism be quoted against the position taken: for Brahm is not the Universe; neither are Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva. Brahm does not lose his individuality because the Universe is evolved from him. Now he is thought of as one, and the Universe as another, although the Universe is thought to be a part of his essence, and hereafter to be reabsorbed by him. Now, this part of his essence which was produced through Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva, is individualized; and so is one, while he is another. Thus, here also, the idea of a proper external agency is preserved. The facts, then, are decisively in favor of the proposition above laid down. "Our investigation" discloses "a fundamental verity in each religion." And the facts and the verity find no consistent ground except in a pure Theism, and there they do find perfect consistency and harmony.
It is required, finally, in closing the discussion of this chapter, to account for the fact that, upon a single idea so many theories of God have fastened themselves; or better, perhaps, that a single idea has developed itself in so many forms. This cannot better be done than in the language of that metaphysician, not second to Plato, the apostle Paul. In his Epistle to the Romans, beginning at the 19th verse of the 1st chapter, he says: "Because that which may be known of God is manifest to them; for God hath shewed it unto them. For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things which are made, even his eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse. Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened: professing themselves to be wise they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things." This passage, which would be worthy the admiring study of ages, did it possess no claim to be the teaching of that Being whom Mr. Spencer asserts it is impossible for us to know, gives us in a popular form the truth. Man, having organic in his mind the idea of God, and having in the Universe an ample manifestation to the Sense, of the eternal power and Godhead of the Creator of that Universe, corresponding to that idea, perverted the manifestation to the Sense, and degraded the idea in the Reason, to the service of base passion. By this degradation and perversion the organic idea became so bedizened with the finery of fancy formed in the Understanding, under the direction of the animal nature, as to be lost to the popular mind,—the trappings only being seen. When once the truth was thus lost sight of, and with it all that restraint which a knowledge of the true God would impose, men became vain in their imaginations; their fancy ran riot in all directions. Cutting loose from all law, they plunged into every excess which could be invented; and out of such a stimulated and teeming brain all manner of vagaries were devised. This was the first stage; and of it we find some historic hints in the biblical account of the times, during and previous to the life of Abraham. Where secular history begins the human race had passed into the second stage. Crystallization had begun. Students were commencing the search for truth. Religion was taking upon itself more distinct forms. The organic idea, which could not be wholly obliterated, formed itself distinctly in the consciousness of some gifted individuals, and philosophy began. Philosophy in its purest form, as taught by Socrates and Plato, presented again the lost idea of pure Theism. But the spirituality which enabled them to see the truth, lifted them so far above the common people, that they could affect only a few. And what was most disheartening, that same degradation which originally lost to man the truth, now prevented him from receiving it. Thus it was that by a binding of the Reason to the wheels of Passion, and discursing through the world with the Understanding at the beck of the Sense, the many forms of religion became.
"ULTIMATE SCIENTIFIC IDEAS."
On a former page we have already attempted a positive answer to the question, "What are Space and Time," with which Mr. Spencer opens this chapter. It was there found that, in general terms, they are a priori conditions of created being; and, moreover, that they possess characteristics suitable to what they condition, just as the a priori conditions of the spiritual person possess characteristics suitable to what they condition. It was further found that this general law is, from the necessity of the case, realized both within the mind and without it; that it is, must be, the form of thought for the perceiving subject, corresponding to the condition of existence for the perceived object. It also appeared that the Universe as object, and the Sense and Understanding as faculties in the subject, thus corresponded; and further, that these faculties could never transcend and comprehend Space and Time, because these were the very conditions of their being; moreover, that by them all spaces and times must be considered with reference to the Universe, and apart from it could not be examined by them at all. Yet it was further found that the Universe might in the presence of the Reason be abstracted; and that, then, pure Space and Time still remained as pure a priori conditions, the one as room, the other as opportunity, for the coming of created being. Space and Time being such conditions, and nothing more, are entities only in the same sense that the multiplication table and the moral law are entities. They are conditions suited to what they condition. In the light of this result let us examine Mr. Spencer's teachings respecting them.
Strictly speaking, Space and Time do not "exist." If they exist (ex sto), they must stand out somewhere and when. This of course involves the being of a where and a when in which they can stand out; and that where and when must needs be accounted for, and so on ad infinitum. Again, Mr. Spencer would seem to speak, in his usual style, as if they, in existing "objectively," had a formal objective existence. Yet this, in the very statement of it, appears absurd. The mind apprehends many objects, which do not "exist." They only are. Thus, as has just been said, Space and Time, as conditions of created being, are. They are entities but not existences. They are a priori entities, and so are necessarily. By this they stand in the same category with all pure laws, all first principles.
"Moreover, to deny that Space and Time are things, and so by implication to call them nothings, involves the absurdity that there are two kinds of nothings." This sentence "involves the absurdity" of assuming that "nothing" is an entity. If I say that Space is nothing, I say that it presents no content for a concept, and cannot, because there is no content to be presented. It is then blank. Just so of Time. As nothings they are, then, both equally blank, and destitute of meaning. Now if Mr. Spencer wishes to hold that nothing represented by one word, differs from nothing represented by another, we would not lay a straw in his way, but yet would be much surprised if he led a large company.
Again, having decided that they are neither "nonentities nor the attributes of entities, we have no choice but to consider them as entities." But he then goes on to speak of them as "things," evidently using the word in the same sense as if applying it to a material object, as an apple or stone; thereby implying that entity and thing in that sense are synonymous terms. Upon this leap in the dark, this blunder in the use of language, he proceeds to build up a mountain of difficulties. But once take away this foundation, once cease attempting "to represent them in thought as things," and his difficulties vanish. Space is a condition. Perhaps receptivity, indivisibility, and illimitability are attributes. If so, it has attributes, for these certainly belong to it. But whether these shall be called attributes or not, it is certain that Space is, is a pure condition, is thus a positive object to the Reason, is qualified by the characteristics named above; and all this without any contradiction or other insuperable difficulty arising thereby. On the ground now established, we learn that extension and Space are not "convertible terms." Extension is an attribute of matter. Space is a condition of phenomena. It is only all physical "entities which we actually know as such" that "are limited." From our standpoint, that Space is no thing, such remarks as "We find ourselves totally unable to form any mental image of unbounded Space," appear painfully absurd. "We find ourselves" just as "totally unable to form any mental image of unbounded" love. Such phrases as "mental image" have no relevancy to either Space or Time. In criticizing Kant's doctrine, which we have found true as far as it goes, Mr. Spencer evinces a surprising lack of knowledge of the facts in question. "In the first place," he says, "to assert that Space and Time, as we are conscious of them, are subjective conditions, is by implication to assert that they are not objective realities." But the conclusion does not follow. If the reader will take the trouble to construct the syllogism on which this is based, he will at once perceive the absurdity of the logic. It may be said in general that all conditions of a thinking being are both subjective and objective: they are conditions of his being—subjective; and they are objects of his examination and cognizance—objective. Is not the multiplication table an objective reality, i. e., would it not remain if he be destroyed? And yet is it not also a subjective law; and so was it not originally discovered by introspection and reflection? Again he says, "for that consciousness of Space and Time which we cannot rid ourselves of, is the consciousness of them as existing objectively." Now the fact is, that primarily we do not have any consciousness of Space and Time. Consciousness has to do with phenomena. When examining the material Universe, the objects, and the objects as at a distance from each other and as during, are what we are conscious of. For instance, I view the planets Jupiter and Saturn. They appear as objects in my consciousness. There is a distance between them; but this distance is not, except as they are. If they are not, the word distance has no meaning with reference to them. Take them away, and I have no consciousness of distance as remaining. These planets continue in existence. They endure. This endurance we call time, but if they should cease, one could not think of endurance in connection with them as remaining. Here we most freely and willingly agree with Mr. Spencer that "the question is, What does consciousness directly testify?" but he will find that consciousness on this side of the water testifies very differently from his consciousness: as for instance in the two articles in the "North American Review," heretofore alluded to. Here, "the direct testimony of consciousness is," that spaces and times within the Universe are without the mind; that Space and Time, as a priori conditions for the possibility of formal object and during event, are also without the mind; but the "testimony" is none the less clear and "direct" that Space and Time are laws of thought in the mind corresponding to the actualities without the mind. And the question may be asked, it is believed with great force, If this last were not so, how could the mind take any cognizance of the actuality? Again, most truly, Space and Time "cannot be conceived to become non-existent even were the mind to become non-existent." Much more strongly than this should the truth be uttered. They could not become non-existent if the Universe with every sentient being, yea, even—to make an impossible supposition—if the Deity himself, should cease to be. In this they differ no whit from the laws of Mathematics, of Logic, and of Morals. These too would remain as well. Thus is again enforced the truth, which has been stated heretofore, that Space and Time, as a priori conditions of the Universe, stand in precisely the same relation to material object and during event that the multiplication table does to intellect, or the moral law to a spiritual person. It will now be doubtless plain that Mr. Spencer's remarks sprang directly from the lower faculties. The Sense in its very organization possesses Space and Time as void forms into which objects may come. So also the Understanding possesses the notional as connecting into a totality. These faculties cannot be in a living man without acting. Activity is their law. Hence images are ever arising and must arise in the Sense, and be connected in the Understanding, and all this in the forms and conditions of Space and Time. He who thinks continually in these conditions will always imagine that Space and Time are only without him—because he will be thinking only in the iron prison-house of the imagining faculty—and so cannot transcend the conditions it imposes. Now how shall one see these conditions? They do "exist objectively"; or, to phrase it better, they have a true being independent of our minds. In this sense, as we have seen, every a priori condition must be objective to the mind. What is objective to the Sense is not Space but a space, i. e. a part of Space limited by matter; and, after all, it is the boundaries which are the true object rather than the space, which cannot be "conceived" of if the boundaries be removed. Without further argument, is it not evident that there Space, like all other a priori conditions, is object only to the Reason, and that as a condition of material existence?