The Eclectic character of the patristic thought is seen also in the frequency with which they use the different forms of the theistic argument in conjunction, or present it in mixed forms. The Greek philosophers, as we have seen, each selected some one of the forms of the argument, and by means of it, attempted to establish the sort of an Ἀρχή, to which such a course of reasoning would lead, ignoring, or attacking the forms in use by their rival school. Thus early, however, as in modern times, Christian theology, in contrast with the attempts of rational theology, began to emphasize the interdependence of these different forms of the theistic argument, and the cumulative character of their evidence. Each one of itself could bring no conviction, nor even high degree of probability, and furthermore, even if all its claims be admitted, would lead to a result far short of theism—a mere indefinite first cause, an Architect of the universe, etc. Each one, however, adds its quota to a great cumulative argument, which, taken in its entirety, raises an exceedingly high presumption, which amounts to "moral" though possibly not intellectual proof. And, after all, "probability is the guide of life."
And this is all that the Fathers, or Christian apologists, generally, would claim for the theistic argument. It is a practical, not a theoretical proof, and it is in this way that the early Christian writers seem to regard it. They resort to it most frequently to show that the Christian doctrine of God is not contrary to reason nor inconsistent with the nature of things, and to demonstrate that such a conception is demanded by man's very nature. In a word, their use of the argument is confirmatory and explanatory rather than by way of absolute proof and demonstration.
This attitude towards and use of the theistic argument, so radically different from that of the Greek philosophers, perpetuated itself in the post-Nicene literature of the Christian Church, and, in its main features, remained unaltered, until the time when men who had abandoned the faith in the Word which had been the main stay of the ante-Nicene writers, and who yet were unwilling to abandon the great theistic idea for which the world was indebted to Christianity alone, sought to justify this idea on the basis of reason. It took the scepticism of a Hume and the criticism of a Kant, and the re-adjustment of all their followers to bring us back at the close of this nineteenth century into substantial agreement with the common-sense estimate placed upon the theistic argument by the ante-Nicene Fathers.
FOOTNOTES:
[92] History of Philosophy, Vol. I, § 4.
[93] Burnet: Early Greek Philosophy, p. 25.
[94] Stromata, II, iv.