British Quarterly Review, American Edition, Vol. LIV / July and October, 1871

by Various

But it is objected that as human knowledge is always finite, we can never have a positive apprehension of an infinite object; that as the subject of knowledge is necessarily finite, its object must be the same. Let us sift this objection.

I may know an object in itself as related to me the knower, or I may know it in its relation to other objects also known by me the knower. But in both and in all cases, knowledge is limited by the power of the knower, therefore it is always finite knowledge. But it may be finite knowledge of an infinite object, incomplete knowledge of a complete object, partial knowledge of a transcendent object. The boundary or fence may be within the faculty of the knower, while the object he imperfectly grasps may not only be infinite, but be known to transcend his faculties in the very act of conscious knowledge. For example, I may know that a line is infinite while I have only a finite knowledge of the points along which that line extends. And similarly my knowledge of the Infinite Mind is partial and incomplete, but it is clear and defined. It is definite knowledge of an indefinite object. We may have a partial knowledge not only of a part, but of the whole. Thus, I have a partial knowledge of a circle, because I know only a few of its properties; but it is not to a part of the circle that my partial knowledge extends, but to the whole which I know in part. In like manner as the Infinite Object has no parts, it is not of a portion of His being that we possess a partial knowledge, but of the whole. We know Him as we know the circle, inadequately yet directly, immediately, though in part. He is dark to us by excess of light. Thus, although our knowledge of the infinite may be vivified, it is not really enlarged by goading our thought to wider and wider imaginings, or spurring our faculties onwards over areas of space, or intervals of time. That knowledge is directly revealed while we are apprehending any finite object, as its correlative and complementary antithesis.

Again it is said that to know the infinite is to know the sum of all reality, and as that would include the universe and its source together, it must necessarily include on the one hand the knower along with his knowledge, and on the other all the possibilities of existence. The possibility of our knowing the Infinite Being as distinct from the universe is denied, since infinite existence is said to be coextensive with the whole universe of things. But that the source of the universe must necessarily exhaust existence and contain within himself all actual being is a mere theoretic assumption. The presence of the finite does not limit the infinite as if the area of the latter were contracted by so much of the former as exists within it. For the relation of the infinite being to the finite is not similar to the relation between infinite space and a segment of it. It is true that so much of finite space is so much cut out of the whole area of infinite space—though, if the remainder is infinite, the portion removed will not really limit it. But as our intuition of the infinite has no resemblance to our knowledge of space, we believe that the relations which their respective objects sustain have no affinity with each other. The intuition of God is a purely spiritual revelation, informing us not of the quantity but of the quality of the supreme being in the universe. And to affirm that the finite spirit of man standing in a fixed relation to the infinite spirit of God limits it, by virtue of that relation, is covertly to introduce a spatial concept into a region to which it is utterly foreign, and which it has no right to enter.[16]

We therefore maintain, in opposition to the teachers of nescience, that a positive knowledge of the Infinite is competent to man, because involved in his very consciousness of the finite. And when psychologically analysed, this intuition explains and vindicates itself.

But there is another aspect, no less important, in which it may be regarded. To say that the infinite is wholly inscrutable by man, is to limit not man's faculty only, but the possibilities of the divine nature itself. If God cannot unveil himself to man through the openings of those clouds which ordinarily conceal His presence, can His resources be illimitable, can He be the infinitely perfect? It is said, on the one hand, that the unknown Force reveals itself in the laws of nature, but cannot disclose its essence; and, on the other, that the infinite being reveals His handiwork, from which He permits us to infer His existence, but cannot reveal Himself. Such assertions are either subtle instances of verbal jugglery or manifest contradictions in terms. All revelation of whatever kind, presupposes some knowledge of the revealer. That knowledge may be imparted the moment the revelation is made, or prior to it, and from an independent source; but no revelation could be made, were the being to whom it was addressed ignorant of the source whence it came. Is there really any special difficulty in supposing that the infinite intelligence can directly disclose His nature to a creature fashioned in His image, the disclosure quickening the latent power of intuition, which, thus touched from above, springs forth to meet its source and object?

The question between the theist and the positivist is brought to its real issue when the latter is forced to recognise that the God of theism is no inference from phenomena, but if we may so speak, a postulate of intuition. And hence it is so necessary to concede frankly the failure of the teleological argument from final causes, as well as the ontological argument from the necessary notions of the intellect. We not only admit, we are forward to proclaim that by inductive science we can never rise higher than phenomena; and hence at the end of our researches we should be no nearer God than at the outset. But though we cannot reach Him by induction, we may do so before we begin our induction, by simply giving the intuition of the soul free scope to rise towards its source. And to dislodge the theist from his position, his opponent must succeed in proving that this intuition, whose root springs from a region beneath phenomena, and which in its flight outsoars phenomena, is as baseless and unauthenticated as a dream.

There are two principles, one of them metaphysical, and the other scientific, which are helpful at this point in our inquiry. These are the principle of causality, and the doctrine of the correlation of forces, or the conservation of energy. We cannot discuss them at any length, but we shall briefly state their nature, and their relation to the theistic intuition.

The phenomena of nature (using that term in its widest sense) are not only a series of sequences, they are also the revelation of a mysterious Power or living Force. All that we perceive by the senses, and, inductively register in nature, is a series of phenomena, of which the laws of nature are the generalized expression and interpretation. But every change is a revelation not only of succession, but of causal power. No matter where we take our stand along the line of sequence, mental or material, always and at every point this conviction is flashed in upon the mind, 'there is a hidden Power behind.' But we instinctively ask, 'what is this power or force determining the changes of the universe?' Is it material or spiritual? Can the force which moves the particles of matter be material? We do not perceive it by the senses, which take note only of the modified phenomena of matter. It is neither visible, nor audible, nor tangible. It is invisible; must we not therefore believe it to be incorporeal? We cannot reach it by analysis. We conclude that it is not physical but hyper-physical, not natural but supranatural. We have an intellectual intuition of it. It announces its presence in every change that occurs, but it nowhere shows its face as a material entity. It is a mystic agency endlessly revealing its existence, everywhere concealing its source. We watch its evolutions, but it escapes our scrutiny; we try to detain it, and we find that it is gone; yet it reappears in the next thing we examine, and in the very phenomena of our search for it; the agency is manifest, but it is the Agent we wish to discover. Must it be, like the sangreal of mediæval legend, sought for in many lands, but nowhere found by any wanderer in quest of it?

Before attempting an answer, we shall state the scientific principle referred to, which is entitled to rank as one of the greatest of modern discoveries. All the forms of force are convertible amongst themselves. They are all ultimately identical, and are endlessly passing and repassing into each other: the mechanical, the chemical, the vital, are all one. 'The many' are 'the one,' its varying phrases, its protean raiment. In short, there is but a single supreme force, ubiquitous and plastic, the fountain of all change. It now evolves itself in heat, now masks itself in light, reveals itself in electricity, or sleeps in the law of gravitation: one solitary pulse within Nature's vast machine, and behind the barrier of her laws. This force, thus endlessly changing, is neither diminished nor replenished; it is not added to, nor subtracted from; it is perennial, and is its own conservator. It is not synthesis, but analysis that has resolved it into unity. But can synthesis combine its manifold phases under one regulative notion? In realizing its general character we cannot discharge from our minds in turn all the known features of particular forces, so as to leave a vague resultant common to all, yet especially identified with none. The diverse types must have an archetype. What is that archetype?