Theism; being the Baird Lecture of 1876. Flint Robert
Father, Judge, and King. The books in which we have the record of this process—the books of the Old and New Testaments—therefore assume, and could not but assume, that God is, and that He is all-powerful, perfectly wise, and perfectly holy. They do not prove it, but refer us to the world and our own hearts for the means and materials of proof. They may draw away from nature, and from before the eyes of men, a veil which covers and conceals the proof; they may be a record of facts which powerfully confirm and largely supplement what proof there is in the universe without and the mind within: but they must necessarily imply, and do everywhere imply, that a real proof exists there. If what they in this respect imply be untrue, all that they profess to tell us of God, and as from God, must be rejected by us, if we are to judge and act as reasonable beings.[1]
For all men, then, who have religious beliefs, and especially for all men who have Christian beliefs, these questions, What evidence is there for God's existence? and, What is known of His nature? are of primary importance. The answers given to them must determine whether religion and Christianity ought to be received or rejected. There can be no use in discussing other religious questions so long as these fundamental questions have not been thoughtfully studied and distinctly answered. It is only through their investigation that we can establish a right to entertain any religious belief, to cherish any religious feeling, to perform any religious act. And the result to which the investigation leads us must largely decide what sort of a religious theory we shall hold, and what sort of a religious life we shall lead. Almost all religious differences of really serious import may be traced back to differences in men's thoughts about God. The idea of God is the generative and regulative idea in every great religious system and every great religious movement. It is a true feeling which has led to the inclusion of all religious doctrines whatever in a science which bears the name of theology (discourse about God, λογοσ περι του θεου), for what is believed about God determines what will be believed about everything else which is included either under natural or revealed religion.
In the second place, the moral issues depending on the inquiry before us are momentous. An erroneous result must, from the very nature of the case, be of the most serious character. If there be no God, the creeds and rites and precepts which have been imposed on humanity in His name must all be regarded as a cruel and intolerable burden. The indignation which atheists have so often expressed at the contemplation of religious history is quite intelligible—quite natural; for to them it can only appear as a long course of perversion of the conscience and affections of mankind. If religion be in its essence, and in all its forms and phases, false, the evils which have been associated with it have been as much its legitimate effects as any good which can be ascribed to it; and there can be no warrant for speaking of benefits as its proper effects, or uses and mischiefs as merely occasioned by it, or as its abuses. If in itself false, it must be credited with the evil as well as with the good which has followed it; and all the unprofitable sufferings and useless privations—all the undefined terrors and degrading rites—all the corruptions of moral sentiment, factitious antipathies, intolerance, and persecution—all the spiritual despotism of the few, and the spiritual abjectness of the many—all the aversion to improvement and opposition to science, &c., which are usually referred to false religion and to superstition—must be attributed to religion in itself, if there be no distinction between true and false in religion—between religion and superstition. In that case, belief in God must be regarded as really the root of all these evils. It is only if we can separate between religious truth and religious error—only if we can distinguish religion itself from the perversions of religion—that we can possibly maintain that the evils which have flowed from religious error, from the perversions of religion, are not to be traced to the religious principle itself.[2]
On the other hand, if there be a God, he who denies His existence, and, in consequence, discards all religious motives, represses all religious sentiments, and despises all religious practices, assuredly goes morally far astray. If there be a God—all-mighty, all-wise, and all-holy—the want of belief in Him must be in all circumstances a great moral misfortune, and, wherever it arises from a want of desire to know Him, a serious moral fault, necessarily involving, as it does, indifference to one who deserves the highest love and deepest reverence, ingratitude to a benefactor whose bounties have been unspeakable, and the neglect of those habits of trust and prayer by which men realise the presence of infinite sympathy and implore the help of infinite strength. If there be a God, the virtue which takes no account of Him, even if it were otherwise faultless, must be most defective. The performance of personal and social duty can in that case no more compensate for the want of piety than justice can excuse intemperance or benevolence licentiousness.
Besides, if God exist—if piety, therefore, ought also to exist—it can scarcely be supposed that personal and social morality will not suffer when the claims of religion are unheeded. It has seemed to some that morality rests on religion, and cannot exist apart from it. And almost all who believe that there are religious truths which men, as reasonable beings, are bound to accept, will be found maintaining that, although morality may be independent of religion for its mere existence, a morality unsupported by religion would be insufficient to satisfy the wants of the personal and social life. Without religion, they maintain, man would not be able to resist the temptations and support the trials of his lot, and would be cut off from the source of his loftiest thoughts, his richest and purest enjoyments, and his most heroic deeds. Without it nations, they further maintain, would be unprogressive, selfish, diseased, corrupt, unworthy of life, incapable of long life. They argue that they find in human nature and in human history the most powerful reasons for thinking thus; and so much depends upon whether they are right or wrong, that they are obviously entitled to expect that these reasons, and also the grounds of religious belief, will be impartially and carefully examined and weighed.
It will be denied, indeed, by no one, that religious belief influences moral practice. Both reason and history make doubt on this point impossible. The convictions of a man's heart as to the supreme object of his reverence, and as to the ways in which he ought to show his reverence thereof, necessarily affect for good or ill his entire mind and conduct. The whole moral life takes a different colour according to the religious light which falls upon it. As the valley of the Rhone presents a different aspect when seen from a summit of the Jura and from a peak of the Alps, so the course of human existence appears very different when looked at from different spiritual points of view. Atheism, polytheism, pantheism, theism, cannot regard life and death in the same way, and cannot solve in the same way the problems which they present to the intellect and the heart. These different theories naturally—yea, necessarily—yield different moral results. Now, doubt may be entertained as to whether or not we can legitimately employ the maxim, "By their fruits ye shall know them," in attempting to ascertain the truth or falsity of a theory. The endeavour to support religion by appealing to its utility has been denounced as "moral bribery and subornation of the understanding."[3] But no man, I think, however scrupulous or exacting, can doubt that when one theory bears different moral and social fruits than another, that fact is a valid and weighty reason for inquiring very carefully which of them is true and which false. He who believes, for example, that there is a God, and he who believes that there is no being in the universe higher than himself—he who believes that material force is the source of all things, and he who believes that nature originated in an intelligent, holy, and loving Will—must look upon the world, upon history, and upon themselves so very differently—must think, feel, and act so very differently—that for every man it must be of supreme importance to know which of these beliefs he is bound in reason to accept and which to reject.
Then, in the third place, the primary question in religion is immediately and inseparably connected with the ultimate question of science. Does the world explain itself, or does it lead the mind above and beyond itself? Science cannot but suggest this question; religion is an answer to it. When the phenomena of the world have been classified, the connections between them traced, their laws ascertained, science may, probably enough, have accomplished all that it undertakes—all that it can perform; but is it certain that the mind can ascend no further? Must it rest in the recognition of order, for example, and reject the thought of an intelligence