would not prove that parental love was not one of the instincts of humanity. But the probability is that the fact is not as reported. It is very difficult for foreigners to get acquainted with the interior life of those who differ from themselves so much in their intellec- tual" and moral condition. And besides, Christians attach such an exalted meaning to the word God, that when they see no evidence of the presence of that exalted conception in the minds of the heathen, they are apt to conclude that all knowledge of God is wanting. Unless such people show that they have no sense of right and wrong, no consciousness of responsibility for character and conduct, there is no evidence that they have no knowledge of such a being as God.
The other objection is drawn from the case of the deaf and dumb, who sometimes say that previous to instruction, the idea of God never entered their minds. To this the same answer may be given. The knowledge obtained by Christian instruction so much surpasses that given by intuition, that the latter seems as nothing. It is hardly conceivable that a human soul should exist in any state of development, without a sense of responsibility, and this involves the idea of God. For the responsibility is felt to be not to self, nor to men, but to an invisible Being, higher than self, and higher than man.
The Belief in (rod Necessary.
But if it be admitted that the knowledge of God is universal among men, is it also a necessary belief? Is it impossible for the mind to dispossess itself of the conviction that there is a God ? Necessity, as remarked above, may be considered as involved in universality, at least in such a case as this. There is no satisfactory way of accounting for the universal belief in the existence of God, except that such belief is founded on the very constitution of our nature. Nevertheless, these two criteria of intuitive truths are generally distinguished, and are in some aspects distinct.
The question then is. Is it possible for a sane man to disbelieve in the existence of God ? This question is commonly answered in the negative. It is objected, however, that facts prove the con- trary. No man has ever been found, who denies that two and two make four, whereas atheists abound in every age and in every part of the world.
There, are, however, different kinds of necessary truths.
1. Those the opposite of which is absolutely unthinkable. That every effect must have a cause, that a part of a given thing is less than the whole, are propositions the opposites of which cannot have
198 PART I. — THEOLOGT. [Ch. I. — Orig. of Idea of God.
any meaning. When a man says that something is nothing, he expresses no thought. He denies what he affirms, and therefore says nothing.
2. There are truths concerning external or material things, which have a power to constrain behef different from that power which pertains to truths concerning the mind. A man cannot deny that he has a body ; and he cannot rationally deny that he has a will. The impossibility in both cases may be equal, but they are of different kinds, and affect the mind differently.
3. Ao-ain, there ai-e truths which cannot be denied without doing violence' to the laws of our nature. In such cases the denial is forced, and can only be temporary. The laws of our nature are sure sooner or later to assert themselves, and constrain an opposite belief. A pendulum when at rest hangs perpendicularly to the liorizon. It may by extraneous force be made to hang at any degree of inclination. But as soon as such force is removed, it is sure to swing back to its normal position. Under the control of a metaphysical theory, a man may deny the existence of the external world, or the obligation of the moral law ; and his disbelief may be sincere, and for a time persistent ; but the moment the speculative reasons for his disbelief are absent from his mind, it of necessity reverts to its original and natural convictions. It is also possible that a man's hand may be so hardened or cauterized as to lose the sense of touch. But that would not prove that the hand in man is not normally the great organ of touch, So it is possible that the moral nature of a man may be so disorganized by vice or by a false philosophy as to have its testimony for the existence of God effec- tually silenced. This, however, would prove nothing as to what that testimony really is. Besides this, insensibilit}' and the conse- quent unbelief cannot last. Whatever rouses the moral nature, whether it be danger, or suffering, or the approach of death, ban- ishes unbelief in a moment. Men pass from skepticism to faith, in many cases, instantaneously ; not of course by a process of argu- ment, but by the existence of a state of consciousness with which skepticism is irreconcilable, and in the presence of which it cannot exist. This fact is illustrated continually, not only in the case of the uneducated and superstitious, but even in the case of men of the highest culture. The simple fact of Scripture and experience is, that the moral law as written upon the heart is indelible ; and the moral law in its nature implies a lawgiver, one from whom that law emanates, and by whom it will be enforced. And, there- fore, so Ion Of as men are moral creatures, they will and must believe