The conclusion, therefore, of the whole matter is, that we know God in the same sense in which we know ourselves and things out of ourselves. We have the same conviction that God is, and that He is, in Himself, and independently of our thought of Him, what we take Him to be. Our subjective idea corresponds to the ob- jective reality. This knowledge of God is the foundation of all religion ; and therefore to deny that God can be known, is really to deny that rational religion is possible. In other words, it makes religion a mere sentiment, or blind feeling, instead of its being what the Apostle declares it to be, a AoytK^ karpeia, a rational service ; the homage of the reason as well as of the heart and life. " Our knowledge of God," says Hase, " developed and enlightened by the Scriptures, answers to what God really is, for He cannot de- ceive us as to his own nature." ^
1 See on this subject, Sir William Hamilton's Discussions on Philosophy and Literature; Hamilton's Lectures on Metaphysics and Logic, edited by Rev. Henry L. Mansel aud John Veitch, M. A.; Philosophy of Sir William Hamilton, arranged and edited by 0. W. Wight, translator of Cousin's History of Modern Philosophy ; The Limits of Religious Thought, eight lectures on the Bampton Foundation, by Henry Longueville Mansel, B. D. ; Calder- wood's Philosophy of the Infinite; Dr. McCosh's works on the Method of the Divine Gov- ernment; The Intuitions of the Mind ; Defence of Fundamental Truths; Princeton Review, • April, 1862, Philosophy of the Absolute, an article by Dr. Charles W. Shields; October, 1861, Review of Dr. Hickok's Rational Psychology, by Dr. Stephen Alexander; and A Phil- osophical Confession of Faith, by the same writer, a very able and concise statement of fun- damental principles, in the number for July, 1867, of the same journal. See also Mill's Review of Hamilton's Philosophy, and the admirable work of Professor Noah Porter, of New Haven, on the Human Intellect, part fourth, chap. viii.