CHAPTER IV.

FAITH AND POSITIVISM.

The Written and the Living Word.

UR course of discussion has led us, first, into

OUR course of of the philosophic and Finite

secondly, into "The Field of the Religious and Infinite." +

In the former we have shown, both by indirect and direct arguments, that philosophic faith (intellectual belief) in things unseen, for example, in substance and the relation between substance and quality, in cause and the relation between cause and effect, etc., has valid ground.

In the latter we have shown, by cumulative and conclusive reasons, the validity of faith in God,

This ground already gained and securely held, we are prepared finally to consider the Revelation of God in the written and in the living Word-in the Scriptures and in Christ. Is Christian faith valid? We have an indefeasible right, henceforth, to + See Ch. iii.

* See Ch. ii.

assume the premise that God is. Will he reveal himself? An antecedent probability is sufficient for our argument here. But more than this has been shown in the preceding discussion. God has revealed himself in Creation and in Providence.

Thus we have found him, not as a logical necessity elaborated by a dialectical process, but as a divine reality. God the Father, Almighty, maker of heaven and earth—giving infallible proofs of his presence and power in making, upholding, and governing the universe. A book of high antiquity and one which will challenge our special attention in this closing discussion precisely expresses our thought: "For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead." Rom. i. 20.

"He left not himself without witness, in that he did good, and gave us rain from heaven, and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with food and gladness." Acts xiv. 17.

Now in the sobriety of prose it speaks, and now in the rapture of poetry. "The heavens declare the glory of God; and the firmament sheweth his handy work. Day unto day uttereth speech and night unto night sheweth knowledge." Ps. xix. I, 2.

God has thus revealed himself; he may, then,

reveal himself more fully. What shall decide? His own infinite wisdom and will. The revelation hitherto made has occurred in the ongoings of Creation and Providence, and would have been made had only material things been created and upheld, with no finite minds to recognize God's handiwork, and wonder and adore. But, now that finite minds appear, will not God reveal himself in these higher creations, and to these spiritual creatures, and through them to others? There is abundant a priori ground for expecting this. conceive of Divine action without Divine revelation. If God has, by the very process of his action, revealed himself in the lower, the physical creation, will he not, by a nobler process of divine action, reveal himself in the higher, the spiritual creation? Mind alone can originate mind. Will not God appear more manifest, and be better understood, by the living soul which he hath made?

Indeed, we can scarcely

This book of singular wisdom, as well as antiquity, precisely states, perhaps suggests, my thought: "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. In the image of God created he him." Gen. i. 26, 27. Man stands forth in this lower world as the representative of intelligence and volition and morality, holding dominion subordinate, but representative of God's supreme dominion. Gen. i. 28.

Thus, in brief, does God reveal himself in the human soul; will he not also reveal himself to the human soul? For this the soul would long intensely, even hunger and thirst for it. Without this there would be the ceaseless cry of the human to the divine.

Until the creation of man, neither could this revelation be, nor could there be the demand for it. Will the divine Father turn away in disregard of his own spiritual children? Will not God avenge (satisfy) his own elect, his chosen ones among all the creatures on earth, that with filial yearning day and night cry unto him? He will; our better Reason replies. He will; saith the Saviour. Luke xviii. 8.

Such revelation, if it occur at all, would seem to be especially desirable and fitting in the earlier history of man until not only the eternal power and Godhead should be known, but until God be known in his moral character,—his holiness, his justice, his benevolence, his spiritual care and kindness towards his spiritual creatures; in a word, in his divine Fatherhood, holy, just, kind, yearning toward his spiritual children.

Has such a revelation been made,-a revelation corresponding to these very wants of the human. soul? There is a book claiming to be a record of such revealings. The book is not a modern fabrica

tion as an after-thought to satisfy a logical necessity, or to embody a cunningly devised theory. The book is genuine; this can not be successfully disputed. It is of the highest antiquity; this all admit. The theory is in the book itself, else it had not been thought of. The book has been wondrously preserved amid the shock and change of ages. A people, specially selected for this purpose, marvellously protected from extermination, though often conquered—from absorption, though everywhere scattered, have carried with them everywhere, and everywhere guarded this book as a sacred treasure. Early in this record, be it observed, the Divine Unity is revealed the Divine Unity, as the basis of all true religion, as contradistinguished from polytheism, which is the parent of idolatry with its endless brood of follies and sins.

This doctrine of the Divine Unity which Socrates hailed as a great light shining from the page of Anaxagoras, (cf. Georg. 2, 490) this doctrine had been divinely revealed a thousand years before the time of Anaxagoras.

Beyond this fundamental doctrine, thus, and thus early revealed, the most progressive theology of modern times has realized its inability to make the least advance. This fundamental doctrine together with the religious and moral principles it