PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION AND HISTORY BY A M. FAIRBAIRN “ Τὸ γνωστὸν τοῦ Θεοῦ φανερόν ἐστιν ἐν αὐτοῖς· ὁ Θεὸς γὰρ αὐτοῖς ἐφανέρωσεν.” ROM. i. 19. Anchora Spei STRAHAN & CO., PUBLISHERS, LONDON JAMES THIN, EDINBURGH "And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation; that they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after Him, and find Him, though He be not far from every one of us: for in Him we live, and move, and have our being: as certain also of your own poets have said, 'For we are also His offspring.””—– ACTS xvii. 26-28. PREFACE. THE resolution to issue in a collected form the following "Studies" was come to after considerable hesitation. They are mostly tentative. They embody, indeed, the results of much thought and not a little inquiry; but they were, and still are, intended to be Studies" preliminary to what should be at once a Philosophy and a History of Religion. They pretend to be no more; but may, even as such, have some worth for an age which seeks to increase by a Science of Religion the number of the already recognized and cultivated Sciences. The first and third Essays, and part third of the fourth, originally appeared in the Contemporary Review. The other parts of the latter formed the substance of two Lectures delivered in the winter of 1874 to the Philosophical Institution, Edinburgh. The second paper was written in the summer of 1875, but has not before been printed. ABERDEEN, June 1876. |