THEIS M. LECTURE I. ISSUES INVOLVED IN THE QUESTION TO BE DISCUSSEDWHENCE AND HOW WE GET THE IDEA OF GOD. I. Is belief in God a reasonable belief, or is it not? Have we sufficient evidence for thinking that there is a self-existent, eternal Being, infinite in power and wisdom, and perfect in holiness and goodness, the Maker of heaven and earth, or have we not? Is theism true, or is some antagonistic, some antitheistic theory true? This is the question which we have to discuss and to answer, and it seems desirable to state briefly at the outset what issues are involved in answering it. Obviously, the statement of these issues must not be so framed as to create prejudice for or against any particular answer. Its only legitimate purpose is to help us A to realise aright our true relation to the question. We can never in any investigation see too early or too clearly the true and full significance, the general and special bearings of the question we intend to study; but the more important and serious the question is, the more incumbent on us is it not to prejudge what must be the answer. It is obvious, then, in the first place, that the inquiry before us is one as to whether or not religion has any reasonable ground, any basis, in truth; and if so, what that ground or basis is. Religion, in order to be reasonable, must rest on knowledge of its object. This is not to say that it is exclusively knowledge, or that knowledge is its one essential element. It is not to say that feeling and will are not as important constituents in the religious life as intellectual apprehension. Mere knowledge, however clear, profound, and comprehensive it may be, can never be religion. There can be no religion where feeling and affection are not added to knowledge. There can be no religion in any mind devoid of reverence or love, hope or fear, gratitude or desire-in any mind whose thinking is untouched, uncoloured, uninspired by some pious emotion. And religion includes more even than an apprehension of God supplemented by feeling-than the love or fear of God based on knowledge. It is unrealised and incomplete so long as there is no self-surrender of the soul to the object of its knowledge and affection-so long as the will is unmoved, the character and conduct unmodified. The importance of feeling and will in religion is thus in no respect questioned or denied when it is maintained that religion cannot be a reasonable process, a healthy condition of mind, if constituted by either feeling or volition separate from knowledge. Some have represented it as consisting essentially in the feeling of dependence, others in that of love, and others in fear; but these are all feelings which must be elicited by knowledge, and which must be proportional to knowledge in every undisordered mind. We can neither love nor fear what we know nothing about. We cannot love what we do not think worthy of love, nor fear unless we think there is reason for fear. We cannot feel our dependence upon what we do not know to exist. feel trustful and confiding dependence on what we do not suppose to have a character which merits trust and confidence. Then, however true it may be that short of the action of the will in the form of the self-surrender of the soul to the object of its worship the religious process is essentially imperfect, this self-surrender cannot be independent of reason and yet reasonable. In order to be a legitimate act it must spring out of good affections, and these affections must be enlightened; We cannot |