The central Presbyterian. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1856-1908, 1881-12-07

dence and consequence. Kant showed
that our belief in cause for every effect
is an irresistible act of the mind. But
Kant went no further than this be rea-
soned that our ideas of the external world
are only impressions of the mind, and
that we cannot prove that there are cor
responding realities. To beings, consti-
tuted differently from human beings,
there may be, he said, no ideas answering
to our conceptions of time and space
Yet Kant believed in God and in the
reality of the external world; he appealed
to our consciousness; the Ueracity of con-
SciouSmeSS, he said, we are irresistibly
compelled to accept.
Auguste Comte appears next ON the
scene--the founder of the Positive Phil
osophy His fundamental position was
that all knowledge comes from experience
that we know only what we get from
our FIVE senses, and can know no more
He repudiated all metaphysics as lying
outside the limit of scientific study
Theology belonged to the infancy of the
world; metaphysics to the youth of the
world; physical science to the manhood
of the world.
John Stuart Mill was the representa-
tive of Comte in England. Both Mill
and Comte declined to affirm whether
there was any reality behind the phe-
nomena recognised by the senses. Mill,
perhaps, might be called materialistic-
idealist. He defined the mind to be the
permanent possibility of sensation" and
evidently sympathised strongly with
Hume's views, although his avowed posi-
ton was that science could not deal with
anything-outside the field of experience.
His mind was, an essentially dishonest
one-with all Hume's power of sophis-
try, and much more earnestness Mill is
the Mephistopheles of Metaphysics. He
meant business Hume was merely play
ing.
Now we reach Herbert Spencer. What
is the difference between Mill and Spen-
GER? All these philosophers believed
In what is called the Relatively Of Knowl-
edge-that we do not get at the thing It,
seJin the impressions made on our senses;
Hume and Mill, as we have shown, do
not admit that there is any reality to get
at. Herbert Spencer teaches equally the
relatively of knowledge; but he holds
that, pressing our Investigations, we fair
ly reach solid ground at last by strict sci
entifc reasoning. He afirms that the
only conclusion consistent with that en-
larged and systematised experience, to
which alone should be given the name Of
science" is " that something real and alb
solute exists behind the mental impress
sions on which Hume and Mill construct
ed their idealism."
Herbert Spencer, in other words, the
undisputed leader of the philosophical
evolutionists, affirms the existence of an
absolute reality behind all the phenomena
of the universe. This absolute existence
is entirely beyond our comprehension;
it is the realm of AGNosTIcIsM. He
neither afirms nor denies the personality
of this Absolute. He says we are COM
PEELED to believe, however, in this IN
movable Absolute, because the opposite
belief is unthinkable.
This, then, is our great resting-place
which we have at last reached in this
discussion. Both sides agree that there is
an Absolute Reality" behind the mani
festations of power which are imaged on
our consciousness.
What is this unknown something ? that
is the next question. We are all agreed
that life is not a dream-that the exter-
nal world is reality-that there exists
an Absolute Something behind and over
ALL
This Something, the theist afirms, is
God; this Something, which exists, and
which has always existed, says the Mate
rialist is NATURE; it is the ORIGINAL,
INDEsTRUcTIBLE FORCE which is eternal,
uncaused, and self-existent.* One party
afirms that the Something behind all
things is a Personal God the other .af-
firms that it is an ETERNAL FORCE, which
gives no account of itself; it is a Some