Harper's New Monthly Magazine, No. XXIII.—April, 1852.—Vol. IV.: NoneVarious
General
Harper's New Monthly Magazine, No. XXIII.—April, 1852.—Vol. IV.: None
Various
American literature -- Periodicals; Civilization -- Periodicals; Culture -- Periodicals
And here, we think, may be found an argument for the existence of Deity,
built on stronger and more assuring ground than is furnished by any of
the ordinary positions of natural theology. It is an argument derived
from one of the most interior wants of our moral constitution. There is
no doubt that in our fallen state a feeling of pain--at times of intense
pain--may connect itself in our minds with the recognition of the Divine
idea; but there is also an element of happiness, and, if cherished, of
the highest and most serious happiness, in the thought that there is One
Great Soul that does penetrate into our most interior spirituality.
There is one Soul that is ever as intimately present with us as our own
consciousness--that holds communion with us, and with whom we may hold
communion, in a manner impossible for any other. There is One that
thinks our thoughts, and feels our feelings, even as we think them, and
as we feel them, although, along with this, in another manner, too, of
its own, that transcends our thinking "even as the heavens are high
above the earth," and is as far removed from all the imperfections of
our own spiritual exercises. There may seem an inconsistency in this
apparent mingling of the finite and the infinite in the Divine Nature,
but it is the belief of both which unlocks for us the meaning of the
Scriptures, and sheds light over every page of revelation and of
providence. There is a higher Soul that pervades our spiritual entity,
not as an impersonal or pantheistic abstraction, but as the most
distinctly personal of all personalities--not as a mere Law of nature,
but as a Father "who careth for us," as a Guardian "who numbereth the
very hairs of our heads," as a Judge who taketh note of every thought,
and gives importance to all our forgotten sins, while He is, at the same
time, present with, and caring for every other individual soul in the
universe. As in some previous musings of our Editorial Table, we might
have adverted to the Divine physical power as the ever-present dynamical
entity in the seeming vacuities of space, and binding together the
isolated material worlds, so here we may regard the Higher Spiritual
Presence as the true bond of union among all those isolated souls that
fill the spiritual universe. Thus viewed, the fact of such communion
would be the highest truth in philosophy, as a belief in the reality of
its possible consciousness would be the highest article of faith.
HISTORY IS PHILOSOPHY TEACHING BY EXAMPLE.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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