Know the Truth: A Critique on the Hamiltonian Theory of Limitation: Including Some Strictures Upon the Theories of Rev. Henry L. Mansel and Mr. Herbert SpencerJones, Jesse Henry
Religion
Know the Truth: A Critique on the Hamiltonian Theory of Limitation: Including Some Strictures Upon the Theories of Rev. Henry L. Mansel and Mr. Herbert Spencer
Another organic distinction is that observed in the mode of seeing
ideals. The Divine Reason not only gives ideas, _a priori_ laws, but it
gives all possible images, which those laws, standing in their natural
relations to each other, can become. Thus all ideals are realized to
him, whether the creative energy goes forth, and power is organized in
accordance therewith, or not. Here again the creature is of the opposite
kind. The creature can never have an idea until he has been educated by
contact with a material universe; and then can never construct an ideal,
except he have first seen the elements of that ideal realized in
material forms. To illustrate: The infant has no ideas; and there is no
radical difference between the beginning of a human being and any other
created spiritual person. He has a rudimentary Reason, but it must grow
before it can make its presentations, and the means of its education
must be a material system. Let a spiritual person be created, and set in
the Universe, utterly isolated, with no medium of communication, and it
would stay forever just what it was at the beginning, a dry seed. The
necessity of alliance with a material Universe is equally apparent in
the mature spiritual person. Such a one cannot construct a single ideal,
except he have seen all the elements already in material forms. He who
will attempt to construct an ideal of any _thing_, which never has been,
as a griffin, and not put into it any form of animals which have been on
earth, will immediately appreciate the unquestionableness of this
position. Therefore it is that no one can, "by searching, find out God."
The creature can only learn what the Creator declares to him.
Still another element of distinction, equally marked and decisive as
those just named, may be mentioned. The Deity possesses as inherent and
immanent endowment Power, or the ability of himself to realize his
ideals in objects. Thus is he the Creator. If this were not so, there
could have been no Universe, for there was no substance and no one to
furnish a substance but he. The creature, on the other hand, cannot
receive as a gift, neither attain by culture the power to create. Hence
he can only realize his ideals in materials furnished to his hand.
Pigments and brushes and chisels and marble must be before painters and
sculptors can become.
Each and every one of the distinctions above made is _organic_. They
cannot be eliminated. In fact their removal is not a possible object of
effort. The creature may _wish_ them removed; but no line of thought can
be studied out by which a movement can be made towards the attainment of
that wish. It would seem, then, that, such being the facts, the fullest
scope might fearlessly be allowed to the legitimate use of every power
of the creature. Such, it is believed, is God's design.
THE END.
Transcriber's Note:
Archaic/multiple spellings and punctuation of the original have been
maintained.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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