Systematic Theology (Volume 1 of 3)Strong, Augustus Hopkins
Religion
Systematic Theology (Volume 1 of 3)
Strong, Augustus Hopkins
Baptists -- Doctrines; Theology, Doctrinal
history, and force is supreme. To Christianity nature is only the
beginning, and man the consummation. Which gives the higher
revelation of the life of the tree—the seed, or the fruit?”
The third form of the theory seems to make God a sensuous object, to
reverse the proper order of knowing and feeling, to ignore the fact that
in all feeling there is at least some knowledge of an object, and to
forget that the validity of this very feeling can be maintained only by
previously assuming the existence of a rational Deity.
Newman Smyth tells us that feeling comes first; the idea is
secondary. Intuitive ideas are not denied, but they are declared
to be direct reflections, in thought, of the feelings. They are
the mind’s immediate perception of what it feels to exist. Direct
knowledge of God by intuition is considered to be idealistic,
reaching God by inference is regarded as rationalistic, in its
tendency. See Smyth, The Religious Feeling; reviewed by Harris, in
New Englander, Jan., 1878: reply by Smyth, in New Englander, May,
1878.
We grant that, even in the case of unregenerate men, great peril,
great joy, great sin often turn the rational intuition of God into
a presentative intuition. The presentative intuition, however,
cannot be affirmed to be common to all men. It does not furnish
the foundation or explanation of a universal capacity for
religion. Without the rational intuition, the presentative would
not be possible, since it is only the rational that enables man to
receive and to interpret the presentative. The very trust that we
put in feeling presupposes an intuitive belief in a true and good
God. Tennyson said in 1869: “Yes, it is true that there are
moments when the flesh is nothing to me; when I know and feel the
flesh to be the vision; God and the spiritual is the real; it
belongs to me more than the hand and the foot. You may tell me
that my hand and my foot are only imaginary symbols of my
existence,—I could believe you; but you never, never can convince
me that the _I_ is not an eternal Reality, and that the spiritual
is not the real and true part of me.”
3. Not from reasoning,—because
(_a_) The actual rise of this knowledge in the great majority of minds is
not the result of any conscious process of reasoning. On the other hand,
upon occurrence of the proper conditions, it flashes upon the soul with
the quickness and force of an immediate revelation.
(_b_) The strength of men’s faith in God’s existence is not proportioned
to the strength of the reasoning faculty. On the other hand, men of
greatest logical power are often inveterate sceptics, while men of
unwavering faith are found among those who cannot even understand the
arguments for God’s existence.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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