Systematic Theology (Volume 1 of 3)Strong, Augustus Hopkins
Religion
Systematic Theology (Volume 1 of 3)
Strong, Augustus Hopkins
Baptists -- Doctrines; Theology, Doctrinal
1. Its definition of matter as a “permanent possibility of sensation”
contradicts our intuitive judgment that, in knowing the phenomena of
matter, we have direct knowledge of substance as underlying phenomena, as
distinct from our sensations, and as external to the mind which
experiences these sensations.
Bowne, Metaphysics, 432—“How the possibility of an odor and a
flavor can be the cause of the yellow color of an orange is
probably unknowable, except to a mind that can see that two and
two may make five.” See Iverach’s Philosophy of Spencer Examined,
in Present Day Tracts, 5: no. 29. Martineau, Study, 1:102-112—“If
external impressions are telegraphed to the brain, intelligence
must receive the message at the beginning as well as deliver it at
the end.... It is the external object which gives the possibility,
not the possibility which gives the external object. The mind
cannot make both its _cognita_ and its _cognitio_. It cannot
dispense with standing-ground for its own feet, or with atmosphere
for its own wings.” Professor Charles A. Strong: “Kant held to
things-in-themselves back of physical phenomena, as well as to
things-in-themselves back of mental phenomena; he thought
things-in-themselves back of physical might be identical with
things-in-themselves back of mental phenomena. And since mental
phenomena, on this theory, are not specimens of reality, and
reality manifests itself indifferently through them and through
physical phenomena, he naturally concluded that we have no ground
for supposing reality to be like either—that we must conceive of
it as ‘weder Materie noch ein denkend Wesen’—‘neither matter nor a
thinking being’—a theory of the Unknowable. Would that it had been
also the Unthinkable and the Unmentionable!” Ralph Waldo Emerson
was a subjective idealist; but, when called to inspect a farmer’s
load of wood, he said to his company: “Excuse me a moment, my
friends; we have to attend to these matters, just as if they were
real.” See Mivart, On Truth, 71-141.
2. Its definition of mind as a “series of feelings aware of itself”
contradicts our intuitive judgment that, in knowing the phenomena of mind,
we have direct knowledge of a spiritual substance of which these phenomena
are manifestations, which retains its identity independently of our
consciousness, and which, in its knowing, instead of being the passive
recipient of impressions from without, always acts from within by a power
of its own.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account