Clues #11-20
Clues of the Maze: Honest Faith - #11-20 11. God can be known
It has been asserted that God cannot be known. Those who say this declare that they themselves know nothing but phenomena; and therefore they are bound, if candid, to admit that they do not themselves know that God cannot be known. As they confessedly know nothing about it, they should not be offended if we leave them out of our consideration.
He who made the world is certainly an intelligent Being; in fact, the highest Intelligence; for in myriads of ways his works display the presence of profound thought and knowledge. Lord Bacon said, "I had rather believe all the fables of the Talmud and the Koran than that this universal frame is without a Mind." This being so, we do in that very fact know God in a measure: ay, and in such a measure that we are prepared to trust him. He that made all things is more truly an object of confidence than all the things that he has made. It would be a strange Mind that did not make itself known: as strange as fire that did not burn, and light that did not shine. We should find it hard to believe in the eternal solitary confinement of the Being who made the worlds.
12. Faith in God permitted May a man trust in God? There is another question which answers both itself and this,—Wherefore should not a creature trust its Creator? What is to forbid it? Such confidence must be honourable both to the man and to his Maker; it is according to the need of the one and the nature of the other. Who by the closest search can discover the faintest trace of a reason why we should not rely upon the living God?
13. God's Existence not taken for granted Do we take God's existence for granted? Certainly not. We believe it to be a fact proved beyond any other. To the candid mind, not diseased with cavilling, but honestly rational, the existence of a work proves the existence of a worker, a design necessitates a designer, a forethought involves a fore-thinker. Now if we were even in a desert with Mungo Park, a bit of moss would be argument enough that God was there: or for the matter of that, the sand under our feet, and the sun above our heads, would suffice to prove that fact. But dwelling on a fair island, teeming with all manner of life, we may count as many proofs of the Godhead as there are objects of sight, and hearing, and taste, and smell.
This, of course, is called "a mere platitude"; but, by the gentleman's leave, his Latin word makes no difference to the absolute certainty of the argument.
If more proofs were offered, they would no doubt be blocked in the same captious manner: but contemptuous epithets are no replies to fair reasoning. We conceive that one sound proof is better than twenty faulty ones; and if that one does not convince, neither would a legion. The French savants, en route for Egypt, pestered Napoleon with their denials of a God, but his astute intellect was not led astray. He took them upon deck, and, pointing to the stars, he demanded, "Who made all these?"
14. Doubt logically carried out
Doubt as to the being of a God has but a short way to run to finish its legitimate career. No man, who believes that he has a soul can give better proof of his mental being than that which we can give of the existence of God. Let him try. He claims that his own consciousness is a proof of his being alive. We reply that it may be very good evidence to himself, but it can be none to us, nor would a rational man attempt to use it in that way. Our friend answers, "I work, and my work demonstrates that I am." Precisely so, and God's works demonstrate that he is. Quickly it is replied: "But you see me work, and you see not God." To which we answer,—We by no means see you work: your body is not yourself, your true self we have never seen. Your mind executes its purposes through your external frame, and we see your limbs moving; but the soul which moves them is out of sight, and it is a mystery of mysteries how a spiritual subsistence, such as the mind is, should be able to operate upon matter. The initial impression of mind upon matter is a secret which no mortal has unveiled. You cannot prove the existence of your soul to another man except by the same arguments which prove the being of God.
If then you stretch your wings for a flight of doubt, be brave enough to fly onward to the Ultima Thule. Doubt your own existence. Doubt whether you doubt; doubt whether there be any you to doubt; doubt whether there be anything to be doubted. A thorough-going Agnostic ought not to be sure that he is an Agnostic; he should not in fact be too confident that he is himself, or that he is at all.
15. No Soul A certain preacher had wrought his best to benefit his audience; but one of them came to him, and somewhat rudely remarked, "Your preaching is of no use to me. I do not believe that I have a soul, I don't want to be talked to about an imaginary here-after: I shall die like a dog." The minister calmly replied, "Sir, I have evidently failed through mis-apprehension. I did my best for the good of all my hearers; but I prepared the entertainment under the notion that I was catering for men with souls. Had I known that there were creatures present who had no souls, and would die like dogs, I would have provided a good supply of bones for them." "Banter," says one. Commonsense, say we. What more gentle dealing than playful sarcasm can be expected by men who hold such degrading views of themselves? Assuredly no soul need be worried by them. They confess their own inability to help us, and tacitly admit that we are not bound to let them hinder us. "There is no such thing as light." cries one, "for I have no eyes wherewith to enjoy it." Is there any argument in this? No, the blind gentleman is to be pitied, but his opinions upon colour and optics can have no weight. Soul-less beings may hold what philosophies they please; their opinions may be interesting as curiosities, but they cannot influence men with souls in the least degree.
16. God in the Sphere of our Life
Trusting in God, we are not exercising a dreamy dependence upon a far-away and inactive power. It is asked whether God ever does operate on behalf of those who trust him; and it is hinted that he is otherwise occupied, and will not stoop to the petty cares of men and women. Obviously this is an error. God's work is at our doors and in our chambers; yes, in our bodies, and in our minds. The child's father is very busy, but he is busy in the room where his child is in need; and therefore he is where he is wanted to be. The ordinary talk is of "The operations of Nature." Pray, Sir, what is Nature? The gentleman who has used the term looks round with surprise. He stutters, and stammers, and says that everybody knows what Nature is. Tell us, then, what it is. "Why," says he, "it is easy enough, Nature is—; Nature is Nature." The truth is that the real Worker is God himself, and other force than his own power is nowhere to be found. The movements around us are not produced by laws, as simpletons say: laws do nothing; they are neither more nor less than certain observed methods of the great Creator's working; but HE, himself, doeth the work. We may well trust him to work for us who is working all around us.
17. The great God answering to Faith
Moreover, we may not refuse reliance upon God on the ground of our insignificance; for it is not conceivable that anything can be too little for God. The wonders of the microscope are quite as remarkable as those of the telescope: we may not set a bound to the Lord in one direction any more than in the other. He can and will show his divine skill in a man's life, as well as in a planet's circuit.
Witnesses are alive to testify to the Lord's making bare his arm on the behalf of them that trust him. Any man may also put the principle to the test in his own instance; and it is memorable that none have done so in vain. There are no reasons in his nature why God should not answer to his creatures' confidence; there are many reasons why he should; at any rate, as far as we are concerned, we are ready to put it to the test, and to let the experiment last throughout our whole existence.
18. Why is not God relied on? Does it not seem remarkable that so few men should lovingly reach forth to the idea of linking their lives to God in faith? Why is it! The severe moralist would rightly answer—because they have no desire to lead lives with which God could have any connection: they seek not such purity, truth, justice, holiness, as God's energy would work in them. Doubtless this is the case; but let it not be true of us. Virtue is so admirable that we cannot have too much of it, and the fact that the divine power makes towards goodness is one of its chief attractions in the eyes of right-minded men.
19. We ought not to be despondent
Possibly there may be some who are not so much averse to goodness as despondent about the attainment of it; it may be helpful to these to reflect that despondency is out of court when once God is concerned in a matter. In this case no doubt should enter, for God can raise the most polluted to innocence, since he is able to do all things. It is shocking to refuse to rely upon God because we do not wish to be pure; it is dishonouring to his glory to decline confidence in his power to elevate us because we are as yet so unrighteous. God is good, and it is a characteristic of a good being that he desires to make others good; God is omnipotent, and his power governs the world of mind as well as that of matter: it is clear that both will and ability are united in God concerning the object of our desire, namely, the purity and usefulness of our lives, and therefore we may with much alacrity fly to him, and with much hopefulness repose upon him.
20. Further causes of Non-belief
Secretly men have a confidence somewhere, even when they refuse to rely upon God. They have made gods of themselves, and have come to rest in self-sufficiency. He who has never seen his own face may easily believe in its superlative beauty, if he be aided therein by flatterers. So a man who knows not his own heart may readily form a high opinion of his own excellence, and find confidence in his own wisdom a plant of rapid growth. This is one of the worst enemies of faith. He who can for all time rely upon himself has no patience with talk about faith in God: he relegates that lowly stuff to underlings; he is of courtlier mould. His self-restraint is perfect, his judgment is infallible, his appreciation of the morally beautiful is fully developed: he is a self-made man, and is both his own Providence and Rewarder.
"Tut:—the man is a fool!" Quick and sensible minds speak thus impatiently; and the cooler observations of the charitable are sorrowfully driven to confirm their verdict. We, with whom the reader now communes, are not such grand self-governing infallibles. We fear that our appetites and passions may betray us, that our reason may misguide us, that our prejudices may impede us, that our surroundings may stumble us; and therefore most deliberately would we look to the Strong for strength, and cast our folly upon the wisdom of the Eternal. Of course we shall not expect imitators among the vain-glorious, the frivolous, and the fancifully perfect.