THE DEFENDER:

a Weekly Magazine,

OF CHRISTIAN EXPOSITION AND ADVOCACY..

Who knows not that truth is strong, next to the Almighty; she needs no policies, nor stratagems, nor licensings to make her victorious, those are the shifts and the defences that error uses against her power.-MILTON.

In my first letter I asserted the 'Eternity of Matter' as the basis of Atheism, which, if admitted, thoroughly undermines all arguments for the existence of any other power in nature. The indestructibility of matter is a fact of such importance in theology that the sceptic may well afford to attack any other arguments for the proof of Deity with perfect success. The great Design analogical argument is most in vogue to prove the Christian's foundation of faith. I utterly repudiate this argument as affording any demonstration of a great Creating Being distinct from, and having power over, matter. I say this, not that I think there is no adaptation of parts to an end, or what is commonly called successful' contrivance' in nature-quite the reverse. I perceive that the organic and inorganic worlds are perfectly adapted for their respective duties this is a fact so patent that it would be the most convincing proof of insanity to deny it. But what then? This adaptation proves nothing but the existence of the thing in dispute, which no one denies. If we enquire what is design, we shall discover it to be the mental energy of a human mind concentrated upon one settled object, endeavouring to construct a new combination of parts to arrive at a certain definite end. This implies a knowledge of all the No. 25, Vol. I.

materials which must be used, for no mechanic ever made a single machine without being previously aware of the powers of his tools and the properties of his materials; and this is gained by a long studious career, obtainable only by close assiduity in labour and a faculty of observation which is possessed by few. Arkwright did not commence designing until he knew the relative value of allhis materials. The first inventor of cannon never could have designed his engine of destruction until the explosive nature of gunpowder was known. And then design differs in quality. The utmost efforts of the South Sea Islanders in ship-building go no further than the construction of a bark canoe; while we, by superior science, launch the gigantic steamers which breast the ocean like a flying bird. And yet these are types which prove that design is altogether human in its origin, and is totally inapplicable to the character of a Supreme Being. Now in analogical arguments there should be a similarity of structure betwixt the known facts which we possess and those of which we are ignorant -yet assume their existence. Now the design argument attempts to give personality to Deity by providing him with intelligence, and, consequently, bodily passions and affections, only in a more extended sense than in the case. of a human being it merely covers him with a garment of infinity. Now let us trace the design argument a little. A savage, bathing in a river, observes a decayed trunk of a tree floating down the water; it crosses his path, and he discovers that it will swim the water with his weight upon it. He wishes to cross the stream, and by means of this log of wood he is enabled to do so. This is a fact which he does not forget. When he requires to cross the water again he provides a piece of tree similar to that before in use. Soon the fact is widely known and as widely practised; improvements in the original design occur; a more civilised race takes the matter under hand, and brings it to perfection; the savages remain with their primitive discovery; civilization brings a million intellects to work, and, by the lapse of time and progress of science, elaborates the mighty vessels propelled by a little vapour-called steam. Here, then, is incipient and full-grown design-the log of wood was the primitive cause, and the observations of nature the effects of preceding causes of subsequent effects. Can we say the same of Deity? Does he improve by practice as man does? If he does, he cannot be a God-if the reverse, the analogical argument is inapplicable to his case, for analogy is merely a resemblance betwixt two or more things-the one we know, the other we think we know by a fancied resemblance between them. If chloroform was administered to a patient, and was attended by certain states of physical appearance, and another patient was mesmerised, and a third had etler given him-all three cases being nearly alike in their results--and if we knew only that one of them was mesmerised, should we not say that the patients operated upon had every appearance of being mesmerised, but, as it was impossible for us to know whether they had or not, that if the other two were not mesmerised, they were under the effects of a medicine with similar results, and most probably it would be of the same principle? So far we could go by analogy, but no further. Can we apply the test to Deity? Can we enter into a series of suppositions without foundations or conclusions without premises? Then as to the force of the design argument. We allow the existence throughout the universe of what we term design when applied to ourselves. But what argument can be drawn from an assumption, when our very existence is proof positive of all that the design can require? Complexity or simplicity are alike harvests for the arguer from 'contrivance and adaptation.' We have five fingers on each hand. Is there any necessity for absolutely neither more nor less than five fingers? Supposing we had but four, the proof of the design argument might be demonstrated in the same manner. The same if we had but three, two, nay, even but ONE finger, and if we were minus our hands, arms, or shoulders, and even our legs, the design question might be

proved from our head, stomach, or heart. If there were no human nor animal beings-nothing left in the world but a speckled frog, there might be a volume written on the wonderful adaptation of his limbs to the sphere in which he moved. Destroy the frog, and some celestial' beings might reason the same concerning the structure of an atom of soil. In fact, when everything we KNOW bears an organised form-when the very stones of the earth can be dragged from the quarries and the combinations of solids evinced in THEIR formations, and the common coal is still richer in its spoils of time, showing the POWERS that have been working to mould its existence, what must we say ? It resolves the argument into its old form the eternity of matter. The universe, in its minutest parts, shows an adaptation to all its internal functions, and we cannot imagine that it should be any other than it is. If it was, we could not exist in our present form. There is as much wisdom displayed (to our minds) in the combination of oxygen and hydrogen gas adapted to our organs of respira tion, as in the most complex structure of our nervous system. We live in a world where wonders crowd upon our senses, when we exert our eyes and our thoughts around us.

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All these things must have had either a beginning or be eternal. the ultimatum of the Design argument! Shelly says, 'Until it is clearly proved that the universe was CREATED, we may reasonably suppose that it has endured from all ETERNITY. In a case where two propositions are diametrically opposite, the mind believes that which is less incomprehensible, it is easier to conceive that the universe has existed from all eternity, than to conceive an eternal being capable of creating it. If the mind sinks beneath the weight of one, is it an alleviation to increase the intolerability of the burden. Such is the only point that the Christian can succeed in proving the existence of God, the creation of matter, the ONUS-PROBANDI rests with him, if he accomplishes this, the existence of a God is proved.

It is often advanced by the Christian, as an argument of the Design theory→→ Where did the first grain of corn come from? The Athiest cannot answer this question nor can the Christian who elaborates the argument by a critical dissection of the powers and wisdom combined in a single grain of wheat-he says it could not have sprung fortuitous from the earth without design-the same with every plant or vegetable, animal or man. These are brought forward as triumphant cases of undoubted Design and superhuman contrivance. Here the Christian and Atheist join hands, for once they agree. True, those evidences are SUPERHUMAN, but are they super-natural-an honest silence is the Christians only answer. But let us examine those cases. A grain of wheat shows evidences of its construction and its purpose, yet a grain of wheat is thoroughly useless unless it is deposited in the ground for fructification and growth; the earth, then, in which it is placed, is necessary for the completion of the origi nal Design, so must be part of the Design itself. Here we have mere matter' elevated to an equality with organized matter, consequently, the dust of the earth' bears the same marks of superhuman contrivance as the most useful vegetable: When the Christian asks, in scorn, why a cabbage does not think, if mind is material, he is forgetting that animals whose limbs are brought forward as proof of the most powerful display of adaptation of organs for the performance of their functions, that those organs are dependent upon the supply of what are termed unorganised vegetables for their existence; and, that man could not exist a moment without having unorganic atmospheric air to support him; it surely must be a proof of either excessive presumption, or wilful ignorance, to attempt to separate the question of Design from that of the existence of matter.

Then, again, if the Design argument was true, what would become of the attributes of God? Let us examine them. The Christian lays great stress

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on deity being intelligent. Now, to accurately design, their must be intelli gence exerted. All that we know of intelligence, is simply, that it is a mode of being, not an existence of itself, but a development of existence. like SOUND a property of a substance, not the substance itself; like a reflection in a glass, not the figure but the shadow.

We cannot know the existence of mind except in the case of a human organisation, we have no experience of mind being developed in any other way than through the agency of a person, and then produced through the medium of sensation and perception, which produces images convertible into separate ideas. No man ever knew that sensation, perception, and reflection, could exist without a human body, and these united, assist in forming intelligence, which creates Design. To assert, therefore, that God designs, is to assert his materiality, to give him ideas, now ideas can only come by sensation and reflection, (which involves comparison) and if God is omnipresent, how can he derive ideas from a non-entity. For that which is beside himself (when he occupies all space) could have no existence, and it is contrary to all human experience to derive ideas and impressions from ourselves prior to having any ideas. Then, as to his omniscience, how could he know all things, if nothing could be reflected upon his SENSORIUM? Seeing that from perception, sensation, &c., all real knowledge springs, if God had not studied external nature he could not be omniscient, and if he is omnipresent, how can there be anything external to him? We never hear of a man studying geology by observing himself. And if God is omnipotent, all powerful, we can have no power; and we KNOW that we have POWER, we know that matter has POWER equal to all its emergencies. What shall we make of this? Arc there three omnipotent powers-God, Matter, Man? Surely there is a contradiction here, and as we must be guided by experience, we can only assign omnipotent power to matter. Shelly forcibly observes, 'If power be an attribute of existing substance, substance could not have derived its origin from power. One thing cannot at the same time be the cause and effect of another. The word power, expresses the capability of anything to be or act. The human mind never hesitates to annex the idea of power to any object of its experience. To deny that power is the attribute of being, is to deny that being can be. If power be an attribute of substance, the hypothesis of a God is a superfluous and unwarrantable assumption.' Knowing that matter and power are always united, what can be further said of the omnipotence of God? Then, again, if Design must have a Designer, and that Designer be God, possessing intelligence and power, constituting personality of mind, by every law of analogy, that intelligence being connected with a body must have had a Designer too, and then the argument is destroyed I have by the absurdities to which it leads when logically carried out. glanced at but a few of the many positions, in this great argument, each of which I should have elaborated at greater length if your columns would have admitted this Secularist intrusion.

SIR,

TO MR. W. H. JOHNSON.

Yours truly, Sir,

W. H. J.

In your first letter you 'asserted,' but did not prove, the 'eternity of matter;' nor do I perceive that you have proved it in your second. On such a subject, as on all other subjects, it is always more easy to assert than to prove; and I must remind you that facility of assertion may be fatal to your cause. If the 'eternity of matter' is 'the basis of Atheism,' and you wish to

gain converts to your funereal system, you must furnish us with logical proofs that matter is eternal. We have all heard and read much about, and most of us have believed in, the triumphs of mind over matter, especially during the present century; but it seems we have been all mistaken, for, according to you, the 'eternity of matter thoroughly undermines all arguments for the existence of any other power in nature.' Matter, with you, is a power, and the only 'power in nature;' and no wonder, when you have chosen matter for your God; only it is rather unfortunate for your argument, that by a power, which it cannot control, and apparently cannot resist, it is every day dragged from the mine, the quarry, and the forest, and forced to answer ends which it could not originate, and never contemplated.

You rest the eternity of matter upon its indestructibility. But the indestructibility of matter' should not be written down a fact' at all, not to say, a fact of importance [in?] theology,' without some clear and indubitable evidence. Need I again remind you that it will not be enough to prove that we cannot destroy matter, or that we have no evidence that matter ever has been destroyed; as neither of these premises can support the conclusion which you would reach.

But even if you had succeeded, beyond the possibility of a doubt, in establishing the indestructibility of matter, would that be proof of its eternity? I think not. An event, of which man is the cause, as a fact in history, may be indestructible, but who would argue that it is, therefore, eternal. That Sebastopol has been besieged for nine months by the allied forces of France and England is a fact absolutely indestructible; but we all know that that is no evidence of its eternity. A thing, then, may be indestructible, and yet have begun to be. Illustrations can be found as numerous as the events of human life, and the facts of human history.

In choosing the 'eternity of matter' as the basis of your atheistic argument, you would do well to take account of the difficulties which press upon your position.

If matter be eternal, then it is omnipotent, absolute, self-existent, intelligent. But we have proof the clearest and the most indubitable that it is not intelligent. The conclusion is obvious.

The eternity of matter involves the eternity of the globe which we inhabit. But there is proof, in the present appearance of the earth, that it is not eternal. Suppose one particle to be washed from the peaks of the primary rocks in a million of years; the time would at length come when they would be reduced to the level of the surrounding soil, if, indeed, the wasting process would not reduce the entire surface of the earth to one dead level, which would everywhere be covered with water. Those mighty rocks, lifting up their rugged heads to heaven with a silent but lofty eloquence, demonstrate the non-eternity of the world, and serve as steps by which the human mind may rise to the Great Creator.

The present amount of the population of the earth furnishes another proof of its non-eternity. Though particular races, at given periods, may decline in numbers, population, on the whole, is of an increasive nature. There are vast tracts of land, which a few centures ago were without a single inhabitant, now giving full scope to the enterprise and energy of teeming thousands. Had the race been eternal these tracts of land would have been inhabited ages ago, every corner of the earth, capable of yielding food to man and beast, would have been crowded with living beings, yea, the world would have been too small to contain its inhabitants, and immense tracts of it would have become sepulchres of the dead. This has never been the case, and is far from being the case even now. The world is not half-populated. There are islands and almost continents that do not sustain one tithe of the inhabitants they might. There are millions of