[79] It is not admissible to urge against this the omnipresence of God, the existence of God in all things, or the existence of things in God. For, apart from the consideration that the future destruction of the world expresses clearly enough its existence outside of God, i.e., its non-divineness, God is in a special manner only in man; but I am at home only where I am specially at home. "Nowhere is God properly God, but in the soul. In all creatures there is something of God; but in the soul God exists completely, for it is his resting-place."--Predigten etzlicher Lehrer, &c., p. 19. And the existence of things in God, especially where it has no pantheistic significance, and any such is here excluded, is equally an idea without reality, and does not express the special sentiments of religion.
[80] Here is also the point where the Creation represents to us not only the Divine power, but also the Divine love. "Quia bonus est (Deus), sumus" (Augustin). In the beginning, before the world, God was alone. "Ante omnia Deus erat solus, ipsi sibi et mundus et locus et omnia. Solus autem; quia nihil extrinsecus præter ipsum" (Tertullian). But there is no higher happiness than to make another happy, bliss lies in the act of imparting. And only joy, only love imparts. Hence man conceives imparting love as the principle of existence. "Extasis bono non sinit ipsum manere in se ipso" (Dionysius A.). Everything positive establishes, attests itself, only by itself. The divine love is the joy of life, establishing itself, affirming itself. But the highest self-consciousness of life, the supreme joy of life is the love which confers happiness. God is the bliss of existence.
[81] In Diogenes (L. 1. ii. c. iii. § 6), it is literally, "for the contemplation of the sun, the moon and the heavens." Similar ideas were held by other philosophers. Thus the Stoics also said:--"Ipse autem homo ortus est ad mundum contemplandum et imitandum."--Cic. (de Nat.).
[82] "Hebræi numen verbo quidquid videtur efficiens describunt et quasi imperio omnia creata tradunt, ut facilitatem in eo quod vult efficiendo, summamque ejus in omnia potentiam ostendant."--Ps. xxxiii. 6. "Verbo Jehovæ coeli facti sunt."--Ps. cxlviii. 5. "Ille jussit eaque creata sunt."--J. Clericus (Comment, in Mosem. Genes, i. 3).
[83] Exod. xvi. 12.
[84] Gen. xxviii. 20.
[85] Exod. xxiv. 10, 11. "Tantum abest ut mortui sint, ut contra convivium hilares celebrarint."--Clericus.
[86] It is well known, however, that their opinions on this point were various. (See e.g. Aristoteles de Coelo, 1. i. c. 10.) But their difference is a subordinate one, since the creative agency itself is with them a more or less cosmical being.
[87] Deut. iv. 19. "Licet enim ea, quæ sunt in coelo, non sint hominum artificia, at hominum tamen gratia condita fuerunt. Ne quis igitur solem adoret, sed solis effectorem desideret."--Clemens Alex. (Coh. ad Gentes).
[88] But of course they only do this in the case of the "absolute religion;" for with regard to other religions they hold up the ideas and customs which are foreign to us, and of which we do not know the original meaning and purpose, as senseless and ludicrous. And yet, in fact, to worship the urine of cows, which the Parsees and Hindoos drink that they may obtain forgiveness of sins, is not more ludicrous than to worship the comb or a shred of the garment of the Mother of God.
[89] Wisd. xix. 6.
[90] See Gfrörer's Philo.
[91] We may here observe, that certainly the admiration of the power and glory of God in general, and so of Jehovah, as manifested in Nature, is in fact, though not in the consciousness of the Israelite, only admiration of the power and glory of Nature. (See, on this subject, P. Bayle, Ein Beitrag, &c., pp. 25-29.) But to prove this formally lies out of our plan, since we here confine ourselves to Christianity, i.e., the adoration of God in man (Deum colimus per Christum. Tertullian, Apolog. c. 21). Nevertheless, the principle of this proof is stated in the present work.
[92] "The greater part of Hebrew poetry, which is often held to be only spiritual, is political."--Herder.
[93] Sebastian Frank von Wörd in Zinkgrefs Apophthegmata deutscher Nation.
[94] It would be an imbecile objection to say that God fulfils only those wishes, those prayers, which are uttered in his name, or in the interest of the Church of Christ, in short, only the wishes which are accordant with his will; for the will of God is the will of man, or rather God has the power, man the will: God makes men happy, but man wills that he may be happy. A particular wish may not be granted; but that is of no consequence, if only the species, the essential tendency is accepted. The pious soul whose prayer has failed consoles himself, therefore, by thinking that its fulfilment would not have been salutary for him. "Nullo igitur modo vota aut preces sunt irritæ aut infrugiferæ et recte dicitur, in petitione rerum corporalium aliquando Deum exaudire nos, non ad voluntatem nostram, sed ad salutem."--Oratio de Precatione, in Declamat. Melancthonis, Th. iii.
[95] Ja-wort.
[95] Ja-wort.
[96] Also, on subjective grounds, social prayer is more effectual than isolated prayer. Community enhances the force of emotion, heightens confidence. What we are unable to do alone we are able to do with others. The sense of solitude is the sense of limitation: the sense of community is the sense of freedom. Hence it is that men, when threatened by the destructive powers of Nature, crowd together. "Multorum preces impossibile est, ut non impetrent, inquit Ambrosius...Sanctæ orationis fervor quanto inter plures collectior tanto ardet diutius ac intensius cor divinum penetrat...Negatur singularitati, quod conceditur charitati."--Sacra Hist. de Gentis Hebr. ortu. P. Paul. Mezger. Aug. Vind. 1700, pp. 668, 669.
[97] In the excellent work, Theanthropos, eine Reihe von Aphorismen (Zurich, 1838), the idea of the sense of dependence, of omnipotence, of prayer, and of love, is admirably developed.
[98] Luther (Th. xv. p. 282; Th. xvi. pp. 491-493).
[99] "God is Almighty; but he who believes is a God." Luther (in Chr. Kapps Christus u. die Weltgeschichte, s. 11). In another place Luther calls faith the "Creator of the Godhead;" it is true that he immediately adds, as he must necessarily do on his standpoint, the following limitation:--"Not that it creates anything in the Divine Eternal Being, but that it creates that Being in us" (Th. xi. p. 161).
[100] This belief is so essential to the Bible, that without it the biblical writers can scarcely be understood. The passage 2 Pet. iii. 8, as is evident from the tenor of the whole chapter, says nothing in opposition to an immediate destruction of the world; for though with the Lord a thousand years are as one day, yet at the same time one day is as a thousand years, and therefore the world may, even by to-morrow, no longer exist. That in the Bible a very near end of the world is expected and prophesied, although the day and hour are not determined, only falsehood or blindness can deny. (See on this subject Lützelberger.) Hence religious Christians, in almost all times, have believed that the destruction of the world is near at hand--Luther, for example, often says that "The last day is not far off" (e.g., Th. xvi. p. 26);--or at least their souls have longed for the end of the world, though they have prudently left it undecided whether it be near or distant. See Augustin (de Fine Sæculi ad Hesychium, c. 13).
[101] Gen. xviii. 14.
[102] "To the whole world it is impossible to raise the dead, but to the Lord Christ, not only is it not impossible, but it is no trouble or labour to him...This Christ did as a witness and a sign that he can and will raise from death. He does it not at all times and to every one...It is enough that he has done it a few times; the rest he leaves to the last day."--Luther (Th. xvi. p. 518). The positive, essential significance of miracle is therefore that the divine nature is the human nature. Miracles confirm, authenticate doctrine. What doctrine? Simply this, that God is a Saviour of men, their Redeemer out of all trouble, i.e., a being corresponding to the wants and wishes of man, and therefore a human being. What the God-man declares in words, miracle demonstrates ad oculos by deeds.
[103] This satisfaction is certainly so far limited, that it is united to religion, to faith in God: a remark which however is so obvious as to be superfluous. Hut this limitation is in fact no limitation, for God himself is unlimited, absolutely satisfied, self-contented human feeling.
[104] The legends of Catholicism--of course only the best, the really pleasing ones--are, as it were, only the echo of the keynote which predominates in this New Testament narrative. Miracle might be fitly defined as religious humour. Catholicism especially has developed miracle on this its humorous side.
[105] Culture in the sense in which it is here taken. It is highly characteristic of Christianity, and a popular proof of our positions, that the only language in which the Divine Spirit was and is held to reveal himself in Christianity is not the language of a Sophocles or a Plato, of art and philosophy, but the vague, unformed, crudely emotional language of the Bible.
[106] Many miracles may realty have had originally a physical or physiological phenomenon as their foundation. But we are here considering only the religious significance and genesis of miracle.
[107] "If Adam had not fallen into sin, nothing would have been known of the cruelty of wolves, lions, bears, &c., and there would not have been in all creation anything vexatious and dangerous to man...; no thorns, or thistles, or diseases...; his brow would not have been wrinkled; no foot, or hand, or other member of the body would have been feeble or infirm."--"But now, since the Fall, we all know and feel what a fury lurks in our flesh, which not only burns and rages with lust and desire, but also loathes, when once obtained, the very thing it has desired. But this is the fault of original sin, which has polluted all creatures; wherefore I believe that before the Fall the sun was much brighter, water much clearer, and the land much richer, and fuller of all sorts of plants."--Luther (Th. i. s. 322, 323, 329, 337).
[108] "Tantum denique abest incesti cupido, ut nonnullis rubori sit etiam pudica conjunctio."--M. Felicis, Oct. c. 31. One Father was so extraordinarily chaste that he had never seen a woman's face, nay, he dreaded even touching himself, "se quoque ipsum attingere quodammodo horrebat." Another Father had so fine an olfactory sense in this matter, that on the approach of an unchaste person he perceived an insupportable odour.--Bayle (Dict. Art. Mariana Rem. C.). But the supreme, the divine principle of this hyperphysical delicacy is the Virgin Mary; hence the Catholics name her Virginum Gloria, Virginitatis corona, Virginitatis typus et forma puritatis, Virginum vexillifera, Virginitatis magistra, Virginum prima, Virginitatis primiceria.
[109] "Salve sancta parens, enixa puerpera Regem, Gaudia matris habens cum virginitatis honore."
Theol. Schol. Mezger. t. iv. p. 132.
[111] See on this subject Philos. und Christenthum, by L. Feuerbach.
[112] In relation to this, the confession of Augustine is interesting: "Ita fluctuo inter periculum voluptatis et experimentum salubritatis: magisque adducor...cantandi cousuetudinem approbare in ecclesia, ut per oblectamenta aurium infirmior animus in affectum pietatis assurgat. Tamen cum mihi accidit, ut nos amplius cantus, quam res quæ canitur moveat, poenaliter me peccare confiteor."--Confess. l. x. c. 33.
[114] "Because God has given us his Son, he has with him given us everything, whether it be called devil, sin, hell, heaven, righteousness, life; all, all must be ours, because the Son is ours as a gift, in whom all else is included."--Luther (Th. xv. p. 311). "The best part of the resurrection has already happened; Christ, the head of all Christendom, has passed through death and risen from the dead. Moreover, the most excellent part of me, my soul, has likewise passed through death, and is with Christ in the heavenly being. What harm, then, can death and the grave do me?"--Luther (Th. xvi. p. 235). "A Christian man has equal power with Christ, has fellowship with him and a common tenure." (Th. xiii. p. 648.) "Whoever cleaves to Christ has as much as he." (Th. xvi. p. 574.)
[115] This exhibits clearly the untruthfulness and vanity of the modern speculations concerning the personality of God. If you are not ashamed of a personal God, do not be ashamed of a corporeal God. An abstract colourless personality, a personality without flesh and blood, is an empty shade.
[116] Concordienb. Erklär. Art. 8.
[117] This was excellently shown by Faustus Socinus. See his Defens. Animadv. in Assert. Theol. Coll. Posnan. de trino et uno Deo. Irenopoli, 1656, c. 11.
[118] Let the reader examine, with reference to this, the writings of the Christian orthodox theologians against the heterodox; for example, against the Socinians. Modern theologians, indeed, agree with the latter, as is well known, in pronouncing the divinity of Christ as accepted by the Church to be unbiblical; but it is undeniably the characteristic principle of Christianity, and even if it does not stand in the Bible in the form which is given to it by dogma, it is nevertheless a necessary consequence of what is found in the Bible. A being who is the fulness of the Godhead bodily, who is omniscient (John xvi. 30) and almighty (raises the dead, works miracles), who is before all things, both in time and rank, who has life in himself (though an imparted life) like as the Father has life in himself,--what, if we follow out the consequences, can such a being be, but God? "Christ is one with the Father in will;"--but unity of will presupposes unity of nature. "Christ is the ambassador, the representative of God;"--but God can only be represented by a divine being. I can only choose as my representative one in whom I find the same or similar qualities as in myself; otherwise I belie myself.
[119] "How much better is it that I should lose the whole world than that I should lose God, who created the world, and can create innumerable worlds, who is better than a hundred thousand, than innumerable worlds? For what sort of a comparison is that of the temporal with the eternal?...One soul is better than the whole world."--Luther (Th. xix. p. 21).
[120] It is true that the heathen philosophers also, as Plato, Socrates, the Stoics (see e.g. J. Lipsius, Physiol. Stoic. l. i. diss. xi.), believed that the divine providence extended not merely to the general, but also to the particular, the individual; but they identified providence with Nature, law, necessity. The Stoics, who were the orthodox speculatists of heathenism, did indeed believe in miracles wrought by providence (Cic. de Nat. Deor. l. ii. and De Divinat. l. i.); but their miracles had no such supranaturalistic significance as those of Christianity, though they also appealed to the supranaturalistic axiom: "Nihil est quod Deus efficere non possit."
[121] "Dicimur amare et Deus; dicimur nosse et Deus. Et multa in hunc modum. Sed Deus amat ut charitas, novit ut veritas, etc."--Bernard, (de Consider. l. v.).
[122] It is true that in one sense the individual is the absolute--in the phraseology of Leibnitz, the mirror of the universe, of the infinite. But in so far as there are many individuals, each is only a single, and, as such, a finite mirror of the infinite. It is true also, in opposition to the abstraction of a sinless man, that each individual regarded in himself is perfect, and only by comparison imperfect, for each is what alone he can be.
[123] With the Hindoos (Inst. of Menu) he alone is "a perfect man who consists of three united persons, his wife, himself, and his son. For man and wife, and father and son, are one." The Adam of the Old Testament also is incomplete without woman; he feels his need of her. But the Adam of the New Testament, the Christian, heavenly Adam, the Adam who is constituted with a view to the destruction of this world, has no longer any sexual impulses or functions.
[124] "Hæ sane vires amicitiæ mortis contemptum ingenerare...potuerunt: quibus pene tantum venerationis, quantum Deorum immortalium ceremoniis debetur. Illis enim publica salus, his privata continetur."--Valerius Max. l. iv. c. 7.
[125] "The life for God is not this natural life, which is subject to decay...Ought we not then to sigh after future things, and be averse to all these temporal things?...Wherefore we should find consolation in heartily despising this life and this world, and from our hearts sigh for and desire the future honour and glory of eternal life."--Luther (Th. i. s. 466, 467).
[126] "Eo dirigendus est spiritus, quo aliquando est iturus."--Meditat. Sacræ Joh. Gerhardi. Med. 46.
[127] "Affectanti coelestia, terrena non sapiunt. Æternis inhianti, fastidio sunt transitoria."--Bernard. (Epist. Ex Persona Heliæ Monachi ad Parentes). "Nihil nostra refert in hoc ævo, nisi de eo quam celeriter excedere."--Tertullian (Apol. adv. Gentes, c. 41). "Wherefore a Christian man should rather be advised to bear sickness with patience, yea, even to desire that death should come,--the sooner the better. For, as St. Cyprian says, nothing is more for the advantage of a Christian than soon to die. But we rather listen to the pagan Juvenal when he says: 'Orandum est ut sit mens sana in corpore sano.'"--Luther (Th. iv. s. 15).
[128] "Ille perfectus est qui mente et corpore a seculo est elongatus."--De Modo Bene Vivendi ad Sororem, s. vii. (Among the spurious writings of St. Bernard.)
[129] On this subject see "Hieronymus, de Vita Pauli Primi Eremitæ."
[130] Naturally Christianity had only such power when, as Jerome writes to Demetrius, Domini nostri adhuc calebat cruor et fervebat recens in credentibus fides. See also on this subject G. Arnold.--Von der ersten Christen Genügsamkeit u. Verschmähung alles Eigennutzes, l. c. B. iv. c. 12, § 7-16.
[131] How far otherwise the ancient Christians! "Difficile, imo impossibile est, ut et præsentibus quis et futuris fruatur bonis."--Hieronymus (Epist. Juliano). "Delicatus es, frater, si et hic vis gaudere cum seculo et postea regnare cum Christo."--Ib. (Epist. ad Heliodorum). "Ye wish to have both God and the creature together, and that is impossible. Joy in God and joy in the creature cannot subsist together."--Tauler (ed. c. p. 334). But they were abstract Christians. And we live now in the age of conciliation. Yes, truly!
[132] "Perfectum autem esse nolle delinquere est."--Hieronymus (Epist. ad Heliodorum de laude Vitæ solit.). Let me observe once for all that I interpret the biblical passages concerning marriage in the sense in which they have been interpreted by the history of Christianity.
[133] "The marriage state is nothing new or unwonted, and is lauded and held good even by heathens according to the judgment of reason."--Luther (Th. ii. p. 377a).
[134] "Præsumendum est hos qui intra paradisum recipi volunt debere cessare ab ea re, a qua paradisus intactus est."--Tertullian (de Exhort. cast. c. 13). "Coelibatus angelorum est imitatio."--Jo. Damasceni (Orthod. Fidei, l. iv. c. 25).
[135] "Quæ non nubit, soli Deo dat operam et ejus cura non dividitur; pudica autem, quæ nupsit, vitam cum Deo et cum marito dividit."--Clemens Alex. (Pædag. l. ii.).
[136] Thomas à Kempis de Imit. (l. ii. c. 7, c. 8, l. iii. c. 5, c. 34, c. 53, c. 59). "Felix illa conscientia et beata virginitas, in cujus corde præter amorem Christi...nullus alius versatur amor."--Hieronymus (Demetriadi, Virgini Deo consecratæ).
[137] "Divisa est...mulier et virgo. Vide quantæ felicitatis sit, quæ et nomen sexus amiserit. Virgo jam mulier non vocatur."--Hieronymus (adv. Helvidium de perpet. Virg. p. 14. Th. ii. Erasmus).
[138] This may be expressed as follows: Marriage has in Christianity only a moral, no religious significance, no religious principle and exemplar. It is otherwise with the Greeks, where, for example, "Zeus and Here are the great archetype of every marriage" (Creuzer, Symbol.); with the ancient Parsees, where procreation, as "the multiplication of the human race, is the diminution of the empire of Ahriman," and thus a religious art and duty (Zend-Avesta); with the Hindoos, where the son is the regenerated father. Among the Hindoos no regenerate man could assume the rank of a Sanyassi, that is, of an anchorite absorbed in God, if he had not previously paid three debts, one of which was that he had had a legitimate son. Amongst the Christians, on the contrary, at least the Catholics, it was a true festival of religious rejoicing when betrothed or even married persons--supposing that it happened with mutual consent--renounced the married state and sacrificed conjugal to religious love.
[139] Inasmuch as the religious consciousness restores everything which it begins by abolishing, and the future life is ultimately nothing else than the present life re-established, it follows that sex must be re-established. "Erunt...similes angelorum. Ergo homines non desinent...ut apostolus apostolus sit et Maria Maria."--Hieronymus (ad Theodorum Viduam). But as the body in the other world is an incorporeal body, so necessarily the sex there is one without difference, i.e., a sexless sex.
[140] "Bene dicitur, quod tunc plene videbimus eum sicuti est, cum similes ei erimus, h. e. erimus quod ipse est. Quibus enim potestas data est filios Dei fieri, data est potestas, non quidem ut sint Deus, sed sint tamen quod Deus est: sint sancti, futuri plene beati, quod Deus est. Nec aliunde hic sancti. nec ibi futuri beati, quam ex Deo qui eorum et sanctitas et beatitudo est."--De Vita solitar a (among the spurious writings of St. Bernard). "Finis autem bonæ voluntatis beatitudo est: vita æterna ipse Deus."--Augustin. (ap. Petrus Lomb. l. ii. dist. 38, c. 1). "The other man will be renovated in the spiritual life, i.e., will become a spiritual man, when he shall be restored into the image of God. For he will be like God, in life, in righteousness, glory, and wisdom."--Luther (Th. i. p. 324).
[141] "Si bonum est habere corpus incorruptible, quare hoc facturum Deum volumus dasperere?"--Augustinus (Opp. Antwerp, 1700, Th. v. p. 698).
[142] "Quare dicitur spiritale corpus, nisi quia ad nutum spiritus serviet? Nihil tibi contradicet ex te, nihil in te rebellabit adversus te...Ubi volueris, eris...Credere enim debemus talia corpora nos habituros, ut ubi velimus, quando voluerimus, ibi simus."--Augustinus (l. c. pp. 703, 705). "Nihil indecorum ibi erit, summma pax erit, nihil discordans, nihil montruosum, nihil quod offendat adspectum" (l. c. 707). "Nisi beatus, non vivit ut vult." (De Civ. Dei, l. 14, c. 25.)
[143] And their conceptions of God are just as heterogeneous. The pious Germans have a German God, the pious Spaniards a Spanish God, the French a French God. The French actually have the proverb: "Le bon Dieu est Français." In fact, polytheism must exist so long as there are various nations. The real God of a people is the point d'honneur of its nationality.
[144] "Ibi nostra spes erit res."--Augustin. "Therefore we have the first fruits of immortal life in hope, until perfection comes at the last day, wherein we shall see and feel the life we have believed in and hoped for."--Luther (Th. i. s. 459).
[145] According to old books of travel, however, there are many tribes which do not believe that the future is identical with the present, or that it is better, but that it is even worse. Parny (OEuv. Chois. t. i. Melang.) tells of a dying negro-slave who refused the inauguration to immortality by baptism in these words: "Je ne veux point d'une autre vie, car peut-être y serais-je encore votre esclave."
[146] Ahlwardt (Ossian Anm. zu Carthonn.).
[147] There everything will be restored. "Qui modo vivit, erit, nec me vel dente, vel ungue fraudatum revomet patefacti fossa sepulchri."--Aurelius Prud. (Apotheos. de Resurr. Carnis Hum.). And this faith, which you consider rude and carnal, and which you therefore disavow, is the only consistent, honest, and true faith. To the identity of the person belongs the identity of the body.
[148] "Neque enim post resurrectionem tempus diebus ac noctibus numerabitur. Erit magis una dies sine vespere."--Joh. Damascen. (Orth. Fidei l. ii. c. 1).
[149] "Ipsum (corpus) erit et non ipsum erit."--Augustinus (v. J. Ch. Doederlein, Inst. Theol. Christ. Altorf, 1781, § 280).
[150] "Præter salutem tuam nihil cogites; solum quæ Dei sunt cures."--Thomas à K. (de Imit. l. i. c. 23). "Contra salutem proprium cogites nihil. Minus dixi: contra, præter dixisse debueram."--Bernhardus (de Consid. ad Eugenium Pontif. Max. l. ii.). "Qui Deum quærit, de propria salute sollicitus est."--Clemens Alex. (Cohort. ad Gent.).
[151] Here and in other parts of this work, theory is taken in the sense in which it is the source of true objective activity,--the science which gives birth to art,--for man can do only so much as he knows: "tantum potest quantum scit."
[152] Concerning the biblical conceptions of Satan, his power and works, see Lützelberger's "Grundzüge der Paulinischen Glaubenslehre," and G. Ch. Knapp's "Vorles. über d. Christl. Glaubensl.," § 62-65. To this subject belongs demoniacal possession, which also has its attestation in the Bible. See Knapp (§ 65, iii. 2, 3).
[153] Doubtless, this unveiling of the mystery of predestination will be pronounced atrocious, impious, diabolical. I have nothing to allege against this; I would rather be a devil in alliance with truth, than an angel in alliance with falsehood.
[154] A kindred doctrine is that of the Concursus Dei, according to which, God not only gives the first impulse, but also co-operates in the agency of the second cause. For the rest, this doctrine is only a particular form of the contradictory dualism between God and Nature, which runs through the history of Christianity. On the subject of this remark, as of the whole paragraph, see Strauss: Die Christliche Glaubenslehre, B. ii. § 75, 76.
[155] "Dum sumus in hoc corpore, peregrinamur ab eo qui summe est."--Bernard. Epist. 18 (ed. Basle, 1552). "As long as we live, we are in the midst of death."--Luther (Th. i. p. 331). The idea of the future life is therefore nothing else than the idea of true, perfected religion, freed from the limits and obstructions of this life,--the future life, as has been already said, nothing but the true opinion and disposition, the open heart, of religion. Here we believe--there we behold; i.e., there there is nothing besides God, and thus nothing between God and the soul; but only for this reason, that there ought to be nothing between them, because the immediate union of God and the soul is the true opinion and desire of religion. "We have as yet so to do with God as with one hidden from us, and it is not possible that in this life we should hold communion with him face to face. All creatures are now nothing else than vain masks, under which God conceals himself, and by which he deals with us."--Luther (Th. xi. p. 70). "If thou wert only free from the images of created things, thou mightest have God without intermission."--Tauler (l. c. p. 313).
[156] "Voluntate igitur Dei immobilis manet et stat in seculum terra...et voluntate Dei movetur et nutat. Non ergo fundamentis suis nixa subsistit, nec fulcris suis stabilis perseverat, sed Dominus statuit eam et firmamento voluntatis suæ continet, quia in manu ejus omnes fines terræ."--Ambrosius (Hexæmeron. l. i. c. 61).
[157] It is only unbelief in the efficacy of prayer which has subtly limited prayer to spiritual matters.
[158] According to the notion of barbarians, therefore, prayer is a coercive power, a charm. But this conception is an unchristian one (although even among many Christians the idea is accepted that prayer constrains God); for in Christianity God is essentially feeling satisfied in itself, Almighty goodness, which denies nothing to (religious) feeling. The idea of coercion presupposes an unfeeling God.
[159] "Natura enim remota providentia et potestate divina prorsus nihil est."--Lactantius (Div. Inst. lib. 3, c. 28). "Omnia quæ creata sunt, quamvis ea Deus fecerit valde bona, Creatori tamen comparata, nec bona sunt, cui comparata nec sunt; altissime quippe et proprio modo quodam de se ipso dixit: Ego sum, qui sum."--Augustinus (de Perfectione Just. Hom. c. 14).
[160] "Pulchras formas et varias, nitidos et amoenos colores amant oculi. Non teneant hæc animam meam; teneat eam Deus qui hæc fecit, bona quidem valde, sed ipse est bonum meum, non hæc."--Augustinus (Confess. l. x. c. 34). "Vetiti autem sumus (2 Cor. iv. 18.) converti ad ea quæ videntur...Amandus igitur solus Deus est: omnis vero iste mundus, i.e. omnia sensibilia contemnenda, utendum autem his ad hujus vitæ necessitatem."--Ib. de Moribus Eccl. Cathol. l. i. c. 20.
[161] At the same time, however, their result is to prove the nature of man. The various proofs of the existence of God are nothing else than various highly interesting forms in which the human nature affirms itself. Thus, for example, the physico-theological proof (or proof from design) is the self-affirmation of the calculated activity of the understanding. Every philosophic system is, in this sense, a proof of the existence of God.
[162] "Christ is ascended on high,...that is, he not only sits there above, but he is also here below. And he is gone thither to the very end that he might be here below, and fill all things, and be in all places, which he could not do while on earth, for here he could not be seen by all bodily eyes. Therefore he sits above, where every man can see him, and he has to do with every man."--Luther (Th. xiii. p. 643). That is to say: Christ or God is an object, an existence, of the imagination; in the imagination he is limited to no place,--he is present and objective to every one. God exists in heaven, but is for that reason omnipresent; for this heaven is the imagination.
[163] "Thou hast not to complain that thou art less experienced than was Abraham or Isaac. Thou also hast appearances...Thou hast holy baptism, the supper of the Lord, the bread and wine, which are figures and forms, under and in which the present God speaks to thee, and acts upon thee, in thy ears, eyes, and heart...He appears to thee in baptism, and it is he himself who baptizes thee, and speaks to thee...Everything is full of divine appearances and utterances, if he is on thy side."--Luther (Th. ii. p. 466. See also on this subject, Th. xix. p. 407).
[164] The denial of a fact is not a matter of indifference; it is something morally evil,--a disowning of what is known to be true. Christianity made its articles of faith objective, i.e., undeniable, unassailable facts, thus overpowering the reason, and taking the mind prisoner by the force of external reality: herein we have the true explanation why and how Christianity, Protestant as well as Catholic, enunciated and enforced with all solemnity the principle, that heresy--the denial of an idea or a fact which forms an article of faith--is an object of punishment by the temporal power, i.e., a crime. What in theory is an external fact becomes in practice an external force. In this respect Christianity is far below Mohammedanism, to which the crime of heresy is unknown.
[165] "Præsentiam sæpe divi suam declarant."--Cicero (de Nat. D. 1. ii.). Cicero's works (de Nat. D. and de Divinatione) are especially interesting, because the arguments there used for the reality of the objects of pagan faith are virtually the same as those urged in the present day by theologians and the adherents of positive religion generally for the reality of the objects of Christian faith.
[166] "Quod crudeliter ab hominibus sine Dei jussu fieret aut factum est, id debuit ab Hebrais fieri, quia a deo vitæ et necis summo arbitrio, jussi bellum ita gerebant."--J. Clericus (Comm. in Mos. Num. c. 31, 7). "Multa gessit Samson, quæ vix possent defendi, nisi Dei, a quo homines pendent, instrumentum fuisse censeatur."--Ib. (Comm. in Judicum, c. 14, 19). See also Luther, e.g. (Th. i. p. 339, Th. xvi. p. 495).
[167] It was very justly remarked by the Jansenists against the Jesuits: "Vouloir reconnoitre dans l'Ecriture quelque chose de la foiblesse et de l'esprit naturel de l'homme, c'est donner la liberté à chacun d'en faire le discernment et de rejetter ce qui lui plaira de l'Ecriture, comme venant plûtot de la foiblesse de l'homme que de l'esprit de Dieu."--Bâyle (Dict. art. Adam (Jean) Rem. E.).
[168] "Nec in scriptura divina fas sit sentire aliquid contrarietatis."--Petrus L. (l. ii. dist. ii. c. i.). Similar thoughts are found in the Fathers.
[169] This is especially apparent in the superlative, and the preposition super, hyper, which distinguish the divine predicates, and which very early--as, for example, with the Neo-Platonists, the Christians among heathen philosophers--played a chief part in theology.
[170] "Scit itaque Deus, quanta sit multitudo pulicum, culicum, muscarum et piscium et quot nascantur, quotve moriantur, sed non scit hoc per momenta singula, imo simul et semel omnia."--Petrus L. (l. i. dist. 39, c. 3).
[171] "Qui scientem cuncta sciunt, quid nescire nequeunt?"--Liber Meditat. c. 26 (among the spurious writings of Augustine).
[173] "The closest union which Christ possessed with the Father, it is possible for me to win...All that God gave to his only-begotten Son, he has given to me as perfectly as to him."--Predigten etzlicher Lehrer vor und zu Tauleri Zeiten. Hamburg, 1621, p. 14. "Between the only-begotten Son and the soul there is no distinction."--Ib. p. 68.
[174] "God can as little do without us as we without him."--Predigten etzlicher Lehrer, &c., p. 16. See also on this subject--Strauss, Christl. Glaubensl. B. i. § 47, and the author's work entitled, P. Bayle, pp. 104, 107.
[175] "This temporal, transitory life in this world (i.e., natural life) we have through God, who is the almighty Creator of heaven and earth. But the eternal untransitory life we have through the Passion and Resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ...Jesus Christ a Lord over that life."--Luther (Th. xvi. s. 459).
[176] It is curious to observe how the speculative religious philosophy undertakes the defence of the Trinity against the godless understanding, and yet, by doing away with the personal substances, and explaining the relation of Father and Son as merely an inadequate image borrowed from organic life, robs the Trinity of its very heart and soul. Truly, if the cabalistic artifices which the speculative religious philosophy applies in the service of the absolute religion were admissible in favour of finite religions, it would not be difficult to squeeze the Pandora's box of Christian dogmatics out of the horns of the Egyptian Apis. Nothing further would be needed for this purpose than the ominous distinction of the understanding from the speculative reason,--a distinction which is adapted to the justification of every absurdity.