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“ART. VII. — NATURAL THEOLOGY,” Quarterly Christian Spectator. Conducted by An Association of Gentlemen, vol. 10, no. 2 (May 1838), pp. 319–37; selection from pp. 322–4.
Anonymous
Published in New Haven, Connecticut, the Quarterly Christian Spectator was an orthodox magazine of the New England Presbyterians. Its first number was published in 1819, and apparently had been planned a few years earlier by Timothy Dwight and Lyman Beecher. The book under review, On Natural Theology was written by Thomas Chalmers (1780–1847). Chalmers was a St. Andrews educated Scottish theologian and preacher who lived and ministered in Kilmeny, Fife, and then Glasgow before taking up the chair of moral philosophy at the University of St. Andrews in 1823. Natural Theology had an American edition in New York in 1836. See Gaylord P. Albaugh, History and Annotated Bibliography of American Religious Periodicals and Newspapers (Worcester, 1994), pp. 786–9; API, pp. 187–8.
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In the two chapters immediately succeeding, the metaphysics which have been employed by Dr. Clarke in the proof of God, and by Hume in evading the proof, are considered. The argument of Clarke, that infinite space and eternal duration are necessary, involving a contradiction in the very supposition of their non-existence, and that consequently they must be the properties of a being, who is alike necessary, involving a like contradiction in the very supposition of his non-existence, — that is, of a self-existence and infinite being, — is represented as being subtle, rather than conclusive, and as operating, even if it were conclusive, by its very abstruseness, to impede, rather than favor conviction in the mass of minds. To the reply which is given to the argument of Hume, the author, in his preface, has requested the judgment of the more thoughtful of his readers. The argument of that infidel and atheistic writer is based on the position, that experience is necessary in order to ascertain the actual sequences in nature. The sequences are admitted to be established and invariable; but it is claimed, that the conjunction between any two terms in such a sequence, must be first observed by us, before we can infer at a future time, from the observation of only one of them, the existence of the other. Hence, as we never saw an instance of world-making, we have no experience on which we can found the conclusion, that the world has an antecedent or a maker. Reid and Stewart, in replying to this argument, have denied, that the inference of design, from its effects, is a result either of reasoning or experience, but have claimed, that it is founded on an intuitive judgment of the mind. But our author objects to the course taken by these philosophers, and chooses rather to base his reply on the very position of Hume, as being, in his view, the ground of truth:
‘We concede to him his own premises — even that we are not entitled to infer an antecedent from its consequent, unless we have before had the completed observation of both these terms and of the succession between them. We disclaim the aid of all new or questionable principles in meeting his objection, and would rest the argument a posteriori for the being of a God, on a strictly experimental basis.’ Vol. I. p. 138.
Passing over the slow process by which Dr. Chalmers strips, one after another, the non-essentials, first from the antecedent, and next from the consequent, in a specific sequence, we will present barely the sum of the argument: — An individual sees, in his own case, by consciousness, the connection between his own mind and some contrivance which springs from it; and from this experience he infers, when he sees a like contrivance executed by another, that it proceeded from a like antecedent, — a thinking and contriving mind in him; or when he sees the contrivance itself only, he infers, that some designing mind gave it its origin. Nor is the inference which thus began in his own experience, confined to one kind of mechanism or one kind of artificer; it matters not whether it be a watch, a house, or a steamboat, that is before him, or whether it proceeded from a carpenter, a joiner, or watchmaker; his inference, that it proceeded from a mind of commensurate wisdom and power, is but applying to the given case, the generality which lay in the germ of his first and constant experience of causation in the actings of his own mind. Though, therefore, the world is a singular and special effect, which he has not competent power to produce, and which he never saw produced by one that is competent; yet, his experience in its general conclusion, — that the adaptation of means to an end, springs from an intelligent mind, — clearly carries with it as a consequent, that it is an effect. He ascends by a sure stepping-stone, “from the seen handi-work of man, to the unseen handi-work of God;” for, the adaptation of means to an end, — that which is the essential thing in the sequent, established by his experience, — is as discernible in the framework of the world, as in any frame-work of human art.
In our view, the position of Hume, as he himself states and defends it, is untrue; for it implies, that for every special effect we must have observed the antecedent; whereas mankind universally infer from the inspection of a particular species of mechanism, that it sprung from an intelligent author, whether they ever contrived the same species themselves, or saw the same made by others. But as the position is modified and restricted by Chalmers to refer to a general sequent, — to the essential and not the circumstantial, found in special sequent, — it passes into a verity. At least, the power of the mind to produce mechanical contrivance, is so far a matter of experience at least, as that the power must first be called into exercise, either in adjusting the parts of some contrivance ourselves, or in comprehending some contrivance that is presented to us, before we see, by intuition, that the mind is the proper and real cause of contrivance. But, we think, the belief may be originated and sustained by the action of our minds in comprehending a piece of mechanism presented to our view, as truly as by the direct act of striking out an original contrivance. For the general truth, that it is mind which plans, which thinks, is as obvious to consciousness in comprehending, as it is in striking out a plan, — in following, as it is in guiding a train of thought. And the order of the world favors most the idea of this method of receiving our earliest convictions. For we begin existence, not as planners, contrivers, and inventors, so much as pupils; not in workshops, to perform or witness the varied elaborations of art, but in the family, with all the means and appliances of busy life around us.