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11 matching pages
Page 1 of 11903 · PDF PAGE 5
…ce on earth, however great, can pull a chord, however fine, into a horizontal line that shall be absolutely straight.” The definition of God as infinite therefore denies man implicitly; while if he be finite, there is an end of the usual Christian reasons for worship, though I dare- say I could myself discover some reasonably good ones. I hardly expect to be asked, somehow. The resulting equilibrium of God and man, des- tructive of worship, is of course absurd. We must reject it, unless we want to fall into Positivism, Material- ism, or somethi…
1903 · PDF PAGE 4
…o opinion. Let us consider the force-quality in the existences conceived of by these two religions ‘respectively, remem- bering that the God of the Christian is infinite, and yet discussing the alternative if we could suppose him to be a finite God. In any equilibrated system of forces, we may sum and represent them as a triangle or series of triangles which again resolve into one. In any moving system, if the resultant motion be applied in a contrary direction, the equilibrium can also thus be represented. And if any one of the original forces…
1903 · PDF PAGE 3
…m, Advaitism, and Dvaitism. Taking the ordinary hypothesis of the universe, that of its Infinity, or at any rate that of the infinity of God, or of the infinity of some substance or idea actually existing, we first come to the question of the possibility of the co-existence of God and man. The Christians, in the category of the existent, enumerate among other things, whose consideration we may discard for the purposes of this argument, God, an infinite being ; man; Satan and his angels; man certainly, and Satan presumably, finite beings. These …
1903 · PDF PAGE 6
…mathematical illusion that it does exist is what the Hindus call Maya. If, on the other hand, the matter-universe is infinite, Brahm and God are crowded out, and the possibility of religion is equally excluded. We may now shift our objective. The Hindus cannot account intelligibly, though they try hard, for Maya, the cause of all suffering. Their position is radically weak, but at least we may say for them that they have tried to square their religion with their common sense. The Christians, on the other hand, though they saw whither the Manich…
1903 · PDF PAGE 10
…s the circle opening out into the line.” The Christian dogma is really identical, for both conceive of a previous and eternally existing God, though the Qabalists hedge by describing this latent Deity as “Nor”. Later commentators, notably the illustrious MacGregorMathers, have explained this Not as Snegatively-existing”. Profound as is my respect for the intellectual and spiritual attainments of him whom I am proud to have been permitted to call my master, I am bound to express my view that when the Qabalists said Not, they meant Not, and nothi…
1903 · PDF PAGE 23
…ters of these various ideas, while explicitly affirming them, implicitly denied. Similarly, note that the Qaba- listic idea of a supreme God (and innumerable hierarchies) is quite compatible with this theory, provided that the supreme God is not infinite. Now as to our weapons. The more advanced Yogis of the Bast, like the Nonconformists at home, have pra- tically abandoned ceremonial as idle. I have yet to learn, however, by what dissenters have replaced it! I take this to be an error, except in the case of the very advanced Yogi. For there ex…
1903 · PDF PAGE 7
…D., * in his piteous and pitiful plaints against the logical results of the Advaitist School. But on his basal hypothesis of an infinite God; infinite space, time, and so on, no other conclusion is possible. Mr. Mansel is found in the impossible position of one who will neither give up his premisses nor dispute the validity of his logical processes, but who shrinks in horror from the inevitable conclusion ; he supposes there must be something. wrong somewhere, and concludes that the sole use of reason is to discover its own inferiority to faith…
1903 · PDF PAGE 17
…these are methods, bad or good, for extricating ourselves from the universe. Closely connected with this question is that of the will of God. People argue that an Infinite intelligence must have been at work on this cosmos. I reply No! ‘There is no intelligence at work worthy of the name. The Laws of Nature may be generalized in one—the Law of Inertia. Everything moves in the direction determined by the path of least resistance; species arise, develop, and die as their collective inertia determines; to this Law there is no exception but the dou…
1903 · PDF PAGE 14
12 by chance, chance in the truest sense of the term, we are found with gods, men, stars, planets, devils, colours, forces, and all the materials of the Cosmos.: and with time, space and causality, the conditions limiting and inyolving them all. Remember that it is not true to say that our 0° existed, nor that it did not exist. The idea of existence ‘was just as much unformulated as that of toasted cheese. But0? is a finite expression, or has a finite phase, and our universe is a finite universe ; its categories are themselves finite, and the e…
1903 · PDF PAGE 12
…he Pleroma, Parabrahma, or the Allah of the Unity-adoring followers of Mehammed. (To the Musulman fakir, Allah is by no means a personal God.) +I cannot here diseuss the propriety of representing the categories a& dimensfons, It-will be obvious to anystudent of the integeal calculi, OF {© anyone who appreciates the geometrical sigaincance of the rm X*
1903 · PDF PAGE 21
… opposites in a We have dismissed infinity as the figment of a morbid ‘mathematic: but in any case the same disproof applies to it as to'God.