1848.]

Constitution of Spiritual Beings.

633

nite caution that too much time is spent under the mere guidance of the grammar and the dictionary. Our youth sometimes become better verbal critics than theologians. I have no doubt of the learning, the earnestness and the sincerity of our accredited teachers. To suggest vague suspicions is a miserable employment. But if there be any danger, let a most acute observer warn us, who is now in his grave.

ARTICLE III.

OF SPIRIT AND THE CONSTITUTION OF SPIRITUAL BEINGS.

By George I. Chace, Prof. of Chemistry and Geology, Brown University.

In a former number of this Review, we laid before its readers, what we believed to be the true view of the constitution of matter. We endeavored to show, that in accordance with the principles of sound logic, it must be regarded as having a real existence, as possessing inherent, constitutional properties, and as acting by virtue of those properties. As such a constitution of matter, would at first view, seem to place all physical events under the control of an iron necessity, leaving no room for the influence of prayer or the exercise of that superintending Providence, which according to the teachings of our holy religion, God continually extends over the affairs of this world, it may be well before entering upon the subject of our present Article, to notice briefly, what, were it true, would constitute so serious an objection to the view taken. In doing so, however, we would say at the outset, that we do not propose considering whether it be possible to reconcile this idea of matter with the above Christian doctrines, but whether it presents in connection with those doctrines, any peculiar difficulties which do not equally attach themselves to any other hypothesis capable of explaining the phenomena. Unless this latter question can be answered in the affirmative, the objection, so far as we are concerned, has no weight.

Now we think it is clear that no practical conclusions whatever can be drawn from the supposition, that all the changes of the external world, are brought about by the spontaneous reaction of the elements composing it, which may not, in like manner, be deduced from that established order which we everywhere observe in the succession VOL. V. No. 20.

54

of events, which lies at the foundation of all the sciences, and without which we could have no knowledge beyond the sphere of our own immediate consciousness. The continual manifestations of power, which present themselves on every side to our observation, do not occur isolated, but linked to one another so as to form one continuous chain of antecedents and consequents, extending through every part of nature, and binding together all her phenomena,-a chain which no created power can loose, which only a miracle can break. It is obviously the same thing to us, whether this fixed order in the succession of events, these established connections among phenomena, are constantly maintained by the direct and unceasing exertion of the Divine power, or whether they were at once provided for, and ever after secured in the original constitution of matter. In both cases, too, the phenomena are alike caused by God, are equally an unfolding of his conceptions, a fulfilling of his will. It makes no difference as to the question of a Divine providence or of the influence of prayer, whether we suppose God to be each moment evolving the changes of the universe in accordance with a preconceived plan and in subordination to preëstablished laws, or whether we suppose Him, in the beginning, to have so framed the constitution of things, as to cause the spontaneous development of these changes, in accordance with the same plan and in subordination to the same laws. On either supposition, the subject presents to our understandings difficulties which can be removed only by admitting in the Divine being, a prescience infinitely beyond our powers of comprehension, enabling Him from the beginning to look down the mighty chain of physical events, through all its ramifications and connections, and thus to foresee the little as well as the great, and to provide for the accomplishment of his special as well as his general purposes.

It may be urged as a further objection to our view of the constitution of matter, that it places the Divine being in a state of inactive repose, leaving Him with nothing more to do, after having finished the work of creation.

Were this so, we reply, it would furnish no valid objection to the doctrine. Our knowledge of the Divine nature, and modes of existence and action, is too imperfect; in forming our ideas of them, we are obliged to reason too exclusively from ourselves, to justify us in drawing any conclusions from this source. The teachings of the Holy Scriptures, so far as they may be conceived to have a bearing upon the question, would seem rather to favor the idea of periods of creative energy and labor, succeeded by others of comparative rest. Such at least is the view presented in the account given by the inspired

1848.]

Spirit invisible and intangible.

635

historian, of the fitting up of our globe for becoming the abode of living beings, and of the formation of the different tribes of plants and animals designed to occupy it. The same idea is also repeatedly alluded to and recognized in other portions of the sacred writings.

But not to press an inference of this kind, beyond what the acknowledged principles of interpretation may be deemed to warrant, we say further, that a state of inactivity or repose on the part of Deity is by no means implied in the doctrine of the real existence of the universe and the spontaneous evolution of its phenomena. There may be, and doubtless are other modes of exerting the Divine power, beside the creation and endowment of material atoms. Of one of these, indeed, we have abundant evidence in the past history of our own planet. Again and again, as we learn from the teachings of modern geology, have the Divine wisdom and power been interposed in the creation of new forms of animal and vegetable life, adapted in their organization to the new conditions which have arisen, one after another, upon the earth's surface, during the slow progress of its gradual and successive developments. Similar interpositions have also taken place at later periods in its history, subsidiary to that moral and social progression, which it seems to have been the purpose of God to establish upon the earth, after having terminated by the formation of man, the long line of physical advances. What has been the history of our own world, in both of these respects, may be the history of innumerable others. Nay further; creation itself, for aught we know, may be a progressive work. In some far off region of space, beyond the reach of human eye, beyond the utmost bound of telescopic vision, away on the outskirts of the existing creation, new worlds, and systems of worlds, may be continually arising, under the fiat of the same almighty power which spake our own into being. And as space is infinite, the boundaries of the universe may go on constantly enlarging, as long as time shall continue, or until they at length shall have reached the limit proposed for them in the Divine mind. But we cannot pursue these thoughts. Enough has been said, we think, to answer fully the objection considered, and it is time we proceeded to an examination of the subject which we have placed at the head of our Article.

When we enter upon the investigation of matter, we have at our command means for determining its constitution and properties, which do not offer themselves, in the case of spirit. We can see and feel it. We can weigh and measure it. We can alter its form. We can change its place. We can demonstrate its presence, or we can prove its absence. We may cause it to enter into combination, or to under

go decomposition. We may subject it to all the tests of mechanical and chemical experiment.

So

The case is widely different, however, when we come to the investigation of spirit. This is invisible and intangible. It does not address any of the senses. It has neither weight nor form nor dimensions. Nor does it possess any properties by which we can determine its locality, from which we can prove its absence or demonstrate its presence, in any given place. We have no power over it. We can effect no changes in it. We cannot collect it. We cannot confine it. We cannot subject it to any form of experiment. We can only take note of its phenomena, as they are revealed to us in our own consciousness, or as we see them indicated by the actions of others. We may collect, compare and classify these phenomena. We may refer them to distinct powers or faculties, in the beings by which they are manifested. But we can derive no information from them, concerning the actual principle or essence from which they are evolved. entirely is this concealed from us, that we are in danger of overlooking its existence, and of referring the manifestations which we witness, to a mere assemblage of powers and capabilities, without considering that those powers and capabilities must have that in which they reside and to which they belong. Indeed, we are inclined to think that most persons, when they endeavor to form a conception of spirit, leave out altogether the idea of substance, and content themselves with coupling a vague notion of energy and power, with the exclusion of every attribute of materiality. Their idea of it, is made up rather of negations, than of any positive qualities. They suppose it to have no form, no extension, to hold none of those relations to space, which necessarily belong to every form of visible, tangible matter. In addition to this, they conceive it to be essentially active, and to possess the attributes of will, memory and affection, which raise it far above all material analogies.

Now that which possesses these, or any of the other properties or endowments of spirit, as a moment's reflection will convince any one, must have a real, substantial existence; an existence as positive and certain as if it could be seen and felt and handled; as unquestionable as if it could be submitted fully to the examination of the senses, and be made the subject of every form of mechanical and chemical experiment. As respects the certainty of their existence, there is no difference between matter and spirit. So far as this is concerned, they both stand upon precisely the same foundation. The real difference between them, and the only real difference, consists in this, that one is more open to our investigations than the other. Of one we may ac

1848.]

Opinions of some ancient Philosophers.

637

quire a knowledge. We may become acquainted with its actual constitution and properties. While of the other we can gain no direct or positive knowledge, but must be content with such ideas concerning it, as may be derived from analogy.

But notwithstanding this difficulty of gaining any satisfactory idea. of the nature of spirit and of the constitution of spiritual beings, the subject is one which always has had, and always will have, much interest for men of serious and reflective habits; one which always has occupied and always will occupy, a large place in their thoughts. Most of the ancient philosophers, whether of Italy or Greece, of Egypt or Hindoostan, so far as we are able to learn their opinions from the imperfect records that have come down to us, believed the human soul and also the soul or living principle of each one of the lower animals to be a part of the Deity, detached in some way from the Divine substance, and incorporated with the body which it for the time animated. In this fallen and humbled condition, they supposed it liable to contract habits of vice and sin, and as a necessary consequence, to become subject to punishment. With these psychological opinions, they very generally connected the doctrine of metempsychosis. They supposed the same soul to animate in succession different bodies, sometimes of men and sometimes of animals, descending in the scale of being, in proportion as it became more vicious, or ascending according as it made progress in virtue. When at length, it had passed through the entire cycle of its transmigrations, which was commonly supposed to occupy a period of several thousand years; when by long penance and many lives of virtue, it had finally freed itself from the last taint of vice, they believed the soul to be restored to its original perfection and happiness, and losing its individual existence, to become once more a part of the Divine substance.

This splendid system of myths which prevailed so generally throughout the East, and which subsequently passed, with but slight alterations, into the south of Europe, seems to have extended its influence to nearly all the nations of antiquity. Traces of it are said to have existed among the Celtic tribes of western Europe, as well as among the more rude and barbarous people inhabiting the north of that continent. At a later period, some of its doctrines found their way into the Rabbinical writings, and even mingled themselves with the purer faith of one at least of the Christian sects. It is not a little remarkable, that a mere fiction of the imagination, without the slightest foundation in either reason or analogy, should have continued for so many ages, to stir the strongest hopes and fears of such multitudes of our race.