SCIENCE AND MORALS : A REPLY. 505 



Whoever asserts the existence of an omnipotent Deity, and that he 

 made and sustains all things, and is the causa causarum, can not, with- 

 out a contradiction in terras, assert that there is any cause independent 

 of him ; and it is a mere subterfuge to assert that the cause of all 

 things can "permit" one of these things to be an independent cause. 



Whoever asserts the combination of omniscience and omnipotence 

 as attributes of the Deity, does implicitly assert predestination. For 

 he who knowingly makes a thing and places it in circumstances the 

 operation of which on that thing he is perfectly acquainted with, does 

 predestine that thing to whatever fate may befall it. 



Thus, to come, at last, to the really important part of all this dis- 

 cussion, if the belief in a God is essential to morality, physical science 

 offers no obstacle thereto ; if the belief in immortality is essential to 

 morality, physical science has no more to say against the probability 

 of that doctrine than the most ordinary experience has, and it effectu- 

 ally closes the mouths of those who pretend to refute it by objections 

 deduced from merely physical data. Finally, if the belief in the un- 

 causedness of volition is essential to morality, the student of physical 

 science has no more to say against that absurdity than the logical phi- 

 losopher or theologian. Physical science, I repeat, did not invent de- 

 terminism, and the deterministic doctrine would stand on just as firm 

 a foundation as it does if there were no physical science. Let any 

 one who doubts this read Jonathan Edwards, whose demonstrations 

 are derived wholly from philosophy and theology. 



Thus, when Mr. Lilly, like another Solomon Eagle, goes about pro- 

 claiming " Woe to this wicked city ! " and denouncing physical science 

 as the evil genius of modern days — mother of materialism, and fatal- 

 ism, and all sorts of other condemnable isms — I venture to beg him to 

 lay the blame on the right shoulders ; or, at least, to put in the dock, 

 along with Science, those sinful sisters of hers, Philosophy and The- 

 ology, who, being so much older, should have known better than the 

 poor Cinderella of the schools and universities over which they have 

 so long dominated. No doubt modern society is diseased enough ; 

 but then it does not differ from older civilizations in that respect. 



lei, puts the whole case into a nutshell, when ho says that the ground for doing a thing 

 in the mind of the doer is as it were the pre-existence of the thing done : 



" Ratio autem ahcujus fiendi in mentc actoris cxistens est quasdam pra-existentia rei 

 fienda? in eo " (Summa, Qu. xxiii, Art. i). 



If this is not enough, I may further ask what " Materialist " has ever given a hotter 

 statement of the case for determinism, on thcistic grounds, than is to be found in the 

 following passage of the Summa, Qu. xiv, Art. xiii : 



"Omnia quae sunt in tempore, sunt Deo ab aeterno prasentia, non solum ea ox ratione 

 qui habct rationes rcrum apud se prcscntcs, ut quasdam dicunt, sed quia ejus intuitus 

 fertur ab asterno supra omnia, prout sunt in sua prasentialitate. Undc mamfestum est 

 quod cnntingenlia infallibrfitcr a Deo cognoscuntur, in quantum subdunturdivino conspectui 

 secundum suam praesentialitatcm ; et tamen sunt future contingentia, suis causis proximis 

 comparata. " 



