THE LOGICAL BASLS OF PANTHEISM. 339 



to credit it against all the opposition of our reason 

 and of our senses. Such an emotion would truly be 

 the most fearful and wonderful thing in our mental 

 furniture, and we should have to contemplate it with 

 unceasing amazement if there were any ground for 

 supposing that it existed. 



As a matter of fact it has already been shown that 

 our feelings not only do not require the assumption 

 of an Infinite, but vehemently repudiate it (§ lo). 

 A deity which is unknowable, inactive and in- 

 different to all that happens in the world, is not one 

 which '* finite minds " can either grasp or cling to. 



§ 15. We have been considering hitherto the 

 inferences to be drawn from Pantheism in its bear- 

 ing upon life and science, and shown how unaccept- 

 able it is from every emotional and scientific point 

 of view. But the real root of the doctrine, the real 

 reason of its persistence, in spite of its more or less 

 obviously unsatisfactory consequences, is to be 

 found in certain supposed requirements of logic 

 and metaphysics. Hence it is necessary to subject 

 the logical validity of the philosophic conception of 

 [the Absolute or Infinite to a most careful scrutiny. 

 jAs the result of that scrutiny, it will appear that the 

 logical arguments for Pantheism are either fallacious 

 lor inconclusive. 



§ 16. It must be observed, in the first place, that 

 Ithe conception of a whole or totality, which is used 

 :in the arguments concerning the Infinity of the 

 Deity, Is ambiguous. 



When, e.£:, we speak of the attribute of omni- 

 potence, we may mean two very different things. 

 To say that the Deity possesses "all" power may 

 mean either that he has all the power there is, and 

 can do all that can be done, or that he can do any- 



