There is nothing but matter. Matter is eternal. Therefore all things are
eternal. Does this have the right ring? It must be so if infidel
materialism be the true philosophy. And if it is so we are all deceived;
for universal conscience, and universal language, are both against it.
If there is anything that is not eternal there was a time when it began
to be, it was created in some way, intelligently or by accident. If
intelligently, the Bible idea is, and _must be_ correct. If without an
intelligence it was not, and could not be by evolution, for creation by
evolution could not, and can not be; because that which is not in a
thing can not be evolved out of it, unless you can get more out of a
thing than there is in it; which is absurd. So evolution is a negation
of the doctrine of a creation. And the doctrine that there is nothing
but matter, and that matter is eternal, is a denial of creation by
intelligence or otherwise. The infidel says, life began to be; for there
was a time when there was no life. But they say matter is eternal. And
life is not eternal. Therefore life is not matter. Gentlemen, will you
get away with this conclusion? The opposite is equally fatal to the
materialistic theory. Thus, matter is eternal. There is nothing but
matter. Therefore life is eternal. Can you get this conclusion out of,
or away from logical deductions?
But infidels say, "Life is a property of certain elements of matter."
Very well; can you separate things and their properties? Can you get
them so far apart as to hold the one class--things--to be eternal, and
the other class--properties--not? Your philosophy of spontaneous
generation of life says, Yes, yes, there was a time when it began to be,
and it was spontaneously generated, of course it was. Very well; there
is nothing but matter. Matter did not begin to be; it is eternal. Life
began to be, therefore it is not matter; otherwise it is eternal
according to infidel logic, unless you take the position that life is
_nothing_!
Matter is eternal.
That which began to be is not eternal.
Mind began to be;
Therefore, mind is not eternal.
Very well; let's look at it once more.
Matter is eternal; it did not begin to be.
Mind is not eternal; it began to be;
Therefore, mind is not matter.
Where, gentlemen, O where will you place mind? is it also nothing?
That which began to be was created.
Life and mind, both, began to be;
Therefore, life and mind were created.
_Question._ Were they the effects of an inadequate cause? Inanimate and
unintelligent nature would not be an adequate cause. Did these do more
than animated intelligence can do? Gentlemen of skeptical proclivities
answer.
If so, is this not evolution backwards? Is it not retrogression, or
development at the expense of the loss of power to rise to the plane of
unintelligent mind and life evolving nature? Do you say, organic life
does evolve organic life and mind. From a state of death? Without
antecedent life and mind being drawn upon? Come, gentlemen; how is this?
You say inanimate Nature produced life and mind without the previous
existence of either; can you duplicate that feat with your power? If you
can't are you not below the inanimate Nature which did it for the first
time? Can inanimate forces do more than living intelligent Nature? Do
you say no! Then demonstrate the philosophy of spontaneous generation of
life, and show yourself A GOD.
An effort to produce organic life without antecedent life, or where it
is not, is an effort to create organic life. The efforts of unbelievers
to produce organic life by spontaneous generation, is an effort to
produce organic life where it is not. Therefore the efforts of
unbelievers to produce organic life, by spontaneous generation, is an
effort to create organic life.
An effort to create organic life where it is not is an effort to rise
into the character of a God, and show one's self the equal of God. But
why should this effort not be made? If unintelligent dead matter has
performed the feat, without wisdom or design, why should it not be
performed by living intelligent Nature? Gentlemen, demonstrate your
theory. Do you say, we have given up all hope of witnessing its
demonstration? Well, well, has any man ever witnessed it? You say no.
Then it is not certain knowledge. Science is certain knowledge.
Therefore spontaneous generation of life and intelligent being is not
science. Now, gentlemen, don't prostitute science at the shrine of your
nonsensical guessing any more. Throw your guessing to one side and
acknowledge God like wise men, and be no longer foolish.
Do you say life was always in matter? "Then we must conclude that it is
in matter in the same sense in which all other corporeal qualities are
in bodies, so as to be divisible together with it, and some of it be in
every part of the matter." This is ancient Hylozoism.
On the other hand, the "Stoical Atheists supposed there was one life
only in the entire mass of matter, after such a manner, as that none of
the parts of it by themselves should have any life of their own." Now,
according to this Stoical theory, "life is no corporeal quality or form,
but an incorporeal substance." There are, really, but two sorts of
Atheism which have been in any thing like extensive notice. First, "Such
as claim that life is essential to matter, and therefore _ingenerable_
and _incorruptible_." Second, "Those who claim that life and everything,
besides the bare substance of matter, or extended bulk, is merely
accidental, generable, or corruptible, rising out of some mixture or
modification of matter." Is life, perception and understanding
essential to matter, as such? Is senseless matter perfectly wise,
without consciousness? Such is Hylozoism, and it is outrageous nonsense.
Very few men ever had credulity enough to receive and appropriate it.
This form of Atheism was a forlorn and abandoned thing, without form or
systemization, for centuries gone by--and it has few--very
few--votaries, even now. The second kind of Atheism "is that of a true
notion of body, that it is nothing but resisting bulk," associated with
atomic physiology, which is an old theory resurrected of late, and
displayed anew, with a _show_ of deep philosophy and wisdom. But that
mind and understanding itself sprang from senseless nature and chance,
as a mere accident, or from the unguided and undirected motions of
matter, is also nonsensical, and utterly absurd. Were there infinite
atoms in mutual encounters, dashing and striking against each other? Did
these atoms, devoid of sense and life, with their reflections and
repurcussions, their cohesions, implexions, and entanglements, their
scattered dispersions and divulsions, produce life and intelligence? If
so, we will call it by the name of chance. Hear this, O, ye scientists,
there is but one choice, and that is between _God_ and _chance_!
The chance theory is that "infinite atoms of various sizes and figures,
devoid of life and sense, moving fortuitously from eternity in infinite
space, and making successive encounters and various implexions and
entanglements with one another, produced first a confused chaos of these
omnifarious particles or atoms, which, jumbling together with infinite
variety of motions by the tugging of their different and contrary
forces, hindered and restricted each other until, by joint conspiracy,
they conglomerated into a vortex or vortexes, where, after many
convulsions and evolutions, molitions and essays, in which all manner of
tricks were tried," without design, "they _chanced_ in length of time to
settle into the form and system of things known as earth, air and fire,
sun, moon and stars, plants, animals and men;" so that senseless atoms
unconsciously moved themselves, although dead as grains of sand, and
kept up the motion until, without any _living substance_ underlying, and
adequate to produce motion, all things so beautifully arranged sprang
into life and being. O, ye stars, what is the magnitude of an infidel's
credulity? What is there which he can not believe? It is no longer to be
set down that he is a reasonable man. "The fool saith in his heart there
is no God." There is a grand relation between the eternal spirit and
that eternal substance which lies behind and underneath all that is, and
that relation is the relation between the "King Eternal" and that over
which he presides and which he controls. So out of nothing nothing
comes.