I.--Immaterialism is absurd, and opposed to true Philosophy.
1. The immaterialist assumes that God consists of an immaterial
substance, indivisible in its nature, "whose centre is everywhere and
circumference nowhere." The indivisibility of a substance implies
impenetrability; that is, two substances cannot exist in the same space
at the same time; hence, if an indivisible substance exist everywhere,
as it cannot be penetrated, it will absolutely exclude the existence of
all other substances. Such a substance would be a boundless, infinite
solid, without pores, incapable of condensation, or expansion, or
motion, for there would be no empty space left to move to. Observation
teaches us that this is not the case; therefore an infinitely extended,
indivisible, immaterial substance is absurd in the highest degree, and
opposed to all true philosophy.
2. The immaterialist teaches that the godhead consists of three persons
of one substance, and that each of these persons can be everywhere
present. Now in order to be everywhere present, each of these persons
must be infinitely extended, or else each must be susceptible of
occupying two or more places at the same time. If a substance be
infinitely extended it ceases to be a person; for to all persons there
are limits of extension called figure; but that which is not limited
can have no figure, and therefore cannot be a person. Therefore, it
is absolutely necessary that a person should be included in a finite
extent. Now that which is limited within one finite extent, cannot be
included within some other extent at the same time; therefore it is
utterly impossible for a person to be in two or more places at the same
time, hence immaterialism is totally absurd and unphilosophical.
3. The immaterialist teaches that the substance of the Deity is not
only omnipresent and indivisible, but that all other substances are
contained in his substance and perform all their motions in it without
any mutual action or resistance. The profound and illustrious Newton,
in the Scholium at the end of the "Principia," has fallen into this
error; he says, "God is one and the same God always and everywhere. He
is omnipresent, not by means of his _virtue_ alone, but also by his
_substance,_ for virtue cannot subsist without substance. In him all
things are contained, and move, but without mutual passions _God is not
acted upon by motions of the bodies; and they suffer no resistance from
the omnipresence of God_." Here we have an omnipresent substance, which
is said by immaterialists to be so compact as to be _indivisible,_
with worlds moving in it without suffering any resistance: this is
the climax of absurdity. All masses of substance with which we are
acquainted, are susceptible of division, yet even in these, bodies
cannot move without being resisted; how much more impossible it
would be for worlds to exist and move in an indivisible substance
without resistance, yet this is the absurdity of the immaterial
hypothesis. There is nothing too ridiculous or too unphilosophical to
be incorporated in an immaterial substance when its existence has been
once assumed.
The reflecting mind turns away from such fooleries with the utmost
disgust, and feels to pity those men who have degraded the great and
all-wise Creator and Governor of the universe by applying to him such
impossible, unheard of, and contradictory qualities. The heathen, in
their wildest imaginations never fancied up a god that could begin to
compare with the absurd qualities ascribed to the immaterialists' god.