" No doubt it is true that education and habits of thought may so
stereotype the intellectual faculties, that at last what is conceivable to
one man or generation may not be so to another;[2] but to adduce this
consideration in this place would clearly be but to destroy the argument
from the _intuitive_ necessity of believing in a God.
Lastly, although superfluous, it may be well to point out that even if the
impossibility of conceiving the negation of God were an universal law of
human mind--which it certainly is not--the fact of his existence could not
be thus proved. Doubtless it would be felt to be much more probable than it
now is--as probable, for instance, if not more probable, than is the
existence of an external world;--but still it would not be necessarily
true.
Sec. 7. The argument from the general consent of mankind is so clearly
fallacious, both as to facts and principles, that I shall pass it over and
proceed at once to the last of the untenable arguments--that, namely, from
the existence of a First Cause. And here I should like to express myself
indebted to Mr. Mill for the following ideas:--"The cause of every change
is a prior change; and such it cannot but be; for if there were no new
antecedent, there would be no new consequent. If the state of facts which
brings the phenomenon into existence, had existed always or for an
indefinite duration, the effect also would have existed always or been
produced an indefinite time ago.
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