Granting the existence of a conditioned
intelligence (and no one could reasonably suppose his own intelligence to
be otherwise), and the existence of an unconditioned intelligence becomes a
logical necessity, unless we deny either the validity of the principle that
every effect must have an adequate cause, or else that the only adequate
cause of Mind is Mind.
It has been a great satisfaction to me to find that my examination of this
argument--an examination which was undertaken and completed several months
before Mr. Mill's essay appeared--has been minutely corroborated by that of
our great logician. I mention this circumstance here, as on previous
occasions, not for the petty motive of vindicating my own originality, but
because in matters of this kind the accuracy of the reasoning employed, and
therefore the logical validity of the conclusions attained, are guaranteed
in the best possible manner, if the trains of thought have been
independently pursued by different minds.
Sec. 10. Seeing that, among the advocates of this argument, Locke went so far
as to maintain that by it alone he could render the existence of a Deity as
certain as any mathematical demonstration, it is only fair, preparatory to
our examining this argument, to present it in the words of this great
thinker.
He says:--"There was a time when there was no knowing (_i.e._, conscious)
being, and when knowledge began to be; or else there has been also a
knowing being from all eternity.
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