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on a confusion of the idea of universality, infinity and absolutism, and on an abuse of the facts of conscience.

Man, it is quite true, only recognizes himself as a person by excluding other persons; but it does not follow that this relation is essential to personality. One might say with the same right that personality implies conscience of a body, which is true in the same sense.

There is therefore no rational motive for contesting the

CHAPTER VIII

THE DOGMA OF MEDIATION

"Versteh! Unendliches und Endliches, das dir scheint

So unvereinbar, ist durch Eines doch vereint."-RUCKERT.

The advantage of the Hegelian trichotomy-dread of Hegelianism—unreasonable-Hegel's method destined to reconcile philosophy to religion— The finite and the infinite supposed to be irreconcileable-The Incarna tion consequently rejected as absurd—The true idea of the infinite-of space and time—The ideas of space and time inapplicable to God— relative only-The Word the equation between the Infinite and the finite-He is the Mediator as well.

HE Hegelian method has this paramount advantage, that it complements all other philosophical systems. If we establish the reality of the phenomenal, material and finite world, we establish at the same time its opposite, the super-phenomenal, immaterial and infinite, and also the link, man, touching simultaneously the material and the immaterial. If we start from man, his vague consciousness of the supernatural and his vivid apprehension of the natural point him out to be the axis of two moments, leaning unduly to the latter, may be, but nevertheless conscious of the former, and thus establishing the reality of the Boundless and the Bounded.

1 "Understand; infinite and finite, what appears to thee
So irreconcileable, are yet reconciled through One."

If we start from the Absolute, we have at once the opposite, the phenomenal world, and its conciliating, doublefaced moment, man.

Hegelianism has created unnecessary alarm in some religious minds. M. Saisset misunderstands Hegel, and holds him up to scorn.1 The Père Gratry, one of the most eminent theologians of the Gallican Church, thinks that the mention of his trichotomy is sufficient to entitle him to be called an atheist.2 M. Lewes has fallen into the same mistake. Yet Hegel was himself a Christian, and, in his obscure and uncouth way, he laboured to reconcile his philosophy with Christian dogma. That he did not make himself intelligible is not astonishing to any one familiar with his style; that he failed to perfect the union, was due to his Lutheran prejudices.

Aristotelianism was, in the same way, dreaded as subversive to Christianity. Tertullian called the Stagyrite the patriarch of heretics, and a French council at Paris in 1209 proscribed his writings. Nevertheless, S. Thomas Aquinas mastered his method, and Aristotelianized Christianity.

In like manner, if I am not mistaken, Hegel is destined to play a conspicuous part in the reconciliation of modern thought to the dogma of the Incarnation. He supplies a key to unlock the golden gate which has remained closed to the minds of modern Europe.

It is incorrect to assert, as is done repeatedly, that Hegel lays down the identity of contraries. He teaches that every thesis implies and contains an antithesis and its mediating moment, which is their synthesis. That Hegel

1 Modern Pantheism, vol. ii. treatise 7.

2 Philosophie du Credo, p. 26; Logique, vol. i. p. 194.

3 History of Philosophy, vol. ii. p. 545.

was the first to create this method is not pretended. He was anticipated by Heraclitus, who taught that contradictory propositions may be consistent.' And S. Augustine, in his Confessions, says, "You have taught me, Lord, that before you gave form to inform matter to distinguish it, it was not anything; it was neither form nor body nor spirit, nevertheless it was not altogether nothing, but the mean between being and not-being."2 S. Clement of Alexandria, S. Vincent of Lerins, and Lactantius, without stating the foundations of the Hegelian method, act upon it and presuppose it. The Hegelian trichotomy, fully apprehended, casts a flood of light over the argument of S. Paul, and makes intelligible to us what was probably only obscurely seen and vaguely felt by himself.

Perhaps one of the greatest impediments to the acceptance of the dogma of the Incarnation is the apparent impossibility of conceiving the union of two contradictions in one person, of the finite and the infinite in Christ.

As M. Larroque says: "To the dogma of the divinity of Jesus is attached that of the incarnation, which, more properly, may be said to be only another expression of the same. If Jesus is not God, it is clear that God was not incarnate in His person. Hence it is unnecessary to insist at length on what is impossible and contradictory, viz., that the infinite and perfect essence should be circumscribed and limited in a finite and imperfect essence; in other terms, that the Divinity should be added to the humanity, or, if the expression be preferred, the humanity should be added to the Divinity; or that the same being should be, at the same time, God and man. From the point of view

1 Ἡρακλεῖτος τὸ ἀντίξουν συμφέρον καὶ ἐκ τῶν διαφερόντων καλλίστην ἁρμονίαν καὶ πάντα κατ ̓ ἔριν γίνεσθαι.—Arist. Ethic. Nic. lib. viii. 1. 2 Confess. lib. xii. c. 3, 4.

of the dogma of the Incarnation, Christ, as God, is an infinite and perfect spirit; but as man, veritable and complete, he is made of soul and body, finite and imperfect as is everything belonging to our nature. Consequently, theology is led to sustain that the human soul of Christ does not comprehend God any better than do we. It follows that, in spite of the intimate union of the two natures, and, on the other side, of the very reason of that union, there is at once, in the same person, two beings, one of whom does not know the other, and in the same individual two distinct personalities, which is downright nonsense."1

This objection rests on the assumption that the finite and the infinite mutually exclude one another, and that, therefore, their synthesis is impossible. A few considerations on the nature of infinity will make it apparent that synthesis is by no means as absurd to suppose as M. Larroque thinks.

When we say that God is infinite, we do not mean that He is of immeasurable size and duration, but that He is beyond all space and time. He is neither in space nor in time; for this reason He is eternal and infinite, and therefore He is also incomprehensible.2

The difficulty lies in admitting the possibility of any being existing outside of space and time,—a difficulty so great at first sight, that it is not surprising that persons should have taken infinity to consist of extension through unbounded space and time. They suppose space and time to be realities, having true existence, and herein lies their

1 Patrice Larroque : Examen critique des doctrines de la Religion Chretienne. Bruxelles, 1864. T. i. p. 165-169.

2 Jules Simon: La Religion Naturelle, c. 2. Essais. Balmez: Fundamental Philosophy, bk. iii. cartes held the same opinion of time and space.

Leibnitz Nouveaux
Aristotle and Des-

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