Systematic Theology (Vol 1) - Hodge - XIX - Chapter 3 (Anti-theistic theories) continued

Required reading
Systematic Theology Volume 1 by Charles Hodge (Available from Amazon or free here) - Continue Chapter 3 (Anti-theistic theories) by reading up to the heading '5. Pantheism'.

My summary
This week Hodge continues exploring the subject of materialism - by refuting it.

Firstly Hodge teaches us that materialism is inconsistent with:
(i) the facts of consciousness;
(ii) the truths of reason;
(iii) the facts of experience.

Hodge then demonstrates that materialism leads one into atheism.

The rest of the chapter denies arguments from materialists for a correlation of physical and vital and mental forces.

What grabbed me
We see a number of the previous arguments surfacing again in today's reading including my favourite, the moral argument: ' Materialism contradicts the facts of our moral and religious consciousness. Our moral perceptions are the clearest, the most certain, and the most authoritative of all of our cognitions. If a man is shut up to deny either the testimony of his senses or the truths of reason, on the one hand, or the testimony of his moral nature on the other, all experience shows that he will give up sense and reason, and bow to the authority of conscience. He cannot help it. No man can free himself from the sense of sin, or of accountability. These moral convictions involve in them, or, at least, necessitate the belief in a God to whom we must give an account. But Materialism, in banishing all mind in man, leaves nothing to be accountable ; and in banishing all mind from the universe, leaves no Being to whom an account can be rendered. To substitute for an intelligent, extramundane, personal God, mere " inscrutable force," is a mockery, an insult. Our whole moral and religious nature declares any such theory to be false. It cannot be true unless our whole nature be a lie. And our nature cannot be a lie, unless, as Sir William Hamilton says, the whole universe be "a dream of a dream." To call upon men to worship gravitation, and sing hallelujahs to the whirlwind, is to call upon them to derationalize themselves. The attempt is as idle as it is foolish and wicked. '

We simply cannot deny the existence of right and wrong, but this must be denied if materialism is true.

Next week's reading
Continue Chapter 3 (Anti-theistic theories) by reading up to the heading 'C. Grecian Pantheism'.

Now it's your turn
Please post your own notes and thoughts in the comments section below.