Common Sense Applied to Religion; Or, The Bible and the People by Catharine Esther Beecher, is part of the HackerNoon Books Series. You can jump to any chapter in this book here. SOURCES OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE.
CHAPTER III. SOURCES OF HUMAN KNOWLEDGE.
We have seen that there are certain intuitive truths, the belief of which is implanted as a part of our mental constitution, and that there is a test by which we can distinguish them from all other kinds of knowledge.
We have seen, also, that we are dependent on these truths for a large portion of our acquired knowledge, inasmuch as they are the basis of reasoning, which is that process by which we gain new truths by the aid of those already believed.
It has been intimated, also, that it is chiefly by the aid of these principles that a harmonious system of truth is to be anticipated, in which all minds will eventually agree, at least in all great questions involving the eternal interests of our race.
We will now proceed in an inquiry as to what are the sources of human knowledge in addition to these first implanted truths.
In the first place, then, we have our own personal experience of the nature and action of our own minds, and of the qualities and powers of the persons and things around us. Next we have the experience of other minds as to their own mental history and the properties and powers of all that has surrounded them. This knowledge is communicated by them to us either directly by word of mouth, or indirectly by writings and books.
The experience of a single mind is very limited both as to space and time, and it is only by the united experience of many persons, in different periods and places, that we arrive at what are called the laws of nature and experience. The laws of day and night, summer and winter, the tides, and all the other phenomena of nature, are simply a uniform succession and regularity of events, from which men infer a future regularity of the same experience. Much of this knowledge of past uniformity is transmitted from others to us, and rests on our confidence in human testimony, and it has been shown that this confidence is based on one of the intuitive truths.
Next, we have the knowledge gained by the process of reasoning, and for this we are dependent on the intuitive truths which are the foundation of all reliable deductions.
Lastly, we have the resource of revelations from the Creator of all, who can communicate to us knowledge that we can not gain either by intuition, or experience, or reasoning.
In regard to the kinds of knowledge to be gained from each of these sources, it is clear that the experience of ourselves and others furnishes us with nothing but facts, as it regards matter and mind, as they are developed in this world only. As it respects the Creator, his character and designs, the immortality of the soul, and the future destiny of our race, we gain nothing by our own personal observation or experience. "No man hath seen God at any time." No one has gone to "the silent land" to learn by inspection the secrets of that dim shore, or the destiny of the soul when it passes from earth.
Neither have we any resource in the experience of others who can go to the invisible world and transmit to us the knowledge there gained. There is not a man upon earth that can furnish any reliable information on these subjects from any personal knowledge.
It becomes, then, a most interesting inquiry as to the amount and kind of knowledge to be gained by means of the intuitive truths, experience, and reasoning, independently of revelation. In what follows this inquiry will be pursued.
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This book is part of the public domain. Catharine Esther Beecher (2017). Common Sense Applied to Religion; Or, The Bible and the People. Urbana, Illinois: Project Gutenberg. Retrieved https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/55531/pg55531-images.html
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