Lectures on the Proofs of the Existence of God

If we look at the difference which exists between the proofs of the existence of God with which we are dealing, as it actually presents itself, we come upon a distinction which is of an essential kind. One set of the proofs goes from the Being to the thought of God, that is, to put it more definitely, from determinate Being to true Being as representing the Being of God; the other set proceeds from the thought of God, from truth in itself, to the Being of this truth. This distinction, although it is brought forward as one which merely happens to exist in this form, and is of a contingent character, is based on a necessary principle which requires to be taken notice of. We have before us two characteristics-the thought of God and the Being of God. We may start from the one or from the other indifferently in following out the course of reasoning which is supposed to result in their union. Where it is thus a question merely of possible choice, it appears to be a matter of indifference from which we start; and further, too, if the one leads to their being brought into connection, the other appears to be superfluous.

But what thus at first appears to be an indifferent duality and an external possibility has a connection in the Notion, so that neither are the two ways of arriving at the truth indifferent to one another, nor is the difference between them merely of an external character, nor is one of them superfluous. This necessity is not of the nature of an accessory circumstance. It is closely connected with the deepest part of our subject, and chiefly with the logical nature of the Notion. So far as the Notion is concerned, the two paths are not merely different in a general way, but are one-sided, both in reference to the subjective elevation of the spirit to God, and also in reference to the nature of God Himself. We wish to exhibit this one-sidedness in its more concrete form in reference to our subject. We have before us, to begin with, merely the abstract categories of Being and Notion, the contrast between them and their mode of relationship. It will be shown at the same time how these abstractions and their relations to one another constitute and determine the basis of what is most concrete.