preservative from atheism. In the imagination, existence has sensational effects, existence affirms itself as a power; with the essence of sensational existence the imagination associates also the phenomena of sensational existence. Where the existence of God is a living truth, an object on which the imagination exercises itself, there also appearances of God are believed in.[1] Where, on the contrary, the fire of the religious imagination is extinct, where the sensational effects or appearances necessarily connected with an essentially sensational existence cease, there the existence becomes a dead, self-contradictory existence, which falls irrecoverably into the negation of atheism.
The belief in the existence of God is the belief in a special existence, separate from the existence of man and Nature. A special existence can only be proved in a special manner. This faith is therefore only then a true and living one when special effects, immediate appearances of God, miracles, are believed in. Where, on the other hand, the belief in God is identified with the belief in the world, where the belief in God is no longer a special faith, where the general being of the world takes possession of the whole man, there also vanishes the belief in special effects and appearances of God. Belief in God is wrecked, is stranded on the belief in the world, in natural effects as the only true ones. As here the belief in miracles is no longer anything more than the belief in historical, past miracles, so the existence of God is also only an historical, in itself atheistic conception.
- ↑ “Thou hast not to complain that thou art less experienced than was Abraham or Isaac. Thou also hast appearances. . . . . Thou hast holy baptism, the supper of the Lord, the bread and wine, which are figures and forms, under and in which the present God speaks to thee, and acts upon thee, in thy ears, eyes, and heart. . . . He appears to thee in baptism, and it is he himself who baptizes thee, and speaks to thee. . . . Everything is full of divine appearances and utterances, if he is on thy side.”—Luther (T. ii. p. 466. See also on this subject, T. xix. p. 407).
