"inward witness of the spirit," or the intuitive argument, hoping
thereby to escape the enemy's fire, if I may use so objectionable a
phrase.

What is called faith, then, or an intuitive spiritual assurance, is a
species of reasoning; let its worth be tested honestly.

In the first place, faith or the intuitive argument would prove too
much. If Jesus is real, notwithstanding that there is no reliable
historical data to warrant the belief, because the believer feels in
his own soul that He is real and divine, I answer that, the same mode
of reasoning--and let us not forget, it is a kind of _reasoning_--would
prove Mohammed a divine savior, and the wooden idol of the savage a god.
The African Bushman trembles before an image, because he feels in his
own soul that the thing is real. Does that make it real? The Moslem
cries unto Mohammed, because he believes in his innermost heart that
Mohammed is near and can hear him. He will risk his life on that assurance.
To quote to him history and science to prove that Mohammed is dead and
unable to save, would be of no avail, for he has the witness of the
spirit in him, an intuitive assurance, that the great prophet sits on
the right hand of Allah. An argument which proves too much, proves
nothing.

In the second place, an intuition is not communicable. I may have an
intuition that I see spirits all about me this morning. They come,
they go, they nod, they brush my forehead with their wings. But do
_you_ see them, too, because I see them? There is the difference
between a scientific demonstration and a purely metaphysical
assumption. I could go to the blackboard and assure you, as I am
myself assured, that two parallel lines running in the same direction