The Project Gutenberg EBook of Theism or Atheism, by Chapman Cohen

This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or
re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org

Title: Theism or Atheism
The Great Alternative

Author: Chapman Cohen

Release Date: May 2, 2008 [EBook #25291]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THEISM OR ATHEISM ***

Produced by Marilynda Fraser-Cunliffe, Martin Pettit and
the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at
http://www.pgdp.net

THEISM OR ATHEISM

THE GREAT ALTERNATIVE

By CHAPMAN COHEN

THE PIONEER PRESS,

61, Farringdon Street,
----E.C.4----

1921.

Contents.

Part I.

AN EXAMINATION OF THEISM.
PAGE

Chapter I. What is God? 9

Chapter II. The Origin of the Idea of God 20

Chapter III. Have we a Religious Sense? 37

Chapter IV. The Argument from Existence 49

Chapter V. The Argument from Causation 59

Chapter VI. The Argument from Design 69

Chapter VII. The Disharmonies of Nature 85

Chapter VIII. God and Evolution 94

Chapter IX. The Problem of Pain 110

Part II.

SUBSTITUTES FOR ATHEISM.

Chapter X. A Question of Prejudice 131

Chapter XI. What is Atheism? 138

Chapter XII. Spencer and the Unknowable 151

Chapter XIII. Agnosticism 169

Chapter XIV. Atheism and Morals 181

Chapter XV. Atheism Inevitable 194

PREFACE.

Shrouded in the cloak of philosophy, the question of the existence of
God continues to attract attention, and, I may add, to command more
respect than it deserves. For it is only by a subterfuge that it assumes
the rank of philosophy. "God" enters into philosophy only when it is
beginning to lose caste in its proper home, and then in its new
environment it undergoes such a transformation as to contain very little
likeness to its former, and proper, self. It disowns its parentage and
claims another origin, and, like so many genealogists devising pedigrees
for the parvenu, certain philosophers attempt to map out fo