Those who are chargeable with it may "profess that they _know_ God, but in works they _deny_ Him." As distinguished from theoretical or speculative Atheism, it is fitly termed _ungodliness_.

It does not necessarily imply either the denial or the doubt of the existence or government of God, but consists mainly in the forgetfulness of His character and claims.
Speculative Atheism always implies habitual ungodliness; but the latter may exist where the former has never been embraced, and has even been openly and sincerely disclaimed.

Yet such is the _connection_ between the two, that Speculative Atheism invariably presupposes and perpetuates practical ungodliness; and that the latter has also a tendency to produce the former, since the habitual disregard of God in the practical conduct of life indicates a state of mind in which men are peculiarly exposed to the seductions of infidelity and prone to yield to them, especially in seasons of revolutionary excitement or of prevailing epidemic unbelief.

It would be wrong to rank every ungodly man among professed or even conscious Atheists, for he may never have denied or even doubted the existence and government of God; yet it were equally wrong to represent or treat him as a true believer, since he shows that, practically, "God is not in all his thoughts;" and hence the necessity of our _first_ distinction between [Transcriber's note: Original had "beetween"] _theoretical_ or _speculative_, and _practical_ or _habitual_ Atheism.
Speculative Atheism, again, is either _dogmatic_ or _skeptical_.

It is _dogmatic_, when it amounts to an affirmation, either that there is no God, or that the question of his existence is necessarily insoluble by the human faculties.