When it is connected, as it often has been, with the doctrine of "Mechanical Necessity," which represents every thought, opinion, emotion, desire, and habit, as the unavoidable result of mere physical influences acting on the brain, and makes no account of the spontaneity or freedom which belongs to man as an intelligent, moral, and responsible agent, it is manifestly impossible to discover any ground for the doctrine of future rewards and punishments.

And accordingly, D'Holbach, Comte, and Atkinson describe man as if he were the mere creature of circumstances, and deny that his character could possibly have been different from what it is.

But even when it is not associated with fatalism, the theory, which denies the distinct existence of the soul as a substantive being, has a tendency to shake our belief in the doctrine of a "future retribution," properly so called, since that doctrine rests on the assumption of our continued personal identity, or the unity and continuity of our consciousness, as dying yet immortal beings; whereas, if there be no "soul," or substantive spiritual being, and if the "body" be in a state of perpetual flux and mutation, it is difficult to see how _the same being that sinned can suffer_, or how the doctrine of "retribution," properly so called, can be consistently maintained.
3.

The doctrine of "the spirituality" of the Divine nature must be seriously affected, in different ways, by the theory of Materialism.
It is said in Scripture that "God made man in His own image," and that He "breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and man became a living soul." Deny the existence of "spirit" or "soul," as God's living image on earth, and what ground of evidence, or what help of analogy, remains for either conceiving or proving aright the existence of Him who is "a Spirit" and "the Father of the spirits of all flesh ?" And if the "spirituality" of the Divine nature be called in question, many of the Divine attributes must also suffer; for it is only as "a spirit" that God can be _omnipresent_, and his omnipresence is presupposed in his _omniscience_ and _omnipotence_.

For these reasons, we incur the greatest risk of entertaining limited and false conceptions of God, by obliterating the distinction between "matter" and "spirit." It is, no doubt, competent, and it may even be highly useful, to entertain the question, how far the theory of Materialism should be held to affect the grounds on which we believe in a living, personal, spiritual God?
In answer to this question, we have no hesitation in avowing our conviction that the theory of Materialism, however it may be modified, has a tendency to impair the evidence of that fundamental article of faith.