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ence can be asserted, for this last theory is generically similar to
the mystical assertion itself in that both approaches claim to be
an interpretation of factors in experience. To sum up the whole
point: because the mystical objection is itself a theory, it cannot
impugn argumentative theism on the ground that it is an intellectual
theory; yet this criticism is precisely the point of the objection.
But suppose that the original assertion is not intended to be
rationally apprehensible and is therefore not a theory. In this
case, the objection is meaningless: it is merely a jumble of
noises or a collection of unintelligible marks on a sheet of paper.
And it follows that no objection is possible, for meaningless
noises and unintelligible marks hardly constitute an
objection. At any rate, it does not occur to us to refute this type
of criticism.
The assertion, that God is unknowable by intellect but
knowable by experience, embodies a basic confusion.---Even
granting the possibility of an intuitive or direct knowledge of
God without the mediation of sensa, this knowledge must be
apprehended by the rational or categorical structure of the intellect,
else it cannot appear as experience at all. To recognize an
object of experience in particular is the function of the intellect
or mind. Now if the experience of God is not the experience of
something in particular, then it is the experience of nothing in
particular and hence not of God or of anything else.
Does the mystic know experientially that God exists? If not,
then the whole position reduces to the baseless assumption that
God is unknowable---an assumption yet to be refuted in the sequel.
If so, then the mystic must have an awareness of God as
an experienced object: now such an awareness would either involve
the intellectual functioning of the categorical structure, or
it would be a completely indeterminate experience. But a completely
indeterminate experience is an experience of nothing
and hence not an experience at all. It must be then that the ex-