previous conviction for robbery as aggravation of theft. Stolen goods are always taken subject to the inherent vitium reale of their acquisition, and the true owner may recover them from any one in whose possession they are. The protection given by market overt is unknown in Scotland. See Macdonald, Criminal Law, p. 18.
United States.—The law depends almost entirely upon State legislation, and is in general accordance with that of England. The only Acts of Congress bearing on the subject deal with theft in the army and navy, and with theft and receiving on the high seas or in any place under the exclusive jurisdiction of the United States. The doctrine of market overt is not acknowledged by any State.(J. W†.) ()
THEISM
Meanings of the word theism. Its generic sense.THE term theism has three significations. In its widest acceptation its object is the Divine, whether regarded as personal or impersonal, as one being or as a number of beings. In this sense theism is coextensive with religion and worship, includes all forms of polytheism and of pantheism, as well as all varieties of monotheism, and so may be said to denote the genus of which polytheism, pantheism, and monotheism are species. The conception of the Divine, in its utmost abstractness and generality, is, however, so vague that it may reason ably be doubted if the forms of theism, thus understood, can be distributed into strictly logical and natural species, with definitions at once perfectly distinct in themselves and exactly accordant with phenomena. It may seem as if polytheism and monotheism must, by arithmetical necessity, be exclusive of each other and exhaustive of theism; but this is not so. Pantheism may clearly partake of the nature of both, and has been sometimes extravagantly polytheistic, sometimes only doubtfully dis tinguishable from fully developed monotheism. Probably few, if any, polytheistic religions are purely polytheistic, or, in other words, do not imply in some mode and measure the unity as well as the plurality of the Divine. Christian monotheism answers to a formal definition of monotheism only inasmuch as it holds to the unity of the Godhead, but contravenes it inasmuch as it holds that in the one Godhead there are three Divine persons, each God.
Its negatives.The complete negation of theism in its generic sense is atheism—the denial of the existence or of the knowability of the Divine. It is only in modern times that the word atheism has acquired this meaning, only in recent times that it has come to be exclusively employed with this meaning. The Greeks meant by it simply disbelief in the Greek gods. The early Christians were called atheists because they refused to acknowledge the pagan deities. Protestants have been charged by Roman Catholics and Roman Catholics by Protestants with atheism. Through out even the 18th century the word was used in an extremely loose manner, and often affixed to systems by which the existence and agency of God were unequivocally recognized. Atheism, in the sense now generally admitted to be alone appropriate, may be of three species, namely, denial of the existence of the Divine, denial that the Divine has been shown to exist, and denial that it can be known that the Divine exists. The first species has been called dogmatic atheism, the second critical atheism; and the third has been designated, and may conveniently be de signated, religious agnosticism. Agnosticism per se should not be identified with atheism or with any of its forms. The term antitheism has been used by some theologians, e.g., Chalmers and Foster, as equivalent to dogmatic atheism; but it may with much more practical advantage be employed to denote all systems of belief opposed to theism, either in the generic sense already indicated, or in the specific sense of monotheism. Understood in this latter mode, it is much more comprehensive than the term atheism. Polytheism and pantheism are alike antitheistic theories, although on different grounds; while only those theories which deny that there is evidence for belief even in the existence of any god, any divine being, are atheistic.
Theism ordinary equivalent to monotheism.It is somewhat remarkable that the term theism by itself never occurs in its etymological and generic sense, never means as a separate word what it means in the compounds atheism, polytheism, pantheism, and monotheism. Ordinarily it is identified with monotheism, and consequently opposed to polytheism and to pantheism, as well as to atheism. Whereas polytheism acknowledges a plurality of finite gods, theism as monotheism acknowledges only one absolute infinite God. Whereas pantheism regards all finite things as merely aspects, modifications, or parts of one eternal self-existent being all material objects and all particular minds as necessarily derived from a single infinite substance, and thus combines, in its conception of the Divine, monism and determinism, theism as mono theism, while accepting monism, rejects determinism, and attributes to the Divine all that is essentially implied in free personal existence and agency. Pantheism is, how ever, wonderfully protean, and rarely conforms to its ideal; hence the systems called pantheistic are seldom purely pantheistic, and are often more monotheistic than pantheistic.
Theism and deism.Sometimes the term theism is employed in a still more special sense, namely, to denote one of two kinds of monotheism, the other kind being deism. Although deus and theos are equivalent, deism has come to be distinguished from theism. The former word first appeared in the 16th century, when it was used to designate antitrinitarian opinions. In the 17th century it came to be applied to the view that the light of nature is the only light in which man can know God, no special revelation having been given to the human race. Dr Samuel Clarke, in the Boyle Lectures preached in 1705, distributed deists into four classes. The first class " pretend to believe the existence of an eternal, infinite, independent, intelli gent being, and, to avoid the name of Epicurean atheists, teach also that this supreme being made the world; though at the same time they agree with the Epicureans in this, that they fancy God does not at all concern Himself in the government of the world, nor has any regard to, or care of, what is done therein." The second class acknow ledge not only that God made all things, but that He sustains and governs them, yet deny that He has any regard in His government to moral distinctions, these being merely the products of human will and law. The third class believe in the being, natural attributes, pro vidence, and to some extent in the moral attributes and government of God, but deny the immortality of the soul and a future state of rewards and punishments. The fourth class acknowledge the being, natural and moral perfections, and providence of God, as also the immor tality of the soul and a future state of rewards and punishments, yet profess to believe only what is discover able by the light of nature, without believing any divine revelation (Clarke, On the Attributes, pp. 140-153, ed. 1823). This division is not an exact classification, nor does it rest on any precise definition of deism, but it, with substantial accuracy, discriminates and grades the varieties of English deism. Clarke did not contrast deism with theism, or even employ the latter word. His contem porary, Lord Shaftesbury, on the other hand, generally used the term theism, yet only as synonymous with deism,
