ABSTRACT
This chapter considers only the possibility of arriving by pure reason at a knowledge of the existence or attributes of a personal God. A pointer to the meaning of 'God' can be obtained by considering the wishes that there being a God would fulfil, or the needs there being one would satisfy, if there were one. All that follows from the fact that God is 'by definition' omnipotent and perfect is that it would be improper to apply the word 'God' to any being who is not omnipotent or not perfect. An objection to doing such things as making God omniscient 'by definition' is that, if one proceeds in this way, one can then make any sentence express a true proposition, about God or about anything else, simply by defining the words in it in such a way as to give one the result that one wants.
