a spirit pervading all things (but not an agerd or & per- son), and of which the souls of man and l)rutes are por- tions. In the Book of Revelation, ' Jtdiovah, the self- existent and all-])erfect Being, with the world which he creatiMl and whicli he is ever ruling, alone meets our view. Though intimately present with all his works, he is yet entirely' distinct from them. In him we live, and move, and have our being. He is infinite- ly nigh to us, and he is intimately present with us.
while we remain infinitelj' distant from his all-perfect and incommunicable essence' " (Eden).
3. Can God be known 1 — The Scriptures declare that God is invisible (Exod. xxxiii, 20 ; John i, 18 ; 1 John iv, 12 ; 1 Tim. vi, IG, etc.) and unsearchable (Job xi, 7; xxxvii, 23). But the very existence of the idea of God, and even the use of the name God, with its connotation as given above, imply, not indeed that it is possible for man to comprehend God, but that it is not impossible to know God. And so the Scriptures make it man's duty to become "acquainted with God" (1 Chron. xxviii, 9 ; Jer. ix, 24 ; 2 Pet. i, 2 ; John xvii, 3, etc.). Even Athe- ists are bound to explain the res in intellectu manifest- ed in the thought and language of men. To deny ab- solutelj' that God can be known is to deny that he exists; and, on the other hand, the proof, or even the admission that God exists, implies that it can not be absolutely unknown what or how he is : the knowledge of his existence implies as a necessary condition some knowledge of the mode of his existence, i.e. his power, wisdom, justice, etc. The passages cited above, de- claring that God is invisible, etc., are not to be tor- tured to favor the idea that the human mind is abso- lutely incapable of knowing God. On the contrary, their purpose is to vindicate the claims of revelation as the source of knowledge of God. The Scriptures teach that God is made known in Christ (1) bj' his works (Rom. i, 20; Psa. xix, 1,2) ; (2) through his Son, which is, in part, his essence. True, God revealed his "gloiy" to Moses (Exod. xxxiii, 18-23), but the manifestation was given through a medium, or, rather, reflection, making "the goodness" of God to "pass before" Moses. Not sight, but faith, is the condition and means of our knowledge of God in this life (2 Cor. V, 7). God, then, can be known, but only so far as he gives the knowledge of himself and so fiir as the capacity of man can reach. Johannes Damascenus said truly, " It is not possible to know God altogether ; neither is it altogether impossible to know God." To see him with the bodily eyes would be fatal to a sinful creat- ure (see citations above). But there is a dead ' ' knowl- edge of God" (Rom. i, 21 ; James ii, 19) ; and, in con- trast with it, there is a living knowledge of God, which includes a spiritual seei'w^ of the invisible, the privilege of all who are in vital union with God through faith in his Son (Ileb. xi, 27).
Science trusts to the functions and laws of the hu- man mind as its instruments for the discover}' of truth. But to know the truth, and to recognise the ground and object of phenomena in their connection and unit}', is a process which leads invariably to the knowledge of the original and perfect Being ; for every science which recognises truth and goodness in the world, in nature and in reason, recognises therewith a power of wisdom and goodness. But as we cannot recognise such a power abstractly, in recognising it at all we recognise the eternal God (Suabedissen, Metcqihi/sik, 183G, p. 143). Yet as man, by science, can know the works of God only very imperfectly and incompletely, criticism and skepticism are always the companions of science ; and she can be, at best, only the pioneer of true religious knowledge, or its servant. For the true religious knowledge of God is not founded upon science, but upon life — the life of communion with. God. In the religious life the consciousness of God is before and apart from all reflection, all speculation ; the soul, in its rapid dialectics, under the pressure of religious needs, has no need of syllogism to prove the existence of God. So Tertullian declares (in his Teslimonium .1 riimtv) that even the common heathen mind, apart from philosophy, reached a truer knowledge of God and of divine things than the heathen mythology and philosophy could teach. Even the Platonic philosophy taught that the longing of the soul for the truth and beauty of goodness leads to a renunciation of the out- ward and visible in behalf of an apprehension of the spiritual and real. Spiritual Christianity transforms
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