necessitates its action. A necessary cause, therefore, in its action, must be conditioned, and not unconditioned and absolute. If God, then, is not a free, he is not the unconditioned cause of all conditional existences. Besides the supposition that the unconditioned and absolute is under the law of necessity, implies that the necessitating power acted antecedently to the unconditioned. This is equivalent to denying that God as the first, as well as the unconditioned and absolute cause.

Intelligence.

As an unconditioned and absolute cause, God must be possessed of Intelligence. This follows as a necessary consequence of the fact, that he is a free, and not a necessary agent. Free agency, in the absence of Intelligence, is an absolute impossibility. We cannot possibly conceive of such an agent. Further, the universe to which God has given existence is one. Every object and element in the universe exists as a part of the great whole. The whole is in perfect adaptation to each and every part, and every part is in adaptation equally perfect to the whole; and the great whole, with all its parts, exists in perfect harmony with fundamental ideas of the Intelligence. Now to suppose that a free cause has created and constituted a universe, all the parts and departments of which, as parts of one great whole, exist in perfect harmony with fundamental ideas of the universal Intelligence, is an absolute impossibility. It is, in reality, the gross absurdity of affirming an event without a cause.

Spirituality.

As the unconditioned and absolute cause of all that conditionally exists, God is a spiritual, and not a material existence. This follows, as the logical consequent of the fact, that he is a free and intelligent, and not a necessary and unintelligent agent.

Moral Agency.

God also must be a moral agent. This likewise is a logical consequent of the fact that he is an intelligent and free agent. Intelligence and free agency cannot be postulated of any being without, as the logical consequent of that supposition, attributing to him moral agency.

The Exercise of Moral Government, in Harmony with the Law of Justice and Goodness.

Every individual, from a consciousness of what is passing in the interior of his own mind, knows perfectly, that in the constitution of his mental being, a moral government, in harmony with the law of justice and goodness, is actually established. He is conscious, that he cannot act in opposition to the law of justice and goodness, without doing violence to the fundamental laws of his moral being. Here is moral government established. What does its existence indicate, in respect to the character of God, the author and establisher of that government ? We must affirm that truth is not revealed at all in nature, or that the fact under consideration reveals God as the moral legislator and governor of the universe, administering his government in harmony with the law of justice and goodness. In the depths of his own Consciousness, every one finds the basis of his convictions in respect to God, as the righteous moral legislator and governor of the universe.

GOD, THE INFINITE AND PERFECT.

We come now to consider the second form in which the idea of God is revealed in the human Intelligence, to wit, God, the Infinite and Perfect.

This a First Truth of Reason.

That this form of the idea of God is a first truth of Reason, is evident from this one consideration. Should any one attribute to God an acknowledged imperfection of any kind, he would, know in himself, that he had thereby involved himself in infinite guilt. Men may, without conscious guilt, impute to the Most High real imperfections, but not as such. Whatever individuals regard as necessarily implied in the idea of the Infinite and Perfect, they universally conceive themselves as under the highest obligation to attribute the same to God. Further, there never was a time, since the idea of God first arose in our minds, when we did not thus regard him. There never was a time since the period under consideration, when we would not regard ourselves as infinitely guilty in attributing to God any acknow

ledged imperfection, or in not affirming of him whatever we regarded as involved in the idea of the Infinite and Perfect.

God, then, the Infinite and Perfect, is a first truth of universal Reason. It now remains to designate the grounds of our conviction of the objective validity of this form of the idea of God.

Does Creation indicate the Character of God as Infinite and Perfect?

At the outset of our inquiries here, an important question arises, to wit: Does creation reveal its author as Infinite and Perfect? Can an effect acknowledged to be finite reveal its cause as infinite? If so, this revelation cannot be found in the mere extent of the Divine works. Suppose that the creation of one world only would have revealed its author as finite. How many such worlds would it take, to reveal him as infinite? Nothing short of a number absolutely infinite, which is an absurdity. It is the height of absurdity, therefore, to reason, as is commonly done, from the mere extent of creation, which is still acknowledged to be finite, to the absolute infinity and perfection of its author. Yet we cannot say, a priori, that God may not stand revealed in his works, as the Infinite and Perfect. That he is thus revealed therein, has been shown above. The fact we are bound to admit, although we may not be able to designate the grounds of our convictions in respect to it. It not unfrequently happers, that in the presence of certain facts, our Intelligence affirms absolutely particular conclusions, as the logical antecedents of the facts, while we may be at a loss to determine the particular elements in view of which those conclusions are affirmed. For such a reason, the conclusions ought to be to us none the less valid. I once read of a painting which presented with great perfection of execution, a human countenance. Every one that contemplated the countenance, felt, as his eyes were fixed upon it, a sort of horror creeping over him. Let us suppose, that no one could designate the elements in the picture which sustained to those feelings the relation of cause. No one would, for that reason, doubt the existence of such elements in the object. So, in the presence of the universe, God stands revealed to our minds as the Infinite and the Perfect. Though we may not be able to find those elements in his works, which thus reveal him, shall we, for that reason,

doubt the reality of the revelation? In the case of the painting referred to, it was found that the author had produced it, after perpetrating the crime of murder. Hence he had pencilled in the countenance, the internal feelings of his own mind. So God, for aught we can know, a priori, may have somewhere in his creation, pencilled out the indications of his own Infinity and Perfection, pencillings which the universal Intelligence discovers and correctly interprets, without, in most instances, being able to distinguish. This I believe to be the real state of the case. God, in his works, stands revealed as the Infinite and Perfect. The elements in his works, by which he is thus revealed, may not yet have been designated. Yet they will be. It becomes us, as philosophers and Christians, to continue our observations till the elements under consideration are recognized and presented to the world.

Reasons why these Elements have not yet been designated.

Permit me here to suggest the inquiry, whether, mainly for the three following reasons, almost, if not quite all efforts to find the ground of the conviction under consideration, pertaining to the Divine Infinity and Perfection, have proved unsuccessful:

1. The two forms above designated, in which the idea of God is developed in the Intelligence, have not been recognized and separated from each other. Hence, considerations adapted only to reveal God as the unconditioned and absolute cause, have been adduced to prove his Infinity and Perfection. Failing to establish this last point, they have been rejected, as having no bearing whatever upon the question of the Divine existence.

2. An attempt is always made to demonstrate the reality of the Divine existence and perfections by a formal process of logical deduction, instead of recognizing the belief of these truths as among the primary and necessary intuitions of Reason, and then falling back upon those intuitions to find their chronological antecedents, in other words, the grounds of such affirmations of Reason pertaining to God.

3. The argument for the Divine Infinity and Perfection has almost invariably taken a wrong direction, to wit, the element of immensity in the external creation. This immensity is limited, finite. The infinite is not found here. Hence, many have concluded, that no evidence at all exists

in creation, of the Infinity and Perfection of God. So Kant reasons; and because this one element of creation does not reveal God as the Infinite and Perfect, he argues, that creation presents no evidence at all, even of the Divine existence, -a most strange and illogical conclusion. Where, then, shall we expect, a priori, to find those pencillings in view of which the Intelligence affirms the Divine Infinity and Perfection? Not surely in the external material universe, but in that "which is made in the image of God," the universe of mind. Among the laws of its inner being, mind will find the indications of the Infinity and Perfection of its author, if it finds them at all.

Foundation of the Conviction that God is both Infinite and Perfect.

We are now prepared for a direct consideration of the grounds of the affirmation of the Intelligence, that God is both Infinite and Perfect.

1. The first that I notice is a fundamental element in the idea of God, as the unconditioned and absolute cause of all that exists conditionally. Whatever the Intelligence necessarily apprehends as finite, it as necessarily regards as conditioned. In tracing back every chain of causes and effects to the first, or unconditioned and absolute cause, we naturally and necessarily ask, in respect to everything given as finite, What caused that? We put this question with no more doubt that it had a cause, than we have that no event exists without a cause. The Intelligence does not, and cannot recognize itself, as in the presence of the unconditioned and absolute, till it finds itself in the presence of the Infinite and Perfect. This I believe to be one of the chief sources of the conviction in our minds in respect to God as the Infinite and Perfect.

2. In the presence of this idea of God, the Intelligence intuitively and absolutely affirms the total absence of all evidence of the idea, that God is finite and imperfect. Hence the Intelligence cannot affirm either of God. Further, from the depth of our inner being there proceeds a solemn prohibition against imputing to God any imperfection, natural or moral, without positive evidence. Every one feels the presence and force of that prohibition, who attends properly to the admonitions of his own nature.

3. To the idea of God, as the Infinite and Perfect, our