ed it. From the bosom of His own fulness He saw that being
without beauty, without form, without life, without name, that being
without being which we call non-existence: He heard the cry of worlds
which were not, the cry of a measureless destitution calling to a
measureless goodness. Eternity was troubled, she said to Time: Begin!"

This, Gentlemen, is eloquence. The thought in itself does not bear a
rigorous analysis; but do not think that the lustrous beauty of the
language is only a brilliant veil to what in itself is absurd. We have
arrived at darkness, but it is at darkness visible; the cloud is lighted
up by the ray that issues from it. Our goodness, finite creatures as we
are, is so much the greater as the object on which it is bestowed is
less. Infinite goodness must create for itself an object. It does not
love nothingness, but a creature which is nothing in itself, a creature
simply possible, which, before owing to it the blessings of existence,
shall owe to it that existence itself. The only being that we can
represent to ourselves, by a sublime image, as stooping towards
nothingness, is He whose look gives life. The creature is willed for
itself, or,--to quote the words of Professor Secretan, addressed to you
last year,--the foundation of nature is grace.[182] We ask: What can
have been the object of creation? Our reason answers: The Infinite Being
can only act from goodness, He can have no other object than the
happiness of His creatures.

And now I recapitulate. We ask what is the object of creation; and
whereas we cannot transport ourselves into the inaccessible light of the
Divine consciousness, we question the work of God in order to discern
the intentions of the Creator. From the fact that humanity prays, we
gather the reply that man has a spontaneous belief in the goodness of
the First Cause of the universe. We place reason in presence of the
idea of the Infinite Being; reason declares to us that He who is the
plenitude of Being could not have created except from the motive of
love. We understand that God has made all for His own glory, and that
His glory consists in the manifestation of His goodness. These thoughts,
in their full light, belong to the Gospel revelation, but they appear,
under a veil, in the conceptions which lie at the basis of pagan
religions. Without entering the temple of idols, we may bow the knee
before the pediment of the ancient sanctuary, and, beneath the open
vault of heave