o himself such generic definitions, and
since there is no more reality in anything than God has assigned to
it, it follows, surely, that the absence of good exists only in
respect of man's understanding, not in respect of God's.

If this be so, then (replies Blyenburg), bad men fulfil God's will
as well as good.

It is true (Spinoza answers) they fulfil it, yet not as the good nor
as well as the good, nor are they to be compared with them. The
better a thing or a person be, the more there is in him of God's
spirit, and the more he expresses God's will; while the bad, being
without that divine love which arises from the knowledge of God, and
through which alone we are called (in respect of our understandings)
his servants, are but as instruments in the hand of the
artificer--they serve unconsciously, and are consumed in their
service.

Spinoza, after all, is but stating in philosophical language the extreme
doctrine of Grace; and St. Paul, if we interpret his real belief by the
one passage so often quoted, in which he compares us to 'clay in the
hands of the potter, who maketh one vessel to honour and another to
dishonour,' may be accused with justice of having held the same opinion.
If Calvinism be pressed to its logical consequences, it either becomes
an intolerable falsehood, or it resolves itself into the philosophy of
Spinoza. It is monstrous to call evil a positive thing, and to assert,
in the same breath, that God has predetermined it,--to tell us that he
has ordained what he hates, and hates what he has ordained. It is
incredible that we should be without power to obey him except through
his free grace, and yet be held responsible for our failures when that
grace has been withheld. And it is idle to call a philosopher
sacrilegious who has but systematised the faith which so many believe,
and cleared it of its most hideous features.

Spinoza flinches from nothing, and disguises no conclusions either from
himself or from his readers. We believe for ourselves that logic has no
business with such questions; that the answer to them lies in the
conscience and not in the intellect. Spinoza thinks otherwise; and he is
at least true to the guide which he has chosen. Blyenburg presses him
with instances of monstrous crime, such as bring home to the heart the
natural horror of it. He speaks of Nero's murder of Agrippina, and asks
if God can be called the cause of s