sly discover and preserve it in our memory. It accumulates
with other regular kinds, until the collection of them fills our
encyclopaedias. Yet all the while between and around them lies an
infinite anonymous chaos of objects that no one ever thought of
together, of relations that never yet attracted our attention.

The facts of order from which the physico-theological argument starts
are thus easily susceptible of interpretation as arbitrary human
products. So long as this is the case, although of course no argument
against God follows, it follows that the argument for him will fail to
constitute a knockdown proof of his existence. It will be convincing
only to those who on other grounds believe in him already.

If philosophy can do so little to establish God's existence, how stands
it with her efforts to define his attributes? It is worth while to
look at the attempts of systematic theology in this direction.

Since God is First Cause, this science of sciences says, he differs
from all his creatures in possessing existence a se. From this
"a-se-ity" on God's part, theology deduces by mere logic most of his
other perfections. For instance, he must be both NECESSARY and
ABSOLUTE, cannot not be, and cannot in any way be determined by
anything else. This makes Him absolutely unlimited from without, and
unlimited also from within; for limitation is non-being; and God is
being itself. This unlimitedness makes God infinitely perfect.
Moreover, God is ONE, and ONLY, for the infinitely perfect can admit no
peer. He is SPIRITUAL, for were He composed of physical parts, some
other power would have to combine them into the total, and his aseity
would thus be contradicted. He is therefore both simple and
non-physical in nature. He is SIMPLE METAPHYSICALLY also, that is to
say, his nature and his existence cannot be distinct, as they are in
finite substances which share their formal natures with one another,
and are individual only in their material aspect. Since God is one and
only, his essentia and his esse must be given at one stroke. This
excludes from his being all those distinctions, so familiar in the
world of finite things, between potentiality and actuality, substance
and accidents, being and activity, existence and attributes. We can
talk, it is true, of God's powers, acts, and attributes, but these
discriminations are only "virtual," and made from the human point of
view. In God all these points of view