that is not ourselves, another Power, a Power that was here
before we were born, a Power that will be here after we have died, a
Power that has produced us, and so is our father and mother on any
theory you choose to hold of it, a Power out of which we have come. Now
suppose we look abroad, and try to find something in regard to the
nature of this Power. We can conceive no beginning: we can conceive no
end. And let me say right here that, as the result of all his lifelong
study and thinking as an evolutionist, Mr. Herbert Spencer has said
that the existence of this infinite and eternal Power, of which all the
phenomenal universe is only a partial and passing manifestation, is the
one item of human knowledge of which we are most certain of all.

An Infinite Power, then, an eternal Power, shall I say an intelligent
Power? At any rate, just as far as our intelligence can reach, we find
that the universe matches that intelligence, responds to it, so that we
must think of it, it seems to me, as intelligent. Out of that Power, as
I have said, we have come; and who are we? Persons, persons that think,
persons that feel, persons that love, persons that hope; and we are the
children of this Power, and, according to one of the fundamental
principles of science, nothing can be evolved which was not first
involved, the stream cannot rise higher than its source, that which is
produced must be equal to that which produces it.

This Power, then, eternal, infinite, intelligent, must be as much as
what we mean by person, by thought, by love, by hope, by all that makes
us what we are. Shall we call a Power like this God? Shall we call it
Nature? Shall we call it Law? Shall we call it Force? It seems to me
that, if we take any name less and lower than God, we are indulging in
a huge assumption, and a negative assumption at that. Suppose that,
looking at one of you, I should call you body instead of calling you
man. I should be assuming that you are only body, which I have no right
to do. If I call this Infinite Power, then, Nature, Force, Law, Matter,
I am indulging in a negative assumption which is scientifically
unwarranted. As a reasonable being, then, I think I am scientifically
warranted in saying that belief in God is something that all
investigation only affirms, and affirms over and over again, and with
still greater and greater force.

I have not time to go into this at any further length this morning; but
I believe that we are