er side, the knowledge of the world, even in a scientific
way, leads us to the acknowledgment of a divine providence which controls
with absolute freedom every process in every place and in every moment of
the world's course. We see continually, in the midst of nature, and in its
causal course conformable to law, something supernatural, transcendental,
and metaphysical, acting decisively upon the course of nature; and that is
the _free activity of man_. Every man carries in the freedom of the
determinations of his will something transcendental and metaphysical in
himself, which we can call natural only when we mean by nature the summary
of all that which exists, but which we have to call supernatural when we
mean by nature the summary of that which belongs to the world of phenomena
in its traceable causes as well as in its traceable effects. The scale of
life-activities, from the lowest arbitrary motions, from the impulses and
instincts of the animal up to the highest moral action of the will of man,
shows us in indistinct transitions all stages which lead from the natural
to the supernatural, until, in the ethical and religious motives of man, we
arrive at superphysical (_i.e._, supernatural) motives which daily and
hourly invade the natural, and in this invasion consciously and
unconsciously use the forces of nature {354} and their activity,
conformable to law, and in spite of their metaphysical and transcendental
origin, from the moment of their activity, join the natural causal
connection of the world's course. This observation of an invasion of the
physical by the supernatural, as it continually takes place in the free
action of man, leads us in a triple way to the acknowledgment of an action
of divine providence upon the course of the world.

In the first place, this observation shows us, in a very direct way, points
where the free disposition of God acts determinatingly upon the course of
things, and where this action becomes accessible to our observation. These
points are the human personalities, in so far and inasmuch as they permit
themselves to be influenced and determined by the will of God in the
ethical and religious motives of their action, and, when these motives
become actions, determinately act upon the course of things.

In the second place, this observation further leads, by way of two
conclusions, to the acknowledgment of a divine providence.

One conclusion is the following: If there exist in the w