ill remain "deeply religious" even when it is recognised that the "Great
Enigma," the "eternal and inscrutable energy," the "ultimate Reality"
cannot be spoken of as "a Personal Creator, or an intelligent Governor of
the universe." For our own part, we find it difficult to believe that
such a forecast could have been framed by anyone possessing a first-hand
knowledge of what "the religious {86} emotions" are; we say with the
utmost confidence that no such emotions can be felt towards a Power which
"cannot be thought of as conscious," let alone as benevolent or
personally interested in us. We well know that we can be nothing to such
a Power--nor can It be anything to us; for a God who does not care, does
not count. We cannot commune with this chill and awesome Unknown; we can
only pray to One who hears; we can only love One who has first loved us.
In the last analysis, an "impersonal Deity" such as one hears
occasionally spoken of, is a mere contradiction in terms, the coinage of
confused and inaccurate thought. Where the meaning of personality is so
much as understood, doubt as to the Divine Personality vanishes; and
least of all will that truth be doubted by those who see the supreme
revelation of God in Jesus Christ. He, the Incarnate Son, has shown us,
not a Power but a Person--the Person of the Father--and, to-day as of
old, "it sufficeth us."

[1] _The Churches and Modern Thought_, by Philip Vivian, p. 231.

[2] _Three Essays on Religion_, R.P.A. reprint, p. 85.

[3] This and subsequent quotations are taken from pp. 108-119 of Prof.
Hudson's _Introduction to the Philosophy of Herbert Spencer_.

[4] Op. cit., p. 231.

[5] Hudson, _op. cit._, p. 116.

[6] _Supra_, p. 46.

{87}

CHAPTER VI

EVIL _versus_ DIVINE GOODNESS

That the renewed emphasis upon the Divine immanence must have for one
of its effects that of raising the problem of evil afresh, and in a
particularly acute form, will be obvious to anyone who has thought out
for himself the implications of that doctrine. Dark and pressing
enough before, this particular problem has, in appearance at least,
been both complicated and accentuated by the displacement of Deism.
If, as we have argued on a previous occasion, there is a certain causal
connection between Deism and a somewhat sombre outlook upon the world,
on the other hand the existence of evil seemed to fit in better with a
view of God which represented Him as outside the universe