iverse, or
rather is the universe itself, in this heaven of abstraction,
nevertheless, a cloud begins to appear; a limitation casts its shadow
over the formless void. Infinite is finite because it is infinite.
That is to say, because infinity includes all things, it is incapable
of creating what is external to itself. Deny infinity in this sense,
and the being to whom it is attributed receives a new power. _God is
greater by being finite than by being infinite_ . . . Logic must admit
that the infinite over-reaches itself by denying the existence of the
finite, and that there are some "limitations," such as the
impossibility of evil or falsehood, which are of the essence of the
Divine nature.[2]

Where, of course, Divine immanence is held to mean the "allness"--which
is the strict equivalent of the infinity--of God, evil in every shape
and form will either have to be ascribed to the direct will and agency
of God Himself, or for apologetic purposes to be reduced to a mere
semblance, or "not-being." Thus we are told to-day in plain terms that
"if God does not avert evil, it is because He requires it"; {8} that
"what to us seems evil is ordained of God"; that--

"If prayers and earthquakes break not Heaven's design,
How then a Borgia or a Catiline?"

But if evil be only apparent and not real, we shall surely, having
gained this insight, be too wise to waste indignation upon the
non-existent; if what we call misdeeds in reality fulfil God's own
"requirements," a thoroughly enlightened public opinion will not seek
to interfere with the sacred activities of the pick-pocket, the forger,
the sweater, the _roue_, every one of whom may plead that he is but
carrying out the Divine ordinances; if Alexander Borgia's perjuries,
poisonings and debaucheries "break not Heaven's design," but are
"ordained of God for some purpose," morality itself becomes an exploded
anachronism.

It is because these and such as these are the results in the fields of
religion and conduct which flow from certain errors in the field of
speculation, that these chapters have been written, and are now sent
forth. Belief in a personal God, personal freedom, personal
immortality--these essentials of religion are one and all endangered
where the doctrine of Divine immanence is presented in terms of a
monistic philosophy; it has been the writer's object to safeguard and
vindicate these truths anew in a volume which, though of necessity
largely cri