or rather as the perfect expression of the duty which man owes to his own being, as standing in a certain relation on the one hand to God and on the other to his fellows.

The distinction here insisted on between dogma and religion is one which may easily be missed.

The latter has so long been mixed up with particular theological notions that it is difficult for most minds to understand how religion can exist without them. Their true relation has been well expressed by a late writer, whose language in the use of the term "supernatural" is, however, not unexceptionable. He says- "The essence of all religion in all its various forms is, the deep feeling excited by the sense of a mysterious, supernatural (?) power, higher and greater than we can understand, acting in the universe and related to us." On the other hand, "theology consists of the notions, the conceptions, the doctrines, by which the mind interprets and explains the power whose influence upon it excites the feelings of wonder, awe, and dependence which constitute religion.” In short, "religion is the feeling excited by the sense of an unknown power, theology is the explanation the mind endeavours to give of that power." If this be a correct expression of the difference between religion and theology, it is clear that the former may continue almost unchanged, while the notions of which the latter is made up have entirely altered their character. No doubt the emotional element undergoes certain modifications according to the idea entertained as to the nature of the object towards which its attention is directed. The dread of the semi-civilized inhabitant of the tropics, and the holy fear of the more cultured Semite, alike give place in great measure to the love of the Christian. But the same emotional element is present in the minds 1 "Credibilia." By the Rev. James Cranbrook, pp. 28-30.

of all; whereas the theological notions formed of the invisible agency, the thought of which arouses various phases of activity, are practically wholly different. Moreover, there is no reason to suppose that the limit of transformation of those notions has yet been reached. Theological changes, required by the elevation of our ideas and the increase of our knowledge, may result in the ordinary Christian notion of deity being as greatly transformed as the conception of a supernatural power has been when the modern idea of God is compared with that held by the lowest savage. Even this conception has not received its final form. God has hitherto been usually viewed as a supernatural existence, but this idea, in the sense that His being is outside of or apart from nature, may yet prove to be untenable.

The question as to the existence or nature of God is a very difficult one, but a like conception of the Divine Being may be so framed as to be less objectionable than that of the Grand-Etre of Positivism. This Supreme Being is, as we have seen, the totality of mankind viewed as resuming in itself the whole of organic nature on the globe. Animals and vegetables, equally with man, are its organs, and the inorganic kingdom also performs certain functions having relation to its activity. Those, at least, who hold these notions, ought not to have any difficulty in accepting the wider view that universal nature itself forms a single Grand-Etre. Of this Supreme Being, the animal and vegetable kingdoms, not of this earth only, but of all the planetary bodies throughout the universe would constitute the several organs. Man himself would also stand in this relation to the Universal Existence. Every individual, human, animal, or vegetable, would thus form a part of the great whole which shows its vitality in the evolution of organic, nature. According to this view, nature is identified

with God himself, and man, as the final product of the evolution of nature-that is, of God-is entitled to be described as a Grand-Etre. There is no warrant, however, for saying that God only consciously exists as man, and therefore Humanity, as being only a part of the great whole, is not a proper object of worship, this being reserved for the Being who, as identifiable with universal nature, is the Supreme Grand-Etre.

This conclusion as to the being of God is required by the very existence of man, whose evident connection with the animal world, notwithstanding the mental and moral phenomena he presents, can be explained only on the assumption that he is the last and necessary product of the organic evolution of nature. That nature, treated as an organic whole, must be identified with God, is provable by several considerations. We cannot suppose that the phenomenal products of evolution possess aught which nature, as a whole, does not possess ; and the latter, therefore, must have, either actually or potentially, all the faculties which man, the latest of such products, exhibits in exercise. But the Universal Existence having, according to this view, the faculties of reflection and reasoning, must be conceived as organic, and being so it can be no other than the Supreme Being, the Deity himself. That the material universe can be otherwise than infinite in extension is contrary to reason. There may be space where the planetary systems which we see around us are wanting, but the absence of matter, cosmical or ethereal, could only be admitted on the inadmissible assumption that space itself is finite. Space indeed is, so far as we know, only the extension of matter, and if the former is infinite, so also must be the latter. But unless the material universe thus extended has an intimate relation to the Deity, as in some sense a part of his own being, we must

conclude, either that as an infinite being he does not exist, or that there can be an infinite existence outside of, and apart from, himself. The latter idea is absurd, and therefore, on the assumption that God is infinite, we must believe that he and the material universe, which has an endless extension, form together but one whole. "Organic nature," then, is only a name for the Supreme Being of whom the universe is the material covering, this, like the body of man to which it bears analogy, owing its activity to the presence of the energizing spirit, the Deity of theologians.

No objection to this view can be derived from the gross condition in which matter is known to us. Although nature is God, yet this is only in the sense that God is nature before it has passed through that grand and gradual process of evolution which, starting from matter in its ethereal or cosmical form, or it may be in a simply organic condition, has ended in man. The existence of gross material substance furnishes, therefore, no greater difficulty than does that of the human body itself. Both present matter in what may be termed a degraded form, and as such they are no longer God, except in a relative sense, as having been derived from his own being. To some minds a more serious difficulty is created by the idea that the possession by "organic nature" of the power of reflection or reasoning requires that it shall have "personality." If nature be God, we must suppose it to have personality, and the difficulty in conceiving of the possibility of this leads to the rejection of the identity between God and nature. The objection, however, is founded on the mistaken idea that, by the hypothesis, nature must be capable of reasoning or reflection at every part. But this is by no means necessary, as may be shown by reference to the analogous case of the human body.

with God himself, and man, as the final product of the evolution of nature-that is, of God-is entitled to be described as a Grand-Etre. There is no warrant, however, for saying that God only consciously exists as man, and therefore Humanity, as being only a part of the great whole, is not a proper object of worship, this being reserved for the Being who, as identifiable with universal nature, is the Supreme Grand-Etre.

This conclusion as to the being of God is required by the very existence of man, whose evident connection with the animal world, notwithstanding the mental and moral phenomena he presents, can be explained only on the assumption that he is the last and necessary product of the organic evolution of nature. That nature, treated as an organic whole, must be identified with God, is provable by several considerations. We cannot suppose that the phenomenal products of evolution possess aught which nature, as a whole, does not possess ; and the latter, therefore, must have, either actually or potentially, all the faculties which man, the latest of such products, exhibits in exercise. But the Universal Existence having, according to this view, the faculties of reflection and reasoning, must be conceived as organic, and being so it can be no other than the Supreme Being, the Deity himself. That the material universe can be otherwise than infinite in extension is contrary to reason. There may be space where the planetary systems which we see around us are wanting, but the absence of matter, cosmical or ethereal, could only be admitted on the inadmissible assumption that space itself is finite. Space indeed is, so far as we know, only the extension of matter, and if the former is infinite, so also must be the latter. But unless the material universe thus extended has an intimate relation to the Deity, as in some sense a part of his own being, we must