RATIONALISM AND THE IDEA OF GOD 213 



external reality. But, whatever we may think of 

 these outer components, there they are, and they do 

 affect us for better or for worse. Before such a 

 heterogeneous assemblage as is constituted by the 

 outer components can operate as a single idea, can 

 deserve a single name such as God, they must be 

 elaborately organized. 



The contribution to the idea of God from within, 

 from the mind of man himself, is its form; and this 

 form is the outcome of a process of mental organiza- 

 tion every bit as real as the physical organization 

 occurring in the unborn embryo. 



The essential thing about both is, as we have in- 

 dicated, that unity should arise in spite of diversity, 

 and the resulting entity — organism in the one case, 

 organized idea in the other — should thus be able to 

 act as a single whole. 



The system of ideas which man holds concerning 

 external powers may be thus organized by thinking 

 of it in terms of magic, of "influence," manifesting it- 

 self in different ways in different operations of Na- 

 ture; or in terms of personality, the manifestations 

 of power being supposed to result from the activities 

 of a being or beings more or less similar to ourselves; 

 or it may be organized, as we shall see, on more sci- 

 entific lines, by carefully pruning away all parts of 

 it which are either definitely the mere product of our 

 own imaginations, or else are not proven. 



Thus what we have called the raw material of 

 Divinity is given in the outer forces of nature, which 



