SOUNDINGS 



the unjust ; he sees the vast, impartial, undiscriminat- 

 ing movements of Nature all about him; he learns 

 that the land cannot sustain life without the fer- 

 tilizing rains, yet he beholds the clouds pouring out 

 their bounty into the sea just as freely as upon the 

 land; he beholds the inorganic crushing the organic 

 all about him, and yet he knows that the latter is 

 nothing without the former. 



If God and the universal cosmic forces are one, 

 how surely is God on both sides in all struggles, all 

 causes, all wars, righteous and unrighteous ! We be- 

 hold warring nations praying to the same God for 

 victory; we see this same God now apparently favor- 

 ing one side, now the other, and we are bewildered. 

 Our theology takes us beyond soundings. But the 

 naturist is not bewildered; he can read the riddle and 

 reconcile the contradictions. Napoleon (if it was 

 Napoleon) was right when he said that God was on 

 the side of the heaviest artillery — the more power, 

 the more God. 



This may be a hard, chilling gospel; it is like 

 going naked into the storm; but how can we deny 

 it? Can we refuse to face it? 



