248 Evolution of Theology. 



does not, in its setting forth of the Nature and Attributes 

 of God, contain the germ, essentially, of a Pantheism as 

 radical as has ever been propounded from Spinoza to Spen- 

 cer. Omniscience, Omnipresence and Omnipotence, as used 

 in articles of belief and confessions of faith, are words void 

 of meaning except with pantheistic implications. Expand 

 these and similar words, under metaphysical treatment, and 

 any idea of Personality and Self-Consciousness in Deity 

 must disappear, in any sense in which Avords are used by 

 us or understood among us. This conclusion does not cer- 

 tainly dispose of the question whether, in the last analysis, 

 if we could make it, some quality or attribute corresponding 

 to Personality and Consciousness may not be found to exist 

 in the Infinite. It is reasonable to claim that, as the stream 

 cannot rise higher than its source, the fact that human per- 

 sonality and self-consciousness have been evolved in mental 

 progress, argues that something higher than this, not some- 

 thing lower, has been its origin ; but any such expressions 

 as Infinite Personality or Infinite Consciousness are so 

 wholly beyond our mental reach that they escape all com- 

 ])rehension. 



Pantheism has taken forms as varying as the different 

 views of the Universe which the philosophies of the world 

 have set forth, and an account of them here is impossible. 

 In all of them the search is for a fundamental Unity, and 

 they can not be charged with irreligion. A rational religion 

 has been the object of all, except the comparatively few 

 systems in which the ultra-materialistic view has led to 

 atheism. The expressions Universal Mind, Universal Soul, 

 are the terms in Avhich idealistic Pantheism strives to real- 

 ize in thought those more comprehensive views Avhich it 

 professes. 



Beyond Pantheism there is but one farther step which 

 can be taken. The Philosophy of the Absolute will accept 

 not even the terms Universal Mind, Soul, or Spirit. It 

 insists that these phases are but expansions of merely human 

 ideas of personal mind, soul or spirit, and still, therefore, 

 imply a limitation Avhich does not allow a free development 

 of a true doctrine of the Infinite. These words still imply 

 consciousness, and that implies limitation. The question 

 is discussed necessarily upon metaphysical lines exclusively, 

 and is substantially this : The Infinite, ex vi ternimi, is that 

 which is Avithout limit, and, so conceived, is an original and 



