422 COSMIC FEILOSOPKY. [pt. hl 



scientific philosopher is still, and must ever be, the God of 

 the Christian, though freed from the illegitimate formulas 

 by the aid of which theology has sought to render Deity 

 comprehensible. What is this wondrou? Dynamis which 

 manifests itself to our consciousness in harmonious activity 

 throughout the length and breadth and depth of the uni- 

 verse, which guides the stars for countless ages in paths 

 that never err, and which animates the molecules of the 

 dew-drop that gleams for a brief hour on the shaven 

 lawn, — whose workings are so resistless that we have 

 naught to do but reverently obey them, yet so infallible 

 that we can place our unshaken trust in them, yesterday, 

 to-day, and for ever? When, summing up all activity in 

 one most comprehensive epithet, we call it Force, we are 

 but using a scientific symbol, expressing an affection of our 

 consciousness, which is yet powerless to express the in- 

 effable Eeality. To us, therefore, as to the Israelite of old, 

 the very name of Jehovah is that which is not to be spoken. 

 Push our scientific research as far as we may, pursuing 

 generalization until all phenomena, past, present, and future, 

 are embraced within a single formula ;^we shall never 

 fathom this ultimate mystery, we shall be no nearer the 

 comprehension of this omnipresent Energy. Here science 

 must ever reverently pause, acknowledging the presence of 

 the mystery of mysteries. Here religion must ever hold 

 Bway, reminding us that from birth until death we are 

 dependent on a Power to whose eternal decrees we must 

 submit, to whose dispensations we must resign ourselves, 

 and upon whose constancy we may implicitly rely. 



Thus we begin to realize, more vividly than theology could 

 have taught us to realize, the utter absurdity of atheism. 

 Thus is exhibited the prodigious silliness of Lalande, who 

 informed mankind that he had swept the heavens with his 

 telescope and found no God there, — as if God were an optical 

 phenomenon ! Thus, too, we see the poverty of that an« 



