2OO Immortality [CH. 



an effect, of the Being of a God Who is the Ground of all. 

 The difference seems to be quantitative. Personality is 

 personality, however it came into being; and once it is 

 there it must have the qualities of its nature or it would 

 not be personality. Qualitatively, all personality must 

 be the same in possessing individuality, lastingness, 

 and the power of willing, loving, and acting freely. The 

 term connotes these things. Quantitatively, it may be 

 brought into existence, or be self-existent from eternity. 

 It is still personality, whatever its origin. And our diffi- 

 culty really arises in our ineradicable tendency to regard 

 the eternal series as temporal. In human relations we 

 assume this reality of personal being without feeling a 

 difficulty. My children are as much personal beings as 

 myself, though in a sense I am their cause. One of the 

 qualities of personality or rather, to speak more ex- 

 actly, the result of all the qualities of personality is 

 the power to create; and when there is only one thing 

 that is ultimately real, that is the thing which will be 

 created. The creation of a temporary illusion cannot 

 satisfy the creative need of a person. Creativeness is 

 one of the qualities of personality, just as enduringness 

 is. Paradox though it may involve, we mean this when 

 we speak of a person. 



Thus we see that in human experience antecedent 

 existence is no bar to the reality and same-in-likeness of 

 the antecedent and the subsequently created person- 

 alities. Why should we then make this an essential dis- 

 tinction between the personal natures of God and men ? 

 The only real point of difference is that God Is, regard- 

 ed as in the temporal series, which is itself factitious, be- 

 fore all other persons, I am only before all subsequent 

 persons 1 . 



Lastly, among minor difficulties, what of memory? 



1 Again, see p. 12. 



