218 The Evolution of Transcendence [CH. 



of the truth that fellowship must begin as self-limitation, 

 and must be limitation until it is returned upon its 

 centre in perfect reciprocity. The work is the gradual 

 realisation of the idea as an actual experience; the 

 entity is that which, by sharing the Perfect Experience, 

 confirms its perfectness. 



The problem of the apparent double consciousness 

 that seems inevitable where transcendence and imman- 

 ence coexist was met in part, but only in part, by an in- 

 sistence on the importance of recognising degrees in 

 Reality; by showing that partial experiences are only 

 partial when they are considered out of relation to the 

 Whole, through a process of abstraction inevitable for 

 limited beings, but not inevitable for God. This mode of 

 looking at the problem in no way detracts from or neglects 

 the reality of partial experience, but lays stress on the 

 fact that it is only real because of its relation to the 

 whole ; so that for God, who sees the Whole, the partial 

 experiences have a truer reality than for man, through 

 His full understanding that they are not real with a self- 

 subsistent reality apart from all else. We cannot grasp 

 them in their fullness; He can. 



Because phenomena are real for Him, we come into 

 touch with His own Nature, on the planes of relative 

 reality, through His attributes. These do not manifest 

 His absolute Being, but they are the true functioning 

 of His nature; its expression in the region of limitation. 

 We are not confined to a knowledge of God's attributes 

 while Himself remains far away and unknowable, for 

 they are His manifestation in conditions that are real 

 for Him as well as for us. 



We then turned to the central motive of our discus- 

 sion, and endeavoured to show that every self-con- 

 scious, active unit must be personal, and that person- 

 ality could not exist as such if it were simply one, with- 

 out any internal manifold. To demonstrate this we 



