MODIFICATIONS IN THE IDEA OF GOD, ETC. 61 



point of our complex beiiig, material, mental, moral, one 

 would imagine that the idea of Him must be one of infinite 

 complexity. My friend Professor Caldecott, in his kindly 

 notice of my paper read before the Institute in February, 

 1883, and of my addendum to it in m}^ little book on the 

 Nicene Creed, remarks that I " let down a very wide net for 

 the ' strengthening,' and — we may suppose — the filling in. of 

 the conception intuitively given at the outset." * Holding 

 the views I do, it would be strange indeed did I not do so. 

 I would let down "a very wide net," an infinitely wide net. 

 for the strengthening and fillijig in of our rudimentary 

 conceptions of a Being " of infinite power, wisdom, and 

 Goodness. "t We have already had a Avarning from Clement 

 of Alexandria against one-sided conceptions of the Divine 

 nature. In fact, as I remarked in my former paper,J I 

 beheve the best way of treating the question of the Being of 

 God to be the scientific one. In other words, I contend that 

 our theories of the Divine Being, as of other truths, should 

 be founded on the principle of inductions from observed 

 facts ; and that thus, by successive approximations, we 

 should arrive, not at a complete knowledge of the Divine 

 natui-e, but at as close a correspondence with the truth as 

 should be necessary as a guide to action. I do not 

 altogether deny that among the factors which contribute 

 to our knowledge on the subject intuitive impressions are to be 

 reckoned. But I confess that, on reconsidering the subject, 

 I should be inclined to restrict the area of our intuitions. I 

 would not extend them to the intellectual ; I would confine 

 them to the moral region. In the intellectual direction I 

 should be inclined to deny the existence of intuitive con- 

 ceptions of God and confine myself to maintaining that each 

 of us has a capacity for receiving impressions of the Divine 

 nature from external sources. But the workings of 

 conscience I should ascribe to the direct influence of the 

 Divine power upon the heart of man, ihougli restrained in 

 its operation by the imperfection of the moral organs 

 through which it works. Such an influence I believe to have 

 been at work from the very first. But far more is this the 

 case since the revelation of God in Christ. If, by virtue of 

 our faith and of the atonement wrought out for us by our 



* The Philosophy of Belief, p. 342. 



+ Art. I of the Church of England. 



X Also in my little book ou the Niceue Creed. 



