Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker Discourse volume 1.djvu/157



To determine the relation of Man to God it is well to determine first the relation of God to Nature—the material world—that we may have the force of the analogy of that relation to aid us. Conscious man may be very dissimilar to unconscious matter, but yet their relations to God are analogous. Both depend on him. To make out the point and decide the relation of God to Nature we must start from the Idea of God, which was laid down above, a Being of Infinite Power, Wisdom, Justice, Love, and Holiness. Now to make the matter clear as noonday, God is either present in all space, or not present in all space. If infinite, he must be present everywhere in general, and not limited to any particular spot, as an old writer so beautifully says: “Even Heaven and the Heaven of Heavens cannot contain Him.” Heathen writers are full of such expressions. God, then, is universally present in the world of matter. He is the substantiality of matter. The circle of his being in space has an infinite radius. We cannot say, Lo here, or Lo there—for he is everywhere. He fills all Nature with his overflowing currents; without him it were not. His Presence gives it existence; his Will its law and force; his Wisdom its order; his Goodness its beauty.

It follows unavoidably, from the Idea of God, that he is present everywhere in space; not transiently present, now and then, but immanently present, always; his centre here; his circumference nowhere; just as present in the eye of an emmet as in the Jewish holy of holies, or the sun itself. We may call common what God has cleansed