Page:The Conception of God (1897).djvu/28

Rh real meaning to the traditional dogma of his Omnipresence.

In this light, the conflict existing in thought down to the present day, so far as it bears on religion, appears to lie between the conception of the Immanent God and the conception of the Immanent Unknowable, — between a world-informing Person, whom it is supposed this idealistic Monism secures us, and a world-pervading Power, perpetually transforming its effects, which is all that the agnostic Monism leaves us. On this view. Monism would appear as if settled: there would only remain, as the reflecting world so far appears to think, a choice between its two species. It was therefore with pertinence that Mr. Balfour, in his Foundations of Belief, set these two systems, under the titles of “Naturalism” and “Transcendental Idealism,” in a contrasting agreement in lack, and, exposing some of their incurable defects, while assuming them to exhaust the possibilities of rational ingenuity, made this assumption the basis of his subtle and rather telling plea for a return to external authority, as the only foundation for religious stability. The day has assuredly gone by, however, when men, confessing there is no support for religion in reason, are willing to rest it on decrees and on might; or, going M. de Voltaire one better in his cynicism, are “for the safety of society” not only willing to “invent a God,” but are ready to enforce him. “When it comes to that,” the minds of this generation surely would say, “it is time to give religion over, and to let God go.” On the other hand, quite as surely,