In truth, however, it is not so. Science sees clearly that what she has really attained by this nebular hypothesis is no unity at all, but only the temporary concealment of a difference. She sees clearly

that, conceding the truth of this general engulfment in a fire-cloud, it does not amount to anything more than an engulfment; it no more destroys the separate potencies of things than a flood which submerged the world would thereby destroy that distinction of elements which existed before submergence. The very fact that the forces latent in this fire-cloud are able ultimately to separate themselves into distinct and relatively independent forces, is a proof that while in the fire-cloud the forces were only latent and not non-existent. If their difference had been non-existent at the beginning, it would have remained so for ever.

And here it is that the theory of evolution, in the person of its representative, Mr Herbert Spencer, feels itself constrained in its search for unity to overleap the boundaries of materialism. Starting as it does with the structures and the forms of things, and tracing back, step by step, the process by which these forms and structures emerged from a common unity, it ends by making the discovery that no structural or physical basis can ever ultimately constitute that unity. Evolution, therefore, is driven by her own scientific researches to suppose the existence of a world which is not physical and

not conditioned by finite things. After exhibiting in minute detail the operations and the transmutations of the forces men call physical-after tracing with untiring care the links of that chain by which these forces penetrate the universe,-Mr Spencer has at last 1 been compelled to admit that they are each and all inadequate to account for a single process of that universe. He has been compelled to recognise the fact that, potent as they seem to be, they are, after all, but the symbols and the emblems of another and a mightier Power, which exists transcendently behind them, and of whose existence they are only the manifestations. What that Power is Mr Spencer does not say; he maintains that it is impossible to say; he contends that its nature is inscrutable. But there is one fact about it which Mr Spencer does grant-a fact which, however negative in itself, has very positive bearings; he admits that this inscrutable Force or Power, which is the ultimate uniting principle of all other forces and powers, is a principle which itself transcends every material process of nature. It is not a result of physical forces, but a cause of physical forces; it unites them not simply by combining, but mainly by underlying them. Without this transcendental Force the forces of nature could no more be, than the shadow could be without the

1 He contemplates this result, indeed, from the beginning; see his chapters on the Unknowable in earlier part of First Principles.

substance. In truth, in Mr Spencer's view, these are the shadows and this is the substance. The things which we see, hear, taste, and handle, come to us from a region of mystery-nay, are now in a region of mystery. What they are in themselves we know not; we only know what they seem to be, and that their seeming must be very different from their reality. Their reality lies in that Existence which they manifest—an Existence which transcends them even while it supports and manifests them-a Power whose being is to them inscrutable even while in it they live and have their being.

To this goal, therefore, have we come, led by the hand of the evolution theory itself. We have been obliged in our search for unity to fall back upon the belief in the existence of a Power which transcends the world of matter as we know it-to postulate the life of a Presence which, although everywhere persistent, is yet everywhere inscrutable. Let it be remembered that, according to Mr Spencer, the belief in such a Presence is equally necessary at all times. It is not something which is required to account for certain processes of nature; it is required to account for every minutest step of every natural process whatever. Mr Spencer does not profess to be a theist, and he would certainly repudiate the imputation of believing in a special Providence; yet no theist, no believer in a special Providence, ever asked more from his

God than Mr Spencer asks from his inscrutable Power. What he demands from that Power is. nothing less than an absolute omnipresence, pervading all the movements and persisting through all the changes of nature. The Force which he requires to account for the universe is a Force which is not required in one place more than another, or at one time more than another. In the view of Mr Spencer, the physical manifestations of nature are all in an equal degree impotent to produce themselves, and all in an equal degree demand the existence of a Power behind them. To him there is no distinction in nature between great and small; nature is a united organism, a connected whole, to which every part contributes, and in which every part is equally essential. No single part of the visible framework is either self-originating or selfsupporting, nor does the visible framework subsist simply by the union of all. For every moment of its being, for every breath of its life, for every manifestation of its movement, there is needed the presence and the action of a Force which is itself perfectly inscrutable and perfectly transcendenta Force, of which the changes in the physical universe are the phases and the embodiments, but which yet itself in its deepest essence is incapable of change. It subsists everywhere and always; the lowliest and the loftiest processes of nature equally manifest its power. It is not simply primal but

basal. To seek it we do not need to go back in search of an absolute beginning; every movement of the existing universe is as much an expression of it as if for the first time it were forming that universe. In each tremor of a nerve, in each weaving of a tissue, in each motion of a limb, in each perception of an organ, we find ourselves perpetually in the presence of a Power which we do not comprehend, but which yet comprehends us and encloses our entire being.

The question now is, What bearing has all this upon the possibility of man's contact with the object of his worship. It has this important bearing, that it shows the theory of evolution to be corroborative of such a possibility. The Force which Mr Herbert Spencer places at the summit and base of things is not indeed an object of theistic worship, but it has this much in common with the God of theism, that it is a Power which transcends nature. Here then is the remarkable concession of a point, and that the fundamental point, on which the new faith can live with the old. The Book of Genesis says that through the possession of a common image there is a possibility of contact between the human and the Divine. Has modern science negatived that assertion? Has the increasing breadth of our knowledge of nature contributed so to dwarf our human consciousness as to make the possibility of Divine con