human agencies, so we find that with improved morals, the Deity became at once more spiritual and more intimate in his relations with our race, until at length the alliance was formed between spiritually-minded men and a spiritual Father in heaven. And as a necessary consequence we find also a belief in man's immortal state, and in an immaterial heaven, to have become prevalent. Let us then once more glance at the historic record upon which our spiritual experience has been to a large extent based.

Our survey has been restricted to one of the branches of that stream of thought known as the monotheistic theology, although that conception of Him has often bordered closely upon the polytheistic view, and perhaps never more so than at the present time. First we found the Deity depicted as the God of nature and of the human soul, presenting many aspects, which caused his worshippers to address him by various names, whilst at the same time they proclaimed his Unity. He was an omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent God, a bountiful and sympathetic Ruler, a fierce and jealous Warrior-king, and a terrible, but still a just and merciful Judge. His heaven, which was synonymous with the skies and was hidden from human gaze, was the vast palace of the universe in which he sat enthroned, surrounded by a divine court of warriors and chiefs.

The next glimpse we obtain of Him, although nominally monotheistic, for it reveals him as one divine Person capable of assuming the flesh if not always clothed in it, was in reality not so elevated as the multiform Vedic God, for by the early Hebrews he was accredited (if the term be not a misnomer) with the most violent human passions

and desires. As these two early conceptions of him were entertained by two peoples living widely apart, and at still undetermined periods of human history, it is impossible to say what relations (if any) those two ideals may have borne to one another. Certain it is, that in the early Semitic conceptions of the Deity he is regarded as one jealous, fear-inspiring God, the King over all Gods, tolerating no rival, and fiercely vindicating his superiority and his claims to the implicit obedience of his "chosen people." As the Lord of Nature he is represented as wielding her powers exclusively for the reward or punishment of the human race, and so completely has this doctrine secured its hold upon the human mind, that we find it perpetuated not only throughout the Hebrew records, but even in its integrity amongst the orthodox of our own day. In times of drought prayers are addressed to the Almighty, that "in this our necessity," He will send "such moderate rain and showers that we may receive the fruits of the earth to our comfort." When the rain with which He has blessed the earth has, in the opinion of his worshippers, exceeded that "moderation which would have met their wants and wishes, then a new prayer is sent up to heaven and He is implored that, "although we for our iniquities have worthily deserved a plague of rain and waters," He will send fair weather. Or He is petitioned, at another time, that dearth and famine may through his goodness "be turned into cheapness and plenty." And finally when the affliction is contagious disease, the belief in its immediate efficacy as a reforming agency and a reminder of the existence of the Deity, is assuming a most remarkable aspect. For whilst we have a certain section of the community apparently including

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persons of every shade of religious belief agitating to prevent the arrest of certain diseases, on the ground that they are intended by Providence as a warning against vice, another section of the community, nay it may be some of those who argue as just stated, join in sending up to Heaven their thanksgivings that, whilst they acknowledge the justice of the punishments which "by reason of our hardness of heart might have fallen upon us, yet that it has pleased Him “upon our weak and unworthy humiliation, to assuage the contagious sickness wherewith we lately have been sore afflicted and to restore the voice of joy and health in our dwellings.'

Although this is not the place to discuss such a subject, and the belief is only referred to in order to indicate its origin, yet it may be mentioned that the wide divergences of opinion existing even amongst the orthodox, will no doubt ere long lead to a better comprehension of the ways of Providence, and to a proper sense of the importance of co-operating with Him in the execution of nature's laws.

To return to the early conceptions of Jehovah. We found him described then as He is now, the Lord of Hosts, the God of Battles; but this picture of him soon gave place to a nobler one, and when next we see him He is the Holy One of Israel, no longer delighting in sacrifices and burnt offerings, no longer a stern patriarch, but a pastor and a guardian of his people. Added to his ancient attributes of omnipotence and omniscience, we find holiness, wisdom, and mercy. Instead of being clothed in a human form, He is now considered a spiritual God co-extensive with the universe which reflects his Majesty. No longer a King

*It is hardly necessary to state that these extracts are all from the Church of England Book of Common Prayer.

over all Gods and the dread of his people, He is the sole self-existent Deity; their rock and their stronghold. In our fourth picture, the last trace of a physical being had disappeared, and we found a purely spiritual God, the Father of the human race. Then it was no longer said that no man shall see God and live; but to see Him is the highest human privilege, attainable only by the pure in heart. There He is depicted as the protector of the meek and lowly, the Comforter of the sorrowful, and the Saviour of sinners.

And when we look at society even in our day, we cannot fail to see the need of such a God, for how few are there, who are rulers, chiefs, and shining lights amongst men? How many drudge patiently and enduringly on the earth, alas! how many under the earth's surface, for the public weal? They it is who have the greatest need of a Comforter, and of a home of many mansions. And again, how many poor sinners are there cast off by the world, who are pointed at as Satan's brood, by the righteous overmuch; by the very men who offer an arm to the rich and successful sinner, provided they are allowed to participate in his gains, without being partners in his iniquity. Those whom society has rejected, have most need of a merciful reforming Deity.

With the physical conception of God, the sensate association with him terminates. In the early Semitic age He was believed to be always talking with men, and performing miracles. Later on, whilst He was still represented as authorising men to perform miracles, his oral converse with them had ceased. To-day miracles are regarded as priestly jugglery, and a man who declared that the Almighty had talked with him, would be considered a fit inmate for a lunatic asylum.

Again, then, we find in our fourth picture of him as drawn by the later prophets and by Christ, superadded to his former attributes of omnipotence, omniscience, omnipresence, holiness, wisdom, and mercy, the further qualities of paternal love for our whole race, care and solicitude for all kinds and conditions of men, and for all living beings, and leniency and long forbearance with sinners. At the same time we have a strongly-marked disapprobation of all the external and formal manifestations of devotion, which in earlier ages had been regarded as the outward and visible signs of true holiness. His heaven was represented as the home of the poor rather than the rich; of the meek before the wise; of the humble in preference to the exalted on earth. So far as the Ideal is concerned, it is hardly conceivable that it can be surpassed, although it is an expansive one, for who can there be higher than a perfect God, and what state more exalted than that which brings us nigh to God's perfection?

The modern pictures of the Deity which we have been contemplating represent him, one as a Father and a Son united in heaven, the other as a Father, a Mother, and a Son; the latter, adding to His nature the gentlest and most sympathetic feelings of a woman. In both cases the bond of union between heaven and earth is a mysterious Spirit, emblematised by a dove, but in that of the Roman Catholics we find also a number of intermediate agencies, the spirits of departed saints and guardian angels, who, whilst they obey the will of God, still listen to the prayers and aspirations of the human beings confided to their charge.

And so these pictures seem to teach us, that at first God revealed himself to man as a great Power in nature;