this system; why He has sent us forth to face the storms of life. We cannot
know, nor is the question practical; suffice it that we are here, and we
must do our best. Yet many philosophers have speculated on this point and
many suggestions have been made. The most beautiful that I know is that of
a Gnostic philosopher:

"God is Love, but Love itself cannot be perfect unless it has those upon
whom it can be lavished and by whom it can be returned. Therefore He put
forth of Himself into matter, and He limited His glory, in order that
through this natural and slow process of evolution we might come into
being; and we in turn according to His Will are to develop until we reach
even His own level, and then the very love of God itself will become more
perfect, because it will then be lavished on those, His own children, who
will fully understand and return it, and so His great scheme will be
realized and His Will, be done."

At what stupendous elevation His consciousness abides we know not, nor can
we know its true nature as it shows itself there. But when He puts Himself
down into such conditions as are within our reach, His manifestation is
ever threefold, and so all religions have imaged Him as a Trinity. Three,
yet fundamentally One; Three Persons (for person means a mask) yet one God,
showing Himself in those Three Aspects. Three to us, looking at Them from
below, because Their functions are different; one to Him, because He knows
Them to be but facets of Himself.

All Three of these Aspects are concerned in the evolution of the solar
system; all Three are also concerned in the evolution of man. This
evolution is His Will; the method of it is His plan.

Next below this Solar Deity, yet also in some mysterious manner part of