causes, or to the belief that in this department of nature at least
certain "properties" had been imparted to matter and it had then been
left to act largely by itself; yet, since the vital processes of living
organisms are capable of exact correlation with all other forces, such
as light, heat, and electricity, the direct action of this universal
all-controlling Mind in all the phenomena of nature seems demonstrated
beyond a doubt, leaving apparently little or no room for any action of
second causes.

But this view of the matter, as is very evident, is liable to lead to a
pantheistic view of the universe, than which nothing could be more
horrible.

How then shall we reconcile these conflicting views?

In this case, as in so many others, the Bible comes in to show us the
rational _via media_, the straight path of reason and sound philosophy
which avoids the absurdities of both extremes.

The plain and unambiguous teaching of the Bible is that God, the
Creator, is a being, a person, infinite in all His powers and
perfections, omnipresent throughout the universe; yet that there is a
place in which He is to be found, or where He abides, in a sense in
which He is not to be found in any other place. This paradox is easily
understood when we realize that God is present everywhere throughout His
universe _by His word and by His Spirit,_--His word being as effective
throughout the remotest corners of His universe as near at hand, for the
very simple reason that matter has no "properties" which He has not
imparted to it, and therefore it can have no innate inertia or
reluctance to act which God's word would need to overcome in order to