with 'second causes,' further than by having started them in the first
instance as a great machinery of 'natural causation,' working under
'general laws.' True the theory of Deism, which entertains more or less
expressly this hypothesis of 'Deus ex machina,' has during the present
century been more and more superseded by that of Theism, which
entertains also in some indefinable measure the doctrine of 'immanence';
as well as by that of Pantheism, which expressly holds this doctrine to
the exclusion _in toto_ of its rival. But Theism has never yet
entertained it sufficiently or up to the degree required by the pure
logic of the case, while Pantheism has but rarely considered the rival
doctrine of personality--or the possible union of immanence with
personality.[49]

Now it is the object of this book to go much further than any one has
hitherto gone in proving the possibility of this union. For I purpose to
show that, provided only we lay aside all prejudice, sentiment, &c.,
and follow to its logical termination the guidance of pure reason, there
are no other conclusions to be reached than these. Namely, (_A_) That if
there be a personal God, no reason can be assigned why He should not be
immanent in nature, or why all causation should not be the immediate
expression of His will. (_B_) That every available reason points to the
inference that He probably is so. (_C_) That if He is so, and if His
will is self-consistent, all natural causation must needs appear to us
'mechanical.' Therefore (_D_) that it is no argument against the divine
origin of a thing, event, &c., to prove it due to natural causation.

After having dealt briefly with (_A_), (_B_) and (_C_), I would show
that (_D_) is the most practically important of these four conclusions.
For the fundamental hypothesis which I began by mentioning is just the
opposite of this. Whether tacitly or expressly, it has always been