(λńρwμa) of the Father, and the Father as gloriously self-revealed in the Person of the Son.

And it may be added that, as we associate human personality especially with the relation between subject and object (the self and the character), so when we are speaking of a Personal God, without explicit reference to distinctions within the Godhead, we shall be thinking primarily of the Holy Spirit who is the Living Relation between the Father and the Son. So, too, when we speak of the Sameness of God who changes not throughout the ages, we shall be thinking primarily of the Father, whom we associate with the identity of the subject in every act of thought or desire; and when we speak of the Character, or self-Revelation, of God, we shall be thinking primarily of the Son, who eternally manifests the Father's will. And the Identity of the Subject, the Character of the Object, and the Personality of the Relation, together are the Life of the indivisible Triune God; the special characteristics of each being shared in perfect inter-communion by the others. And if it is still thought that the existence of distinct Personalities within the Holy Trinity, thus understood, brings with it the danger of tritheism, it is worth while to remind ourselves that even in our own case personality is not meant to be a hard barrier of severance and antagonism between man and man. With us, indeed, it has come to be some such thing in consequence of sin, which consists in self-love and works by self-assertion, and which has hardened the fluid boundaries of personality into a fortress

wall. Ideally the uniting bond of a common nature should be a great deal more effective amongst us, and the separateness of man from man much less keenly emphasised.

The perfect relation between persons is a distinctness which melts away through soft gradations, and never becomes separation. Of such a sort may we conceive to be the union between the Divine Persons of the Undivided Trinity.

Lastly, we must notice the objection that, if God is personal, He cannot also be "the Absolute." The meaning is, that personal life, with its distinction of subject and object, involves an attitude of "otherness" to a world which is contemplated, and which, by the fact of being contemplated, is distinguished from him who contemplates it. Thus a personal God cannot be identified with the worldwhich is the apparent privilege of the Absolute. In this sense we may readily and gratefully acknowledge that God is not Absolute.

If He were, He would be revealed equally and indifferently in any and every event and in any and every character.

As personal, God expresses Himself in His Son, who is truth and goodness in their ideal perfection, who is distinct from the Father as the object is distinct from the subject, but is united to Him as the full and complete expression of His Being. Here the distinction of subject and object is a distinction which lies entirely within the unity of the Godhead. The Father is aware of the Son, not as of an alien and separate non-self, lying outside His

own nature and limiting it, but as of One in whom His own Being is completely and exclusively mirrored.

The identification of the Absolute with the world means, in one word, Pantheism. God, as Personal, transcends the world, and is not to be identified with it; though, as we shall see in the next chapter, the world has its ideal in God, and can grow to perfection by gradual approximation to that ideal.

Moreover, each human personality which God creates, exists with a life of its own distinct from that of God. In making us free personal creatures He deliberately limits His direct control over us, and sends us out into the world to refuse the evil and choose the good for ourselves; by giving us power of choice, He has imparted to us a measure of creative power. "All the whole heavens are the Lord's; the earth hath He given to the children of men." This only means that He who is boundless in power has freely and lovingly limited the exercise of that power, in order that we may be free; and He gives us a nature distinct from Himself though entirely dependent upon Him, that we may feel after Him and find Him, and find ourselves through union with Him.

The God, then, whom we contemplate, and with whom we may experience the joy of union, is not a Being utterly unlike ourselves, an unknown, an alien hypothesis, an abstract unity; but a Personal Life, a God whose thought is the Eternal Generation of the Son, and whose Love is the Procession of the Holy Ghost. Such a God contains in Himself the

fulness of everything that we are or desire to be; He is like us, because we are His offspring and His image. By placing ourselves humbly and lovingly in His presence we may gain the power of unlimited growth of knowledge and love.

IN

CHAPTER XII

THE ETERNAL WORD

IN the last chapter we were thinking of God the Son in His relation to the Father. This relation may be summed up by saying that He is the complete expression of the Father's Being; or, in language made familiar to us by Scripture, that He is the Word of God, co-eternal and co-divine with the Father, the effulgence of His glory, and the counterpart or impression of His Person; the image of the invisible God, in whom the fulness of the Godhead dwells; the beloved Son, in whom the Father is well pleased, and whom the Father loved before the foundation of the world.

And, flowing from this, there is another truth about the Divine Son which we must now go on to consider, namely, His relation to the universe. In dealing with this we shall dwell especially on the passages in which this relation is stated or adumbrated in the Bible. But it is well to admit at the outset that these passages are neither very numerous nor very explicit. Indeed, we should not expect it to be otherwise. The Bible is mainly concerned