When in the Christian religion God is worshipped in human form, that is something altogether different; for the divine Essence is there beheld in the man who has suffered, died, risen again, and ascended to heaven. That is not man in his sensuous, immediate existence, but man who has taken on the form of Spirit. The most startling contrast, however, is when the Absolute has to be worshipped in the immediate finite nature of a human being; this is an even more isolated individualisation than the animal itself is. And what is more, humanity has within itself the requirement that it should rise higher, and hence it seems repugnant that this demand should be suppressed, and man’s aspiration tied down to continuance in ordinary finite existence.
We must, however, learn to understand this general conception, and in understanding it we justify it: we show how it gets its foundation, its element of rationality, a place within reason; but it is also implied in this that we perceive its defectiveness. In dealing with religions, we must learn to perceive that what is in them is not mere nonsense, mere irrationality. What is of more importance than this, however, is to recognise the element of truth, and to know how it is in harmony with reason; and that is more difficult than to pronounce a thing to have no sense in it.
Being-within-itself is the essential stage, so that we may advance from immediate, empirical singularity to the determination of essence, of essentiality, to the consciousness of Substance, of a substantial Power which governs the world, causes everything to originate and come into being in accordance with rational laws of connection. So far as it is substantial, inherently existent, it is a power which works unconsciously; and just because of this it is undivided activity, has universality in it, is universal power. And in order to make this intelligible to ourselves, we must recall the expressions activity of nature, spirit of nature, soul of nature. We do not mean by
