He opens his whole heart in invocation to the Soul of the universe, and wins the sense of sufficient power. He returns to his task equal to the great emergency, and possessing in himself the witness of the help of the living God. The moral history of the true men of the world is rich in this type of experience. The mark set up beyond the wild seas of passion has been followed; first in despair, then in desperate hope; finally the appeal to the Infinite and the moral response of the Infinite to the soul, has issued in prosperous, joyous power. The triumph of man at his moral task, the equivalence of his spirit to his moral opportunity is through the strength of the Eternal. In this type of experience God is known as the adequate inward equipment, as the sufficient grace of the soul.

There is still another way, the greatest of all ways, I believe, of bringing to distinctness the consciousness of God. The good is the path to God. Here we must ask, What do we mean by the good? The answer is in one word, satisfaction. For man, for rational being anywhere, beyond perfect satisfaction there is nothing. Truth is the satisfaction of the intellect; the intellect asks for nothing beyond that. This is the truth. The intellect replies, "I am satisfied." The æsthetic sense calls for beauty, and when beauty comes it is satisfied, it asks for nothing

beyond. The conscience calls for right, and when right comes the conscience is satisfied and asks for nothing more. The heart cries out for love and when that comes the heart is satisfied. Truth is the satisfaction of the intellect; beauty is the satisfaction of the aesthetic sense; right is the satisfaction of the conscience; love is the satisfaction of the heart. All these satisfactions gather themselves into the Absolute satisfaction which is the Absolute good, the Absolute God: "I shall be satisfied when I awake in thy likeness."

II

Four examples, two philosophies and two religions, will constitute four supporting arguments in behalf of the validity and greatness of this way of bringing into clearness and power our instinctive sense of the Infinite mystery as our God.

Plato in his greatest Dialogue, "The Republic," sets out to find justice. In his quest and as a help he analyzes the human soul and discovers that it consists of three parts, reason, spirit, appetite. There can be no justice in the soul unless each part does its own work and does it well. In that case, when each does its own part and does it well, there will be harmony in the soul, and that is justice in the individual. Plato concludes that in order to see justice written

large, he must organize a state, an ideal state, and this he does. He has three classes in the state, wise men, men of courage, the artisan class. Justice in the state means that each class does its own work and does it well. Then we have harmony in the state, as we had harmony in the soul; in each case that is justice, individual and social. Plato further discovers that it is impossible to attain harmony in the soul, or in the state, without the vision of the Absolute Good; the Eternal satisfaction is in God. We must move through our psychic life and through our political life to the Eternal; when we see God as the Absolute satisfaction, we are able to come back and organize life personal and social in light and truth and peace. Here is an example of a great mind, seeking through life the Absolute Good; he was led in his search to all that he meant by God. Good is the satisfaction of the finite soul; good is the satisfaction of the Infinite soul; good is the highest name for God. Why callest thou me good? There is none good, save God. Good is experience both in the finite spirit and in the Infinite; it is, in the last analysis, Infinite experience satisfying finite experience; “O satisfy me early with thy mercy."

Aristotle in his Ethics asks the question, What is the chief good? In answer to this question he names three different views of good. The sensu

alist holds one view, the lover of honor another, the philosopher still another. It is the view of the philosopher or wise man that counts. His view is that the final good of man is the exercise of what is highest in the soul; this is mind on its speculative side, and secondarily on its ethical side. Morality is the temporal form of the pure spirit, in the conventions of human society; thought is adjusted to reality; truth is the eternal interest, and the highest development of the rational soul is the supreme good. The highest good of man is an approach, in favored moments, to the eternal good in the mind of God. God lives in the pure eternal vision of himself, as the truth and perfection of the universe. This is not the whole story. God is the universal object of desire and love because of his perfection. God as the perfect good or satisfaction moves the universe; he moves the universe below man through the desire that does not understand itself, through the desire whose issue would be a share in his life; he moves the rational spirit of man through love of the highest, and thus draws the soul to himself. Aristotle is another instance of a great thinker a greater never lived-setting forth in quest of the ultimate satisfaction and ending in the vision of God.

How great Aristotle's thought is may be seen from the use that Dante makes of it. Dante's

Beatific Vision is nothing but the idea of Aristotle in ecclesiastical and poetic dress. Further, if Aristotle's idea of God as the ultimate irresistible moving force of the universe, moving all worlds by his perfection if this idea were allowed its full consistent expression, it would at once cancel Dante's Inferno. The power that moves the poet from his entrance into Hell, to his arrival among those who look upon the glory of the Highest, is the eternal perfection of God; that has almighty power; nothing can remain where it began to be; upward in search, consciously or unconsciously, of the Infinite good, it must rise; and if its capacity calls for completion, along the highest level, if it is a soul, it can rest nowhere short of the vision of God, the final, complete satisfaction. Dante's Hell is a logical blunder, no less than an ethical horror. It is built in the path of a universe, still more in the path of a humanity moved irresistibly by the Eternal perfection, and drawn toward the vision of that perfection. This is the logic of Aristotle's quest for the good of man; man's quest is a sign that God's influence is over him, that the spell of the Eternal Mind is upon him from the first; the quest itself can end in final satisfaction nowhere short of the vision of the Perfect One.

These two thinkers, Plato and Aristotle, the greatest, the most original, the purest in their