rce,
gravitation. It is more than our minds can compass to measure its
power. We have no arithmetic to tell its power on every mote in the
sunbeam, or flower, or grain-head bowing toward the earth, tree brought
down with a crash, or avalanche with thunder. Much less can we measure
the power that holds the earth to the sun spite of its measureless
centrifugal force. We did not make the next highest force, cohesion.
The particles of rock and iron cohere with so great an energy that
gravitation cannot overcome it. But it is not by our energy. We did
not make the next highest force, chemical affinity, that masters both
gravitation and cohesion. Water, the result of chemical affinity
between oxygen and hydrogen, can be rent into its constituent elements
with nothing less than a stream of lightning. We did not make the next
highest force, vegetative life. That masters gravitation, and lifts up
the tree in spite of it; masters cohesion--the tree's rootlets tear
asunder the particles of stone; masters chemical affinity--it takes the
oxygen from air and water. We did not create that force, measureless
to our minds. We say it must have come out of some omnipotence greater
than all of them. The conclusion of all minds is, there is a power not
ourselves.

It is unthinkable that these forces before mentioned should have
originated themselves. It is equally so that they could maintain and
continue themselves. There must be some continual upholding by a word
of power.

It is equally plain that there is intelligence, thought, and plan
behind these forces. They are not blind Samsons grinding in a
prison-house, and liable at any moment to bring down in utter ruin
every pillar of the universe on which they can put their hands.

If intelligent and planful, there must be personality. We may as well
call it by the name by which it is universally known, God.

Now does this intelligent and powerful personality know our plans and
lend his powers to the accomplishment of our purposes? It is better to
put it the other way. Mr. Lincoln taught us the truer statement when
one said to him, in the awful anxiety of the war, "I think God is on
our side;" he answered, "My great concern is to know if we are on God's
side." So our question is better thus: Does this intelligent, powerful
personality accept and use our energy in the accomplishment of his
plans?

That will depend on what he wants done. If he only wants mountains
lif