the total absence, of all these pompous
conceptions of the Divine Nature, which show such speaking signs of
having originated under lawyers' wigs.

The idea that I do find seems to have originated in a very intimate and
loving comradeship with man and with nature. Indeed, the religion of
Jesus is precisely this spirit of comradeship raised to its highest
power, the spirit which perceives itself to be "not alone," but
lovingly befriended and supported, extending its intuitions to the
heart of the world, to the core of reality, and finding there the
fellowship, the loyalty, the powerful response, the _love_, of which
the finest fellowships and loyalties of earth are the shadows and the
foretaste. In its essence the Gospel is a call to make the same
experiment, the experiment of comradeship, the experiment of
fellowship, the experiment of trusting the heart of things, throwing
self-care to the winds, in the sure and certain faith that you will not
be deserted, forsaken nor betrayed, and that your ultimate interests
are perfectly secure in the hands of the Great Companion. This
insight, this sure and firm apprehension of a spirit at hand, swiftly
responsive to any trust we have in its answering fidelity, coming our
way the moment we beckon it, motionless and irresponsive till we hoist
the flag of our faith and claim its fellowship, but then mighty to
save--this is the centre, the kernel, the growing point of the
Christian religion, which, when we have it all else is secure, and when
we have it not all else is precarious. God, said Jesus, is spirit: man
is spirit no less; and when the two meet in fellowship there is
religion.

I am approaching my conclusion and must gather up my threads.

All along my theme has been that we make a mistake when we look to
religion to relieve us of the perplexities and difficulties of life,
whether intellectual or moral. In a sense we should look for the
opposite. Religion will bring our perplexities to a focus; will
concentrate them on a point; will show us in one clear and burning
vision the depth of the mystery that confronts us in life. But in
raising our difficulties to that high level it will raise our nature to
a higher level still, by liberating faith, courage and love, qualities
that spring from a single root. In revealing the world as a world fit
for heroes to live in, that is, a difficult world, it will arouse also
the heroic spirit in ourselves, which is fit to live u