s the only Source of Things--WHY should
It Desire to manifest a Universe from and within Itself?"

A little consideration will show you that there is no intelligent
answer to the "Why," either in your own minds, or in the writings and
teachings of the greatest minds. The matter is important, to those who
are confronted every day with some of the many attempts to answer this
Final Question--it is well that our students inform them regarding the
futility of such questioning. And with this end in view, we shall
herein give a few of the wise "guesses" at the answer, and our reasons
for considering them inadequate. We ask the student to consider
carefully these remarks, for by so doing he will post himself, and will
be saved much tedious and perplexing wandering along the dangerous
places in the Swamp of Metaphysics, following the will-o'-the-wisp of
Finite Mind masquerading as the Infinite Wisdom! Beware of the False
Lights! They lead to the quagmire and quicksands of thought!

Let us now consider some of these "guesses" at the answer to the Final
Question. Some thinkers have held that the Absolute was bound by a
Divine Necessity to manifest itself as Many. The answer to this is that
the Absolute could not be _bound_ by anything, inner or outer, else it
would not be Absolute and Infinite, but would be Relative and Finite.
Another set of thinkers have held that the Absolute found within itself
a Desire to Manifest as Many. From whence could come such an
action-causing Desire? The Absolute could lack nothing, and there would
be nothing for it to desire to gain, other than that which It already
possessed. One does not desire things one already has, but only what he
lacks.

Another school would tell us that the Infinite wished to _Express_
itself in the phenomenal world. Why? Such a phenomenal world could only
be reflection of Its power, witnessed only by Itself, and could contain
nothing that was not already contained in the All. To what end would
such a wish tend? What would be accomplished or gained? The Infinite
All could not become anything more than It already was--so why the wish
for expression? Some say that the whole phenomenal world is but _Maya_,
or Illusion, and does not exist at all. Then who else than the Infinite
caused the Illusion, and why the necessity? This answer only removes
the question back one point, and does not really answer it. Some would
say that the Universe is the "dream of the Infinite." Can we