lete; we
merely urge that, having regard to the magnitude and the complexity of
the subject it could not be otherwise. A theory, without accounting
for all the facts, may be true so far as it goes, correctly indicating
the way which, if we could pursue it further, would lead us into more
and fuller truth. No doubt, when that which is perfect is come, that
which is in part will be done away; but pending the advent of a
complete explanation, a partial one is not without all value.

Indeed, the very inadequacy of our instruments, resulting in that
incompleteness of which we just spoke, should once more suggest a
reflection which, while in no wise original or startling, is specially
relevant to the subject under discussion: for if God's knowledge
necessarily and immeasurably transcends ours, if He knows _more_ than
we, does it not follow {106} with equal certainty that He knows
_better_? Granted that we do not understand how this or that
dispensation of Providence fits in with the general belief in His
perfect goodness, our failure to understand no more disproves that
goodness than the similar failure of a child to comprehend why such and
such irksome tasks are imposed upon him by his parent, disproves the
wisdom and goodness which prompt the parent's act. The child _cannot_
understand; but where the relations are at all normal he acquiesces,
being on general grounds convinced that the parental commands aim at
his welfare, and that his parents, after all, know better than he. Is
the application so far to seek?

In the second place--turning now from the subject of sin to that of
evil generally--it may be worth while to remind ourselves of a fact
which seems to be forgotten by some of the impetuous arraigners of the
Deity, _viz._, that, after all, the problem is not a new one, which
they have suddenly discovered by dint of superior sagacity. What we
mean is this: the problem of evil as such is of anything but an
abstruse or remote nature, nor one requiring unusual philosophical
penetration to bring to light; on the contrary, pain and sorrow,
privation, adversity, death--these are experiences that have come
within the cognisance of all. If, then, the facts are neither so
remote nor so inconsiderable that men could have simply {107} forgotten
to take them into account in framing their estimates of the Divine
character, how is it, we ask, that they have arrived at and clung to
the belief in the benevolence of God at all