THE FACT OF GOD

If it did not much matter whether man be-

lieved in God or not, there can be little doubt

that many more would acknowledge their

belief in Him than actually do.  If men could

be allowed to accept God and still live exactly

as they pleased, if they could treat Him as a

power who belonged to a quite different sphere

and had no concern with this world, or as a

friendly neighbour, or an acquaintance, or a

distant relation, who looked to his own affairs

and left us free to look after ours, then it is

probable that the proofs and signs of

His existence would be received with less

questioning and opposition; indeed, there is

scarcely a man who lays claim to common

sense, and is not the victim of his own violent

mind, but acknowledges at least a Supreme

Being somewhat of this nature.  When the old

paganism had outgrown its many gods, and

had settled down to a life of self-indulgence, it

still accepted the belief in a God who cared

little or nothing for mankind; and the modern

paganism, impatient of all interference from

without, believes in much the same way, and

in the same way buries its God behind a cloud.

Is there a priest, with any experience of so-

called unbelievers, but has again and again

heard this profession of faith: "I believe in

Something Supreme "; to which, however, this

corollary has been added or implied:   Who is

no concern of mine "?

But it is precisely because an explicit act ot

faith in God cannot stop at that and be done

with, that to many it comes so much against

the grain.   If we say positively that God is,

there follow no end of consequences; conse-

quences by no means congenial to the man who

wishes and intends to manage his life according

to his own sweet will.  So that, rather than

commit itself by making this first admission,

rather than allow itself to be convicted of

falsehood or inconsistency, human nature in-

stinctively prefers to make no admission at all,

or to set the question aside and to substitute

others in its stead.  To make no admission, to

assume an attitude of doubt, to say one has

not been able finally to decide, is the commonest

and easiest course; for this a man can do with

an abundant show of reason—nay, more, with

an abundant show of honesty.  He can appeal

to a sense of duty, and declare that his life is

too full to allow him time and opportunity to

arrive at a final conclusion about God; he can

be diffident and humble, and say that he is

too dull of understanding, too lacking in tech-

nical training, to attempt so intricate a problem;

he can claim to be broadminded and unbiassed,

and therefore, to avoid over-emphasis, to appre-

ciate too keenly the gropings of other minds

to be sternly dogmatic himself; or he may be

studious, learned, a hard reader, and maintain

that the doubts of greater minds than his own

justify his own hesitation, while the almost

infinite succession of blunders on this point in

past ages, justifies even his disbelief in a definte

solution, justifies even his leaving the question

altogether alone  In countless ways, when

driven to speak, the man who says he doubts

the fact of God can make out a good defence

yet more often he prefers to say nothing, but

to let the question die unanswered.

For as a matter of fact, men know that there

are other proofs of truth than those of argu-

ment; upon argument alone men accept very

little, by it they do not even arrange their

lives.  In their hearts they know that to deny

God outright, no matter with what show of

reason, is merely foolish.  Where the most a

man can claim is ignorance, it is foolish posi-

tively to deny; there is no greater folly than to

argue from one's ignorance of a thing to the

conclusion that the thing is not.  But common

sense does not stop there; not only does it

prove downright atheism to be no more than

arrogant folly, but it also compels other ad-

missions."  The man who confesses his own

ignorance implicitly confesses that others may

know better than himself. The man who

acknowledges that he never gives the matter a

thought must also acknowledge that others

who do may probably have reached conclusions

that he has not.  Common sense makes him

suspect that, in that case, they are more likely

to be right; while his common instincts in-

stantly drive him to act on the assumption

that God ia, and that he matters to God, and

that God matters to him.  At many a sudden

turn to his life his very human nature betrays

him into acting as one who believes, even while

he affects not to care, and the man who did not

he would despise as one who had debased hia

manhood.

This is no place for theological discussion.

We have no need here even to summarize the

proofs of the fact of God.  We are addressing

those who know; though, in any case, to very

few people indeed does the fact of God depend

upon proof, as the word is commonly under-

stood.  To most it is a "certainty greater than

reason"; on that account are men and women

willing to die for it, who would not die for the

conclusion of a syllogism.  One has only to

sit back and watch human nature, at all times,

under all circumstances, in every condition of

life,  either writhing and resisting under the

intolerable burden of God, or gladly accepting

Him and finding Him a yoke that is sweet and

a burden that is light, we shall then realize

how great a confession of the fact of God is

human life itself.  Man is too terribly conscious

of God, for God not to be or not to matter.

However independent and self-governed he

may be, he cannot leave God alone. He can

scarcely act without the wonder coming to

him as to what that Other One may think;

he cannot follow his own likes or dislikes as he

wills, simply because Something else says he

must not.  Whichever way he turns God con-

fronts him; even if he looks into his heart he

finds Him there; if he leaves God aside he

knows he does so by convention, not by con-

viction.  So it has always been; this, at least,

evolution has not mended, and so he knows it

always will be, whatever evolution may say.

In face of this fact, as has just been said,

man is driven to one of two attitudes.  "He

who is not with Me is against Me."  He may

indeed claim a third position, he may claim to

follow a middle course; but to pass God by is

to refuse Him.  Either man finds God an in-

tolerable burden, and does all he can to shake

Him off; or he believes that the burden is a

blessing, that truth, rightly understood, cannot

be tyrannical or cruel, accepts God, and has a

happy heart as his reward.  One man chooses

what he sees, blinds himself to what he does

not, makes for himself a working creed, a work-

ing code of moral action, a conventional under-

standing of life, based on the assumption that

this world is all there is, and that no other

concerns him.  By signing that convention,

by abiding to that code, he succeeds in hemming

himself within a charmed circle, which may

serve him as long as he lives, and which may

hide from him for that length of time the weird

visions that haunt the space without.  But his

security he knows to be unsound; his peace of

mind is unreal, for he has not known the things

that were to his peace, he cries for it and there

is none.   Another knows of no such charmed

circle.   He does not believe that life is made

more true by any confinement of horizon.  He

is open to the truth from whatever side it may

come; he believes life is deeper than convention,

that this world is not all existence; he has more

reverence for right and wrong than to think

that it can be fixed, or sanctioned, or regulated,

by any human code; as a vessel is most itself

when out on the ocean rather than when cooped

up in the stocks, so is the life of man most real

when it lies and is tossed on the infinite ocean

of God.

Such a man lets this life dictate to him the

fact of God, and its evidence is overwhelming.

He lets the fact of God be to him the key to

life, and it solves every mystery; and, accept-

ing the key, he accepts the consequences of its

possession.  If God is.  God counts; if God

counts. He counts for more than man, for more

than all creation put together;  if He counts

for more than all this, then His mind must be

considered.  His will must be fulfilled, and the

finding of that mind, the fulfilment of that

will, somehow explains the riddle of the world.

And if it explains that riddle, then it is also

the secret of the happiness of life.  Human

nature may, at times, resent; it may long to

shake off its harness, but it knows very well

—and too often experience has confirmed the

knowledge—that to live without God leads to

death and to lasting fetters, even when the

death of life has no more than cast its shadow

over it.

"The fear of the Lord is honour,

and glory, and gladness,

and a crown of joy.

The fear of the Lord

shall delight the heart, and shall give joy,

and gladness, and length of days.

With him that feareth the Lord

it shall be well in the latter end,

and in the day of his death

he shall be blessed.

The love of God

is honourable wisdom " (Ecclus. 1, 11-14).

(THE MEANING OF LIFE; Rev. A. Goodier, S.J.; 1919)