4. The Wonders of Man's Mind-Power: But not only does man think, and from consciousness of the fact deduce his own existence, but he passes judgment upon things, determining that this is a better thing, or state, or condition than that. He chooses between and among things, states, and conditions. He is conscious of a power within himself also to will this or that, and can become a true cause of certain and very many things within his experience, especially as concerns his individual movements and conduct.
He is equally conscious of certain emotions that pertain to himself. He fears, is awed; he experiences sorrow, hate, joy, and, best of all, love. And, certain abnormal individuals aside, man loves what he conceives to be the beautiful, the true, the good. In this, too, he is capable of rising in conception from the concrete to the abstract; from the relative to the absolute; from the finite to the infinite. He loves the truth of his experience; but he knows it is limited, relative, and he longs for the Absolute Truth. He loves the good of his experience, but again he knows the good of his experience to be relative, finite, and he longs for and could love, and love supremely, the Infinitely Good. He aspires to relationship with it, to fellowship, to union, to one-ship with it.
In order to attain to such relationship, however, it is obvious that the Infinite Power, the Infinitely Beautiful and the Infinitely Good must be some thing more than mechanical force. It must be even more than an "Unknown"; something more than a "Mystery," a mere "Incomprehensible," an "Inscruitable," if man is to stand in any sympathetic relationship to it: for the "Infinite Power" as an admittedly "Unknown," or as "Inscruitable Mystery," leaves that power as incapable of reciprocal, moral and spiritual relations with man as the "Power" conceived as mere mechanical force is.[A]
[Footnote A: These remarks are made in view of what Mr. Herbert Spencer says of the value of "A Mystery ever pressing for an interpretation," as an "ultimate religious truth of the highest possible certainty"; but which, if analyzed, will be discovered to be of no more religious value than the conception of the "Infinite Power" as mechanical force. Yet Mr. Spencer thus speaks of it: "And thus the mystery which all religions recognize, turns out to be far more transcendent mystery than any of them suspect—not a relative, but an absolute mystery. Here, then, is an ultimate religious truth of the highest possible certainty—a truth in which religions in general are at one with each other, and with a philosophy antagonistic to their special dogmas. And this truth, respecting which there is a latent agreement among all mankind from the fetish-worshiper to the most stoical critic of human creeds, must be the one we seek. If Religion and Science are to be reconciled, the basis of reconciliation must be this deepest, widest, and most certain of all facts—that the Power which the Universe manifests to us Is utterly inscrutable." "First Principles," pp. 47, 48.]
5. The Immanence of the New Dispensation—Reconciliation of Difficulties: The Immanence of God, as we have seen, and as that conception is commonly held, presents a difficulty. The difficulty of regarding the Immanent Power as being at once immanent in the world and at the same time personal. But that difficulty is overcome in the theology of the New Dispensation by the fact that the Immanent God is conceived as Spirit or Spiritual Light—"the Light of Christ," for us men—which "proceedeth forth from the presence of God to fill the immensity of space. The light which is in all things; which giveth life to all things; which is the law by which all things are governed: even the Power of God."[A] And which is, according to the testimony of St. John "the true light which lighteth every man that cometh into the world,"[B] and according to the word of the Lord to Joseph Smith is, "the light which now shineth, which giveth you light, is through him who enlighteneth your eyes, which is the same light that quickeneth your understandings."[C]
[Footnote A: Doc. & Cov., Sec. lxxxviii:12,13.]
[Footnote B: St. John, i:9.]
[Footnote C: Doc. & Cov., Sec. lxxxviii:11.]
Also, as we have seen (ante-Lesson III), not only is the Immanent Spirit the Divine Power, but that spirit carries with it into the immensity of space which it pervades, at least certain attributes of the Divine Intelligence from whom it proceeds, and becomes the inspiration to intelligence in men, and the atmosphere of wisdom, holiness, truth, and of love. Also the Immanent Spirit is a means of union for man, if he desires it, if he seeks to make it so by drawing nigh unto God, that God may draw nigh unto him—a means of union with the Divine Intelligences from whom the spiritual light proceeds, and of whom the Christ is the type, and with whom man is destined, ultimately, to associate, living in the physical presence of such Intelligences as well as in their spiritual presence, on terms of intimate friendship—face to face communion; personal association in councils; personal cooperation in the divine purposes, in creation, in sustentation; in redemptive processes, and, in a word, in all the Divine activities, until man shall be satisfied to the uttermost with his fellowship and perfect union with God, finding in the free harmony of Divine Intelligences, that "City of God," that moral order, that expression of the "Absolute," that completeness, which seems necessary to a rational universe for man.