UNION BETWEEN THE INFINITE AND THE FINITE, OR FIRST MOMENT OF GOD'S EXTERNAL ACTION
The result of our preceding article was a supreme duality—the infinite and the finite. The one absolutely distinct in nature from the other. The first self-existing, necessary, eternal, immutable, infinitely perfect, and absolutely complete and blessed in his interior life; the other, created, contingent, mutable, imperfect, and on the way to development. How can this duality, so marked and so distinct, the terms of which are so infinitely apart, be harmonized and brought together into unity?
Such is the fifth problem which pantheism raises, and which it undertakes to solve.
Let us investigate more deeply the nature of the problem.
We do not now inquire whether there be any kind of union between the infinite and the finite, because they are already united by means of the creative act.
The infinite creates the finite, sustains and directs it, three moments which constitute the finite and cause it to act. This is the first and fundamental union between the infinite and the finite. After what union, then, do we seek when the problem is raised, Is there a union between the infinite and the finite already perfect as to being, or, in other words, between the infinite and the finite already united by the creative act?
We inquire after a union which may mark and express the highest possible elevation of perfection which the cosmos, or the assemblage of all finite beings, may attain; and as the finite, as we shall see, cannot acquire its highest possible perfection except by a union with infinite perfection, it follows that the problem inquires after the highest possible union between the infinite and the finite.
We shall, according to our wont, give the pantheistic solution of the problem, and then subjoin the answer of Catholicity. The pantheistic solution is as follows: The infinite is the highest possible indetermination and indefiniteness in the way to development. It becomes definite and concrete in the finite, and this by a gradual process.
First, it assumes the lowest possible form of existence in the mineral kingdom. Then it begins to show life in the vegetable kingdom. It acquires sensation and perception in the animal, and shoots up into intelligence and consciousness in humanity. Yet is this intelligence and consciousness essentially progressive, and begins from the minimum degree to rise to the highest. This principle explains all the stages of more or less civilization of which history makes mention. At first the infinite acquires those faculties in humanity which border on and are more akin to the senses, such as the imagination and the fancy; hence the primitive state of nations is marked with very imperfect development of the reasoning faculties, and with a superabundance of imagination; consequently, this primitive state abounds in national bards, who discharge all those offices which, in nations more civilized, are fulfilled by others, such as historians, orators, etc. It is also the age of myths, when people with young and robust fancy are apt to give flesh and blood and personality to any striking legend in vogue, until the legend, so dressed up and personified, is misunderstood for a historical fact and real person. Then, in proportion as the development advances, the infinite acquires a better explication of the reasoning faculties, and hence the ages of philosophy. Of course the development is gradual and slow, and is perfected by time and continued development, until the infinite arrives not only to the fullest explication of the reasoning faculties, but also to the full consciousness of its infinity, and of its eternal duration.
The infinite, arrived at the fullest explication of its intelligence, and to the full consciousness of its infinity, is humanity, or the cosmos arrived to the highest possible perfection. This humanity, dressed up by the imagination of the people, with individuality and personal traits, is the Christ, or the myth which Christians adore.