The Infinite and Eternal cannot be grasped by man.
The conception of infinity and eternity is given us by revelation, but
it is not comprehended so that its contents are fully known. The words
are known, but their full meaning is not, and no revelation can make
them, known to finite intelligences.
God dwells in light inaccessible, which is darkness.
Revelation opens abysses down which we cannot look. It raises and
leaves unsettled as many questions as it solves.
The telescope resolves many nebulae, but only to bring more
unresolvable ones into the field of vision.
Now all this is but one side of the truth. There is a tendency in some
minds to underrate what is plain because all is not plain. For some
minds the obscure has a fascination, apart altogether from its nature,
just because it is obscure. It is a noble emulation to press forward
and 'still to be closing up what we know not with what we know.' But
neither in science nor in religion shall we make progress if we do not
take heed of the opposing errors of thinking that all is seen, and of
thinking that what we have is valueless because there are gaps in it.
The constellations are none the less bright nor immortal fires, though
there be waste places in heaven where nothing but opaque blackness is
seen. In these days it is especially needful to insist both on the
incompleteness of all our religious knowledge, and to say that--