But that which is most vital to man's world is unknown in the
domain of nature. Already the perception of a dualism is here.
But now a third element comes into it. There is something spiritually
common to nature and man behind the one, within the other. This
Something is the origin, the responsible agent for man's and nature's
physical identity. This Something binds the separates into a sort of
whole. This, I suppose, is what Professor Hocking refers to when he
says, "the original source of the knowledge of God is an experience
which might be described as of _not being alone in knowing the world_,
and especially the world of nature."[23] Thus the religious man
recognizes beyond the gulf, behind the chasm, something more like
himself than it. When he contemplates nature, he sees something other
than nature; not a world which is what it seems to be, but a world
whose chief significance is that it is more than it seems to be. It is
a world where appearance and reality are inextricably mingled and yet
sublimely and significantly separate. In short, the naturalist, the
pagan, takes the world as it stands; it is just what it appears; the
essence of his irreligion is that he perceives nothing in it that
needs to be explained. But the religionist knows that the world
which lies before our mortal vision so splendid and so ruthless, so
beautiful and so dreadful, does really gain both its substance and
significance from immaterial and unseen powers.
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