A writer in a contemporary journal tells us, "there is no place where dwells not Spirit that it sleeps in the mineral, dreams in the animal, and comes to consciousness in man." This implies that spirit is different from all these, since it dwells in them, either awake or asleep; and the described relation of the two implies a gross pantheism, as if God were the soul of the world. We regret that our neighbor is not more careful and precise in his language. God does not properly dwell in us; we dwell in God; "in him we live and move and have our being." This is not only Scriptural, but it is the latest and highest utterance of psychological science. According to this, the world is our idea, and so dwells in us; and we are God's idea, and dwell in him, as the source and end of all.
Indeed, this talk of Spirit,—God,—to which the writer refers, dwelling in all things, is a plain recurrence to fetishism in the name of philosophy. If God is there, why not worship it? It is on that ground that the savage will worship a pebble, or a crooked stick. Pascal received from a relative a bony relic of some alleged saint, and spoke of it as a residence of the Holy Spirit, thus justifying the worship paid by papal devotees to consecrated old rags and bones. Our contemporary would call this grovelling superstition; but it is only less extensive and grovelling than his own, which affirms that the same Spirit dwells in all things. An understanding of their own position would make some people attempt a speedy "moonlight flit,"—if they could only know where to go.
