is round about Him;" and yet He stands before the
world, "clothed with light as with a garment."

When we try to reach the ideas which are included
in these two pictures, so as to see whether we can hold
them both in our minds at once, the first thing of which
we wish to be sure is that the difference between them
is the difference not between mystery and no mystery,
but between two kinds of mystery. It is not that the
figure of the darkness presents to us a Being all obscure
and hidden, whom no intelligence can understand, and
then the figure of the light throws open all the closed
doors of this Being's nature so that whoever will may
enter in and understand Him through and through.
God is forever mysterious to man. The infinite is for-
ever infinitely past the comprehension of the finite.
None but another God, the equal of Himself, could
fathom what God is. He not merely does not, He can-
not, make to us a revelation of Himself which shall
uncover all the secrets of His life and leave us nothing
for our wonder, nothing to elude us or bewilder us.
What then? What is it that He does do when He
changes the figure of His presentation and, instead of
standing before our awe-filled vision wrapped in the
robes of darkness, stands forth radiant, "clothed with
the light as with a garment?" This is one of the
questions which lie at the root of any true understand-
ing of revelation; one of the questions men's confusion
with regard to which keeps their whole idea of revela-
tion misty and confused; one of the questions therefore
which we want to answer as carefully and truly as we
can.

The answer to the question lies in the fact that there

-306-