In reality the seeming conflict between the doctrine of second causes
and that of God's omnipresence is closely analogous to the old
(imaginary) conflict between the Law and the Gospel, read from the book
of nature instead of from the Bible. The reign of second causes is the
reign of law; but God's immediate action brings in the supernatural, the
miraculous, or the Gospel. Each has its proper place; and neither must
be dwelt on to the exclusion of the other. We are all under the hard
exactitude of the law, with its irrevocable condemnation, until the
Gospel intervenes, and not only pardons the past, but enables us to
fulfil the law's requirements for the future. The reign of second causes
alone would take away man's moral responsibility, making us all mere
creatures of our environment, the victims of a merciless determinism,
and death would be the inevitable result of the violation of the
slightest physical or physiological law. But we are all given power to
live above environment, and a beneficent healing power is constantly
intervening to save us from the consequences of our errors, healing our
wounds and curing our diseases, in this giving us an object lesson of
the forgiveness of sin and a promise of our ultimate conquest over all
its power.
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