When Bryant identifies God with tempests and thunderbolts, with “whirlwinds that uproot the woods and drown the villages,” or with the tidal wave that overwhelms the cities, “with the wrath of the mad, unchained elements”--“tremendous tokens of thy power”--does he make God more lovable or desirable? Well may he say, “From these sterner aspects of thy face, spare me and mine.” By way of contrast let me recall that when an earthquake shook California, John Muir cheered himself and friends by saying it was only Mother Earth trotting her children fondly upon her knee! If we identify God with all of Nature, this wrathful Hebrew Jehovah of Bryant is a legitimate conception. There are times when the aerial forces behave like a raving maniac bent upon the destruction of the world--the insensate powers run amuck upon all living things. This is not the God we habitually love and worship, but it is a God from whom there is no escape. As the result of the inevitable action of the natural irrational or unrational forces, tempests and earthquakes and tidal waves do not disturb us; but as the will and purpose of an Almighty Being, Creator of heaven and earth, they give all pious souls a fearful shake-up. We take refuge in such phrases as “the inscrutable ways of God,” or “the mysteries of Providence,” a Providence whose ways are assuredly “past finding out.” Our State Commissioner of Education, Dr. Finley, in an agricultural address on “Potatoes and Boys,” showed God coöperating with the farmer in a way that amused me. “The Almighty,” the Commissioner said, “can make, unaided of man, potatoes, but only small potatoes, and of acrid taste. He had to make a primitive man and even teach him to use a hoe, before He, the Omnipotent One, could grow a patch of potatoes.” The wild potato, he implied, like the wild grape, the wild apple, the wild melon, was the work of God before he had man to help him; now, with man’s help, we have all the improved varieties of potatoes and fruits. We have heard a good deal about the coöperation of man with God, and as a concrete example this potato-growing partnership is very interesting. How far from our habitual attitude of mind is the thought that the Higher Powers concern themselves about our potatoes or our turnips or our pumpkin crop, or have any part or lot in it! Emerson in his Journal expresses another view: “One would think that God made fig-trees and dates, grapes and olives, but the Devil made Baldwin apples and pound pears, cherries and whortle berries, Indian corn and Irish potatoes.”