From so practised a logician, however, about the very last thing to have been here expected was that he should suggest creative 'ignorance and incompetence' as the only apparent alternative to denying a Creator altogether, as if incapacity for a comparatively easy process were a likely reason for choosing one greatly more difficult. It might have occurred to Mr. Lewes that, if there were any absurdity in the choice, the Being who made him and bestowed on him the faculty of perceiving the absurdity, could not have failed himself likewise to perceive it and consequently to avoid it. Of divine power, the measure or measurelessness is obviously identical with that of divine wisdom. Both attributes must be at least co-extensive with the universe; both consequently illimitable. Divine goodness, moreover, inasmuch as the creature's moral ideal cannot be superior to his Creator's, must be at least as vast as human imagination: God must be at least as good as man can conceive Him. But how, by goodness so transcending, conjoined with immeasurable might, can the co-existence of evil be tolerated? To this last, and perhaps greatest, among the many great questions brought forward for renewed discussion in these pages, I have long had by me an attempt at a reply, which, finding myself unable either to strengthen or shorten it by turning it into prose, I venture to submit in its original rhythmical form. A Voice came to me as I sate apart, Pondering the burthen of life's mystery, In dim perplexity, with troubled heart. With whisper weak and faint it came to me, Like feeble glimmer of the struggling moon To wildered mariner on midnight sea: With whisper weak at first, but strengthening soon, Like the moon's beam when filmy clouds disperse, And through my scattered doubts, with quiet tune, Uttering in clear, apocalyptic verse, Truth, which for comfort and monition sent, E'en as the voice revealed, do I rehearse.