Therefore, amongst other reasons, Christians cling to the Atonement, and to make that sacrifice the greatest possible it must be the sacrifice of God, and as God can only be sacrificed to God the Christian God must be a multiple one. To postulate as the Mahommedan does, God is God, would destroy the depth of the Atonement. Hence arises the creed, the attempt to reconcile two opposed instincts. There is one God--that is an instinct, arising from our generalising power; there must be at least two Gods to explain the Atonement, and so we have the Father and the Son. For of the three Godheads only these two are real to most people. There is God the Ruler, the Maker of the world, and there is Christ. These are both very real to all Christians. They are prayed to individually, they are worshipped separately, they are clear conceptions. But is there any clear conception of the Holy Ghost as a distinct personality? Is He ever cited separately from the others? Has He any special characteristics? There are, for instance, many pictures of God, and many more of Christ--are there any of the Holy Ghost? This Third Person of the Trinity appeals to no instinct, and is only an abstraction in popular thought. When the Creed was framed it was necessary to include the Holy Ghost because He is mentioned in the New Testament. He has remained an abstraction only. But the other two Godheads are realities, because they appeal to feelings that are innate. They are the explanation of these feelings. * * * * * Thus do creeds arise out of instincts. It is never the reverse. Postulate God the Father as All-Powerful, All-Merciful, and see if by any possibility you can work out the Atonement or see any beauty in it. Can anyone see aught but horror in this Almighty demanding the sacrifice of His Son? You cannot. But granted that Atonement and sacrifice have to you an innate beauty of their own, and the dogma of a multiple Godhead easily follows. There are creeds built on ceremonies, and ceremonies upon instincts: ceremonies are never deduced from creeds. CHAPTER XX. GOD THE MOTHER. The only other form in which the Christ is presented to popular adoration is as a baby in the Madonna's arms. Out of all the life of Christ, all the varied events of that career which has left such a great mark upon the Western world, only the beginning and the end are pictured. Christ the teacher, Christ the preacher, the restorer of the dead to life, the feeder of the hungry, the newly arisen from the grave, where is He? The great masters have painted Him, but popular thought remembers nothing of all that. There is Christ the sacrificed and Christ the infant with His mother. To the Latin people these two phases represent all that is worth daily remembrance. There are crucifixes and Madonnas in every hill side, by every road, at the street corners, in every house, and of the rest of the story not a sign.