We find it impossible to determine with absolute certainty the character even of our fellow men, from their imperfectly interpreted words and actions, so that each man is more or less a mystery to his fellows. The mystery deepens when we try to read the character of animals,—to interpret the motives which determine the overt acts of dogs or horses. And if we were able to communicate by visible signs with the inhabitants of other planets, with how much greater difficulty should we draw conclusions from their visible acts regarding _their_ character? But if this is so when we use the data of sense for reading the character of finite persons, how infinite must be the difficulty of reading the character of the Eternal Spirit, in and through the gradual evolution of the universe of things and persons, which in this reasoning is supposed to be His body; and the history of that universe the facts of His biography, in and by which He is eternally revealing Himself! For we know nothing about the unbeginning and unending. The universe of persons is assumed to have no _end_; and I know not why its evolution must be supposed to have had a _beginning_, or that there ever was a time in which God was unmanifested, to finite persons. Shall we in these circumstances turn with Euphranor, in the Fifth and Sixth Dialogues, to professed revelation of the character of the Universal Mind presented in miraculous revelation, by inspired prophets and apostles, who are brought forward as authorities able to speak infallibly to the _character_ of God? If the whole course of nature, or endless evolution of events, is the Divine Spirit revealed in omnipresent activity, what room is there for any other less regular revelation? The universe of common experience, it is implied by Berkeley, is essentially miraculous, and therefore absolutely perfect. Is it consistent with fairness, and benevolence, and love of goodness in all moral agents for its own sake, that the Christian revelation should have been so long delayed, and be still so incompletely made known? Is not the existence of wicked persons on this or any other planet, wicked men or devils, a dark spot in the visible life of God? Does not perfect goodness in God mean restoration of goodness in men, for its own sake, apart from their merit; and must not Omnipotent Goodness, infinitely opposite to all evil, either convert to goodness all beings in the universe who have made themselves bad, or else relieve the universe of their perpetual presence in ever-increasing wickedness?