SPIRIT: Surely, the different meanings attached to this word are legion. According to the writer’s conception, Spirit, briefly stated, is the Formative principle of Life. More broadly defined, Spirit is the supreme principle of existence. The Tao of the Chinese mystic Lao Tzu: the immanent, all pervasive, formless power that is, at once, the primal source, the impulse, and the law through which we live and move and have our being. The ground of the universe is an illimitable ocean of formless substance in which the supreme spirit is the immanent principle. From this arises a psychical movement of unlimited extent which may be called the World Spirit. And this World Spirit is the psycho-physical basis of all movements, the source of all form visible or invisible. The old Chinese philosopher was right when he said “Tao is without limitation. Its depth is the source of whatever is.• I know not who gave it birth. It is more ancient than God.• This Tao, or Spirit, then, is the formless which manifests itself through form. Is immanent in matter, as energy, and gravity. [1 See Appendix IlI. 2 The “Tao TehKing.”] In organic life, as procreation, and love. In Art, as inspiration, and sympathy. In Science, as the insatiable thirst for knowledge. And in Religion, as faith and self-surrender to the highest ideal “I and the Father are one.”
The Quest of the Spirit, 1913.