is God a substance?

Spirit or God is a distinct substance, standing entire and alone, as much as the element through which it works.

Spirit is the embodiment of love, purity and elevation, perfect in and of itself, divine by itself, operating by itself independent of matter, is urged forth as the propelling influence of good by its innate will, holds communion by the desire and promptings of its innate qualities, is regulated and set in motion by the inherent properties possessed within itself and concludes all with a force of power manifested by the will of its own being.

Spirit as substance is tangible to that element alone.

Neither is it for you to restrict the word substance to what comes under physical demonstration alone, for as spirits are in the spirit world now, yet they remain in the same ratio in the next, etherealized, not diminished, finer and more subtle from the fact of their being more closely allied to spirit or the source whence it was given. It is produced aside from the annexations of matter for the mind to operate through in its concentration as spirit. 

In defining God as a substance, He is an ethereal, sublimated composition.

It is in proportion as matter is wrought upon by spirit, pervading every part and making it appear more refined.

You have only to extract the ethereal part and the material shows that it possesses no properties giving evidence of exaltation or being in the least refined! It gravitates back to the element of which it was a part before the spirit breathed upon and bade it come up higher.

The most scrupulously investigated facts furnish no evidence that He has ever been seen aside from his works. But there is unmistakable evidence, which discloses more of the innate life-principle than is presented by matter. It is an established principle with spirit inhabitants that God is a substance.

He is just as tangible to spirits as the appendage of substance is to you in the different parts composing the body.

He surely is, for they taste, feel and see with the spirit, they are of it, they live by it―their growth is spirit.

Hence, when they declare God to be a substance, they speak from positive knowledge, having communed with and partaken of divine emanations more real and lasting than the eternity through which you are passing.

Its independence cannot be understood so long as matter, of which the body is composed, depends entirely upon spirit for its existence.

This is plainly manifested, for extract spirit and it takes away life, but spirit, not being destroyed, shows it to be an element by itself, capable of surviving in or out of Nature.