He had never thought directly about God, but for a very long time now he had had Him in the background of his life as Polchester Town Hall was in the background.
But now he definitely and actively figured to himself this God, this God Who was taking his mother away and was intending apparently to put her into some dark place where she would know nobody.

It must be some horrible place, because his father looked so frightened, which he would not look if his mother was simply going, with a golden harp, to sing hymns.

Jeremy had always heard that this God was loving and kind and tender, but the figure whom his father was now drawing for the benefit of the congregation was none of these things.
Mr.Cole spoke of a God just and terrible, but a God Who apparently for the merest fancy put His faithful servant to terrible anguish and distress, and then for another fancy, as light as the first, spared him his sorrow.

Mr.Cole emphasised the necessity for obedience, the need for a willing surrender of anything that may be dear to us, "because the love of God must be greater than anything that holds us here on earth." But Jeremy did not listen to these remarks; his mind was filled with this picture of a vast shadowy figure, seated in the sky, his white beard flowing beneath eyes that frowned from dark rocky eyebrows out upon people like Jeremy who, although doing their best, were nevertheless at the mercy of any whim that He might have.

This terrible figure was the author of the hot day, author of the silent house and the shimmering darkened church, author of the decision to take his mother away from all that she loved and put her somewhere where she would be alone and cold and silent--"simply because He wishes..." "From this beautiful passage," concluded Mr.Cole, "we learn that God is just and merciful, but that He demands our obedience.