GIFT OF 
 Isaacson 
 
"ill. 
 
The Gifford Lectures 
 
 DELIVERED BEFORE THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF GLASGOW 
 
 First Series 
 
 THE PROVIDENTIAL ORDER OF 
 THE WORLD. Crown 8vo, $2.00 
 
 Second Series 
 
 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE 
 WORLD. Crown 8vo, $2.00 
 
THE MORAL ORDER 
 OF THE WORLD 
 
 IN ANCIENT AND MODERN THOUGHT 
 
 BY 
 
 ALEXANDER BALMAIN BRUCE, D.D. 
 
 t^ 
 
 PROFESSOR OF APOLOGETICS AND NEW TESTAMENT 
 
 EXEGESIS IN THE FREE CHURCH COLLEGE, 
 
 GLASGOW 
 
 NEW YORK 
 CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 
 
 1899 
 
TbTO 
 
 
 :.. ./:::: : 
 : V . v :::./ 
 
PREFACE 
 
 c 
 
 OUR theme is still the Providential Order. The 
 new title, however, is used not merely to make a 
 nominal distinction between the two courses of 
 Lectures, but because there is a real, though slight, 
 difference in meaning which makes the title the more 
 appropriate to this course. A Providential Order 
 implies a God who provides. One who speaks of 
 a Providence is a Theist, who believes in a God 
 caring for, and governing, all. The Moral Order, on 
 the other hand, is impersonal, and one may use the 
 phrase and believe in the thing it denotes, who is 
 no Theist, no believer in a living personal God in 
 the ordinary theistic sense of the words. Buddha, 
 the theme of our first Lecture, is an instance. 
 
 Of course this historical survey is not exhaustive. 
 It is, however, fairly representative, and brings the 
 whole subject, by samples, sufficiently under view to 
 
 M27861 
 
vi THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 answer the question, What have the wisest thought 
 on the great theme of the Moral Order of the uni- 
 verse in its reality and essential nature ? 
 
 Publication of these Lectures has been delayed 
 for a twelvemonth by the state of my health. 
 
 A. B. BRUCE. 
 
 GLASGOW, April 1899. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 LECTURE I 
 
 PACK 
 BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER, , . . . I 
 
 LECTURE II 
 ZOROASTER: DUALISM, 34 
 
 LECTURE III 
 
 THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS : NEMESIS, . .... 66 
 
 LECTURE IV 
 
 THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE, . 103 
 
 LECTURE V 
 
 DIVINATION, .... 140 
 
 LECTURE VI 
 
 THE HEBREW PROPHET 1 74 
 
viii THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 LECTURE VII 
 
 FACE 
 THE BOOK OF JOB, 2O7 
 
 LECTURE VIII 
 CHRIST'S TEACHING CONCERNING DIVINE PROVIDENCE, . 243 
 
 LECTURE IX 
 
 MODERN OPTIMISM : BROWNING, ...... 279 
 
 LECTURE X 
 
 MODERN DUALISM : SCIENTIFIC AND PHILOSOPHIC ASPECTS, 312 
 
 LECTURE XI 
 
 MODERN DUALISM : RELIGIOUS AND SOCIAL ASPECTS, . . 346 
 
 LECTURE XII 
 
 RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT, 3 80 
 
 INDEX, 4<7 
 
 
THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
LECTURE I 
 
 BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 
 
 THE Providential Order is still our theme. Now, 
 however, it is not to my own thoughts that I solicit 
 attention. I ask you to engage with me in a sympa- 
 thetic while critical study of the thoughts of other 
 men in ancient and modern times. The subject is 
 sufficiently large, attractive, and difficult to justify a 
 second course. It cannot be said to be exhausted 
 till we have made ourselves acquainted in some 
 degree with the more important contributions to- 
 wards its elucidation. Earnest thought on Divine 
 Providence, however ancient, cannot but be interest- 
 ing, and it may be instructive, not only by the 
 abiding truth it contains, but even by its doubts, its 
 denials, its crudities, its errors. It is obvious, how- 
 ever, that selection will be necessary. Attention 
 must be confined to outstanding types of thought, 
 in which an exceptionally intense moral conscious- 
 ness is revealed, and deep, sincere protracted brood- 
 ing, as of men wrestling with a great hard problem. 
 On this principle preference must be given in the 
 A 
 
2 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 first place to representative thinkers in India, Persia, 
 and Greece, the countries in which, in far-past times, 
 human reflection on the august topic of the moral 
 order mny be said to have reached the high-water 
 mark. In India, the centre of attraction is Buddha, 
 with his peculiar way of viewing life and destiny ; in 
 Persia, Zoroaster. To each of these great characters 
 a lecture will be devoted, and in these two lectures 
 my representation, through lack of first-hand know- 
 ledge, must rest on the authority of experts. On 
 the contributions of Greece we shall have to tarry 
 longer. The Tragic Poets and the Stoics have both 
 strong claims on our regard, the former as conspicuous 
 assertors of the moral order, the latter as not less 
 prominent champions of a universal Providence. 
 With these representatives of Greek wisdom two 
 lectures will be occupied. Our next topic will be 
 one having no exclusive connection with Greek 
 thought or with the Greek people, but with which 
 the name of the Stoics is closely associated. I mean 
 Divination. The oracles have long been dumb, 
 and it requires an effort to revive interest in the 
 subject. But we cannot understand the views of 
 the ancient world without taking the belief in 
 Divination into account. This, therefore, will form 
 the subject of the concluding lecture on Pagan 
 thought. 
 
 Hebrew thought, on its own intrinsic merits, claims 
 serious attention. The Prophets of Israel, as we all 
 
BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 3 
 
 know, had much to say concerning the moral govern- 
 ment of God. The Book of Job also is a unique 
 contribution to the discussion of the problems of 
 Providence which cannot be overlooked. Prophetic 
 teaching, therefore, having been disposed of, all too 
 inadequately, in a single lecture, that book will re- 
 ceive the consideration it claims in another. A 
 reverent study of the teaching of Jesus on the 
 Providence of the Divine Father in a third will close 
 the discussion of Hebrew wisdom. 
 
 The foregoing part of our programme will take up 
 eight lectures. Three of the remaining four will be 
 devoted to modern thought on topics bearing on our 
 theme, while the final lecture will assume the form 
 of a retrospect and a forecast. 
 
 Modern thought is a wide word, and a point of 
 view will be needed to guide selection. Let it be 
 the question, What tendencies characterise those 
 who have been anxious to abide as far as possible by 
 the Christian idea of God ? Two broadly contrasted 
 tendencies may be discriminated, one optimistic, 
 the other dualistic. The one accepts without 
 abatement Christ's idea of a Divine Father and says : 
 All is well with the world, or is on the way to be 
 well. The other also accepts the Christian idea of 
 God, but, unable to take an optimistic view of the 
 past, present, or future of the world, introduces in 
 some form a rival to the beneficent Deity of Christian 
 faith. Two types of modern dualism may be dis- 
 
4 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 tinguished, one of which discovers in the world of 
 nature traces of a personal rival to the Good Being, 
 counter-working His beneficent purpose, while the 
 other finds a foe of the Divine even in the reason of 
 man. Each of these types of dualism will engage 
 our attention in a separate lecture. 
 
 The subject of the present lecture is Buddha^- and 
 his view of the moral order of the world. 
 
 Buddha was the originator of a type of religion 
 called Buddhism, which to-day is professed in the 
 East by one-third of the human race. He was born 
 in India, of a royal family, in the sixth century 
 before the Christian era. The religion of India had 
 run through a long course of development before he 
 arrived on the scene. There was first the religion of 
 the Vedic Indians, a comparatively simple nature- 
 worship, poetic in feeling, and cheerful in spirit, 
 setting a high value on the good things of this life 
 and making these the chief objects of prayer. Then 
 there came ancient Brahmanism, with its pantheistic 
 conception of the universe as an emanation out of 
 Brahma, its view of the world as an unreality, its 
 elaborate ritual, its asceticism, and its caste distinc- 
 tions. This system Buddha found in vogue, and to 
 a large extent accepted. But in some respects his 
 attitude was protestant and reforming. He dis- 
 carded the sacred books the Vedic hymns, he set 
 
 1 Buddha is an epithet rather than a name. Buddha's name was 
 Gotama Sakya. 
 
BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 5 
 
 no value on sacrifice, he treated the Brahmanical 
 gods with scant respect, and he disregarded caste, at 
 least in the religious sphere. 
 
 In his religious temper Buddha differed widely 
 both from the Vedic Indian and from the Brahman. 
 In the cheerfulness and the frank worldliness of the 
 former he had no part, and in contrast to the latter 
 he set morality above ritual. He was a pessimist 
 in his view of life, and he assigned to the ethical 
 supreme value. From the moment he arrived at the 
 years of reflection, he had an acute sense of the 
 misery of man. At length, so we learn from biogra- 
 phical notices, a crisis arrived. One day various 
 aspects of human suffering old age, disease, death 
 fell under his observation, and thereafter a hermit 
 came in view with a cheerful, peaceful aspect which 
 greatly struck him. He was now resolved what to 
 do. He would forsake the world and seek in solitude 
 the peace he had hitherto failed to find. He with- 
 drew into the wilderness, and lived a severely ascetic 
 life, alone Sakya-muni, i.e. Sakya the lonely. Still 
 he was not happy, nor did he attain peace till he dis- 
 covered that the seat of evil was in the soul, and that 
 the secret of tranquillity was to get rid of desire. 
 This seen, Sakya-muni had become Sakya-Buddha 
 Sakya the enlightened. Having found the way of 
 salvation for himself, he felt impelled by sympathy 
 with suffering humanity to make it known to others. 
 He commenced to preach his gospel ; in technical 
 
6 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 phrase, to turn the wheel of the law. The essence of 
 his doctrine was summed up in four propositions : 
 (i) Pain exists pain, the great fact of all sentient 
 life ; (2) pain is the result of existence ; (3) the anni- 
 hilation of pain is possible ; (4) the way to the desired 
 end is self-mortification, renunciation of the world 
 both outwardly and inwardly. All who were willing 
 to receive this message, of whatever caste or char- 
 acter, were welcome to the ranks of discipleship. 
 Discipleship in the strict sense meant not merely a 
 pure life, but an ascetic habit in the solitude of the 
 forest or in the still retreat of the monastery. From 
 being a few, disciples grew to be many through the 
 missionary ardour of converts, till at length the 
 sombre faith of the Buddha became one of the great 
 religions of the world. 
 
 On that account alone, if for no other, Buddhism 
 would be entitled to some notice in even a short 
 study of the thoughts of men on the moral order of 
 the world, unless indeed it should turn out that so 
 widely diffused a religion had nothing to say on the 
 subject. That, however, is so far from being the 
 case that few religions have anything more remark- 
 able to say. For Buddhism, true to the spirit of the 
 founder, is an ethical religion. It finds in moral 
 good the cure of physical evil, and in moral evil the 
 cause of physical evil. It asserts with unique em- 
 phasis a moral order as distinct from a providential 
 order, the difference being that a moral order is an 
 
BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 7 
 
 impersonal conception, while a providential order 
 implies a Divine Being who exercises a providential 
 oversight over the world. Even an atheist, like 
 Strauss, can believe in a moral order, but only a 
 theist can believe in a Providence. Buddha taught 
 no doctrine either of creation or of providence, or 
 even of God. He was not an atheist. He did not 
 deny the being of God, or of the gods of ancient 
 India, poetically praised in the hymns of Vedic bards 
 and elaborately worshipped in Brahmanical ritual. 
 He treated these gods somewhat as the Hebrew 
 worshippers of Jehovah treated the deities of other 
 peoples, allowing them to remain as part of the 
 universe of being, while refusing to acknowledge 
 them as exceptional or unique in nature, dignity, or 
 destiny. It is characteristic of the Buddhist system 
 to treat the gods in this cavalier fashion and to re- 
 gard them as inferior to Buddha. When Buddha 
 summons them into his presence they come ; they 
 listen reverently to his words, and humbly obey his 
 behests. Yet Buddha is but a man, though more 
 than divine in honour. Buddhism, it has been re- 
 marked, is the only religion in which the superiority 
 of man over the gods is proclaimed as a fundamental 
 article of faith. 1 That the destinies of the world 
 should be in the hands of such degraded and dis- 
 honoured beings is of course out of the question. 
 Equally out of the question is it that one who 
 
 1 Koeppen, Die Religion des Buddha und ihre Entstehung, p. 123. 
 
8 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 viewed human life as Buddha viewed it could pos- 
 sibly believe in a benignant Providence. Buddha's 
 idea of life, according to all reliable accounts, was 
 purely pessimistic. For him the great fact of life 
 was pain, misery, and the four chief lessons to be 
 learnt about life were that pain exists and why, that 
 it can be put an end to and how. Birth, growth, 
 disease, decay, death behold the sorrowful series of 
 events which make life a mere vanity and vexation 
 of spirit. Such is it as we see it, such it has ever 
 been, such it ever shall be. The process of the whole 
 universe is an eternal, monotonous, wearisome suc- 
 cession of changes, an everlasting becoming. No- 
 thing abides, for all is composite, and all that is 
 composite is impermanent. And the best thing that 
 can happen to a man is to be dissolved body and 
 soul, and so find rest among the things that are 
 not. 
 
 While knowing nothing of a Divine Providence in 
 our sense of the word, the religion of Buddha is 
 honourably distinguished by its emphatic assertion 
 of a moral order of the world. The moral order is 
 the great fact for the Buddhist. It is the source of 
 the physical order. Moral facts explain the facts of 
 human experience. Wrong action is the cause of 
 sorrow, not only in general and on the whole, but in 
 detail and exhaustively. What a man does or has 
 done sometime or other, explains completely what 
 he suffers. I say 'has done, sometime or other/ 
 
BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 9 
 
 because perfect correspondence between conduct and 
 lot is not held to be verifiable within the bounds of 
 this present life. Buddha was fully aware of the 
 lack of correspondence as exhibited in many startling 
 contrasts of good men suffering and bad men pros- 
 pering. But he did not thence conclude that life was 
 a moral chaos, or that there was no law connecting 
 lot with conduct. He simply inferred that to find 
 the key to life's puzzles you must go beyond the 
 bounds of the present life and postulate past lives, 
 not one or two, but myriads, an eternal succession of 
 lives if necessary, each life in the series being deter- 
 mined in its complex experience by all that went 
 before ; the very fact that there is such a life at all 
 that we are born once more, being due to evil 
 done in former lives. 
 
 This conception of successive lives is so foreign 
 to our modes of thought that it may be well to 
 dwell on it a little. 
 
 Buddha did not invent the doctrine of trans- 
 migration ; he inherited it from the pre-existing 
 Brahmanical religion. How it came to be there, 
 seeing there is no trace of it in the Vedic hymns, 
 is a question which very naturally suggests itself. 
 Students of Indian religions have found the ex- 
 planation, both of this theory and of the pessimistic 
 conception of human life associated with it, in the 
 Brahmanical view of God's relation to the world, 
 according to which all being flows out of Brahma 
 
io THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 by way of emanation. 1 Anthropologists prefer to 
 see in the Indian idea a special form of a more 
 general primitive belief having its fact-basis in 
 observed resemblances between ancestors and de- 
 scendants, and between men and beasts, natvely 
 accounted for by primitive men as due to the souls 
 of ancestors passing into children, and of men into 
 beasts. In higher levels of culture, as in India, they 
 see this crude physical theory invested with ethical 
 significance, so that ' successive births or existences 
 are believed to carry on the consequences of past 
 and prepare the antecedents of future life.' 2 
 
 What amount of truth may be in these hypotheses 
 it is not necessary here to inquire. What we are 
 concerned with is the relation of Buddha to the 
 doctrine in question. Now at first it may seem 
 strange that one who discarded the traditional 
 theory of the emanation of the world out of Brahma 
 did not also part with the kindred theory of trans- 
 migration. But on reflection we see that, while the 
 latter theory might have no attraction for Buddha, 
 as forming part of a merely speculative conception 
 of the universe, it might be very welcome to him on 
 moral grounds. This is indeed so much the case 
 that, had he not found the theory ready to his hand, 
 he would have had to invent it as a postulate of his 
 ethical creed, which maintained without qualification 
 
 1 So e.g. Koeppen, p. 33. 
 
 Vide Tylor, Primitive Culture, u. pp. 3 and 9. 
 
'BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER n 
 
 that men reap as they sow. That thesis is not veri- 
 fiable within the bounds of the present life, at least 
 not in a sense that would have seemed satisfactory 
 to Buddha. You must go beyond, either forward 
 or backward. Christians go forward, and seek in a 
 future life a solution of the mysteries of the present. 
 Buddha went both forward and backward, and more 
 especially backward ; and with characteristic thorough- 
 ness he gave to the hypothesis of transmigration, in 
 an ethical interest, a very comprehensive sweep, 
 making the range of migration stretch downwards 
 'from gods and saints, through holy ascetics, 
 Brahmans, nymphs, kings, counsellors, to actors, 
 drunkards, birds, dancers, cheats, elephants, horses, 
 Sudras, barbarians, wild beasts, snakes, worms, in- 
 sects, and inert things.' 1 
 
 The application of the doctrine, in the Buddhistic 
 system, is as minute as it is wide. For everything 
 that happens to a man in this life an explanation is 
 sought in some deed done in a former life. Character 
 and lot are not viewed, each, as a whole, but every 
 single deed and experience is taken by itself, and 
 the law of recompense applied to it. 
 
 The Buddhist Birth Stories, the oldest collection 
 of folk-lore, contain curious illustrations of this 
 habit of thought. One story tells how once upon a 
 time a Brahman was about to kill a goat for a feast, 
 how the intended victim had once itself been a 
 
 1 Tylor, ii. p. 9. 
 
12 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Brahman and for killing a goat for a feast had had 
 its head cut off in five hundred births, and how it 
 warned the Brahman that if he killed it he in turn 
 would incur the misery of having his head cut 
 off five hundred times. The moral is given in this 
 homely stanza : 
 
 * If people would but understand 
 That this would cause a birth in woe, 
 The living would not slay the living ; 
 For he who taketh life shall surely grieve.' 1 
 
 A less grotesque instance is supplied in the 
 pathetic history of Kunala, a son of the famous 
 King Asoka, the Constantine of Buddhism, related 
 at length by Burnouf in his admirable Introduction 
 to the History of Indian Buddhism. Kunala had 
 beautiful eyes, which awakened sinful desire in a 
 woman who, like his mother, was one of Asoka's 
 wives. Repulsed, she conceived the wicked design 
 of destroying his beauty by putting out his eyes, 
 and carried out her purpose on the first opportunity. 
 From our point of view this was a case of innocence 
 suffering at the hands of the unrighteous, an Indian 
 Joseph victimised by an Indian Potiphar's wife. 
 But this did not content the Buddhist. He asked 
 what had Kunala done in a previous life to deserve 
 such a fate, and he received from his teacher the 
 reply : Once upon a time, in a previous life, Kunala 
 was a huntsman. Coming upon a herd of five 
 
 1 Rhys Davids, Buddhist Birth Stories, or J&taka Tales, No. 1 8. 
 
BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 13 
 
 hundred gazelles in a cavern he put out the eyes of 
 them all. For that action he suffered the pains of 
 hell for many hundred thousand years, and there- 
 after had his eyes put out five hundred times in 
 as many human lives. 1 
 
 Buddha had to go forward as well as backward in 
 order to give full validity to his austere conception 
 of the moral order. As in this life men enjoy and 
 surfer for the good or evil done in former lives, so, 
 he taught, must there be suffering and enjoyment in 
 some future life or world for corresponding deeds 
 done here. For the expression ' good or evil done ' 
 Buddhism has one word, * Karma.' It will be con- 
 venient to use it for the longer phrase, as denoting 
 merit and demerit, or character. The Buddhistic 
 doctrine then is that the Karma of this life demands 
 a future life, as this life presupposes and answers 
 to the Karma of past lives. A * future life,' I have 
 said ; by which we should, of course, understand our 
 own life, implying personal identity, continuity of 
 the soul's existence. Experts, however, are agreed 
 that that is not the genuine thought of Buddhists. 
 The soul for them is only a bundle of mental states 
 without any substratum ; therefore, like all com- 
 posites, dissoluble and impermanent. Therefore, 
 
 1 Burnouf, Introduction h FHistoire du Buddhisme Indien, pp. 360- 
 370. The hunter put out their eyes instead of killing them because he 
 would not know what to do with so much dead meat. The blinded 
 animals would not be able to escape, and could be killed at con- 
 venience. 
 
14 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 though in popular conception transmigration means 
 transmigration of the soul, for the disciple of Buddha 
 it means transmigration of Karma, that is, of char- 
 acter. Mr. Rhys Davids, one of the best informed of 
 our authorities, expresses this view in these terms: 
 ' I have no hesitation in maintaining that Gotama 
 did not teach the transmigration of souls. What he 
 did teach would be better summarised, if we wish to 
 retain the word transmigration, as the transmigration 
 of character. But it would be more accurate to 
 drop the word transmigration altogether when 
 speaking of Buddhism, and to call its doctrine the 
 doctrine of Karma. Gotama held that, after the 
 death of any being, whether human or not, there 
 survived nothing at all but that being's Karma, the 
 result, that is, of its mental and bodily actions.' 1 
 
 This transmigration or survival of character 
 appears to us a very strange idea, but as Mr. Huxley 
 has remarked, 2 something analogous to it may be 
 found in the more familiar fact of heredity, the trans- 
 mission from parents to offspring of tendencies to 
 particular ways of acting. Heredity helps to make 
 the idea of transmitted Karma more intelligible, and 
 at the same time enables us in some degree to get 
 over the feeling of its objectionableness on the score 
 of morality. On first view, it seems an outrage on 
 justice that my Karma should be handed on to 
 
 1 The Hibbert Lectures, 1881, p. 92. 
 1 Evolution and Ethics, p. 6l. 
 
BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 15 
 
 another person that he may bear the consequences 
 of what I have done. If my soul survived death and 
 passed into another form of incorporated life in 
 which I, the same person, reaped the harvest of what 
 I had sown in a previous life, no such objection 
 would arise. But how, one is inclined to ask, can 
 it serve the ends of the moral order, that one should 
 sow in conduct what another reaps in experience? 
 It is a very natural question, yet the thing com- 
 plained of is essentially involved in moral heredity. 
 Whether we like it or not, and whatever construction 
 is to be put upon it, it is certainly an actual fact of 
 the moral world. 
 
 While an analogy, instructive in some respects, 
 exists between heredity and Karma, it would be a 
 mistake to identify them. Heredity operates within 
 the same species, every animal producing its kind ; 
 Karma roams through all species of animated being, 
 so that the Karma of a man living now may be 
 handed on some day to an elephant, a horse, or a dog. 
 Heredity is transmitted by generation ; according to 
 the developed ontology of Buddhism Karma can 
 work without the aid of a material instrumentality. 1 
 Heredity asserts its power in spite of great moral 
 changes in the individual who transmits his qualities 
 to his offspring. A saintly father who, by self-dis- 
 cipline, has gained victory over evil propensity may 
 transmit, nevertheless, an inheritance of evil bias to 
 
 1 Hardy, A Manual of Buddhism in its Mode rn Development^ p. 395.- 
 
t6 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 his children. A Buddhist Arahat who, by sublime 
 virtue, has attained Nirvana, escapes from the sway 
 of the Karma law, and, though he may leave behind 
 him a family born before he retired into the monastic 
 life, he has no successor who takes upon him his 
 moral responsibilities. Finally, in heredity the pecu- 
 liarity of both parents, not to speak of atavistic 
 or collateral contributions, are mixed in the char- 
 acter of offspring. Karma, on the other hand, is, 
 as I understand, an isolated entity. Each man has 
 his own Karma, which demands embodiment in an 
 independent life for the working out of its moral 
 results. 
 
 Karma then demands another life to bear its fruit. 
 But how is the demand supplied ? Now we know how 
 Kant answered an analogous question, viz. : How is 
 the correspondence between character and lot that 
 which ought to be and therefore sometime shall be 
 to be brought about? Only, said Kant, through the 
 power of a Being who is head both of the physical and 
 of the moral universe God, a necessary postulate of 
 the practical reason, or conscience. But in Buddha's 
 system there was no god with such powers. The 
 gods, in his view, far from being able to order all 
 things so as to meet the requirements of Karma, were 
 themselves subject to its sway. How then are these 
 requirements to be met ? The answer must be, that 
 Buddhism assigns to Karma the force of physical 
 causation. The moral postulate is turned into a 
 
BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 17 
 
 natural cause. The moral demand literally creates 
 the needful supply. Karma becomes a substitute 
 for Kant's Deity. Similar confusion runs through 
 the whole system. 
 
 Another source of the endless succession of exist- 
 ence must now be mentioned. It is Desire, the will 
 to live. Desire for life originates new life. This 
 Buddhistic tenet is a new form of the old Brah- 
 manical account of the origin of the world, based 
 on a hymn in the tenth book of the Rig-veda, where 
 we find the theory that the universe originated in 
 Desire na'fvely hinted in the following lines : 
 
 'The One breathed calmly, self-sustained, nought else 
 
 beyond it lay. 
 
 Gloom hid in gloom existed first one sea, eluding view, 
 That One, a void in chaos wrapt, by inward fervour grew. 
 Within it first arose Desire, the primal germ of mind, 
 Which nothing with existence links, as sages searching 
 
 find.' 1 
 
 The only difference between Brahmanism and 
 Buddhism here is that in the former the desire 
 which sets in motion the stream of existence is in 
 Brahma, in the latter it is in individual sentient 
 beings, the cosmological and pantheistic significance 
 of the Brahmanical dogma being translated into an 
 anthropological and ethical one. 2 How desire, either 
 in Brahma or in the individual man, could have such 
 power is, of course, an unfathomable mystery. Most 
 
 1 Muir, Sanskrit Texts, vol. v. p. 356. 
 
 2 Koeppen, Die Religion des Buddha, p. 294. 
 
 6 
 
i8 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 of us, I suspect, will agree with Mr. Rhys Davids 
 when he bluntly declares that Buddha attached to 
 desire, as a real, sober fact, an influence and a power 
 which has no actual existence. 1 
 
 But suppose we concede to desire all the power 
 claimed for it, this question arises : Might it not be 
 possible to give transmigration the slip, to break the 
 continuity of existence, to annul the inexorable law 
 of Karma, by ceasing from desire? Yes, joyfully, 
 ecstatically, answered Buddha ; and the reply is in 
 brief the gist of the complementary doctrine of 
 Nirvana. Karma and Nirvana are the great key- 
 words of Buddhism. They represent opposite, con- 
 flicting tendencies. Karma clamours for continuance 
 of being, Nirvana craves and works for its cessation. 
 There is, as all must see, an antinomy here. Why 
 should we cease to desire, if continuance of the 
 stream of being is demanded by Karma? What 
 higher interest can there be than that of the moral 
 order? Ought not good men rather to cling to life 
 for the very purpose of providing scope for the dis- 
 play of that order? 
 
 The precise meaning attached by Buddhists to the 
 term 'Nirvana' has been the subject of much dis- 
 cussion. Some have taken it as signifying the 
 annihilation of the soul, while others have assigned 
 to it the directly opposite sense of a perpetuated life 
 of the soul in a future state of bliss. The former of 
 
 1 Hibbert Lectures, p. 113. 
 
BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 19 
 
 these views can hardly be correct, seeing the cessa- 
 tion of soul-life takes place at death in the natural 
 course of things, whereas Nirvana, whatever it be, is 
 attained by moral effort. The latter view, while not 
 without support in popular Buddhistic conceptions, 
 is not in accordance with the genius of the system. 
 Nirvana is, in the first place, a state of mind attain- 
 able in this life, the cessation of desire rather than 
 of existence. According to Mr. Rhys Davids, the 
 nearest analogue to it in Western thought is 'the 
 kingdom of heaven that is within a man, the peace 
 that passeth understanding.' l But this inward con- 
 dition reached by the perfect man, the arahat, has an 
 important objective result. It suspends the action 
 of the law of Karma, breaks the chain of successive 
 existence, prevents another life, bearing its prede- 
 cessor's responsibilities, from coming into being. In 
 the words of Mr. Davids, * When the arahat, the man 
 made perfect, according to the Buddhist faith, ceases 
 to live, no new lamp, no new sentient being, will be 
 lighted by the flame of any weak or ignorant longing 
 entertained by him.' 2 It is another instance of the 
 Buddhist habit of turning moral postulates into 
 physical causes. Our first example was taken from 
 Karma. Karma demands another life to bear its 
 fruit ; therefore, according to Buddhist ways of think- 
 ing, it produces the life required. Even so with 
 Nirvana. It demands the suspension of the law of 
 
 1 Hibbert Lectures > p. 31. a Ibid. t p. 101. 
 
20 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Karma, therefore it ensures it Hence, if all men 
 were to become Arahats and attain Nirvana, the 
 result ought to be the eventual extinction of ani- 
 mated being. 
 
 Other illustrations of the same mental habit are 
 not wanting. The marvellous abstraction called 
 Karma not only creates a succession of individual 
 lives, but even a succession of worlds wherein to 
 work out adequately the great problem of moral 
 retribution. The cosmology of developed Buddhism 
 is a grotesque, mad-looking scheme. But there is 
 method in the madness. It is the moral interest 
 that reigns here as everywhere, which, once it is per- 
 ceived, redeems from utter dreariness pages concern- 
 ing innumerable worlds in space and time that seem 
 to contain but the idle dreams of an unbridled, 
 fantastic Eastern imagination. For that which gives 
 rise to the whole phantasmagory is the need of end- 
 less time to exhaust the results of Karma. The fruit 
 of an action does not necessarily ripen soon ; it may 
 take hundreds of thousands of Kalpas to mature. 
 What is a Kalpa? A great Kalpa is the period 
 beginning with the origin of a world and extending 
 beyond its dissolution to the commencement of a 
 new succeeding world. This great Kalpa is divisible 
 into four Kalpas, each representing a stage in the 
 cosmic process of origination and dissolution. The 
 four together cover a time of inconceivable length, 
 immeasurably longer than would be the time required 
 
BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 21 
 
 to wear away by the touch of a cloth of delicate 
 texture, once in a hundred years, a solid rock sixteen 
 miles broad and as many high. Yet, long as is the 
 period of a great Kalpa, it may require many such to 
 bring to maturity the fruit of an action done by a 
 man during his earthly life of three-score years and 
 ten. Therefore, as one world does not last long 
 enough for the purpose, there must be a succession 
 of worlds. Karma demands them, therefore Karma 
 creates them. The Fiat of almighty Karma goes 
 forth : Let there be worlds ; and world after world 
 starts into being in obedience to its behest. Worlds 
 exist only for moral ends to afford adequate scope 
 for the realisation of the moral order. 
 
 There is something sublime as well as grotesque 
 in this cosmological creation of the Buddhist con- 
 science. And one cannot but admire the moral 
 intensity which conceived it possible for an action, 
 good or evil, to be quickened into fruitfulness after 
 the lapse of millions on millions of years, during 
 which it lay dormant. This long delay of the moral 
 harvest gives rise to a curious anomaly in the 
 Buddhist theory of future rewards and punishments. 
 It is this : men who have lived good lives in this 
 world may go at death into a place of damnation, 
 and men who have lived here bad lives may pass 
 into the heaven of the gods. The damnation in the 
 one case is the late fruitage of some evil deed done 
 in long bygone ages, and the bliss, in the other, the 
 
22 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 tardy recompense of a good deed done in a previous 
 state of existence. This seems a perilous doctrine 
 to preach, presenting as it does to the hopes and 
 fears of men prospects for the near future which 
 appear like a reversal of the normal law of retribu- 
 tion. 
 
 Thus far of Karma and Nirvana. I now add a 
 brief statement on Buddhist conceptions concerning 
 the experience and functions of a Buddha. 
 
 In view of the infinitely slow action of the law of 
 retribution and the strangely incongruous experiences 
 of intermediate states, one can imagine what an 
 interminably long and endlessly varied career one 
 must pass through whose ultimate destiny it is to 
 become a Buddha one, that is, perfectly enlightened, 
 completely master of desire, sinless, and no more in 
 danger of sinning. One wonders, indeed, how there 
 ever could be such a being. The Buddhist creed 
 certainly cannot be charged with representing the 
 making of a Buddha as an easy thing. On the con- 
 trary, he is believed to have passed through many 
 existences under many forms of being, and in various 
 states of being : now an animal, then a man, then a 
 god ; at one time damned, at another time beatified ; 
 in one life virtuous, in another criminal ; but on the 
 whole moving on, slowly accumulating merits which 
 are eventually crowned with the honours of Buddha- 
 hood. 1 
 
 1 Burnouf, Introduction, etc., p. 120. 
 
BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 23 
 
 One who has passed through such an adventurous 
 history, and has at length arrived safely at the goal 
 of perfect wisdom and goodness, must be a very 
 valuable person when he comes into a world like 
 this, full of ignorance, misery, and sin. What will be 
 his function? What can he do for the race into 
 which he has been born ? For the Buddhist there is 
 only one possible vocation for a Buddha. He cannot 
 save men by vicarious goodness or suffering. Every 
 man must be his own saviour, working out his salva- 
 tion, as Buddha worked out his, through the ages 
 and worlds, through beasthood, godhood, devilhood, 
 to perfect manhood in some far-distant future aeon. 
 But a Buddha can tell men the way of self-salvation. 
 He can preach to them the gospel of despair, declar- 
 ing that life is not worth living, that birth is the 
 penalty of previous sin, that the peace of Nirvana is 
 to be reached by the extirpation of the will to live, 
 and by gentle compassion towards all living creatures. 
 This was how Gotama, the Buddha who was born in 
 India some six centuries before the Christian era, 
 occupied himself, after he became enlightened ; and 
 such must be the vocation of all possible Buddhas. 
 
 Of all possible Buddhas, I say, for to the followers 
 of Gotama a plurality of Buddhas is not only possible 
 but even necessary. Buddhist imagination has been 
 busy here, as in the manufacture of worlds. The 
 Christian knows of only one Christ, but the Buddhist 
 knows of many Buddhas. The Buddhists of the 
 
24 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 North, according to Burnouf, believing in an infini- 
 tude of worlds situated in ten regions of space, 
 believe also in an infinite number of Buddhas, or 
 candidates for the honour, co-existing at the same 
 time. The popular pantheon includes two kinds of 
 Buddhas : a human species, and another described 
 as immaterial Buddhas of contemplation. The 
 theistic school of Nepaul has an Ur-Buddha, a kind 
 of divine head of all the Buddhas. But, according 
 to the same distinguished authority from whom I 
 have taken these particulars, primitive Buddhism, as 
 set forth in the short, simple Sutras, knows only of 
 human Buddhas, and of only one Buddha living in 
 the world at the same time. 1 
 
 Faith in a succession of Buddhas seems to be 
 common to all Buddhistic schools. This faith has 
 no basis in historical knowledge : it is simply the 
 creature of theory. If asked to justify itself it might 
 advance three pleas : possibility, need, necessity. 
 Possibility, for it is always possible that in the long 
 course of ages a man should make his appearance 
 who has attained the virtue of Buddhahood. One 
 actual Buddha proves the possibility of others. 
 Looking at the matter a priori, one might be inclined 
 to doubt whether in the eternal succession of exist- 
 ence even so much as one Buddha could ever 
 appear. A candidate for the high distinction (called 
 a Bodhisat) must become a proficient in the six great 
 
 1 Burnouf, Introduction^ pp. 97-107. 
 
BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 25 
 
 virtues ' which conduct to the further shore ' : sym- 
 pathy, purity, patience, energy, contemplation, 
 wisdom. One can imagine a human being working 
 at the heroic task in his own person, or through the 
 successive inheritors of his Karma, during countless 
 aeons, in millions of existences, and after all failing 
 in the task. The chances are millions to one against 
 its ever being achieved. But then Gotama was a 
 Buddha, and in presence of that one fact all a priori 
 reasoning falls to the ground. The thing has 
 happened once, and it may happen again and again. 
 And it is very desirable that it should happen 
 repeatedly. Need justifies faith. How important 
 that in each new world as it arises a Buddha should 
 appear to set the wheel of doctrine in motion, to 
 unfold the banner of the good law, and so inaugurate 
 a new era of revelation and redemption ! It is 
 abstractly possible, of course, that no Buddha might 
 come just when one was most wanted, or that a 
 Buddha might arrive on the scene when there was 
 no urgent need for him, or that a multitudinous 
 epiphany of Buddhas might take place at the same 
 time ; for the Buddhist theory of the universe knows 
 of no Providence over all that can arrange for the 
 appearance on the scene of its elect agents when 
 their work is ready for them, and so plan that there 
 shall be no waste of power. But even a Buddhist 
 may hope that the fitness of things will somehow be 
 observed ; and for the rest the imperious demands of 
 
26 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 theory must be complied with. The way to Nirvana 
 must be shown to the blind, and the competent 
 leader must be forthcoming. Stat pro ratione 
 voluntas. 
 
 But why cannot the one historic Buddha who was 
 born in Kapilavastu in the sixth century before Christ 
 meet all requirements ? Well, for one reason, be- 
 coming, succession, is the supreme cosmological 
 category of Buddhism, and it is not surprising that, 
 in sympathy with the spirit of the system, the 
 category was applied also to Buddhahood. There is 
 an eternal succession of Kalpas, of destructions and 
 renovations of worlds ; why not also an unending 
 series of Buddhas ? But, granting that a succession 
 of Buddha-advents is required by the genius of the 
 system, why should it not be simply a series of 
 re-appearances on the part of one and the same 
 Buddha? Because all things in this universe are 
 impermanent, Buddhas not excepted ; nay, they 
 more than all, for existence is a curse, and it is the 
 privilege of a Buddha to escape from it absolutely, 
 his own candle of life going out, and not lighting, 
 by his Karma, the lamp of a new life in another. 
 Gotama is to-day only a memory, and nothing re- 
 mains of him for his disciples to worship except his 
 bones scattered here and there over the lands. 
 
 This series of Buddhas, as already stated, is simply 
 the creature of theory. Once more a moral postulate 
 is turned into an efficient cause. Buddhas are 
 
BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 27 
 
 needed at recurrent intervals, therefore Buddhas are 
 forthcoming in spite of antecedent improbabilities. 
 Of these Buddhas, countless in number, nothing is 
 known, save in the case of one. Pretended know- 
 ledge simply makes the careers of all the rest a fac- 
 simile of the career of that one. All are born in 
 middle-India ; their mothers die on the seventh day 
 after birth ; all are in similar way tempted by Mara, 
 and gain victory over the tempter ; all begin to turn 
 the wheel of the law in a wood, near the city of 
 Benares ; all have two favourite disciples, and so on. 
 The story of these imaginary Buddhas is evermore 
 but the monotonous repetition of the legendary 
 history of Gotama. 
 
 In proceeding to offer some critical observations 
 on the Buddhist conception of life and of the moral 
 order, I must begin with the remark that the great 
 outstanding merit of this religion is its intensely 
 ethical spirit. In Buddhism virtue, in the Indian 
 passive sense self-sacrifice, sympathy, meekness is 
 supreme. It was indeed characteristic of ancient 
 Indian religion under all forms to assign sovereign 
 value and power to virtue in some shape. Even in 
 the Veda, with all its naturalism, and its secular con- 
 ception of the summum bonum> prayer, penitence, 
 sanctity, wisdom, are represented as more powerful 
 than the gods, as making men gods. But Buddhism 
 rises to the purest conception of what virtue is, 
 
28 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 making it consist, not in meditation or self-torture, 
 or work-holiness, but in inward purity and the utter 
 uprooting of selfish desire. And, in opposition to 
 Brahmanism, the new religion showed the sincerity 
 and depth of its ethical spirit by treating caste dis- 
 tinctions as of subordinate importance compared with 
 ethical qualities. It did not meddle with caste as a 
 social institution, but it treated it as irrelevant in the 
 religious sphere. It invited all, of whatever caste, to 
 enter on the new path, believing all capable of com- 
 plying with its requirements ; and in the new brother- 
 hood all invidious distinctions were ignored. 'My 
 law is a law of grace for all,' Buddha is reported to 
 have said. Whether he uttered it or not, the saying 
 truly reflects his attitude and the genius of his 
 religion. It is in principle revolutionary, and, had 
 the virtue of Buddhists not been of the quietistic 
 type, treating all secularities as matters of indiffer- 
 ence, it might have ended in the abolition of caste, 
 as the Christian faith led to the eventual abolition of 
 slavery. 
 
 One wonders why a moral consciousness so robust 
 did not give birth to a reformed faith in God and in 
 Providence. We have seen what it was equal to in 
 connection with the doctrine of Karma. To Karma 
 it assigned the functions both of creation and of 
 providence. Karma is in fact a substitute for God. 
 By the aggregate Karma of the various orders of 
 living beings the present worlds were brought into 
 
BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 29 
 
 existence, and their general economy is controlled. 
 Karma creates and governs the world, because it 
 postulates a world adapted to the working out of its 
 requirements. Why not rather believe in a God 
 who is at the head both of the physical and the 
 moral worlds, and therefore able to make the two 
 correspond? That surely is the true postulate of 
 every system which makes the ethical supreme. 
 Its failure to see this is the radical defect of the 
 Buddhistic theory of the universe. 
 
 The failure was due to two causes. 
 
 First, the traditional gods of India were unworthy 
 to hold their place in the faith and worship of men. 
 When a severe moral temper began to prevail, 
 sceptical reaction was inevitable. Reaction towards 
 atheism is to be expected whenever a religious creed 
 has degenerated into a set of dogmas in which the 
 human spirit cannot rest ; or when a creed, in itself 
 pure, has become associated with an ignoble life. 
 And a virtuous atheism of reaction is a better thing 
 than the unvirtuous insincere theism or pantheism it 
 seeks to replace. Buddhism was a virtuous atheism 
 of reaction which sought /to replace the prevalent 
 Brahmanical pantheism. And as such it was rela- 
 tively justified, a better thing than it found, if not an 
 absolutely good thing. 
 
 But why remain in the reactionary stage? why 
 not strive after a reformed idea of God ? Why not 
 go back to the Vedic idea of a Heaven-Father, 
 
30 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Dyauspitar, and charge it with new, ethical contents, 
 so giving to the world centuries before the Christian 
 era a Father in heaven, possessing moral attributes 
 such as Buddha admired and practised benignant, 
 kind, gracious, patient, forgiving ? The question leads 
 up to the second cause of Buddha's theological short- 
 coming. It was due to his pessimistic interpretation 
 of human life. Life being utterly worthless, how 
 could a Father-God be believed in? Buddha's 
 ethical ideal and his reading of life were thus in 
 conflict with each other. The one suggested as its 
 appropriate complement a benignant God over all ; 
 the other made the existence of such a Deity in- 
 credible : and the force on the side of negation proved 
 to be the stronger. And yet the judgment on life 
 which landed in virtual atheism was surely a mistake. 
 All is not vanity and vexation of spirit. ' The earth 
 is full of the goodness of the Lord,' declares a 
 Hebrew psalmist. Why should Hebrews and Indians 
 think so differently, living in the same world and 
 passing through the same experiences of birth, 
 growth, disease, decay, death? Do race, tempera- 
 ment, climate, geographical position, explain the 
 contrast ? 
 
 Out of this great error concerning life sprang an- 
 other equally portentous, the idea of Nirvana as the 
 summum bonum. Life, taught Buddha, is inherently 
 miserable ; therefore let wise men cease to desire it, 
 and abstain from kindling with the taper of Karma 
 
BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 31 
 
 the light of another life. Perfectly logical reasoning; 
 but observe in what an antinomy the Buddhist is 
 thus landed between Karma on the one hand and 
 Nirvana on the other. Karma and Nirvana are 
 irreconcilable antagonists. The one creates, the 
 other destroys, worlds. Let Karma have its way, and 
 the stream of successive existences will flow on for 
 ever. Let Nirvana have its way, and men will cease 
 to be, and the worlds will perish along with them. 
 It is a dualism in its kind, as decided as that pre- 
 sented in the Persian religion, but with this difference: 
 the Persian twin spirits are opposite in character, the 
 one good, the other evil ; the Indian antagonists, 
 on the other hand, are both good, Karma represent- 
 ing the moral order, righteousness, Nirvana, the 
 summum bonum. It is a fatal thing when these two 
 come into collision. 
 
 The Buddhist conception of Karma is as fantastic 
 as its doctrine of Nirvana is morbid. Its atomistic 
 idea of merit and demerit, as adhering to individual 
 acts instead of to conduct as a whole, destroys the 
 unity of character; and its' theory of indefinitely 
 delayed retribution is as baseless as it is mischievous 
 in tendency. The resulting view of the world- 
 process presents the spectacle of a moral chaos rather 
 than a broad intelligible embodiment of sowing and 
 reaping in the moral universe. It is unnecessary to 
 point out how entirely diverse the world-process of 
 Buddhist ethical theory is from that implied in the 
 
32 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 modern theory of evolution. In the evolutionary 
 theory the world moves steadily onward from lower 
 to higher forms of life till it culminates in man. On 
 the Buddhist theory the universe is turned topsy- 
 turvy. The higher may come before the lower, 
 according to the requirements of the law of Karma. 
 Man comes first of all, not at the end of the evolu- 
 tionary process, as its crown and climax ; for moral 
 acts are the prius and cause of physical creation. 
 There had been no world unless man, with his merit 
 and demerit, had previously been. Under the modern 
 conception physical causality and moral aims have 
 their distinct value, under law to a supreme Cause 
 who controls all, and makes the two worlds work in 
 concert. Under the Buddhist conception physical 
 causation counts for nothing ; moral requirements 
 alone find recognition : and the result is a fantastic 
 see-saw, a wild fluctuation in the history of moral 
 agents who may be gods at one time, men at another, 
 beasts at a still later stage of their existence. 
 
 Yet, in spite of all its defects, theoretical and 
 practical, the religious movement originated by 
 Buddha may be numbered among the forces which 
 have contributed in a signal degree to the moral 
 amelioration of the world. Its ethical idea, if one- 
 sided, is pure and elevated. It has helped millions 
 to live sweet, peaceful lives in retirement from the 
 world, if it has not nerved men to play the part of 
 heroes in the world. It has soothed the pain of 
 
BUDDHA AND THE MORAL ORDER 33 
 
 despair, if it has not inspired hope, and has thus, as 
 Bunsen remarks, produced the effect of a mild dose 
 of opium on the tribes of weary-hearted Asia. 1 This 
 is all it is fitted to do, even at the best. The 
 Buddhism even of Buddha was at most but an 
 anodyne, sickly in temper while morally pure. The 
 sickliness has been a more constant characteristic of 
 the religion he founded than the purity. It has 
 entered into many combinations which have marred 
 its beauty, not even shrinking from alliance with the 
 obscenities of Siva-worship. 2 But no religion can 
 afford to be judged by all the , phases it has passed 
 through in the course of its development. Let us 
 therefore take Buddhism at its best and think of 
 it as kindly as possible. But what it gives is not 
 enough. Men need more than a quietive, a sooth- 
 ing potion ; militant virtues as well as meekness, 
 gentleness, and resignation. The well-being of 
 the world demands warriors brave in the battle 
 against evil, not monks immured in cloisters, and 
 passing their lives in poverty and idleness, wearing 
 the yellow robe of a mendicant order. 
 
 1 Vide his God in History ; vol. i. p. 375. 
 
 1 Vide on this Burnouf's Introduction^ pp. 480-488. 
 
LECTURE II 
 
 ZOROASTER: DUALISM 
 
 THE date of Zoroaster is very uncertain. Con- 
 jecture ranges over more than a thousand years, 
 some making the prophet of the ancient Persians 
 a contemporary of Abraham, while others bring 
 him down as far as Hystaspes, the father of 
 Darius I., i.e. to the sixth century B.C. The 
 translator of the Gathas, in the Sacred Books of 
 the East, Mr. Mills, thinks that these poems, the 
 oldest part of the Avesta, and believed to be from 
 the mind if not from the hand of Zoroaster, may 
 possibly have been composed as early as about 
 1500 B.C.; but that it is also possible to place them 
 as late as 900 to 1200 B.C. 1 Taking the latest of 
 these dates, the ninth century before the Christian 
 era, as the period in which Zoroaster, or as he is 
 now called, Zarathustra, made his appearance, it 
 results that the man who is known to all the world 
 as the promulgator of the dualistic theory preceded 
 Buddha by three hundred years. If it had been 
 necessary to be guided supremely by chronological 
 
 1 Vide the Introduction, p. xxxvii. 
 
ZOROASTER: DUALISM 35 
 
 considerations he should, therefore, have come first 
 in our course. But for our purpose it does not 
 greatly matter which of the two religious initiators 
 has the honour of the first place. The movements 
 they inaugurated are independent products of human 
 thought brooding on the phenomena of life, proceed- 
 ing from minds differently constituted and influenced 
 by diverse environments. 
 
 The two men, however, were connected by very 
 important links. They were kindred in race and 
 in language, and they had a common religious in- 
 heritance. Indians and Persians were both of the 
 Aryan stock. Their fathers lived together at a 
 far-back time in the region north of Hindostan, 
 whence they are believed to have migrated in two 
 streams, one flowing southwards through the moun- 
 tains towards India and the other westward towards 
 Eastern Persia. Some time ago the theory was 
 held that the separation was due to a religious 
 rupture. The hypothesis was built on the facts 
 that certain gods of the Vedic Pantheon appear 
 degraded to the rank of demons in the Persian 
 Sacred Book, the Avesta, and that the very name 
 for a god in the Vedic dialect (devd) is, under a 
 slightly altered form (daeva), in that book the 
 name for a demon. It seemed a not improbable 
 inference that the Zoroastrian movement was of 
 the nature of a religious revolt which threw con- 
 tempt on the common deities of the Indo-Iraniah 
 
36 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 family. 1 Recent scholars reject this theory and 
 invert the relation between geographical separation 
 and religious divergence. Mr. Mills expresses the 
 view now in favour in these terms : * No sudden 
 and intentional dismissal of the ancient gods is to 
 be accepted with Haug, nor any religious schism 
 as the cause of the migration of the Indians towards 
 the south. The process was, of course, the reverse. 
 The migrating tribes, in consequence of their separa- 
 tion from their brethren in Iran, soon became 
 estranged from them, and their most favoured gods 
 fell slowly into neglect, if not disfavour.' 2 
 
 Whatever the cause of religious diversity may 
 have been, there is no room for doubt as to its 
 existence. The religious temper revealed in the 
 Gathas is widely different from that of the Vedic 
 hymns, and still more from that of Buddha. The 
 Vedic religion, as we saw, is a kind of healthy, 
 cheerful, poetic naturalism, of which the beautiful 
 hymns to the dawn (Ushas) may be taken as the 
 typical expression. The Vedic worshipper cherishes 
 no lofty conception of the highest good, nor does 
 he brood too much on the sorrows of life and on 
 its dark end in death. He seeks chiefly material 
 things in his prayers, enjoys life cheerily while 
 he may, and thinks of death as a sleep, without 
 
 1 So Haug, Die Gdthas des Zarathustra. On his view vide Dar- 
 mesteter, Onnuzd et Ahriman, p. 261 /. 
 
 2 Introduction to translation of the Gathas, p. xxxvi. 
 
ZOROASTER: DUALISM 37 
 
 fear of aught beyond. By Buddha's time the 
 Indian mind has made an immense advance 
 in moral earnestness. Life now means much 
 more than meat and drink ; man's chief end 
 is not to be happy, but to be good ; sin and 
 sorrow, the very occasional themes of reflection in 
 the Veda, now monopolise attention. But the 
 animal vigour and healthy energy of the Vedic 
 Indian are gone, and in their place have come 
 quietism and despair. The religion of the Gathas 
 sympathises with the moral intensity of Buddha 
 as against the easy-going ways of the Vedic 
 Indians; but, on the other hand, it is in touch 
 with the manliness of the earlier phase of Indian 
 character, as opposed to the sickly life-weary 
 spirit of the later. There is a fervid spirituality 
 pervading the Githas which reminds one of the 
 Hebrew Psalter. The moral world, not the material, 
 is what the seer has mainly in view. Of the Pagan 
 enjoyment of nature, as it appeals to the senses, 
 there is little trace. We find there nothing corre- 
 sponding to the Ushas-group of hymns. Natural 
 objects are seldom referred to, and never alone, or 
 as the supreme objects of interest. When the 
 Good Spirit is praised as the Maker of heaven 
 and earth and all things therein : sun, moon, and 
 stars, clouds, winds, waters, plants, He is also 
 praised as inspirer of good thoughts. 1 The summum 
 
 1 Mills' translation of the Gathas, p. 113. 
 
38 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 bonum for the poet of the Gathas is the Kingdom 
 of righteousness ; fields, crops, flocks, have only the 
 second place in his thoughts. 
 
 On the other hand, the morality of the Gathas, 
 unlike that of Buddhism, is virile, militant. It is 
 a fight for the good against evil with all available 
 weapons, material ones not excepted. The Zoro- 
 astrian has no idea of retiring from the world into 
 a monastery, to give himself up to meditation on 
 the vanity of things, and to that extirpation of 
 desire which issues in Nirvana. His aim is to do 
 his part manfully in the work of the world, tilling 
 the fields, tending the flocks ; and for the rest to 
 fight to the death men of evil minds and evil lives 
 whenever he encounters them. 
 
 Compared with Vedism the religion of the Gathas 
 is monotheistic, in tendency at least, if not in precisely 
 formulated creed ; compared with Buddhism it is 
 theistic, believing not only in a moral order of the 
 world, but in a moral order presided over by a 
 Divine Sovereign. And the natural order and the 
 moral are conceived as under one and the same 
 divine control. The Good Spirit, Ormuzd (now 
 written, Ahuramazda\ is at once maker of the 
 physical world, the source of piety, and the fountain 
 of that reverential love which a dutiful son cherishes 
 towards a father. 1 In the hymns of Zoroaster, as 
 in the Hebrew Psalms, the glory of God appears 
 
 1 The Gathas, Yasna xliv. 7. 
 
ZOROASTER: DUALISM 39 
 
 alike in the firmament which shovveth His handi- 
 work and in the moral law whose statutes make 
 wise the simple. 
 
 But beside the Divine Head of the Kingdom of 
 righteousness is Another, not perhaps of equal 
 power and godhead, yet a kind of antigod, head 
 of the Kingdom of evil and maker of whatever in 
 the world is hostile to goodness. The Zoroastrian 
 idea of God is practically dualistic, if not in the 
 strict sense ditheistic. Ahuramazda has to submit 
 to a rival, Ahriman (now called Angra-mainyii), the 
 evil-minded, the Demon of the Lie. This dualism 
 is not necessarily a pure invention of Zoroaster's. It 
 may be the development of an unconscious dualism 
 latent in the primitive religion of the united Aryan 
 family. 1 Anthropologists tell us that dualism in 
 crude forms was a characteristic of all primitive 
 religions. It is e.g. a conspicuous feature in the 
 religion of American Redmen from north to south. 2 
 Tylor gives the following curious example: * North 
 American tribes have personified Nipinukhe and 
 Pipunukhe, the beings who bring the spring (nipin) 
 and the winter (pipun) : Nipinukhe brings the heat 
 and birds and verdure, Pipunukhe ravages with his 
 cold winds, his ice and snow ; one comes as the 
 other goes, and between them they divide the 
 world.' 3 Traces of this 'early omnipresent dualistic 
 
 1 Such is the view of Darmesteter, Ormuzd et Ahriman , p. 87. 
 * Vide Lang's Myth, Ritual, and Religion, vol. ii. p. 47. 
 3 Tylor, Primitive Culture, vol. i. p. 300. 
 
40 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 philosophy' 1 were to be expected in the original 
 Aryan religion as elsewhere ; and they are found 
 in the Vedic Hymns as well as in the Gathas. 
 
 In the Veda, however, the conflict is physical, not 
 ethical. It is simply a vivid mythological repre- 
 sentation of the phenomena of storms. The scene 
 of warfare is the atmosphere, and the war is between 
 Indra, the god of light and of rain, and Ahi, the 
 serpent whose tortuous body, the clouds, hides the 
 light, or Vritra, the bandit, who shuts up the light 
 and the waters in his nebulous cavern. 2 It has 
 been maintained that the Persian dualism was 
 originally of the same type, and ingenious attempts 
 have been made to discover support for the assertion 
 in the Avesta. 3 This position, whether true or not, 
 it is not necessary to call in question. The fact of 
 importance for us is that at some time before the 
 Gathas were composed the physical conflict was 
 transformed into a moral one, and the scene of 
 warfare passed from the sky to the earth, and the 
 subject of contest was no longer the light and the 
 waters of heaven but the human soul. This is 
 admitted even by Darmesteter, who strenuously 
 maintains the primitive affinity between the Indian 
 
 1 Lang, Myth, Ritual, and Religion, vol. i. p. 334 ; also vol. ii. 
 p. 4, in reference to the crow and the eagle, the 'old ones' who 
 made the world according to an Australian myth. 'There was 
 continual war bet wen these ornithomorphic creators. The strife was 
 as fierce as between wolf and raven, coyote and dog, Ormuzd and 
 Ahriman.' 
 
 a Darmesteter, p, 97. * Vide Darmesteter's work above cited. 
 
ZOROASTER: DUALISM . 41 
 
 and the Persian forms of dualism. At what precise 
 time the transformation took place it may be im- 
 possible to determine, as also to what agency it 
 was due ; enough for us that the great crisis in 
 the Persian religion was antecedent to the Gathic 
 period. If the Gathas, as is alleged, contain 
 survivals of the older type of dualism, they contain 
 also abundant traces of the transformed ethical 
 type. Ahura is an ethical divinity loving righteous- 
 ness and hating iniquity. His rival also is an ethical 
 being, but of a sinister order ; a lover of falsehood 
 and patron of wrong. And their respective subjects 
 are like-minded with the divinities they serve. And 
 the great fact for the sacred poet is the subjection 
 of the world to the dominion of two antagonistic 
 spirits, with the corresponding division of mankind 
 into two great classes, those who obey the Good 
 Spirit and those who are subject to the Evil Spirit. 
 If these lofty conceptions were not entirely new 
 creations, but transformations from lower forms of 
 thought, they are none the less marvellous, when 
 we consider how much is involved in the change 
 of physical deities into ethical deities. If the 
 transformation was the work of Zoroaster, single- 
 handed, he deserves to be ranked among the great 
 religious initiators of our race. If it was not the 
 work of one man, or of one generation, the gradual- 
 ness of the process does not make the result less 
 valuable. It was a great day for ancient Persia, 
 
42 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 and for the world, when there dawned upon 
 prophetic minds the idea of a Kingdom of the 
 good under the dominion of a beneficent Spirit 
 who required of men the culture of righteousness 
 and the practice of mercy. If the bright vision 
 had its dark shadow in a Kingdom of evil presided 
 over by a rival deity, let us not undervalue it on 
 that account. The Demon of the Lie only serves 
 as a foil to show forth by contrast the virtues of 
 Ahura. The sombre conception of an antigod, 
 however crude and helpless from a philosophical 
 point of view, at least evinces the resolute de- 
 termination of the Persian sage to preserve the 
 character of the good Spirit absolutely free from 
 all compromise with evil, and from all moral con- 
 tamination. To accomplish this laudable purpose is 
 the raison cFetre of the evil Spirit in the Zoroastrian 
 creed. He is simply the negative of the good Spirit. 
 He grows in the distinctness of his attributes and 
 functions in proportion as the importance of keeping 
 the divine idea pure is realised. He is whatever it 
 is desirable that the truly divine should not be. In 
 the primitive time before the separation, he was not 
 known by name ; then he became the personifica- 
 tion and heir of the demons of the storm ; then he 
 assumed more definite shape as the antithesis of 
 Ahura, and his character was outlined in malign com- 
 pleteness on the principles of analogy and contrast. 1 
 
 1 Vidt Darmesteter, Ormuzd et Ahriman, chap. vi. 
 
ZOROASTER: DUALISM 43 
 
 The thing to be emphasised, therefore, in the first 
 place, in the religion of the Gathas, is not the 
 dualism, but the conception contained in them of 
 the Good Spirit. This is a permanently valuable 
 contribution to the evolution of religious thought. 
 The character ascribed to Ahura is pure and exalted. 
 Among the epithets employed to describe him, one 
 specially strikes a thoughtful reader. Ahura is 
 declared to be ' the Father of the .toiling good mind,' 
 and piety or devotion revealing itself in good deeds 
 is called his daughter. 1 The application of the title 
 * Father' to the Divine Being is in itself worthy of 
 note, and from the connection in which it is used we 
 get a glimpse into the heart of the Divine Father. 
 Observe who are His children. They are the men 
 who toil, who take life in earnest, who with resolute 
 will strive to do the work that lies to their hand. 
 And what is the nature of that work ? It is such as 
 commends itself to the 'good mind/ work in which 
 noble souls can be enthusiastic. That means some- 
 thing higher than tilling the fields and tending 
 the flocks, though these useful labours are not 
 despised. It means contributing to the store of 
 righteousness and its beneficent fruits : in short, 
 toiling for the kingdom of goodness. That is to 
 say, the sons and daughters of Ahura are those 
 who, in the language of Jesus, 'seek first the king- 
 dom of God,' and heroically devote themselves to 
 
 1 The Gathas, Yasna xlv. 4. 
 
44 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 its service. Through the children we know the 
 Father, and perceive that He bears some resem- 
 blance to the Father-God Jesus made known to 
 His disciples. 
 
 Further light is thrown on the character of Ahura 
 by the doctrine of the Amschaspands. The name 
 sounds very unattractive to our ears, but the thing is 
 simple. The doctrine of the Amschaspands is simply 
 the doctrine of the divine attributes. The Amschas- 
 pands are personified virtues of the good Spirit. 
 They are six, or, counting Ahura Himself as one, 
 seven. Their names are uncouth, and I shall not 
 attempt to pronounce them, but according to Dar- 
 mesteter they signify righteousness, the good mind, 
 sovereign might, piety as it manifests itself in the 
 souls of believers, health, and long life. 1 In this list 
 there seems to be a mixture of physical and moral 
 properties. Another thing still more notable is, the 
 ascription to the Divine Being of what belongs to 
 His worshipper practical piety. We have already 
 seen that the piety of good men is represented as 
 the daughter of Ahura. But in the doctrine of the 
 Amschaspands it is more than a daughter, even an 
 essential ingredient in the character of Ahura. It 
 almost seems as if the Deity of the ancient Persians 
 were simply the immanent spirit of the holy com- 
 monwealth ; He in it and it in Him, and all 
 characteristic properties common to both. This 
 
 1 Darmesteter, I.e., p. 42. 
 
: DUALISM 4$ 
 
 might be called pantheism, were it not for the con- 
 ception of an antigod, which is not consistent with 
 a pantheistic theory of the universe. Mr. Mills 
 suggests the designation, ' Hagio-theism,' to which 
 he appends the explanatory title, 'a delineation of 
 God in the holy creation.' 1 
 
 This phrase does not cover the whole truth about 
 God as conceived by Zoroastrians. Ahura is not 
 merely the immanent spirit of the society of saints ; 
 He is, as already indicated, the Creator-spirit of the 
 universe. His attribute of righteousness, Asha y 
 denotes right order not only in the holy common- 
 wealth but in the cosmos at large. This appears in 
 Yasna xliv., which contains a series of suggestive 
 questions addressed to Ahura which, in an interro- 
 gative form, set forth the poet's confession of faith 
 concerning the relations of the good Spirit to the 
 cosmic order. Two of these questions may be given 
 by way of sample. 
 
 3. ' This, I ask thee, O Ahura 1 tell me aright : 
 
 Who by generation was the first father of the righteous 
 
 order (within the world) ? 
 Who gave the (recurring) sun and stars their (unde- 
 
 viating) way ? 
 Who established that whereby the moon waxes and 
 
 whereby she wanes, save thee ? 
 These things, O great Creator 1 would I know, and 
 
 others likewise still. 
 
 1 The Githas, Introduction, p. xix. 
 
46 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 4. * This I ask thee, O Ahura ! tell me aright, 
 
 Who from beneath hath sustained the earth and the 
 
 clouds above that they do not fall ? 
 Who made the waters and the plants ? 
 Who to the wind has yoked on the storm-clouds, the 
 
 swift and fleetest two ? 
 Who, O great Creator ! is the inspirer of the good 
 
 thoughts (within our souls) P 1 
 
 The cosmic order and the moral order, then, are 
 both alike ordained by Ahura. The courses of the 
 stars; the alternations of light and darkness, day and 
 night, sleep and waking hours ; the daily succession 
 of dawn, noon and midnight ; the flow of rivers, the 
 growth of corn and of fruit-trees ; the exhilarating 
 sweep of purifying breezes ; the inspired thoughts of 
 poets, saints, and sages, and the love which binds 
 men together in family ties these all have their 
 origin in Ahura's wisdom and power. 
 
 This being so, what room and need, one is inclined 
 to ask, in this universe, fora rival divinity? On first 
 thoughts Angra-mainyu may seem an idle invention ; 
 but on second thoughts we are forced to admit that 
 the conception, however crude, was very natural. 
 Theories always have their ultimate origin in ob- 
 servation of facts. The fact-basis of the Persian 
 dualism was the observed presence in the world of two 
 sorts of men, diverse in spirit and in conduct, with 
 incompatible interests and ever at war. They are the 
 
 1 The Gathas, Yasna xliv. The bracketed clauses in this and othei 
 quotations are explanatory expressions introduced by the translator. 
 
ZOROASTER: DUALISM 47 
 
 good-minded and the evil-minded respectively ; those 
 who love truth and justice, and those who love false- 
 hood and wrong. The existence of the two classes 
 is recognised in the Gathas in these quaint terms, 
 * He is evil who is the best one to the evil, and he is 
 holy who is friendly to the righteous, as thou didst 
 fix the moral laws, O Lord.' 1 The opposed classes 
 come under the notice of the poet in a very realistic, 
 obtrusive, and unwelcome manner in the form of two 
 peoples, diverse in race, language, religion, and social 
 condition. The good are represented by his own 
 people, Aryans in race and language, worshippers 
 of Ahura and tillers of the soil in fertile valleys by 
 river-courses where flocks graze and grain grows. 
 The evil are represented by obnoxious neighbours 
 of the Turanian race, 2 nomads, worshippers of 
 demons, too near the Aryan farmers for their comfort, 
 ever ready to make incursions into their settlements 
 and carry off the 'joy-creating kine' from the 
 pleasant peaceful meadows. 8 
 
 Behold an elect people, an Israel, in the far East, 
 with Philistines on every side ! The incessant con- 
 flict between them can be imagined. Invasion and 
 rapine on the part of the demon-worshipping nomads, 
 resolute defence of their property on the part of 
 Zoroastrians. The bitterness of the increasing strife 
 is reflected in the sacred poems by frequent reference, 
 and by the terms of intense dislike applied to the 
 
 1 Yasna xlvi. 6. 2 Ibid., 12. 8 Yasna xlvii. 3. 
 
4 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 foes of the children of light. In the conflict, material, 
 moral and religious interests and motives are blended, 
 and all three are surrounded with a common halo of 
 sacredness. The defence of agriculture against the 
 assaults of pagan nomads becomes a holy cause. 
 Hence the personified abstraction, the * Soul of the 
 Kine/ becomes the poetic emblem, not only of the 
 material interests of the worshippers of Ahura, but 
 also of the spiritual. It is the 'Soul of the Kine/ 
 representing the devout tillers of the land, that in the 
 hour of distress raises a wailing cry to Ahura to send 
 a strong wise man to teach them the true faith and 
 lead them against their foes. Zoroaster was the 
 answer to its prayer. 1 
 
 No wonder that in these circumstances the idea of 
 a divine antagonist to Ahura, head of the Kingdom 
 of darkness, took possession of the mind of the poet 
 and prophet who was sent in answer to the Soul 
 of the Kine's prayer. For one of his intense mystic 
 temper, Ahriman would seem the appropriate divine 
 embodiment of the evil spirit active in the dark 
 Turanian world. One can imagine how it might 
 appear to him as a great revelation, throwing a flood 
 of light on life's mysteries, to proclaim as an ultimate 
 fact the existence of two opposed Spirits dividing the 
 dominion of the world between them. This accord- 
 ingly the hero, sent in answer to the distressed cry 
 of the Kine's soul, is represented as doing in a 
 
 1 Yasna xxix. 
 
ZOROASTER: DUALISM 49 
 
 solemn address to an assembled multitude. ' Hear 
 ye then with your ears/ thus he begins, ' see ye the 
 bright flames with (the eyes of the) Better Mind. 
 It is for a decision as to religions, man and man, 
 each individually for himself.' 1 Then follows the 
 great doctrine of dualism : ' Thus are the primeval 
 spirits who as a pair (combining their opposite 
 strivings), and (yet each) independent in his action, 
 have been formed (of old). (They are) a better 
 thing, they two, and a worse, as to thought, as to 
 word, and as to deed. And between these two let 
 the wisely acting choose aright. (Choose ye) not 
 (as) the evil-doers.' 2 
 
 That this doctrine of dualism would never have 
 been heard of but for Turanian invasions of Aryan 
 settlements, would be a very simple supposition. 
 Alas ! there was evil within the holy land as well 
 as without, and there was a traditional instinctive 
 dualism already in possession of the popular mind, 
 and both these sources would contribute material 
 for reflective thought on the mystery of good and 
 evil and its ultimate explanation. But the doctrine 
 would gain sharpness of outline from the existence 
 of a Turanian environment, and the constant con- 
 flicts between the two hostile races would convert 
 what might otherwise have been a mild philosophic 
 theorem into a divine message coming from a heart 
 on fire with a sacred enthusiasm and uttered in 
 
 1 Yasna xxx. 2. 2 Yasna xxx. 3. 
 
 D 
 
So THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 words of prophetic intensity. Such is the character 
 of the Gatha in which the doctrine is proclaimed. 
 The temper of the poet is not philosophic ; it is 
 truculent, Hebrew, Puritan. His utterance breathes 
 at once the lofty spiritual tone and the vindictiveness 
 of certain Psalms in the Hebrew Psalter. He con- 
 templates with satisfaction the time when vengeance 
 shall come upon the wretches who worship the 
 Daevas. 1 His mind is dominated by the same broad 
 antitheses that were ever present to the thoughts of 
 Israel : between the elect people and the Gentiles, 
 between light and darkness, truth and falsehood ; 
 and the light is very brilliant and the darkness very 
 dark. 
 
 Yet the attitude of the Persian prophet towards 
 the outside world is not exclusively hostile, as if 
 those who had given themselves to the service of 
 the Evil Spirit were incapable of change. Conver- 
 sion is conceived to be possible. Conversions are 
 expected even from the Turanians. With clear pro- 
 phetic vision, reminding us of Hebrew Psalmists, the 
 poet of the Gathas anticipates a time when ' from 
 among the tribes and kith of the Turanian those 
 shall arise who further on the settlements of Piety 
 with energy and zeal/ and with whom Ahura shall 
 1 dwell together through his Good Mind (in them), 
 and to them for joyful grace deliver His commands.' 2 
 The man who cherishes this hope has no wish to 
 
 1 Yasna xxx. 33. a Yasna xlvi. 12. 
 
ZOROASTER: DUALISM 51 
 
 enjoy a monopoly of Ahura's blessing. He harbours 
 in his heart no pride either of election or of race. He 
 is conscious, indeed, of possessing in the true faith 
 a boon for which he cannot be too thankful. But he 
 is willing to share the boon with any who have a 
 mind to receive it, even if they come from the tents 
 of the nomads. Race for him is not the fundamental 
 distinction among men, as is caste for his kindred in 
 India. The grand radical cleavage in his view is 
 that between men of the Good Mind and men of the 
 Evil Mind, and the fact attests the sincerity and 
 depth of his devotion to the creed he proclaims. 
 
 That conversion is thought to be possible, even 
 in unlikely quarters, is a point worth noting in that 
 creed. Men, we see, are not conceived to be good 
 or evil by necessity of nature and irrevocably ; every 
 man by an insurmountable fatality a child of Ahura, 
 or a child of Ahura's antagonist ; no change from 
 bad to good possible, either through self-effort or 
 through gracious influence of transcendent powers. 
 Evil and good are objects of choice, and the man 
 who makes a wrong choice to-day may make the 
 better choice to-morrow. Such is the hopeful creed 
 of Zoroaster. 
 
 But no optimistic expectations aie cherished. 
 Present experience does not encourage extravagant 
 anticipations or universalistic dreams. Depressing 
 facts stare one in the face : the obstinacy of unbelief, 
 the rarity of conversions, and even within the pale 
 
52 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 of the chosen people the prevalence of grievous evil : 
 arrogance among those of high degree, lying among 
 the people, slothful neglect of needful toil; 1 and, 
 worst 'of all, evil men not seen and believed to be 
 the sinners that they are, posing and passing as 
 children of light when they are in truth children 
 of darkness. 2 To these moral faults have to be 
 added perplexing social evils bad men prosper- 
 ing, good men suffering frustration and misfortune. 
 Surveying the whole, a man of earnest spirit addicted 
 to reflection is more likely to fall a prey to dark 
 doubt than to indulge in high hopes of rapid ex- 
 tension and steadily increasing sway for the king- 
 dom of righteousness. Traces of such doubts are 
 not wanting in the Gathas. The poet asks such 
 questions as these : * Wherefore is the vile man not 
 known to be vile?' 8 'When shall I in verity dis- 
 cern if ye indeed have power over aught, O Lord ? ' * 
 and he brings under Mazda's notice the perplexing 
 facts of his own experience unable to attain his wish, 
 his flocks reduced in number, his following insignifi- 
 cant beseeching him to behold and help if he can. 6 
 Here is matter enough surely for musing ! Vile 
 men, e.g. not known to be vile ! Why cannot men 
 be either one thing or another, decidedly good or 
 decidedly evil ? Why be evil and at the same time 
 feign goodness ? Alas ! it is so advantageous some- 
 
 1 Yasna xxxiii. 4. a Ibid. xliv. 12. Ibid. xliv. H. 
 
 * Ibid, xlviii. 9. B Ibid. xlvi. 2. 
 
ZOROASTER: DUALISM 53 
 
 times to have the name of being good ; so easy to 
 slide intc the false ways of hypocrisy, especially in 
 times of exceptional religious enthusiasm. When 
 in the first fervour of a new faith believers have 
 all things in common, Ananiases and Sapphiras are 
 sure to arise. Again, has Ahura any real power? 
 Ahura's good-will is not doubted, and that is well ; 
 for when, as in the case of the author of the 73rd 
 Psalm, doubt arises in the mind whether God be 
 indeed good even to the pure in heart, the feet are 
 near to slipping. 1 But Ahura's power seems open 
 to grave question. As things stand, the Evil Spirit 
 seems to be in the ascendency. Openly wicked men 
 abound, hypocrisy is rampant, all around the settle- 
 ments of the worshippers of Mazda is the dark world 
 of demon- worship. How can this be, if Ahura's 
 power to establish the kingdom of righteousness be 
 equal to his will? The personal afflictions of which 
 the poet complains help, of course, to make these 
 doubts and perplexities more acute. If Ahura be 
 powerful, why does he not protect his devoted 
 servant from plunder, and give him the success 
 his heart desires in the propagation of the faith? 
 Natural questions raising abstruse problems out of 
 experiences which repeat themselves in all ages. 
 
 The poet of the Gathas seems to have regarded 
 the conflict between good and evil as eternal. The 
 doctrine of dualism enunciated in the 3Oth Yasna 
 
 1 Ps. Ixxiii. 2. 
 
54 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 comes in as an answer to the question how the 
 primaeval world arose. 1 According to that doctrine, 
 evil always has been and always will be. It never 
 had a beginning, and never will have an end. There 
 might be a time when men were not, but there never 
 was a time when the transcendent Evil Mind was 
 not. The two antagonist minds are both repre- 
 sented as 'primaeval.' 2 And the prospect for the 
 future is not one of the final conversion of all the 
 evil-minded to goodness, but of the final judgment 
 of the inveterately wicked. * The swallowing up of 
 sin and sorrow in ultimate happiness/ according to 
 Mr. Mills, 'belongs to a later period It is not 
 Gathic Zarathustrianism.' 3 
 
 Of 'Zarathustrianism/ according to the Gathas, I 
 have endeavoured in the preceding statement to give 
 a brief account. It remains to offer some observa- 
 tions on its general religious value, on its special 
 contribution to the theory of the providential order, 
 and on the influence which it has exerted on the 
 subsequent history of religious thought. 
 
 The grand merit of this Persian religion is its 
 thoroughgoing moral earnestness, its Hebrew pas- 
 sion for righteousness. In this respect Zoroaster is 
 not unworthy to stand beside the prophets of Israel. 
 As regards this fundamental characteristic, the mean- 
 ing of the Gathas, we are assured, remains unaffected 
 by all the difficulties of syntax which make trans- 
 * Yasna xxviii. 12. 8 Ibid. xxx. 3. * The Gathas, p. 26. 
 
ZOROASTER: DUALISM 55 
 
 lation a hard task for experts. 1 The poet on every 
 page appears an ardent admirer of the Good Mind ; 
 a passionate lover of justice, truth, purity, and kind- 
 ness. Mr. Mills, who has rendered an important 
 service by translating his hymns into English, pro- 
 nounces an opinion on their value which may well 
 be accepted as authoritative. It is in these terms : 
 'So far as a claim to a high position among the 
 curiosities of ancient moral lore is concerned, the 
 reader may trust himself freely to the impression that 
 he has before him an anthology which was probably 
 composed with as fervent a desire to benefit the 
 spiritual and moral natures of those to whom it was 
 addressed as any which the world had yet seen.' 2 
 
 The Gathic idea of God is the child of this intense 
 ethical temper. The wise, good, beneficent Spirit 
 called Ahura-mazda is a projection of the good 
 mind which animates his worshipper. In our study 
 of Buddhism we found, to our surprise, that his 
 beautiful ethical ideal did not suggest to Buddha 
 the conception of a Deity in which all he admired 
 and sought to be was perfectly realised. The Persian 
 prophet did not make this mistake. He saw in the 
 good mind of man the immanence and operation of 
 an absolute Good Mind. Hence his theology was 
 as pure as his ethics. It was the bright reflection of 
 a good conscience. 
 
 1 Vide an article by Mr. Mills on 'Avestan Difficulties' in The 
 Critical Review for July 1896. 2 The Gathas, p. I. 
 
56 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 The antigod proclaimed in the doctrine of dualism 
 had a similar origin. It was a device to protect the 
 character of Ahura from taint, and to heighten the 
 brightness of its light by contrast with darkness. It 
 may be a failure as a theory, but it does credit to 
 the moral sentiments of its promulgator. Had he 
 been less deeply impressed with the radical irrecon- 
 cilable distinction between good and evil, he might 
 have found it easier to believe that God was one not 
 two, and so have divided with Hebrew prophets the 
 honour of giving to the world ethical monotheism. 
 
 Passing now to the doctrine of the two gods, I 
 remark concerning it, in the first place, that in 
 promulgating it the Persian prophet was dealing 
 seriously with a radical problem, the origin of evil. 
 Of moral evil I mean, for it does not appear from 
 the Gathas that physical evil occupied a very pro- 
 minent place in their author's thoughts. The question 
 of questions for him was, Why are all men not under 
 law to the good? To be good seemed so reason- 
 able, so natural, to one whose own mind was good, 
 to love truth, justice, and mercy so easy, that he 
 could not but wonder why any should be otherwise 
 minded. Evil appeared to him so unnatural, so 
 unaccountable, that he was forced to seek its foun- 
 tain-head not in man, but in a transcendent causality 
 even within the region of the divine. A more serious 
 view of the matter it is impossible to conceive. 
 
 But this short and easy solution will not bear 
 
ZOROASTER: DUALISM 57 
 
 reflection. Obvious defects at once suggest them- 
 selves. 
 
 In the first place, the theory assigns too absolute 
 significance to Evil by finding its origin and even 
 its permanent home in the sphere of the divine. It 
 has indeed been questioned whether Zoroaster really 
 did this, whether his so-called dualism was dualistic 
 in principle ; that is, whether the Evil Spirit was 
 co-ordinate with the Good Spirit, and not rather sub- 
 ordinate, even his creature. 1 But there is no trace 
 of such a view in the Gathas. The Good Spirit, as 
 there conceived, could not create a spirit evil at the 
 moment of his creation. He could only create a 
 spirit who was at first good, then afterwards fell into 
 evil a being, i.e. like Milton's Satan. Such, how- 
 ever, is not the history of Ahriman as given in the 
 Gathas. He is evil from the beginning. 
 
 This idea of an absolute divine Evil is self-cancel- 
 ling. It gives to Evil equal rights with the Good. 
 If evil and good be alike divine, who is to decide 
 between their claims ? what ground is there for pre- 
 ferring either to the other? It comes to be a matter 
 of liking, one man choosing the Good Spirit for his 
 god, another the Evil Spirit, neither having a right 
 
 1 The second of these alternatives is adopted by Harnack. Vide his 
 essay on Manichseism at the end of vol. iii. of his History of Dogma^ 
 English translation. The opposite view was held by Hegel, who 
 regarded the dualism of the Persian religion as a merit. The fault 
 lay not in introducing the antithesis into the sphere of the divine, but 
 in not providing for its being ultimately overcome. Vide his Philo- 
 sophie der Gcschichte, p. 182 (English translation, p. 186). 
 
58 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 to call in question the other's choice. So it results 
 that a dualism created by the over-anxious assertion 
 of moral distinctions turns into its opposite, and makes 
 these distinctions purely relative and subjective. 
 
 The account given of man's relation to this divine 
 dualism, though simple and satisfactory at first sight, 
 breaks down on further examination. It is repre- 
 sented as a matter of choice, * a decision as to 
 religions, man and man, each individually for him- 
 self.' The man of evil will, accordingly, chooses the 
 Evil Spirit for his Divinity. But whence the evil 
 will ? Has the Evil Spirit waited till he was chosen 
 before beginning to exert his malign influence, or 
 has he been at work before in the soul of his wor- 
 shipper predestining and disposing him to the bad 
 preference? On the latter alternative, where is the 
 freedom of will ? If, on the other hand, the will be 
 uncontrolled, and the choice perfectly deliberate and 
 intelligent, a free preference of the worse mind by 
 one who fully knows what he does, does this not 
 involve a state of pravity which is final, leaving no 
 room for change from the worse to the better mind, 
 a sin against the Good Spirit which cannot be 
 repented of or forgiven? Yet the Gathic creed 
 recognises the possibility of conversion. 
 
 The origin of evil cannot be explained so easily 
 as the Persian sage imagined. The doctrine of the 
 Twin Spirits raises more difficulties than it solves. 
 Better leave the problem alone and confess that the 
 
ZOROASTER: DUALISM 59 
 
 origin of evil is a mystery. Or, if you will have a 
 dualism, why not one such as Zoroaster's personal 
 history might have suggested to him ? One of the 
 Gathas obscurely hints at a temptation to a gross 
 form of sensual indulgence. 1 How near the tempted 
 one was to the discovery that the real antithesis was 
 not between two divine Spirits eternally antagonistic, 
 but between spirit and flesh in man ; between the 
 law in the mind and the law in the members ! This 
 form of dualism may not, any more than the other, 
 go to the root of the matter, or utter the final word 
 on all questions relating to evil. But it at least 
 points to a real, not an imaginary, antagonism. And 
 by placing the dualism within rather than without 
 it gets rid of the hard line of separation between 
 good men and bad men, drawn by a theory which 
 lays exclusive emphasis on the will. In the light 
 of this internal dualism we see that men are not 
 divisible into the perfectly good and the perfectly 
 evil, but that all men are both good and evil in 
 varying proportions. There is a law in the members 
 even of a saint, and there is a law of the mind con- 
 senting to good even in the most abandoned trans- 
 gressor. The fact once realised tends to breed 
 humility and sympathy. The good man becomes 
 less satisfied with himself, and more inclined to 
 lenient judgment on his fellow - men. What an 
 immense advance in self-knowledge is revealed by 
 
 1 Yasna li. 12. 
 
60 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 comparing the Gathas with the seventh chapter of 
 St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, and what a con- 
 trast between the hard severe tone of the Persian 
 hymns and the benignant kindly accent of the 
 words, 'Considering thyself, lest thou also be 
 tempted'! Evil is not to be explained away by 
 smooth phrases ; but there is comfort in the thought 
 that few commit that sin against the Holy Ghost 
 which consists in a perfectly deliberate and intelli- 
 gent preference of evil to good ; that most sins are 
 sins of ignorance and impulse committed by men 
 who are carried headlong by desire or habit, and 
 deluded by a show of good in things evil. 
 
 On the historic influence of the Persian theory, 
 only a few sentences can be added. The religion 
 of Zoroaster is almost extinct, its only adherents 
 now being the Parsees in India, amounting to about 
 one hundred and fifty thousand ; an insignificant 
 number compared with the four hundred millions 
 professing Buddhism, and suggesting the thought 
 that, with all its fair promise, this ancient faith must 
 have had some inherent defect which foredoomed 
 it to failure. It is not easy to believe that under 
 the providential order a religion fitted to render 
 important service to mankind would be allowed so 
 completely to sink out of sight. The subsequent 
 career of Zoroastrianism, while it was the religion 
 of the Persian people, was not favourable to per- 
 
ZOROASTER: DUALISM 61 
 
 manent influence and extensive prevalence. It 
 developed into the worship of fire, and of the Haoma 
 plant, and of spirits innumerable, of diverse grades, 
 names, and functions, and into elaborate ceremonial 
 for the purpose of securing ritual purity. Dualism 
 widened out into a species of refined polytheism, 
 and the ethical, supreme at first, became lost among 
 the de.tails of a sacerdotal system. 
 
 The direct influence of Persian dualism has been 
 supposed to be traceable specially in two quarters : 
 in the later religious ideas of the Hebrews, and in 
 the Manichaean religion which made its appearance 
 in the third century of our era. As to the latter, to 
 speak of it first, the main interest it possesses for us 
 is the hold which it took of the youthful mind of 
 Augustine, and the influence which through him it 
 has exercised on Christian theology. It used to be 
 regarded as certain that the religion of Mani was 
 a revival of Zoroastrianism modified by Christianity. 
 Recent investigation, however, has brought about a 
 change of view ; and the theory now in favour is that 
 the basis of Manichaeism is to be sought in the old 
 Babylonian religion ; that it is a Semitic growth 
 with a mixture of Persian and Christian elements. 
 It resembles Zoroastrianism in so far as it also teaches 
 a dualistic theory of the universe. But the Mani- 
 chaean dualism is not ethical, but physical. The 
 great antithesis in the creed of Mani is that between 
 light and darkness, not as emblems of good and evil, 
 
62 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 but as themselves good and evil. Religious know- 
 ledge consists in the knowledge of nature and its 
 elements, and redemption in a physical separation 
 of the light elements from the darkness. Human 
 nature belongs mainly to the realm of darkness, 
 while not without some sparks of light. The ethics 
 of the system are ascetic, inculcating abstinence from 
 all that belongs to the dark region, such as fleshly 
 desire. However repulsive to us this strange re- 
 ligious conglomerate may appear, it must have met 
 the mood of the time, for it spread rapidly, and 
 became one of the great religions of the period. 1 
 
 Going back now to the alleged influence of Persian 
 thought on the religious ideas of Israel after the 
 period of the Exile : the chief instance of this has 
 been found in the conception of Satan. Satan has 
 been supposed to be Ahriman transferred from Persia 
 to Palestine. It is a plausible but by no means in- 
 disputable hypothesis. The question is mixed up 
 with critical theories as to the dates of those Old 
 Testament books in which Satan occurs as a personal 
 designation. These are Job, Zechariah, and I Chron- 
 icles. If these books were written during or after 
 the Exile, the Persian origin of the Satan idea would 
 be at least possible. But even among critics of the 
 freest type there is diversity of opinion as to their 
 dates. Thus Renan places the Book of Job as far 
 back as the eighth century B.C. He is equally 
 1 Vid* the article by Harnack referred to on p. 57, note. 
 
ZOROASTER: DUALISM 63 
 
 decided as to the non-identity of Satan with Ahriman, 
 giving as his reason that Satan does nothing except 
 by the order of God, that he is simply an angel of a 
 more malign character than the rest; sly, and inclined 
 to slander ; by no means to be identified with the 
 genius of evil existing and acting independently. 1 
 More significant, perhaps, is the function assigned to 
 Satan in I Chronicles. He there performs an act 
 which in an earlier book, 2 Samuel, is ascribed to 
 God. In Samuel Jehovah tempts David to number 
 the people, in Chronicles Jehovah's place is taken by 
 Satan. 2 It is a ready suggestion that the Chronicler, 
 writing at the close of the Persian period of Jewish 
 history, made the alteration under the influence of 
 Persian ideas as to what it was fit that God should 
 do. To tempt men to evil was not, from the Persian 
 point of view, suitable work for the Good Spirit; such 
 a malign function properly belonged to his rival. 
 That familiarity with Persian ways of thinking gave 
 rise to the scruples betrayed in the alteration made 
 on the older narrative is an allowable conjecture. 
 
 However they are to be explained, the scruples 
 manifestly existed, and this is the thing of chief 
 interest for us. We see here, if not Persian dualism, 
 at all events a species of dualism originating in a 
 feeling kindred to that which gave rise to the 
 doctrine of the 'Twin Spirits. 1 The Chronicler's 
 
 1 Le Livre dejob, p. xxxix. 
 
 ' Vide 2 Samuel xxiv. II, and cf. I Chronicles xxi. L 
 
64 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 feeling obviously was that to tempt is an evil work 
 which may not be ascribed to God. The feeling 
 represents an advance in some respects on the older 
 less scrupulous way of thinking, which would have 
 found no stumbling-block in the robust prophetic 
 sentiment, * I form the light and create darkness ; I 
 make peace and create evil.' 1 The scruple of the 
 later time grew out of an intensified sense of morat 
 distinctions : wherever this sense becomes acute, 
 dualism in some form is likely to reappear. Hence 
 we are not done with dualism even yet. Though 
 the Zoroastrian religion is all but extinct, itts con- 
 ception of an antigod is not a thing of the distant 
 past. As we shall see, at a later stage in our course, 
 it is being revived under a new form in our own 
 time. 2 There is much in the world to tempt one 
 who believes in a good God to take up with the 
 dualistic hypothesis. Yet surely it cannot be the 
 last word. The broad strong creed contained in the 
 prophetic oracle above cited expresses, not only the 
 rough belief of an unrefined moral consciousness, but 
 also the ultimate conviction in which alone the heart 
 can find rest. Perhaps the prophet had the Persian 
 dualism in view when he made the bold declaration. 
 While respecting the moral earnestness in which that 
 dualism had its source, he deemed it, we may sup- 
 pose, only a half truth, and therefore supplied the 
 needed correction by representing God as the creator 
 
 1 Isaiah zlv. 7. ' Vide Lecture X. 
 
ZOROASTER: DUALISM 65 
 
 both of light and of darkness. However hard to 
 hold, this is the true creed. The dominion of the 
 world cannot be divided between two, whether we 
 call them Ormuzd and Ahriman, Jehovah and Satan, 
 God and Devil, or by any other names. God must 
 be God over all, and His providence must be all- 
 embracing. 
 
LECTURE III 
 
 THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS : NEMESIS 
 
 STUDENTS of the religions of mankind insist on the 
 importance of distinguishing between the mythical 
 and the truly religious elements in belief. In all 
 stages of culture, among the lowest and most back- 
 ward peoples as among the most advanced, the two 
 elements are found to co-exist. They are of very 
 different value. In the mythical element the absurd 
 and the immoral abound. The religious element, on 
 the other hand, is a comparatively pure and rational 
 sentiment, everywhere essentially the same ; faith in 
 a Power working for righteousness, and more or less 
 benign in its dealings with the children of men. 1 
 
 In no case is it more necessary to bear this dis- 
 tinction in mind than in dealing with the religion 
 of Greece. The mythology of that religion earned 
 for itself a bad reputation by those grotesque and 
 licentious features on which the early Christian 
 Fathers were wont to dilate in an apologetic interest. 
 The tendency of apologists generally has been to 
 think of these features of ancient Pagan religions too 
 
 1 Vide Lang, Myth, Ritual, and Religion, vol. i. pp. 328, 329. 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS : NEMESIS 67 
 
 exclusively, in forming an estimate of their worth. 
 Hence the fact complained of by Professor Max 
 Miiller, that while we have endless books on the 
 mythology of the Greeks and Romans, we have 
 comparatively few on their religion, that is, their 
 belief in a wise, powerful Eternal Ruler of the world. 1 
 Since that distinguished scholar made his complaint, 
 thoughtful students of Greek literature have become 
 more alive to the fact that such a belief in a Divine 
 Moral Order had a large place in the minds of the 
 wisest Greek thinkers, and really constituted their 
 proper religious creed. The modern spirit inclines 
 to give that belief the position of prominence in its 
 estimate of Hellenic religion, and to regard the 
 mythology as a thing which grew out of a primitive 
 nature-worship, for which the Greeks of a later age 
 were not responsible, and towards which they 
 assumed varying attitudes of reverent receptivity 
 respectful tolerance, or sceptical contempt. 
 
 Mythology and religion, in the sense explained, are 
 intimately combined in Greek Tragedy. The myths 
 and legendary tales of the heroic age are the warp, 
 and the ethical and religious sentiments of the poet 
 are the woof, of the immortal dramas of -^Eschylus, 
 Sophocles, and Euripides. The warp is essentially 
 the same in all three, yet the colour varies more or 
 less in each of them. The individuality of each of 
 the great dramatists comes out in his manner of 
 
 1 Vide Science of Language, vol. ii. p. 413. 
 
68 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 reproducing the tradition, as also in the attitude he 
 assumes towards the whole stock of myths and 
 legends handed down from antiquity. For yEschylus 
 they are truth to be accepted with reverent faith ; 
 for Sophocles they are fiction to be received and 
 used with artistic decorum ; for Euripides they are 
 ridiculous tales to be regarded with sceptical scorn 
 and handled with critical freedom. The woof varies 
 as well as the warp. When we compare the three 
 tragedians with each other, we can trace a certain 
 advance in their respective conceptions of the moral 
 order of the world. This was to be expected in the 
 case of men possessing exceptionally high intel- 
 lectual and moral endowments. None of them was 
 likely to be a simple echo of his predecessor. Every 
 one of them, ^Eschylus not excepted, was likely to 
 have some new thought to utter on the high themes 
 which occupied their minds in common. Develop- 
 ment in all respects, indeed, may be looked for ; 
 in dramatic art, in the personal attitude towards 
 mythology, and in the individual views concerning 
 the providential order. 
 
 Progression has been recognised in the two first 
 of these three departments. As to the artistic side 
 I cannot go into details, but must content myself 
 with a brief general indication, based on the in- 
 structive statement of Mr. Symonds in his Stu-iies 
 of the Greek Poets. Mr, Symonds says : ' The law 
 of inevitable progression in art from the severe and 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS : NEMESIS 69 
 
 animated embodiment of an idea to the conscious 
 elaboration of merely aesthetic motives and brilliant 
 episodes, has hitherto been neglected by the critics 
 and historians of poetry. They do not observe 
 that the first impulse in a people towards creative- 
 ness is some deep and serious emotion, some fixed 
 point of religious enthusiasm or national pride. To 
 give adequate form to this taxes the energies of the 
 first generation of artists, and raises their poetic 
 faculty, by the admixture of prophetic inspiration, to 
 the highest pitch. After the original passion for the 
 ideas to be embodied in art has somewhat subsided, 
 but before the glow and fire of enthusiasm have 
 faded out, there comes a second period, when art is 
 studied more for art's sake, but when the generative 
 potency of the early poets is by no means exhausted.' 
 The author goes on to indicate how, during these 
 two stages, the mine of available ideas is worked 
 out, and the national taste educated, so that for the 
 third generation of artists the alternatives left are 
 either to reproduce their models a task impossible 
 for genius or to seek novelty at the risk of impair- 
 ing the strength or the beauty which has become 
 stereotyped. ' Less deeply interested in the great 
 ideas by which they have been educated, and of 
 which they are in no sense the creators, incapable of 
 competing on the old ground with their elders, they 
 are obliged to go afield for striking situations, to 
 force sentiment and pathos, to subordinate the 
 
70 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 harmony of the whole to the melody of the parts, 
 to sink the prophet in the poet, the hierophant in 
 the charmer.' ^Eschylus represents the first stage 
 in this progression, Sophocles the second, Euripides 
 trie third. Mr. Symonds compares the three poets 
 to the three styles of Gothic architecture, ^Eschylus 
 representing the rugged Norman, Sophocles the 
 refined pointed style, Euripides the florid flamboyant 
 manner. ' ^Eschylus/ he says, * aimed at durability 
 of structure, at singleness and grandeur of effect. 
 Sophocles added the utmost elegance and finish. 
 Euripides neglected force of construction and unity 
 of design for ornament and brilliancy of effect.' 1 
 
 The advance in the second respect, i.e. in the 
 attitude assumed towards the legends which formed 
 the stock-in-trade of dramatic art, from the reverence 
 of ^Eschylus through the artistic reserve of Sophocles 
 to the outspoken rationalism of Euripides, has been 
 duly recognised by such recent writers as Verrall 
 and Haigh. 2 But the third aspect of the onward 
 movement for our purpose the most important of all 
 that exhibited in the respective conceptions of the 
 three great tragedians on the subject of the moral 
 order and relative phenomena, has not received as 
 yet, at least so far as I know, the full acknowledg- 
 ment and distinct formulation to which it is entitled. 
 
 1 Studies of the Greek Poets, 1st series, pp. 206-208. 
 * Vide Verrall's Euripides the Rationalist (1895), and Haigh 's Th* 
 Tragic Drama of the Creeks (1896), 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS: NEMESIS 71 
 
 That development here also can be verified, seems 
 to me beyond doubt. It is just such a progression 
 as might have been expected. When stated, the law 
 of advance is so simple and natural as to appear 
 self-evident, and scarcely in need of verification. 
 
 The law in question is as follows : 
 
 ^Eschylus, coming first, believes firmly in the 
 unimpeachable retributive justice of Providence. 
 His doctrine is kindred to that of Eliphaz in Job : 
 ' Remember, I pray thee, who ever perished being 
 innocent? or where were the righteous cut off?' 1 
 Sophocles, coming next, while not questioning the 
 general truth of the ^Eschylean doctrine of Nemesis, 
 sees clearly and states frankly that there are ex- 
 ceptions both ways ; bad men prospering, good 
 men suffering grievous misfortune. Antigone, QEdi- 
 pus, Philoctetes are some of the conspicuous 
 examples of afflicted innocence. ;Such facts the 
 poet, while constrained to acknowledge their exist- 
 ence, does not profess to understand ; he simply 
 reckons them among the mysteries of human life. 
 Euripides goes one step further ; the suffering of 
 innocence is for him as well as for Sophocles a fact, 
 but not altogether a mysterious one : he perceives 
 a ray of light amid the darkness. He knows and 
 notes that there is not merely such a thing as 
 innocence involuntarily suffering unmerited evil, but 
 also such a thing as innocence voluntarily enduring 
 1 Job iv. 7. 
 
72 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 evil, at the prompting of love and in devotion to a 
 good cause. Such self-sacrifice did not appear to 
 him, I think, a violation of the moral order, but 
 rather the manifestation of that order under a new 
 form. This law of progress in the reading of moral 
 phenomena, kept well in view, will help us to ap- 
 preciate better the distinctive lessons to be learnt 
 from the Greek Tragedians concerning the provi- 
 dential order of the world. 
 
 A few general statements of fact may here be 
 premised. 
 
 The story of the rise, progress, and uses of the 
 Greek Tragic Drama cannot here be told. Suffice 
 it to say that the drama served the same purpose 
 for the Greeks that the sermon does for a Christian 
 community. It did this and more. The statement 
 of Professor Blackie is not far from the truth, that 
 'the lyrical tragedy of the Greeks presents, in a 
 combination elsewhere unexampled, the best ele- 
 ments of our serious drama, our opera, our oratorio, 
 our public worship, and our festal recreations.' 1 
 The drama was for the Greek the chief medium 
 of ethical and religious instruction. The three 
 most celebrated dramatic preachers were those 
 already named: ^Eschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. 
 jEschylus was born 525 B.C., Sophocles about 497 
 B.C., and Euripides 480 B.C. ^Eschylus took part 
 in the war against the Persians and made the defeat 
 
 Translation of /Eschylus, vol. i. Introduction, p. xlviii. 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS : NEMESIS 73 
 
 of the mighty foe by his countrymen the subject 
 of one of his tragedies. He and his brother-poets 
 wrote many tragic dramas, only a few of which have 
 been preserved ; of ^Eschylus seven, of Sophocles 
 seven, and of Euripides eighteen. Their themes 
 were taken for the most part from the traditional 
 tales of the ggds and the legendary history of the 
 heroic age of Greece. Homer was their Bible. 
 ^Eschylus is reported to have said that his tragedies 
 were only slices cut from the great banquet of 
 Homeric dainties. The siege of Troy with relative 
 incidents supplied abundant topics for the dramatic 
 preacher who, with the true preacher's instinct, was 
 ever careful to point the moral lesson suggested by 
 his story. Among the legends which offered ample 
 opportunity for moralising were those relating to 
 the fortunes of Agamemnon, the leader of the 
 Greek host against Troy, and of his family. The 
 main events are: the sacrifice of the daughter of 
 Agamemnon, Iphigenia, at Aulis, to obtain a fair 
 wind to carry the fleet to Troy; the murder of 
 Agamemnon on his return home from the ten 
 years' siege, by his own wife, Clytemnestra ; and the 
 murder of her in turn by her son Orestes. ^Eschylus 
 and Euripides both handle these themes with great 
 power, though with characteristic differences in the 
 mode of treatment. Three of the extant plays of 
 ^Eschylus are devoted to them : the Agamemnon y 
 the Libation- Bearers, and the Eumenides^ i.e. the 
 
74 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Furies who haunted Orestes when he had killed his 
 mother. The first and the last of the three show the 
 genius of the poet at its best. With them is worthy 
 to be associated the Prometheus Bound \ whose theme 
 is unique, and whose story, as we shall see, presents 
 a curious problem with reference to the doctrine of 
 ^Eschylus concerning the moral order, which I now 
 proceed to illustrate. 
 
 The message of ^Eschylus, broadly stated, is that 
 the gods render to every man according to his works, 
 that men reap in lot what they sow in conduct. In 
 teaching this doctrine he was by no means merely 
 echoing traditional opinion. The older view was 
 that quaintly expressed by Herodotus, that Deity 
 is envious; 1 that is to say, that the gods inflict 
 misery on men not only because they do wrong, but 
 also because they are more prosperous than befits 
 the human state. In a passage in the Agamemnon 
 ^Eschylus refers to this ancient belief as still current, 
 intimates his inability to acquiesce in it, and, though 
 conscious of standing alone, 2 boldly declares his 
 conviction that 
 
 1 Whoso is just, though his wealth like a river 
 Flow down, shall be scathless : his house shall rejoice 
 In an offspring of beauty for ever.' 3 
 
 1 Historic i. 32. To fletov vu> <f>0ovep6v. 
 
 8 Nagelsbach, in Nachhomerische Theologie, p. 50, leads proof that 
 ^Eschylua really stood alone in his view that he was, as he says, 
 povtxppuv. 
 
 ' B kc kit's translation of ^schylus, vol. i. p. 47. 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS: NEMESIS 75 
 
 Thus, while, by comparison with Sophocles and 
 still more with Euripides, representing an antiquated 
 theory, Jischylus was himself an innovator, inaugu- 
 rating a new type of thought on the subject of the 
 moral order. His contribution was an important 
 step onwards in the evolution of providential theory. 
 It aimed at the moralisation of belief concerning 
 the divine dealings with men, by lifting these out 
 of the low region of caprice or jealous passion 
 into the serener atmosphere of fixed ethical prin- 
 ciple. It was a doctrine worth preaching with all 
 the enthusiasm that a new and noble faith can 
 inspire, and ^Eschylus lost no opportunity of illus- 
 trating and enforcing it. 
 
 The Persians is the only piece among the remains 
 of the ancient drama which draws its material from 
 the history instead of the mythology of Greece. 
 ^Eschylus may have been tempted to make it an 
 exception because of the splendid opportunity it 
 afforded of illustrating his doctrine of retribution. 
 This drama is a sermon on the ruin that overtakes 
 pride, as exemplified in the disastrous failure of the 
 ambitious attempt of the Persian despot to subdue 
 Greece. The mood of the preacher is that of a 
 Hebrew prophet announcing the doom of Babylon 
 or Tyre, or of Carlyle when he wrote The French 
 Revolution. ' To him, as to the old Hebrew prophets, 
 history is a revelation of the will of providence ; and 
 the ruin of armies, and the overthrow of nations, are 
 
 
76 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 but examples of the handiwork of God.' 1 The gist 
 of the whole dramatic spectacle is given in these 
 few lines : 
 
 * For wanton pride from blossom grows to fruit, 
 The full corn in the ear, of utter woe, 
 
 And reaps a tear-fraught harvest ' ; 
 
 or still more tersely in the brief sentence : 
 
 * Zeus is the avenger of o'er-lofty thoughts, 
 A terrible controller.' 2 
 
 The sway of the principle of Nemesis in individual 
 experience is pithily proclaimed by ^Eschylus in these 
 sentences : 
 
 * Whatsoever evil men do, not less shall they suffer.' 1 
 
 * Doubt it not, the evil-doer must suffer. 14 
 
 * Justice from her watchful station 
 With a sure-winged visitation 
 Swoops, and some in blazing noon 
 She for doom doth mark, 
 
 Some in lingering eve, and some 
 In the deedless dark.' 6 
 
 These oracles show the punitive aspect of the 
 moral order, which is the thing chiefly insisted on by 
 the poet. But he is not unmindful of the action of 
 Providence in rewarding the good, however humble 
 their station : witness this cheering reflection : 
 
 4 Haigh, The Tragic Drama of the Greeks, p. 104. 
 
 a The /'crstans, 816-819 and 823-824 ; Plumptre's translation. 
 
 ' Oi5 TO?? /ca/fo?s 7-6 Spa^a rov irddovs ir\tov,Agam. 533 ( vide Sales Att.\ 
 
 4 Apcuraprt drjirov K.a.1 vaQf.lv 60e{\ercu, Fabula 
 
 9 Chotphora, 61-65; Blackie's translation. 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS : NEMfcSf tf 
 
 ' Justice shineth bright, 
 
 In dwellings that are dark and dim with smoke, 
 And honours life law-ruled.' 1 
 
 To call in question or deny the doctrine set forth 
 in these and similar utterances ^schylus accounts 
 an impiety. Hear his emphatic protest in the 
 Agamemnon : 
 
 ' One there was who said, 
 The gods deign not to care for mortal men 
 By whom the grace of things inviolable 
 Is trampled under foot. 
 
 No fear of God had he.' 8 
 
 The devout poet not only believes in the punish- 
 ment of sin, but that the penalty may come in a 
 later generation : 
 
 * I tell the ancient tale 
 
 Of sin that brought swift doom. 
 Till the third age it waits.' 3 
 
 Laius sins, GEdipus his son sins and suffers, 
 Eteocles and Polyneikes his grandsons fall by each 
 other's hands. 
 
 He believes that there is heredity of moral evil, 
 sin propagating itself, and entailing a curse upon 
 
 offspring : 
 
 * But recklessness of old 
 
 Is wont to breed another recklessness, 
 Sporting its youth in human miseries, 
 Or now, or then, whene'er the fixed hour comes.' 4 
 
 1 Agamemnon, 747-749 ; Plumptre's translation. 
 * Ibid., 360-364; Plumptre's translation. 
 
 3 The Seven against 7hebes> 739-741 ; Plumptre's translation. 
 
 4 Agamemnon, 737-740 ; Plumptre's translation. 
 
78 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 But he also believes that there is mercy as well as 
 severity in the visitations of divine justice. Suffering 
 is disciplinary as well as punitive, when rightly 
 taken : 
 
 * For Jove doth teach men wisdom, sternly wins 
 To virtue by the tutoring of their sins. 
 Yea ! drops of torturing recollection chill 
 The sleeper's heart ; 'gainst man's rebellious will 
 
 Jove works the wise remorse : 
 Dread Powers ! on awful seats enthroned, compel 
 
 Our hearts with gracious force.' l 
 
 Wholesome doctrine all this ; but are there no 
 exceptions, no cases of good men suffering and bad 
 men thriving ? What ^schylus may have taught on 
 this question in his many lost tragedies we cannot 
 guess, but his extant plays contain one instance of 
 a good man or demigod suffering, without, as we 
 should judge, any sufficient reason. I refer to the 
 Titan Prometheus, chained to a rock for thousands 
 of years because he had been a benefactor to men. 
 What view /Eschylus took of the remarkable legend : 
 whether he regarded Prometheus as a real offender 
 suffering just punishment, or as an exception to his 
 own rule, we have not the means of deciding, as the 
 Prometheus Bound is the second of three connected 
 dramas on the same theme, and is the only part 
 of the trilogy that has been preserved. Guesses 
 have been made at the nature of the solution 
 which would be given in the concluding part, the 
 
 1 Agamemnony 170-177; Blackie's translation. 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS : NEMESIS 79 
 
 Prometheus Unbound. Mr. Symonds holds that 
 ^Eschylus regarded the hero as a real transgressor, 
 that the vilification of Jove as a despot in the 
 Prometheus Bound is to be understood in a dramatic 
 sense, and that in the concluding play the Titan 
 was shown to be really and gravely in the wrong ; 
 guilty of obstinacy eminently tragic, as display- 
 ing at once culpable aberration and at the 
 same time the aberration of a sublime character. 1 
 This is a legitimate supposition, but not the only 
 one possible. Is it not conceivable that in the final 
 piece the poet represented Jove as adopting an 
 apologetic rather than a self-justifying tone, as in 
 reference to the destroying flood we find the sacred 
 writer putting into Jehovah's mouth the words, * I 
 will not again curse the ground any more for man's 
 sake,' 2 and admitting that he had treated the Titan 
 with undue severity ? Or, granting that to the end 
 the poet held the hero to be guilty, and tried to show 
 how, does it follow that, in the words of Mr. Symonds, 
 1 if we possessed the trilogy entire we should see that 
 Prometheus had been really and grandly guilty'? 3 
 Might we not rather have seen the poet trying hard 
 to prove that, and failing? What if it was a case 
 not capable of solution on the principle of just 
 retribution? a case, like that of Job, of too deep 
 
 1 Studies of the Greek Poets, 2nd series, pp. 173-188. 
 
 * Genesis viii. 21. 
 
 Syraonds' Studies of the Greek Poets, 2nd series, p. 188. 
 
&> THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 import for the Eliphaz theory to cope with, and 
 coming under some other, deeper law ? 
 
 There is a law, known to us, under which the 
 Titan's experience might with some measure of 
 reason be classified, the law, viz. according to which 
 the world's greatest benefactors are the greatest 
 sufferers. Prometheus, as exhibited by ^Eschylus, is 
 a signal benefactor. He is what writers on primitive 
 religions call a culture-hero, one whose vocation is to 
 teach ignorant untutored races the rudiments of 
 civilisation. He taught rude primitive men the use 
 of fire stole fire from heaven for their benefit ; 
 taught them to speak and to think ; instructed them 
 in house-building and ship-building, in medicine, 
 divination, and smelting ore, in the art of using 
 the stars for fixing the order of the seasons: in 
 short, enabled them to pass from the brutish ignor- 
 ance of the Stone Age, as it is now called, when 
 
 'no craft they knew 
 
 With woven brick or jointed beam to pile 
 The sunward porch ; but in the dark earth burrowed 
 And housed, like tiny ants, in sunless caves,' * 
 
 to the intelligence and culture of civilised humanity. 
 The same hero who has been such a benefactor to 
 men had previously done signal service to Zeus, 
 helping him in his war against Kronos and the 
 Titans, and securing for him his celestial throne. 
 Here surely was one who had deserved well at the 
 
 1 Prometheus Bound, 457-461 ; Blackie's translation. 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS: NEMESIS 81 
 
 hands of both gods and men ! Yet what is his fate ? 
 To be chained for long ages to a rock in a Scythian 
 wilderness. The attempt to show that such signal 
 service followed by such barbarous treatment illus- 
 trates the justice which makes conduct and lot 
 correspond, must be desperate. One would rather 
 say that such an experience belonged to a morally 
 chaotic age when Zeus had not begun to be just, 
 when in the exercise of a newly-attained sovereignty 
 he could not afford to be either just or generous, 
 but had to be guided in his action by selfish policy 
 rather than by equity, treating as enemies those who 
 had been his greatest friends. The radical defect of 
 the legend from a moral point of view is that the 
 reign of Zeus, the fountain of Justice, has a beginning, 
 involving as a necessary consequence that justice has 
 a beginning also. The divine monarch is thereby 
 subjected to the exigencies of an Eastern despot, 
 whose first use of power is to destroy his rivals, and 
 also those to whom he has been much indebted. 
 How one who was so earnest in proclaiming the 
 reality of a just moral order as ^Eschylus could be 
 attracted by so uncouth and grim a story, it is as 
 difficult to understand as it is to conjecture how he 
 treated it. Was his motive to meet an objection to 
 his favourite theory, to answer an imaginary opponent 
 asking : On your view, what do you make of the 
 Prometheus legend ? And was his answer, in effect, 
 this : * That is an old-time story ; all that happened 
 
82 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 before the moral order was settled ; no such thing 
 could happen now ' ? How the legend itself arose is 
 another puzzling question. Was it a survival from 
 savage times, modified and transformed in the long 
 course of tradition? 1 Or had it for its fact-basis 
 the observation that benefactors of men often have 
 a hard lot ? 
 
 The Eumenides, not less than the Prometheus 
 Bound, possesses a peculiar interest in connection 
 with the ^Eschylean doctrine of Nemesis. If the 
 latter be an instance of apparently flagrant injustice 
 belonging to a rude age before the moral order was 
 settled, to be explained away or apologised for, the 
 former supplies an instance illustrating the difficulty 
 of applying the principle of retributive justice when 
 right seems to be on both sides. Orestes slays his 
 mother, Clytemnestra, for murdering his father, her 
 husband, Agamemnon. He acts on the counsels of 
 the Delphic oracle, and the Erinnyes pursue him for 
 the deed. Divine beings take opposite sides ; Apollo 
 advising the action, the Furies driving to madness 
 the actor. Which of these is in the right? Is 
 Orestes a hero or is he a criminal ? or is he both in 
 one ? How is the principle of retributive justice to 
 be applied? Must the scales be evenly balanced, 
 inclining to neither side ? So it would appear, from 
 
 1 According to Lang (Myth, Ritual, and Religion, ii. 31), Mani, the 
 culture-hero of the Maoris, stole fire from heaven, like Prometheus, for 
 his people, among other services, such as inventing barbs for spears 
 and hooks. 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS : NEMESIS 83 
 
 the issue of the trial of Orestes before the Areopagus 
 in Athens, which is that the votes for acquittal and 
 for condemnation are equal, Athene giving her 
 casting vote in favour of the accused. The equality 
 in the vote is significant. It is a virtual confession 
 that there are cases in which the theory of retributive 
 justice breaks down ; when it is impossible to say 
 how on that theory a man is to be treated ; when he 
 cannot be treated either as a well-doer or as an evil- 
 doer without overlooking an essential element in the 
 case ; and whe the only possible course is a com- 
 promise in whicn the accused gets the benefit of the 
 doubt. The compromise is suggested by Athene, 
 the goddess of wisdom, who votes for Orestes and 
 strives to appease and soothe his relentless pursuers. 
 They, however, are characteristically reluctant to be 
 appeased, a point of instructive import in connection 
 with the theory of Nemesis. The Erinnyes of 
 ^Eschylus are a marvellous creation. They are more 
 than a powerful artistic representation of a legend- 
 ary group of avenging deities. They possess psycho- 
 logical significance as symbols of the punitive action 
 of conscience. In this point of view certain features 
 in the dramatic presentation are noteworthy. The 
 Furies pursue Orestes, the slayer of his mother, 
 not Clytemnestra, the murderess of his father; he 
 being noble-minded, she thoroughly bad. 1 They 
 
 1 The formal explanation of this fact is that the Furies pursued only 
 when the blood shed was that of kindred ; but Mr. Symonds truly 
 
84 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 are unwilling to yield to the counsels of wisdom, 
 repeating their wild song of relentless pursuit before 
 yielding to the persuasions of Athene. They do at 
 last submit. But, though constrained to surrender 
 their victim, they are treated with great respect as 
 a power making for righteousness justly inspiring 
 wholesome dread. All this is a parable embodying 
 weighty spiritual truth. The nobler the nature, the 
 more it is liable to become the prey of an evil con- 
 science for acts which, justifiable under a certain 
 aspect, do violence to tender natural affection. A 
 mother may deserve to die, but it is not for a son 
 to be the executioner ; and if he be a man of fine 
 nature, he cannot play that part with impunity. 
 Maddening remorse will be the penalty. And that 
 remorse will not be easily exorcised by wise reflec- 
 tion on the ill desert of the dead and the irrevocable- 
 ness of the deed. It will keep saying, You killed 
 your mother. But remorse, though obstinate, need 
 not be unconquerable. The greatest offender may 
 take comfort in the thought that his sin is not 
 unpardonable, and the time comes to many who 
 have been in a hell of torment when they are able 
 to grasp this consoling truth. But though now at 
 rest, they never regret the misery they have passed 
 through. They look back on it with satisfaction as 
 
 observes that *in a deeper sense it was artistically fitting that Clytem- 
 nestra should remain unvisiied by the dread goddesses. They were the 
 deities of remorse, and she had steeled her soul against the stings of 
 conscience' (Studies of the Greek Poets^ 1st series, p. 191). 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS : NEMESIS 85 
 
 an expiation for their sin. Remorse is the penalty for 
 wrong done to the best feelings of our nature. It is 
 penalty enough. No need for added pains to punish 
 the man who has suffered mental agony through 
 conflict between feelings, both in their own place 
 good, the sense of justice and the affection of love. 
 That agony satisfies the moral order. It is also 
 justified by the moral order. For Orestes is indeed an 
 offender. He should have consulted his conscience, 
 not the Delphic oracle. No need for any other 
 oracle than conscience to tell him that his mother 
 must suffer for her crime by other hands than his. 
 
 In passing from ^Eschylus to Sophocles we become 
 conscious of a considerable change in the moral 
 atmosphere. He is less of a theologian, more of an 
 artist, than his predecessor. The human interest 
 of his story counts for more with him than problems 
 in ethics and religion. He does not deny the 
 ^Eschylean theory of retribution : on the contrary, 
 he accepts and re-echoes it, but only half-heartedly, 
 with less depth of conviction and fainter emphasis 
 of utterance. He sees that there are many excep- 
 tions to the theory, many instances in which no 
 intelligible moral law can be detected ; human 
 experiences in which a reign of chance rather than 
 of moral order seems to prevail. Life appears to 
 him a mystery too deep and complex to be 
 explained by any cut-and-dried theory such as 
 
86 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 that which insists on a uniform correspondence 
 between conduct and lot. 
 
 Such being the attitude of Sophocles, we do not 
 expect to find in his dramas either such splendid 
 exemplifications, or such memorable statements, of 
 the law of Nemesis, as we meet with in the pages 
 of ^Eschylus. Yet sufficient, if not signal, homage 
 is done to the law by occasional sayings such as the 
 few samples which follow. 
 
 CEdipus at Colonus thus addresses his friends : 
 
 * If thou honourest the gods, show thy reverence by thine 
 acts ; and remember that their eyes are over all men, 
 regarding both the evil and the good.' l 
 
 Creon in Antigone asks : 
 
 'Dost thou see the gods honouring evil men?** 
 
 The swift punishment of wrong is proclaimed in 
 the same drama in these terms : 
 
 'Lo, they come, the gods' swift-footed ministers of ill, 
 And in an instant lay the wicked low.' 3 
 
 Slow punishment is hinted at in these words from 
 (Edipus Coloneus : 
 
 'The gods see well, though slowly, when one turns from 
 their worship to the madness of impiety.' 4 
 
 Sometimes the expression of this faith is coloured 
 
 1 (Edipus ColonZus, 277-281, translation from D'Arcy Thomson's 
 Sales Attici. 2 Antigone, 288. 
 
 * Ibid., 1104-1106; translated by Plumptrc. 
 
 * (Edipus Colon Jus, 1536-9. 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS : NEMESIS 87 
 
 by a tinge of doubt. Thus Philoctetes, maddened by 
 a sense of wrong, exclaims : 
 
 * Perdition seize you all ! 
 
 And it shall seize you, seeing ye have wronged 
 Him who stands here, if yet the gods regard 
 Or right or truth. And full assured am I 
 They do regard them.' 1 
 
 Two different, if not incompatible, points of view 
 are combined in these words spoken by Athene to 
 Ulysses : 
 
 ' All human things 
 A day lays low, a day lifts up again. 
 Yet still the gods love those of temperate mind, 
 And hate the bad?' 2 
 
 The sombre sentiment expressed in the first 
 sentence of this extract recurs with significant 
 frequency in the pages of Sophocles. The fleeting, 
 unstable nature of human fortune, irrespective of 
 character, is a trite theme with him. Thus in 
 CEdipus Tyrannus the chorus sing : 
 
 ' Ah, race of mortal men, 
 How as a thing of nought 
 I count ye, though ye live ; 
 For who is there of men 
 That more of blessing knows, 
 Than just a little while 
 In a vain show to stand, 
 And, having stood, to fall?' 8 
 
 1 Philoctttes, 1035-39. * Ajax y 130-133. 
 
 8 1186-1193; Plumptre's translation. 
 
88 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 In a fragment preserved from an unknown drama 
 the changefulness of life is likened to the phases of 
 the moon : 
 
 ' Human fortunes, good and ill, 
 Never stand a moment still ; 
 To a wheel divine they 're bound, 
 Turning ever round and round ; 
 The moon of our prosperity 
 Wanes and waxes in the sky ; 
 Plays her fickle and constant game, 
 Aye a-changing, aye the same : 
 See 1 her crescent of pale light 
 Gathers beauty night by night ; 
 Till, when sphered in perfect grace, 
 Gradual she dims her face ; 
 Lies anon on heaven's blue floor 
 A silver bow, and nothing more.' l 
 
 The phases of the moon, however brief their period, 
 still run through a regular course. The misery of 
 human life, as depicted by Sophocles, includes sub- 
 jection to the caprice of chance not less than to 
 periodic change. The Messenger in Antigone thus 
 delivers his opinion : 
 
 ' I know no life of mortal man which I 
 Would either praise or blame. It is but chance 
 That raiseth up, and chance that bringeth low, 
 The man who lives in good or evil plight, 
 And none foretells a man's appointed lot.' 2 
 
 In a fragment from a lost drama, one of the 
 
 1 Fabula Incerta, translated by D'Arcy Thomson in Sales Attici % 
 p. 81. 
 8 1156-1160; translated by Plumptrc. 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS: NEMESIS 89 
 
 dramatis persona sums up his philosophy of life in 
 these pithy terms : 
 
 * Say not them of weal or woe : 
 'Tis big, or little, or not at all : 
 For mortal blessings come and go, 
 As flit sun-shadows athwart a wall.' 1 
 
 This is dismal enough : human experience without 
 any traceable order or law, given up to the dominion 
 of hazard, so that anything may happen to any man 
 at any moment. But there is something more dismal 
 still : human experience subject to an evil order, re- 
 versing the awards of the moral order, and assigning 
 prosperity and adversity with sinister indifference 
 to desert. That our poet was keenly alive to the 
 existence of phenomena of this sort appears from 
 another fragment out of the same drama from which 
 our last quotation is taken. I give it in the version 
 supplied by Mr. Symonds : 
 
 * 'Tis terrible that impious men, the sons 
 Of sinners, even such should thrive and prosper, 
 While men by virtue moulded, sprung from sires 
 Complete in goodness, should be born to suffer. 
 Nay, but the gods do ill in dealing thus 
 With mortals ! It were well that pious men 
 Should take some signal guerdon at their hands; 
 But evil-doers, on their heads should fall 
 Conspicuous punishment for deeds ill-done. 
 Then should no wicked man fare well and flourish.' * 
 
 These sentiments concerning the changefulness 
 and chancefulness and moral confusion of life make, 
 
 1 Aletes : Thomson's translation ; rather free. 
 
 * Symonds, Studies of the Greek Poets > 2nd series, p. 273, 
 
90 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 on the whole, a depressing impression. They arc 
 pessimistic in tone, though it is not to be supposed 
 that the poet had any intention to teach a full-blown 
 pessimistic theory. He took life as he found it ; and 
 fie found it dark enough, so dark that in gloomy 
 moments a thoughtful man might be tempted to 
 doubt whether it were worth living. A reflection of 
 this despairing mood may be found in these lines 
 from a choral ode in (Edipus at Colonus : 
 
 4 Happiest beyond compare 
 Never to taste of life ; 
 Happiest in order next, 
 Being born, with quickest speed 
 Thither again to turn 
 From whence we came.' * 
 
 And in this from The Maidens of Trachis : 
 
 * On two short days, or more, our hopes are vain ; 
 The morrow is as nought, till one shall show 
 The present day in fair prosperity.' * 
 
 Yet we must never forget that the man who made 
 his dramatic characters utter such sombre sentiments, 
 also put into the mouth of Antigone that grand de- 
 claration concerning the eternal unwritten laws of 
 God that know no change, and are not of to-day nor 
 yesterday, and that must be obeyed in preference to 
 the temporary commandments of men. 3 One who 
 believes in these eternal laws of duty, as expressing 
 the inmost mind of deity, and that reckons com- 
 
 1 1223-1228; Plumptre's translation. 
 
 1 943-946 ; Plumptre's translation. 8 Antigone, 455-459- 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS: NEMESIS 91 
 
 pliance with them at all hazards the supreme 
 obligation, cannot with propriety be classed with 
 pessimists, though that Antigone should suffer for 
 her loyalty to these sovereign behests may appear 
 to him a great mystery. If he does not understand 
 Antigone's fate, he at least sees in it a moral 
 sublimity which redeems life from worthlessness and 
 vulgarity. Nay, the nobleness of her self-sacrifice 
 seems to bring him to the threshold of a great 
 discovery : that such a life cannot be wasted, but 
 must possess redemptive value. What but this is 
 the meaning of these words spoken to Antigone by 
 her father CEdipus : ' One soul acting in the strength 
 of love, is better than a thousand to atone.' 1 A 
 single utterance like this may not justify the con- 
 clusion that the poet had fully grasped the principle 
 of vicarious atonement, but it does show that the 
 idea was beginning to dawn on his mind. 
 
 It is now, happily, quite unnecessary to waste 
 time in defending Euripides against the prejudiced 
 criticism of scholars who, taking Sophocles as the 
 model, see in him nothing but artistic blemishes, 
 or the still more prejudiced diatribes of religious 
 philosophers who, biassed by pet theories, see in him 
 nothing but an impious scoffer. We can afford to 
 smile at the oracular verdict pronounced upon him 
 
 1 Vide Plumptre's ' Essay on the Life and Writings of Sophocles,* 
 vol. i. of his translation, pp. Ixxvii.-xcix. 
 
92 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 by Bunsen, that his theory of the universe is that of 
 Candide, and that the religion of ^Eschylus and 
 Sophocles was as repugnant to him as that of the 
 Psalms and Prophets was to Voltaire. 1 The man 
 whose dramatic productions have been a delight 
 to poets like Milton, Goethe, and Browning, can 
 dispense with the patronage of learned critics ; and 
 as for his religious and ethical bent, it is sufficiently 
 guaranteed by the fact of his belonging to the 
 Socratic circle. It will be well to come to the study 
 of his sentiments on the topics which concern us 
 with this fact in our minds, and to remember that 
 when a play of Euripides was to be put upon the 
 stage Socrates was ever likely to be one of the 
 spectators. Euripides was doubtless a sceptic in 
 reference to the mythology of Greece, but that in no 
 way impugns the sincerity and depth of his ethical 
 and religious convictions. He believed in God if 
 not in the gods, he reverenced moral law, and he had 
 no doubt as to the reality of a moral order, though 
 it may be that he did not rest his faith therein on 
 the same religious foundation as ^Eschylus. It may 
 be well to offer a few vouchers of this last statement 
 before going on to notice the more distinctive con- 
 
 1 God in History ', ii. 224. For a chillingly unappreciative estimate 
 of Euripides vide Religion in Greek Literature, by Dr. Lewis Campbell, 
 1898. According to this author, Euripides was simply a melodramatist 
 whose task was rather to interest than to instruct ; his connection or 
 sympathy with Socrates is regarded as d ubtful ; the examples of self- 
 devotion which brighten his pages are spoken of as recurring 'with 
 almost monotonous frequency.' 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS : NEMESIS 93 
 
 tribution of this great Master of song to the doctrine 
 of Providence. 
 
 The Hercules Furens contains an explicit testimony 
 to the Power-not-ourselves making for righteousness. 
 Just before, it is true, the chorus have made a rather 
 profane and senseless complaint that the gods have 
 not given to the good, as the unmistakable stamp 
 of their worth, the privilege of being a second time 
 young, so that they might be as easily recognised 
 as the stars at sea by sailors. 1 But for this incon- 
 siderate outburst the poet makes ample amends by 
 putting into the mouths of the chorus this distinct 
 confession of faith in the moral order : 
 
 * The gods from on high regard the wicked and the good. 
 Wealth and prosperity try the hearts of men, and lead 
 
 them on to the ways of unrighteousness ; 
 For he that is prosperous saith within himself: surely the 
 
 evil days will never come : 
 Therefore driveth he furiously in the race; and heedeth 
 
 not the limits of the course ; 
 And he striketh his wheel against a stone of stumbling ; 
 
 and dasheth in pieces the chariot of his prosperity.' 2 
 
 This also from Ion has the ring of conviction in it. 
 It is the last word in a drama replete with beautiful 
 wise thought : 
 
 * Let the man who worships the divine beings be of good 
 cheer, when his house is visited with misfortune. 
 For in the end the worthy obtain their deserts and 
 the wicked, as is meet, shall not prosper.' 3 
 
 1 Hercules Furens, 646-660. 
 
 8 Ibid. t 753-760; Thomson's translation. * Ion, 1620-1623. 
 
94 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Artemis in Hippolytus declares that ' the gods have 
 no pleasure in the death of the righteous, but they 
 destroy the wicked with their children and homes.' 1 
 
 Euripides is familiar with such great truths of the 
 moral order as these : that confession takes a burden 
 off the heart, 2 and that in all human thought and 
 action God co-operates.* But it is specially to be 
 noted that he has some insight into the 'method 
 of inwardness/ a glimpse, that is to say, of the truth 
 that the rewards and punishments of human conduct 
 are to be sought not merely or chiefly in the sphere 
 of outward life, but in the state of the heart. He 
 understands, at least dimly, that to be spiritually- 
 minded is life and peace. Witness this hymn of 
 Hippolytus to Artemis : 
 
 * For thee this woven garland from a mead 
 Unsullied have I twined, O Queen, and bring. 
 There never shepherd dares to feed his flock, 
 Nor steel of sickle came : only the bee 
 Roveth the springtide mead undesecrate : 
 And Reverence watereth it with river-dews. 
 They which have heritage of self-control 
 In all things, not taught, but the pure in heart 
 These there may gather flowers, but none impure. 
 Now Queen, dear Queen, receive this anadem, 
 From reverent hand to deck thy golden hair ; 
 For to me sole of men this grace is given 
 That I be with thee, converse hold with thee, 
 Hearing thy voice, yet seeing not thy face. 
 And may I end life's race as I began.' 4 
 
 1 Hippolytus, 1329-30. 3 Ion, 874-6. Supplier, 736-8. 
 
 4 Hippolytus, 73-87. The translation is by Arthur S. Way, The 
 Tragedies of Euripides in English Verse, vol. i. p. 127. 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS: NEMESIS 95 
 
 That the penalty of wrongdoing is also to be 
 sought within seems to be hinted at in this fragment 
 from a lost drama : 
 
 * Think you that sins leap up to heaven aloft 
 On wings, and then that on Jove's red-leaved tablets 
 Some one doth write them, and Jove looks at them 
 In judging mortals ? Not the whole broad heaven, 
 If Jove should write our sins, would be enough, 
 Nor he suffice to punish them. But Justice 
 Is here, is somewhere near us.' 1 
 
 These extracts seem to bring us within measur- 
 able distance of New Testament ethics. But we 
 get nearer still to Christian thought along a different 
 path. The light of that day whose dim dawn we 
 descried in Sophocles shines on the pages of 
 Euripides. He sees the glory and the power of 
 self-sacrifice. He understands that the good man's 
 life is not self-centred, but rather is a fountain of 
 benefit to all around. In the Children of Hercules y 
 which contains one of the most signal examples of 
 sacrifice, he opens with this sentiment put into the 
 mouth of lolaus, the nephew of Hercules : * This 
 has long been my opinion : the just man lives for 
 his neighbours, but the man whose mind is bent on 
 gain is useless to the city, hard to conciliate, good 
 only to himself.' 
 
 The novelty of this point of view living for others 
 the mark of goodness may be seen by comparing 
 
 1 Fragment from Mdanippe t translation from Symonds, 2nd 
 series, p. 293. 
 
96 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 the behaviour of Iphigenia, daughter of Agamemnon, 
 when she is being sacrificed at Aulis, as described by 
 ^Eschylus, with the account given of the same scene 
 by Euripides. In the Agamemnon of the earlier poet 
 the sacrificed maiden is simply a reluctant victim, 
 casting at those who offered her to the gods a piteous, 
 piercing glance, and unable, though wishing, to speak. 1 
 In the Iphigenia in Aulis of Euripides, on the other 
 hand, the daughter of King Agamemnon, after a 
 struggle with natural feeling, rises at length to the 
 heroic mood of self-devotion, and seeks to reconcile 
 her outraged mother to the inevitable by such argu- 
 ments as these : Greece looks to me ; on me depends 
 the prosperous voyage of the fleet to Troy and the 
 destruction of that city; I shall have the happy 
 renown of having saved my country ; I may not 
 be too attached to life, for as a common boon to 
 the Greeks, not for yourself only, you bore me. 2 
 The opportunity it affords him of exemplifying this 
 mood is the chief, if not sole, source of the poet's 
 interest in the whole story. He has no faith in 
 the oracles of soothsayers which pronounced the 
 sacrifice necessary, no faith in the gods who 
 demanded it, no faith in its efficacy, no faith even 
 in its reality ; for in his presentation of the legend 
 the victim is rescued and appears afterwards as a 
 priestess in Tauris. But he has faith in self-sacrifice 
 as the highest virtue, and he loses no opportunity of 
 
 1 Agamemnon, 230-235. * Iphigenia in Aulis, I347-'3 6 S' 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS: NEMESIS 97 
 
 eulogising it, as in the instances of Menoekeus in 
 the Phcemssce, who, in accordance with the prophecy 
 of Tiresias, kills himself to save Thebes, 1 and of 
 Polyxena in Hecuba? 
 
 The most pathetic instances, however, are those of 
 Macaria and Alcestis. In the case of Macaria, the 
 daughter of Hercules, the element of voluntariness is 
 very conspicuous. The oracle demands that some 
 one shall die, but does not indicate the particular 
 victim. Theseus, though willing now, as at all 
 times, to defend the cause of the innocent, refuses 
 to give any of his family as a sacrifice for the 
 Heraclidae. In this crisis Macaria comes to the 
 rescue and offers herself. lolaus, guardian of the 
 children of Hercules, approves her spirit, but to 
 soften the rigour of a hard fate proposes that the 
 victim should be determined by lot. To which 
 Macaria replies in these remarkable terms : ' I will 
 not die by lot, for there is no merit in that. Do 
 not speak of it, old man. But if ye choose to 
 take me, ready as I am, I willingly give my life 
 for these, but not under compulsion.' 3 
 
 The most signal example of self-sacrificing love 
 is supplied in the beautiful tale of Alcestis related 
 in the tragedy of the same name. Admetus, king 
 of Pherae, in Thessaly, is sick and about to die. 
 Apollo, who had formerly served the king as a 
 
 1 The Phoenician Damsels, 990-1015. 
 
 2 Vide lines 339-375. 
 Heraclida, 547-557- 
 
 G 
 
98 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 herdsman, in reward for past kindness asks and 
 obtains from the Fates a respite for Admetus, on 
 condition that he find some one willing to die for 
 him. The king asks all his friends in turn to do 
 him this service, but in vain. At last his wife, 
 Alcestis, hearing how matters stand, offers to grant 
 the boon all others had refused. She sickens and 
 dies accordingly. Hercules arrives shortly after, 
 and, on learning what has happened, goes to the 
 tomb of the deceased, brings her back to life and 
 restores her to her husband. 
 
 In his Symposium Plato alludes to this story as 
 illustrating the doctrine that love is ever ready to 
 do anything that may be required of it for the 
 good of the object loved, even to die in its behalf 
 (vTrepaTToOvrjcriceiv). He could not have chosen a 
 better example. Love was the sole motive of 
 Alcestis. She does not nerve herself to the need- 
 ful pitch of heroic fortitude by considerations of 
 patriotism or posthumous fame. She makes no fuss 
 about the matter, nor does the poet make it for 
 her. She is not brought on the stage resolving 
 to die, and telling what has helped her to adopt 
 such a resolution. The curtain is lifted on a woman 
 lying sick on a couch. She speaks but once, to 
 bid farewell to her husband, and to utter her last 
 wishes. Her praises are sung for her, not by her. 
 An attendant relates with enthusiasm her behaviour 
 on the morning of her last day, in terms of exquisite 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS: NEMESIS 99 
 
 pathos. The choral odes referring to her noble action 
 are singularly beautiful. One declares that Alcestis 
 will be a theme of song to the poets of Greece in all 
 after ages ; another sings of the inevitable dominion 
 of death, and then of the consolations of posthumous 
 fame in these glowing terms : 
 
 1 Deem not she sleeps like those devoid of fame, 
 
 Unconscious in the lap of earth ; 
 Such homage as the gods from mortals claim 
 Each traveller shall pay her matchless worth, 
 Digressing from his road ; and these bold thoughts, 
 Expressed in no faint language, utter o'er her grave : 
 " She died to save her Lord, and now 
 She dwells among the blest. 
 Hail, Sainted Matron ! and this realm befriend."-' * 
 
 The love of Alcestis is beautiful, but the occasion 
 of her self-sacrifice does not command our respect. 
 Indeed, none of the occasions of self-sacrifice in the 
 dramas of Euripides do this. They are, in other 
 instances, the result of superstition ; in the one 
 before us, of selfishness. Why could Admetus not 
 die himself, after having lived sufficiently long? 
 Probably Euripides had no more respect for the 
 occasion than we have; no more respect, I may 
 add, than he had for the legend that Alcestis was 
 brought back to life by Hercules. There is probably 
 truth in the view of Mr. Verrall that the poet did 
 not believe that Alcestis was really dead. 2 His 
 
 1 Alcestis, 1007-1014 ; Wodhull's translation. Cf. Way's translation 
 in The Tragedies of Euripides in English Verse , vol. i. p. 51. 
 
 2 Verrall's Euripides the Rationalist, p. 75. 
 
ioo THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 point was that Alcestis was willing to die. And 
 as for the occasions of self-sacrifice, he took this 
 one, and all the rest, as they were furnished to him 
 by tradition. They were welcome as giving him the 
 opportunity of preaching his favourite doctrine that 
 the spirit of self-devotion is the soul of goodness. 
 
 This doctrine was an important contribution to 
 ethics. How far Euripides was aware of the extent 
 to which life afforded natural and most real oppor- 
 tunities for the display of the self-sacrificing temper 
 of love we have no means of knowing. It may 
 be assumed that it was a subject possessing keen 
 interest to his mind, and that he was a close 
 observer of all illustrative phenomena. It may 
 also be assumed that in utilising the traditional 
 data supplied by heroic legends he had something 
 more important and specific in view than to illustrate 
 the ' pluck,' as it has been called (eityi^ia), of Greek 
 men and women. 1 Not the physical virtue of ' pluck,' 
 though that element might have its place, but the 
 high moral virtue of self-devotion, was his theme. 
 And, seeing that virtue awakened in his soul such 
 an ardent enthusiasm, he could not have found it 
 hard to believe that a moral order which afforded 
 large scope for its exercise was not an evil order 
 but rather a beneficent one, which might have been 
 
 1 Symonds, Studies of the Greek Poets, is. series, p. 212. Mr. 
 Symonds sees in the value set on eityi/xfa by Euripides a reflection of 
 the advancing tendencies of philosophy containing the germ of the 
 Stoical doctrine of Kaprepia. 
 
THE GREEK TRAGEDIANS: NEMESIS ici 
 
 appointed by a benignant deity. It has indeed 
 been denied that Euripides had any such belief, 
 while his merit in proclaiming the vicarious nature 
 of love is fully acknowledged. Professor Watson 
 remarks : ' It is only in Euripides that we find 
 something like an anticipation of the Christian 
 idea that self-realisation is attained through self- 
 sacrifice. In Euripides, however, this result is 
 reached by a surrender of his faith in divine justice. 
 Man, he seems to say, is capable of heroic self- 
 sacrifice, at the prompting of natural affection, but 
 this is the law of human nature, not of the divine 
 nature. Thus in him morality is divorced from 
 religion, and therefore there is over all his work 
 the sadness which inevitably follows from a sceptical 
 distrust of the existence of any objective principle 
 of goodness.' 1 I am not satisfied that this is a 
 well-grounded judgment. The spirit of Euripides, 
 I believe, was the spirit of Socrates, the martyr, and 
 the devout believer in a beneficent deity. There 
 may be sadness in his writings, but there is neither 
 cynicism nor pessimism. An admirer of heroic love 
 cannot be a pessimist. He sees in love's sacrifice 
 not merely the darkest, but the brightest feature in 
 the world's history. All that is needed to make 
 him an optimist is that he have faith in a God in 
 harmony with his own ethical creed : admiring self- 
 sacrifice ; yea, himself capable of it. That Euripides 
 
 1 Christianity and Idealism^ p. 39. 
 
102 THE* MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 had fully found such a God I do not assert. That 
 he was on the way to the discovery I cannot doubt. 
 The idea of God as the absolutely good was familiar 
 to the Socratic circle, as we learn from the Dialogues 
 of Plato, and such a man as Euripides could neither 
 be unacquainted with it nor fail to perceive its value. 
 It is true that in his pages, as in those of his brother- 
 dramatists, the dark shadow of a morally indifferent 
 Fate (Molpa) now and then makes its appearance, as 
 in these lines : 
 
 * A bow of steel is hard to bend, 
 And stern a proud man's will ; 
 
 But Fate, that shapeth every end, 
 Is sterner, harder still ; 
 
 E'en God within the indented groove 
 
 Of Fate's resolve Himself must move.' 1 
 
 This utterance points to a species of dualism, a 
 conflict between a benignant Providence and a blind 
 force which exercises sway over both gods and men. 
 There is a dualism in Plato also. A certain in- 
 tractableness in matter resists the will of the Good 
 Spirit so that he cannot make the world perfect, but 
 only as good as possible. 2 But the thing to be thank- 
 ful for in Plato is the clear perception that the will 
 of God is absolutely good, if his power be limited. 
 Euripides also, I think, had a glimpse of this truth. 
 
 1 D'Arcy Thomson's Safes Attici, p. 213, based on a chorus in the 
 Alcestis (962-981). For a literal translation vide Way, The Tragedies 
 of Euripides, vol. i. p. 49. 
 
 Vide Lecture X. 
 
LECTURE IV 
 
 THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 
 
 THE system of thought and the way of life which 
 go by the name of Stoicism constitute a pheno- 
 menon not less remarkable in its fashion than the 
 ethical wisdom of the great Greek tragedians. Zeno, 
 Cleanthes, and Chrysippus, the founders of the school 
 of the porch, are in some respects as notable a triad 
 as ^Eschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides. Their dis- 
 tinction, however, lies, not like that of the three 
 poets, in literary genius, but in moral intensity. 
 Their thoughts of God, man, duty, and destiny, and 
 the life in which these found practical embodiment, 
 present the best religious product of Greek philo- 
 sophy. There is room indeed for doubt whether that 
 philosophy can be credited with the exclusive parent- 
 age of so worthy an offspring. The influence of 
 Socrates is of course very manifest in the ethical 
 spirit of the Stoics. But something more than 
 Socrates seems to be discernible there: something 
 new, foreign; a stern temper in striking contrast to 
 Hellenic lightheartedness ; a seriousness reminding 
 
 103 
 
104 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 us more of the gravity of a Hebrew prophet than of 
 the gaiety of a Greek philosopher. 
 
 This first impression is seen to be more than a 
 passing fancy when it is considered that the early 
 masters and scholars of Stoicism were actually, for 
 the most part, strangers from the East, and not a 
 few of them natives of Semitic towns or colonies. 
 Zeno, the first founder, was from Citium, a Phoenician 
 colony in Cyprus, and he commonly went by the 
 name of ' the Phoenician,' a fact which bears witness 
 to his Semitic origin. Thus the hypothesis readily 
 suggests itself that race enters as a factor in the 
 genesis of Stoicism, that the peculiarities of this new 
 phase of Greek philosophy are the unmistakable 
 product of Semitic genius. This view has been 
 adopted and earnestly advocated by such competent 
 writers as Sir Alexander Grant 1 and Bishop Light- 
 foot. 2 Their high authority cannot lightly be dis- 
 regarded ; but if we do not feel able to share their 
 confidence as to the certainty of this racial theory, 
 we shall do well at least to lay to heart the ethical 
 affinity which it is adduced to explain. The Stoic 
 temper and the Semitic temper are kindred. The 
 Stoic philosophy is, so to speak, Hebrew wisdom 
 transplanted into Greek soil ; like the latter, intensely 
 ethical in spirit, and practical in tendency. In both 
 we discern the same leading characteristics : ' the 
 
 1 Vide his Ethics of Aristotle, 3rd edition, vol. i. Essay VI. 
 
 1 Vide his St. Paul's Epistle to t/n Philippians, Dissertation IL 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 105 
 
 recognition of the claims of the individual soul, the 
 sense of personal responsibility, the habit of judicial 
 introspection, in short the subjective view of ethics.' 1 
 
 Stoicism was at once intensely ethical and in- 
 tensely individualistic. It contemplated the universe 
 from the view-point of the individual man, and the 
 thing of supreme interest for it in the individual 
 man was his moral consciousness. The latter feature, 
 as we have seen, may be traced partly to the in- 
 fluence of Socrates, partly to the influence of the 
 Semitic spirit ; the former was the natural result 
 of the complete breakdown of the political life 
 of Greece due to the Macedonian conquest. It is 
 necessary to note the time at which the Stoical 
 movement made its appearance. Like all great 
 spiritual movements, it came when the world was 
 prepared for it and needed it. It was the offspring 
 of despair in more senses than one, but very specially 
 of political despair. When public life offered no 
 opportunities, what could a thoughtful man do but 
 retire within himself, and concentrate his energies 
 on the discipline of his own spirit? And yet the 
 same circumstances which brought about this con- 
 traction of interest led also to a great expansion. 
 If the glory of Greece had vanished, humanity re- 
 mained ; in place of the city, the philosopher had 
 the wide world as a home for his soul. And so it 
 
 1 Lightfoot on Philippians, p. 272. 
 
106 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 came to pass that the system of thought which most 
 worthily met the need of the time was cosmopolitan 
 in spirit as well as individualistic. The Stoic, while 
 intensely conscious of himself as a moral personality, 
 was also not less conscious of belonging to a great 
 human brotherhood. It has been reckoned among 
 the contradictions of Stoicism that, 'with the hardest 
 and most uncompromising isolation of the individual, 
 it proclaims the most expansive view of his relations 
 to all around.' 1 In reality, however, these two con- 
 trasted qualities are but complementary aspects of 
 the same fundamental point of view. The ethical 
 is universal ; the ethical individual is but a particular 
 embodiment of that which constitutes the essential 
 element common to humanity. The same combina- 
 tion of individualism with universalism appears in the 
 later prophetic literature of Israel under similar out- 
 ward circumstances, national misfortune opening the 
 eyes of Hebrew seers and Greek sages alike to the inner 
 world of the soul and the outer world of mankind. 
 
 Stoicism was not the only philosophy in Greece 
 at the beginning of the third century before the 
 Christian era. Philosophic activity in the post- 
 Aristotelian period gave rise to three rival schools 
 that of the Stoics, that of the Epicureans, and that 
 of the Sceptics. All three had the same fundamental 
 characteristic of subjectivity, retirement within the 
 self, and the same general temper of self-sufficiency, 
 
 1 Bishop Lightfoot on Philippians, p. 296. 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 107 
 
 or independence of outward things. The two first- 
 named schools, to confine our attention to them, 
 differed in their conception of the chief good. The 
 Stoics placed it in virtue, the Epicureans in free- 
 dom from disagreeable feelings, or, in one word, in 
 Pleasure. The mere co-existence of a school having 
 'pleasure' for its watchword lends added emphasis 
 and significance to the Stoic position. It is not 
 necessary to judge severely the philosophers of the 
 garden, and to impute to them all the abuses to 
 which their leading tenet too easily gave rise. 
 Epicurus did not undervalue virtue; he maintained 
 that there could be no true pleasure dissociated 
 from virtue. Seneca states the point at issue between 
 him and the masters of the porch in these terms, 
 'whether virtue be the cause of the highest good, 
 or itself the highest good.' 1 With the Stoics he 
 espouses the latter alternative, and repudiates with 
 indignation not merely the placing of virtue under 
 pleasure, as a lower category and mere means to 
 pleasure as an end, but the comparing of virtue 
 with pleasure at all. ' Virtue,' he says, ' is the 
 despiser and enemy of pleasure ; leaping away as 
 far as possible from it, it is more at home with 
 labour and pain than with that effeminate good.' 2 
 The Roman representative of Stoicism may be 
 accepted as a true interpreter of the respective 
 attitudes of the two opposed systems. Taking them 
 
 1 De BeneficiiS) lib. IV. cap. ii. 2 Eodem loco. 
 
io8 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 at his estimate, one cannot but feel that the Stoic, 
 whatever his defects, has the nobler bearing. Much 
 depends on what you put first. It is a great thing 
 to say : virtue, duty, is first ; especially when you 
 know that others are saying something very different. 
 Then your doctrine means : virtue first, all else, 
 whatever is comprehended under enjoyment, second ; 
 virtue first and at all hazards, be the consequences 
 what they may ; pleasure or pain, it is all one. This 
 is a heroic programme, and the man who is able 
 to carry it out will certainly live to better purpose 
 than the man whose programme is : enjoyment the 
 summum bonum, but enjoyment obtained on the 
 most rational and virtuous methods possible. 
 
 The Stoic, while sternly opposed to making plea- 
 sure the chief good, did not refuse it a place, under 
 any form, in human experience. He held, however, 
 that the only pleasure or happiness worth having 
 was that connected with right conduct. Virtue, in 
 his view, was its own reward, and vice its own 
 penalty. Virtue is self-sufficient ; nothing else is 
 needed to make a wise man happy. This doctrine 
 makes the wise man entirely independent of every- 
 thing outside his own will. The good man is 
 satisfied from himself, and perfectly free from all 
 dependence on outward good. Outward goods, so- 
 called, are really things indifferent. There is nothing 
 good but the absolute good, a good will ; nothing 
 evil but the absolute evil, an evil will. Health, 
 
THE STOICS : PROVIDENCE 109 
 
 riches, honour, life, however much valued by ordinary 
 men, fall under the category of the indifferent, for 
 every one who knows the secret of the blessed life. 1 
 This view of outward good kills passion. The 
 passions are the result of wrong estimates of external 
 good and evil. From the irrational estimate of 
 present good arises the passion of pleasurable 
 feeling, of future good that of desire ; out of a false 
 conception of present evil comes sorrow, and of 
 future evil, fear. 2 The wise man, subject to no 
 illusions, is passionless. He feels pain, but, not 
 regarding it as an evil, he suffers neither torment 
 nor fear; he may be despised and evil-treated, but 
 he cannot be disgraced ; he is without vanity, be- 
 cause honour and shame touch him not ; he is not 
 subject to the passion of anger, nor does he need 
 this irrational affection as an aid to valour ; he is 
 even devoid of sympathy, for why should he pity 
 others for experiences which are matters of indiffer- 
 ence to himself? 3 
 
 Nothing is more characteristic of Stoicism than 
 this doctrine of apathy as the distinctive mood of 
 wisdom. Mr. Huxley tells us that he finds it 
 difficult to discover any very great difference between 
 
 1 Zeno reckoned among the &8id<f>opa life, death, honour, dishonour, 
 pain, pleasure, riches, poverty, disease, health, and the like. Vide 
 Stobseus, Eclogce, vol. ii. 92. 
 
 2 The Stoics, with Zeno at their head, reckoned desire, fear, pain, 
 and pleasure the four chief passions. Vide Stobaeus, Ecloga^ ii. 166. 
 
 3 7<& Zeller, Die Philosophie der Griecheit, iii. pp. 216, 217, where 
 vouchers for these details are given. 
 
no THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 the Apatheia of the Stoics and the Nirvana of 
 Buddhists. 1 The one does readily suggest the other 
 to our minds, and the two words do denote states 
 of soul essentially the same. But the calm retreat 
 of passionless peace is reached by different paths 
 in the two systems. It is a case of extremes meet- 
 ing, a common result arrived at by entirely opposite 
 interpretations of life, that of the Buddhist being 
 pessimistic, while that of the Stoic was optimistic. 
 Life is full of misery, said the Buddhist ; from birth 
 to death human existence is one long unbroken 
 experience of sorrow and vexation of spirit, there- 
 fore extinguish desire and so escape finally and for 
 ever from pain. The so-called ills of life, said the 
 Stoic, do not deserve the name ; the so-called goods 
 of life are no better entitled to the designation: 
 treat all alike with disdain and so possess your soul 
 in serenity. The relation of the two systems to 
 objects of desire is diverse. Buddhism is ascetic, 
 ever engaged in the work of extirpating desire. 
 Stoicism finds its inner satisfaction 'in ignoring not 
 in mortifying desires.' The Stoic's attitude is ' non- 
 chalance, the charter of his self-sufficiency.' 2 The 
 diversity in temper goes along with a corresponding 
 diversity of view in regard to the universe at large. 
 The Buddhist deemed the existence of the world, 
 
 1 Evolution and Ethics^ p. 76. 
 
 * Vide Kendall's translation of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus to Him- 
 self, introduction, p. xlii. (1898). 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE in 
 
 as of the individual man, an evil. As a man is 
 born because he has done wrong in a previous state 
 of existence, so the world exists to afford scope for 
 the law of moral retribution displaying itself in the 
 apportionment of rewards and penalties. The Stoic, 
 on the other hand, took an optimistic view of the 
 world. He believed in the rationality of the uni- 
 verse. Therefore he defined virtue alternatively as 
 living according to our own reason, or as living in 
 accordance with the nature of things, in harmony 
 with the laws of the cosmos. The Buddhist view 
 of birth and death as evils, and penalties of sin, 
 would never enter his mind, or seem other than 
 an absurdity if suggested by another person. He 
 would have said : birth and death both belong to 
 the universal order, therefore they are not evil. The 
 natural order was to be accepted loyally, without 
 demur. The will of nature, said Epictetus, can be 
 learned from what is common to all. How do we 
 take the death of another man's wife or child ? We 
 say it is human. Say the same as to your own. 1 
 Faith in nature, with frank submission to its appoint- 
 ments, was part of the piety of Stoicism. 
 
 This faith, as held by the Stoics, was associated 
 with and buttressed by a physico-theological system 
 of thought. Though before all things practical, 
 ethical philosophers, they had their science of nature, 
 which was at the same time their theology. Their 
 
 1 Enchiridion^ cxxxiii. 
 
Hi ?HE MORAL 0&t)ER OF HE WORLD 
 
 physics were not original, being to a very large 
 extent simply an appropriation of the opinions of 
 the pre-Socratic philosopher Heraclitus, who taught 
 that fire, or aether, was the original substance of the 
 universe, identified this primaeval fire with God, to 
 whom he ascribed the properties at once of matter 
 and of mind, and represented the history of the 
 world as a gradual transformation of the primaeval 
 fire into the elements, and of the elements into the 
 primaeval fire ; that is, as consisting in an endless 
 alternation of world - making and world - burning. 
 The theological aspect of this cosmological specula- 
 tion is what chiefly concerns us. In the hands of 
 the Stoics the resulting idea of God is a strange 
 mixture of Materialism, Pantheism, and Theism. 
 God, like all things that really exist, is material 
 and the source of all matter. He is one with the 
 world which is evolved out of His essence, as in 
 the theory of Spinoza ; God and Nature are the same 
 thing under different aspects. Yet, unlike Spinoza, 
 the Stoics introduced into their idea of God theistic 
 elements reminding us of the characteristic concep- 
 tions of Socrates, who regarded the world teleo- 
 logically, plied the argument from design for the 
 existence of a good God, and asserted the reality 
 of a benignant providential order, having man for 
 the special object of its care. In these respects the 
 Stoics were disciples of Socrates, as in their physics 
 they were followers of Heraclitus. 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 113 
 
 Accustomed as we, in modern times, are to sharply 
 defined contrasts between materialistic, pantheistic, 
 and theistic theories, we are apt to wonder how such 
 heterogeneous elements could ever have been brought 
 together in even the crudest attempt to form an idea 
 of God. Unless we be on our guard we may draw 
 from the materialism of the Stoics very mistaken 
 and prejudicial inferences as to their view of Deity, 
 confounding them with those who cherish a purely 
 mechanical idea of the universe and have no faith 
 in the exceptional significance of man arising out 
 of his spiritual nature ; whereas, in truth, as to these 
 vital questions their creed was the same as that held 
 by modern theists. The two forms of materialism, 
 as has been pointed out by a French writer on 
 Stoicism, are not only distinct, but of opposite 
 tendency. ' While the materialism of our day 
 wishes to recognise the existence of the corporeal 
 and sensible only, to get rid for ever of the ideal 
 realities and inaccessible essences, the physics of 
 the Stoics made everything material in fear lest 
 the spiritual realities should vanish. The modern 
 materialist says : " All is body, therefore thought is 
 nothing but a mode of body." The Stoic said: 
 " All is body, and thought being corporeal is a 
 substance, more subtle without doubt, but as real 
 as are the objects our senses perceive." It is 
 not to withdraw the world from the watchful 
 authority of a sovereign intelligence, but rather to 
 
 FT 
 
H4 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 give to that supreme reason efficacious power every- 
 where present that the Stoics conceived God as 
 co-extensive with the universe.' 1 
 
 We must take ancient thought about God as we 
 find it, looking indulgently on the materialistic dross, 
 and giving full value to the theistic gold. If we 
 keep in view the Semitic origin of the founders of 
 Stoicism, we shall remember that speculative con- 
 sistency was not to be expected of them, and that 
 ethical wisdom was more in their line than cosmo- 
 logical theory. It is difficult to say in what precise 
 relation such theory as they did promulgate stood 
 to the ethical doctrines which constitute the chief 
 ground of their claim to serious consideration at this 
 date. Did the ethical system, first formulated, create 
 a desire for a congruous and confirmatory theory of 
 the universe, or did the masters of the school bring 
 to their ethical studies such a theory cut-and-dried, 
 and always at hand to give direction to thought in 
 the answering of puzzling questions? Were ethical 
 problems first solved and then God conceived in 
 harmony with the solutions, or was the idea of God 
 first fixed, then employed to control moral judg- 
 ments? The question has special interest in 
 reference to the Stoic doctrine concerning things 
 indifferent. That doctrine seems a paradox, and it 
 is natural to ask, Would the men who promulgated 
 
 1 F. Ogereau, Essai sur le Systhne Philosophique des Stoicitns, p. 
 297. 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 115 
 
 it have adopted so extreme a position as that pain, 
 disease, privation, dishonour, are not evils, unless 
 they had been required to do so by their theological 
 creed ? Was it not a case of a priori reasoning ? 
 ' The soul of the world is just ; the world in all its 
 arrangements is rational, because the work of a 
 Supreme Reason. The Providence of God, like God 
 Himself, must be perfect ; therefore it must ever be 
 well with the good ; therefore human happiness must 
 depend on the state of the soul, not on outward 
 experiences, which, whether pleasant or the reverse, 
 are to be regarded as of no account.' That they 
 argued thus is not inconceivable. But it is against 
 this view that in their doctrine of the indifferent the 
 Stoics were not original any more than in their 
 materialistic physics, or in their teleological concep- 
 tion of the world. In this, as in some other im- 
 portant respects, they were disciples of the Cynics. 
 Speaking generally, the Stoics were original in the 
 spirit rather than in the matter of their teaching. 
 They borrowed freely from all preceding schools, 
 and blended the separate contributions into a 
 harmonious system under the inspiration of their 
 characteristic moral enthusiasm. This fervour saved 
 them from being pure eclectics, and converted what 
 might otherwise have been a mere patchwork o 
 opinions into a living organism of thought, in which 
 all parts of the system acted and reacted on each 
 other. When the body of Stoical doctrine is thus 
 
n6 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 conceived, the question above formulated is super- 
 seded. It is no longer a question of exclusive action 
 of the ethics on the theology, or of the theology on 
 the ethics. Each in turn influenced the other. Be- 
 lief in a benignant Providence confirmed the doctrine 
 of the adiaphora> and this doctrine made that beliei 
 easier. 
 
 Assuming that such a relation of interaction 
 existed between the doctrines of Providence and of 
 things indifferent in the minds of the Stoical teachers, 
 we may regard them as making an important con- 
 tribution to the solution of the problem, How is the 
 providential order to be justified in view of the facts 
 of human experience ? It is an anticipation of what 
 Mr. Matthew Arnold calls the Christian ' method of 
 inwardness'; the method, that is to say, of seeking 
 happiness within, in the state of the heart, rather 
 than without in the state of fortune. The Stoics 
 taught : It must always be well with the good man ; 
 his felicity lies in a well-ordered mind, which is life 
 and peace. The outward ills which befall him are 
 of little account ; at the worst, they are light, easily 
 tolerable afflictions. This is obviously a decided 
 advance upon the Old Testament view, whether we 
 have regard to the more ancient theory championed 
 by Eliphaz in the Book of Job, according to which 
 outward lot and conduct uniformly correspond no 
 innocent person perishing or to the modified con- 
 ceptions of prophets like Jeremiah, which recognised 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 117 
 
 suffering on the part of the righteous as a fact, but 
 as a fact full of mystery and furnishing ground for 
 surprise and complaint. 1 It is equally an advance 
 on the ideas of the elder Greek tragedians, ^Eschylus 
 and Sophocles, which correspond respectively to 
 those of Eliphaz and Jeremiah. It falls short, on 
 the other hand, of the lofty thought enunciated in 
 the oracles of the second Isaiah, and re-echoed by 
 Euripides, that the sufferings of the good are not a 
 dismal fate involuntarily endured, but the free self- 
 sacrifice of love cheerfully offered for the benefit of 
 others. 2 Stoicism had not humanity enough to rise 
 to such a conception. Even when recognising the 
 existence of such instances of heroism, it would look 
 rather to the benefit accruing to the hero himself 
 than to that accruing to others. In discoursing on 
 the benefits derivable from all external ills, even 
 death, Epictetus uses as an illustration the story 
 of Menoekeus, on which he makes this comment : 
 'Think you, Mencekeus reaped little benefit when 
 he devoted himself to death ? Did he not preserve 
 his piety towards his country, his magnanimity, his 
 fidelity, his generosity? Had he preferred to live 
 would he not have lost all these, and acquired in- 
 stead the opposite vices cowardice, meanspiritcd- 
 ness, lack of patriotism, ignoble love of life ? ' 3 The 
 point made is, in its own place, not unimportant. It 
 
 1 Vide Lectures VI. and VII. 2 Vide Lecture III. 
 
 * Dissertationes, Book iii. c. 20, I. 
 
n8 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 is something to be able to say that outward ill, so 
 far from robbing the good of happiness, may even 
 promote the increase of that happiness by strength- 
 ening the virtue which is the sole fountain of all true 
 felicity. But when that alone is said in connection 
 with instances of self-sacrifice, a lesson is missed 
 of far greater importance for the vindication of the 
 providential order than the merely homeward-bound 
 view of affliction as useful to the individual sufferer. 
 
 The method of inwardness, as pursued by the 
 Stoics, is open to the objection that it makes the 
 way to peace too much of a short cut. They 
 minimised unduly the outward ills of life. It sounds 
 very philosophic to say : To the good no real evil can 
 happen, as to the evil no real good ; and to ply the 
 sorrow-laden with such admonitions as these: 'A 
 son has died ; it depends not on the will of man, 
 therefore it is not an evil. Caesar has condemned 
 you an involuntary event, therefore not evil ; you 
 have been led to prison so be it. Jove has done all 
 these things well, because he has made you able to 
 bear such things, made you magnanimous, provided 
 that no real evil should be in such experiences, made 
 it possible for you to be happy in spite of such 
 experiences.' 1 Men within the school might make 
 themselves believe that such considerations were con- 
 clusive, but those outside could not be expected to 
 acquiesce. It is not reasonable to ask men to accept 
 
 1 Epictetus, Dissertationes, iii. 8. 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 119 
 
 bereavement, condemnation by a judicial tribunal, 
 imprisonment, as matters of indifference, because 
 involuntary so far as the sufferer is concerned. Men 
 naturally wish to know how such events are to be 
 construed with reference to the will of the Supreme. 
 And when it is considered that the masters of the 
 school were wont to point to suicide as a door of 
 escape always open for the unhappy, it becomes 
 doubtful if even they were satisfied with their own 
 philosophy. Why fly from life if outward ill be 
 illusory? If there be a benignant Providence at 
 work in human experience, why not live on through 
 all possible experience, rejoicing evermore, praying 
 without ceasing, in everything giving thanks? 
 
 Dissatisfaction with the Stoic justification of 
 Providence finds forcible expression in Cicero's De 
 Natura Deorum, where, after the creed of the porch 
 has been sympathetically expounded by one inter- 
 locutor, Balbus, another, Cotta, is introduced sharply 
 criticising it. Among the trains of reflection put 
 into Cotta's mouth the following has a prominent 
 place. If the gods really care for the human race 
 they ought to make all men good ; at least they 
 ought to look after the interest of those who are 
 good. But do they? Is it not the fact that there 
 are many instances of good men suffering undeserved 
 calamity, and of bad men prospering? The argu- 
 ment winds up with the remark : * Time would fail if 
 I wished to recount the examples of good men over- 
 
120 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 taken with bad fortune and of evil men favoured 
 with good fortune.' Of course the case of Socrates 
 receives prominent mention. 'What,' asks the 
 sceptic, * shall I say of Socrates, whose death, as I 
 read, always brings the tears into my eyes? Surely 
 if the gods pay any attention to human affairs they 
 exercise very little discrimination.' 1 
 
 Here is the age-long problem of the sufferings of 
 the righteous stated, if not solved in the pages of the 
 philosophic Roman orator. The early Stoics, far 
 from solving the problem, hardly even stated it, their 
 exaggerated doctrine concerning the indifference of 
 outward ill preventing them. What grand possi- 
 bilities of sublime wrestling with an apparently un- 
 fathomable mystery they thereby missed we know 
 from the Book of Job. Suppose Zeno, Cleanthes, 
 and Chrysippus had occupied the place of Eliphaz, 
 Bildad, and Zophar, what would they have said to 
 the sufferer? Something like this : ' We hear, friend, 
 that the Sabaeans have stolen your oxen and asses, 
 and that your flocks of sheep have been destroyed 
 by lightning ; vex not yourself, these are merely 
 outward events independent of your will, therefore 
 no evils, to be treated as if they had not happened 
 by a wise man. We hear, moreover, that your sons 
 and daughters have been suddenly killed, amid their 
 festivities, by a tornado. It is a somewhat unusual 
 and startling event ; still, such things do occur now 
 
 1 Lib. iii. cc. 32, 33. 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 121 
 
 and then, and form part of the order of nature ; they 
 happen indifferently to all, irrespective of character ; 
 and when they happen they are purely external 
 events, therefore indifferent. For the rest : consider 
 that your children have been restored to the peace of 
 the pre-natal condition, and say to yourself: "When 
 I begot them I knew that they would have to die." 1 
 We not only have heard, we see, that you are afflicted 
 in your own person with a loathsome disease, wasting 
 and painful. This is harder to bear than all the 
 other ills, but the apathetic wise man is equal to the 
 task. Consider, Job : Pain has its seat in the body, 
 why should it disturb the peace of your mind?' 
 What would the man of Uz have thought of such 
 consolations? Would they have appeared to him an 
 improvement on the solemn homilies in vindication 
 of divine justice addressed to him by the friends who 
 had come to condole with him ? Which is the more 
 trying to patience to be told : ' You suffer much, 
 therefore you must be a very bad man ' ; or to be 
 told : * You are, we are sure, a very good man, but 
 you know you do not really suffer?' Perhaps there 
 is not much to choose between them. Let us be 
 thankful that the author of Job kept aloof from the 
 pedantries alike of Eliphaz and of Zeno ; that he 
 conceived of his hero as at once an exceptionally 
 good man and an exceptionally miserable man. For 
 
 1 Ego quum genui, turn moriturum scivi. Seneca, in Ad Polybium 
 ConsolattO) cxxx. 
 
122 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 by this sharp antithesis between conduct and lot 
 the problem of Providence in the individual life was 
 adequately stated, and a need for earnest discussion 
 created ; and if, after all that was said in the debate, 
 the problem remained unsolved, it was at least kept 
 open for other attempts by the ruthless sweeping 
 away of premature superficial solutions. The Stoic 
 solution was probably not before the writer's mind. 
 Had it been, we can imagine what his sound Hebrew 
 sense would have had to say about it : ' Destitution, 
 sorrow, pain, are not to be charmed away by fine 
 phrases. They are grim realities. They happen to 
 men under the Providence of God, and some account 
 of them must be given if faith in the justice and 
 goodness of God is not to make shipwreck.' 
 
 The later Stoics did make some attempt to supply 
 a rationale of the sufferings of the good, on the 
 assumption that these were real. Epictetus offered 
 as his contribution the idea that tribulation promotes 
 the development of heroic character. In an apologetic 
 discourse on Providence he asks : * What sort of a 
 man would Hercules have been had there not been 
 lions and hydras and stags and wild boars and 
 unrighteous savage men to fight with, and drive out 
 of the world ? What would he have been doing, had 
 not such beings existed? Spending his whole life 
 nodding in luxury and idleness, without any chance 
 of using his arms, strength, power of endurance, 
 generous disposition.' The moral of the life of 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 123 
 
 Hercules is thus pointed : * Come then, thou also, 
 look at the powers given thee, then say to Jove, 
 Bring any trial you please, for, lo! I have been 
 equipped by thee for beautifying myself by the 
 things which happen.' To such as are of a different 
 temper, preferring to sit and groan and complain in 
 presence of difficulties, he addresses the remon- 
 strance : * I can show you that you have been pro- 
 vided with talents and opportunities for the exercise 
 of magnanimity and fortitude ; show me, if you can, 
 what occasion you have for complaining and finding 
 fault.' 1 
 
 In his treatise De Providentia Seneca presents 
 some distinctive points of view. The aim of this 
 work is not to treat of Divine Providence in general, 
 but to discuss the special question, Why, if the world 
 be under a providential guidance, do so many evils 
 overtake good men? It abounds in fine thoughts 
 felicitously expressed, which, for the most part, must 
 here be left unnoticed. I can refer only to what 
 may be called the spectacular aspect under which 
 the subject is prominently, though not exclusively, 
 presented. Two thoughts fall under this category. 
 The first is that the sufferings of the good are a 
 pleasing sight to the gods ; the second, that they 
 make an important revelation of character to the 
 sufferers themselves and to their fellow-men. As to 
 the former, Seneca remarks : * I do not wonder if 
 
 1 Dissertations , i. 6. 
 
124 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 sometimes the gods are seized with a desire to see 
 great men struggling with calamity.' 1 He repre- 
 sents the gods as, like generals, placing the best men 
 in the posts of danger, and he counsels those so 
 placed to console themselves with the reflection : God 
 has deemed us worthy to be employed as a means 
 of ascertaining how much human nature can bear. 2 
 The use of trial for the revelation of character to 
 men is thus set forth : You are a great man ; but 
 how shall I know, if fortune give you no opportunity 
 of displaying your virtue? I judge you miserable 
 because you never have been miserable. You have 
 passed through life without an adversary. Nobody 
 will know what you could have done, not even you 
 yourself. There is need of trial for the knowledge 
 of ourselves. No one learns what he is good for 
 except by being tried. 3 You know the steersman 
 in a tempest, the soldier in battle. 4 Calamity is 
 the opportunity of virtue. 6 Fire proves gold, misery 
 brave men. 6 To other men the manifestation of a 
 heroic spirit conveys a lesson of endurance. The 
 suffering hero is born to be an example. 7 
 
 The general theory of Providence taught by the 
 early masters of the school might have been satis- 
 
 1 De Providentia^ cap. ii. s Ibid., cap. iv. 
 
 ' Ibid. , cap. iv. 
 
 4 Ibid., cap. iv. : ' Gubernatorem in tempestate, in acie militem 
 intelligas.' 
 
 8 Ibid., cap. v. : ' Calami tas virtutis occasio est.' 
 
 Jbid. t cap. v. * lbid. t cap. vi. 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 125 
 
 factory enough, if they had not done their best to 
 render it nugatory by dividing men into two classes, 
 one of which did not need God's care, and the other 
 did not deserve it. There was no lack of emphasis 
 in their assertion of the doctrine that God cares for 
 men. After God, they argued, there is nothing in 
 the world better than man, and nothing in man 
 better than reason. Therefore God must have 
 reason. The divine reason finds its proper occupa- 
 tion in caring for the world, providing for its per- 
 manence, furnishing it with all things needful, and 
 adorning it with beauty ; but above all in caring for 
 man. The world was made for beings endowed with 
 reason, gods and men. The care of God for man is 
 apparent in the structure of his body and the endow- 
 ment of his mind, and in the subservience of the 
 vegetable and animal creation to his benefit. Not 
 to see the evidence of divine care, especially in the 
 mind of man, is to be devoid of mind. As for the 
 body, it is enough to refer to the hand, with its 
 marvellous capacity of art, in the use of which men 
 can produce a second nature in the nature of things. 1 
 Most acceptable doctrine ; but when we view this 
 richly endowed being more closely, and consider the 
 account given of the use he makes of his reason, our 
 faith in his being the object of divine care is some- 
 what shaken. Human beings, we are told, consist of 
 
 1 Vide Cicero, De Natura Dearum, lib. ii., in which an account of 
 the teaching of the early masters on God and Providence is given. 
 
126 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 two classes : wise men and fools. The wise are those 
 who follow the dictates of reason ; the fools those 
 who disregard these dictates, and are blindly led by 
 false opinion and passion. The fools, it appears, 
 form the great majority ; almost the whole mass 
 indeed. And the fools are perfect fools. The wise 
 men also are perfectly wise. There is no shading ; 
 there are no degrees of folly and wisdom. Virtues 
 and vices respectively go in groups ; he that has one 
 virtue or vice has all, and each in perfection. This 
 idealising way of viewing character is not peculiar to 
 Stoicism, but the tendency to apply the category of 
 the absolute to ethical distinctions was never carried 
 to greater extravagance than by the Masters of the 
 Porch. It reached its highest point of fantastic 
 idealisation in the delineation of the Wise Man. 
 The Wise Man of Stoic theory cultivates all the 
 virtues ; does all things rightly ; is prophet, poet, 
 orator, priest ; is perfect in character, and endowed 
 with a felicity not inferior to that of the gods ; is 
 a free man and a king. He is invulnerable, not 
 because he cannot be struck, but because he cannot 
 be injured. Nothing hurts divinity; no arrow can 
 reach the sun. 1 He is absolutely self-reliant, and 
 totally indifferent to popular judgment. As the 
 stars move in a contrary direction to the world, so 
 he goes against the opinion of all. 2 He neither asks 
 
 1 Seneca, De Constantia Sapientis, cap. iv. 
 
 2 Ibid. cap. xiv. 
 
THE STOICS : PROVIDENCE 127 
 
 nor gives sympathy. In the proud consciousness of 
 virtue he feels no soft indulgence towards the bad, 
 but severely leaves them to endure the just penalty 
 of their folly. 
 
 This man needs not God's care. He is a god 
 himself. He is even superior to the gods in some 
 respects, e.g. in patience. They are beyond, he is 
 above, patience. He does not need even so much as 
 to believe in God. Like Buddha, he can do without 
 gods. The ethics of Stoicism have no need for a 
 theistic foundation ; they would suit the agnostic 
 better than the theist The Stoic wise man is 
 absolutely self-sufficient, and does not need to care 
 whether there be such a thing as a deity, a pro- 
 vidence, or a hereafter. He talks piously about the 
 gods, and about their care of men ; but this is merely 
 the accident of his position, the tribute he pays to 
 the time in which he lives. He might cast off his 
 creed like a suit of old garments, and it would make 
 no difference. The Stoic temper can survive Stoic 
 theology. The temper is indeed likely to survive 
 the theology, for it is apt to be the death of it. That 
 temper is much more hostile to true faith in divine 
 Providence than the belief in fate, destiny, and the 
 inexorable reign of law which formed a part of the 
 Stoic system of thought. The reign of physical law 
 in no way excludes a providential order of the world, 
 which simply means that the world, while mechani- 
 cally produced, has an aim to which the whole 
 
128 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 cosmos is subservient and each part in its relation 
 to the whole. But the proud self-sufficiency of the 
 sage stultifies the whole theory of a providential aim 
 guiding the mind of God, by making man, the crown 
 of creation, independent of God. 
 
 The Stoic scorn for fools tends in the same direc- 
 tion. Who can believe that God cares for a race 
 who, having received the gift of reason, almost with- 
 out exception make no use of it, and seem incapable 
 of being cured of their folly? The true disciple of 
 the porch did not believe it. His maxim was : ' God 
 cares for the great and neglects the small.' 1 The 
 sentiment, as put into the mouth of Balbus, the 
 advocate of Stoicism, by Cicero, means that divine 
 favour is not to be judged by outward chances such 
 as the destruction of a crop by a storm. We are 
 not to think that a man has been neglected by God 
 because such misfortunes befall him, if he be endowed 
 with the truer and more enduring riches of virtue. 
 The inner treasures are the great things ; the outer 
 goods of fortune are the small. But for the genuine 
 Stoic the adage was apt to bear another sense, viz. 
 that God cares for great men and neglects small 
 men. In his exposition of the doctrine of Pro- 
 vidence, Balbus maintains that the gods care not 
 only for the human race, but for individual men, for 
 men in the great divisions of the earth Europe, 
 
 1 Magna dii curanf, paroa negligunt. Cicero, De Natura Deorum, 
 lib. ii. cap. IxvL 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 129 
 
 Asia, and Africa ; and also for men living in Rome, 
 Athens, Sparta, and, among these, for particular men 
 named. 1 But the men named are all more or less 
 famous, concerning whom, and others like them, it 
 is affirmed that they could never have been the men 
 they were without divine aid. There is no mention, 
 even in a general way, of insignificant men as the 
 objects of God's care ; no hint that even the hairs 
 of their heads are all numbered. The pathos of the 
 doctrine of Providence, as taught by Jesus, is wholly 
 lacking in these grandiose demonstrations. ' Magna 
 Dii curant, parva negligunt' is the keynote of the 
 Stoic's providential psalm of praise. 
 
 Returning to the wise man of Stoic imagination, 
 the question arises, Where are men answering to the 
 description to be found ? The Stoics themselves 
 were obliged to admit that their number was few ; 
 but they ventured to name Socrates, Diogenes, and 
 Antisthenes among the Greeks, and Cato among the 
 Romans, whom the modern historian Mommsen 
 bluntly calls a fool. 2 The wise man of Stoicism is 
 in truth only an ideal. But he is none the less 
 important as an index of the spirit of the system. 
 There can be no better guide to the genius of a 
 religion or a philosophy than its moral ideal. The 
 
 1 Cicero, De Natura Deorum, lib. ii. cap. Ixvi. Balbus alludes to 
 the fact that Homer assigns to the leading heroes, Ulysses, Diomede, 
 Agamemnon, Achilles, divine companions in their trials and dangers. 
 
 2 Mommsen, The History of Xome, vol. iv. part ii. p. 448 ; English 
 translation by Dr. Dickson. 
 
 I 
 
130 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 wise man of Stoicism is as vital to it as the Buddha 
 to Buddhism, or the perfect man who studies the 
 law day and night to Judaism. The modifications 
 which Stoicism underwent in course of time tended 
 to gain for it wider currency, but they are not the 
 most reliable indication of the true temper of its 
 teachers. It is by the esoteric doctrine of Buddhism, 
 the law for the monk, rather than by its exoteric 
 doctrine, the law for the laity, that its true char- 
 acter is known. In like manner the apathetic sage, 
 passionlessly yet passionately following reason, is 
 the beau ideal of Stoicism, the revelation of its 
 inmost soul. Suppose, now, we saw the ideal 
 realised in a few rare specimens of humanity, what 
 would they look like? Like the blasted pines of the 
 Wengern Alp, standing near the summit of the pass, 
 leafless, barkless, sapless ; chilled to death by the 
 pitiless icy winds of winter blowing off the glaciers. 
 Compare this picture with that of the righteous man 
 of Hebrew poetry : ' He shall be like a tree planted 
 by the rivers of water,' with its leaf ever green and 
 bringing forth fruit in its season. 1 How poor a 
 character the cold, unsympathetic wise man of 
 Stoicism appears compared even with the tender- 
 hearted saint and sage of Buddhism ! Between the 
 Stoic wise man and the Jesus of the Gospels, the 
 friend of publicans and sinners, no comparison is 
 possible. Can we wonder that Stoicism, with all its 
 1 Psalm L 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 131 
 
 earnestness, remained an affair of the school? No 
 system of religious thought can make way in the 
 world which has no place in its ethical j^eal for pity; 
 no gospel for the weak. The Stoic was a Greek 
 Pharisee who thought himself better than other men, 
 and despised all whom he deemed his inferiors. He 
 had his reward. He enjoyed to the full his own 
 good opinion, and failed to win the trust and love of 
 his fellow-men. 
 
 In the foregoing paragraph I have referred to 
 modifications of the Stoic system as originally con- 
 structed. These were much needed in connection 
 with three salient features : the exaggerated concep- 
 tion of the wise man, the doctrine that pain is no 
 evil, and the connected doctrine of apathy. Shading 
 was introduced into the first by substituting, in the 
 place of the ideal wise man, the man who, though 
 he hath not attained nor is already perfect, yet is 
 advancing onwards towards the goal. In connection 
 with the second it was found necessary to introduce 
 distinctions among the things which rigid theory 
 had slumped together as indifferent, and to divide 
 these into three classes the things to be desired, the 
 things to be avoided, and the intermediate class of 
 things neither to be desired nor to be avoided, to 
 which the title 'indifferent* is properly applicable. 
 In the first class were included such physical endow- 
 ments as were favourable to virtue bodily health, 
 riches, honour, good descent, and the like. Finally, 
 
132 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 the apathy of theory was toned down by a gracious 
 permission to the wise to indulge natural feeling to 
 a certain measured extent ; to rejoice in prosperity 
 and grieve under bereavement, to commiserate the 
 unfortunate, and to give play to the sentiment of 
 friendship. 
 
 It was, as might have been expected when 
 Stoicism became naturalised in the Roman world, 
 towards the beginning of the Christian era, and 
 from that time onwards, that it underwent this 
 humanising transformation. The austere Roman 
 nature presented a promising stock whereon to graft 
 the philosophy of the porch, but Roman good sense 
 was not likely to adopt without qualification the 
 paradoxes and subtleties of Greek theorists. While 
 welcoming the system in its main outlines, and 
 especially in its characteristic temper, Roman 
 disciples supplied at the same time the needful 
 corrective. Cicero, one of the earliest Roman ad- 
 mirers, if not an abject disciple, of Stoicism, reveals 
 in his writings the common Roman attitude. In the 
 second of his Tusculan Questions^ having for its 
 theme how to bear grief, he treats as a mere ex- 
 travagance the doctrine of Zeno, that pain is no 
 evil. ' Nothing is evil, he teaches, save what is 
 base and vicious. This is trifling. You do not by 
 saying this remove what was troubling me.' 1 
 Seneca, coming a century later, about the begin- 
 
 1 Tuscu!. Qu<rst. t lib. ii. cap. xiu 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 133 
 
 ning of our era, 1 rebukes the pride of the Stoic wise 
 man by frank confession of personal moral infirmity, 
 and by equally frank proclamation of the evil bias 
 of human nature. c We have all sinned/ he sadly 
 owns, * some gravely, others less grievously ; some 
 deliberately, others under impulse, or carried away 
 by evil example. Some of us have stood in good 
 counsels with little firmness, and have involuntarily 
 and reluctantly lost our innocence. We not only 
 come short, but we will continue to do so to the end 
 of life. If any one has so well purged his mind that 
 nothing can any more disturb and deceive it, he has 
 still come to innocence through sin/ 2 This con- 
 fession occurs in a treatise entitled De dementia, 
 and it is meant to suggest a motive for the exercise 
 of mercy, a virtue to which Stoics were not prone. 
 As one reads the penitent acknowledgments of the 
 Roman courtier he is reminded of the Pauline sen- 
 timent : ' Considering thyself, lest thou also be 
 tempted/ 8 
 
 With not less emphasis than Cicero, Seneca dis- 
 sents from the Stoic doctrine concerning pain. ' I 
 know,' he says, ' that there are some men of severe 
 rather than brave prudence who assert that the wise 
 man will not grieve. They must speak of what 
 they have never experienced, else fortune would 
 
 1 Cicero was born 106 B.C., Seneca probably a few years before the 
 commencement of our era. 
 
 8 De dementia^ cap. vi. * Galatians vi. I. 
 
134 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 nave shaken out of them this proud wisdom, and 
 driven them in spite of themselves to a confession of 
 the truth. Reason demands no more than that 
 grief be free from excess.' 1 Some have doubted 
 whether Seneca could have referred in such un- 
 sympathetic terms to a sentiment so characteristic 
 of Stoicism, and have found in the passage quoted a 
 ground for calling in question the authenticity of the 
 work in which it occurs, the Consolatio ad Polybium. 
 But the plea for the legitimacy of grief takes its 
 place beside that for the exercise of mercy, as an 
 appropriate feature of Roman Stoicism. 
 
 Epictetus, the Phrygian, was of sterner stuff than 
 Seneca. He had been a slave before he became 
 a teacher ; he was lame and of a sickly constitution. 
 This hard lot had bred in him the temper of an 
 out-and-out Stoic, or even of a Cynic ; so that he 
 was ready to accept without abatement the dogma : 
 Pain no evil. But the same severe experience had 
 opened his naturally generous heart to a sympathy 
 with the weak more akin to Christianity than to 
 Stoicism. In his teaching God is not the God of the 
 wise only, but of all, wise and foolish alike. No 
 human being is an orphan, for God is a Father 
 exercising a constant care over all. 2 On the ground 
 of the universal Fatherhood of God he inculcates 
 humanity in the treatment of slaves. To one who 
 
 1 Ad Polybium Consolatio, cap. xxxvii. 
 8 Pissertationes, in. xxiv. I. 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 135 
 
 is represented as asking : ' How can you put up with 
 a slave who, when you call for hot water, pays 
 no attention or brings water lukewarm?' he replies: 
 ' Slave ! can you not bear with your own brother 
 who takes his origin from Jove, as a son born of the 
 same seed as yourself?' 1 so giving to the idea that 
 men are God's offspring, in the hymn of Cleanthes, 
 a breadth of application which its author in all pro- 
 bability did not dream of. 
 
 In two respects the later Roman Stoicism was no 
 improvement on the earlier, viz. : the practice of 
 suicide and the view entertained of the future life. 
 The former is one of the most perplexing features of 
 the system. It is hard to reconcile with Stoic prin- 
 ciples either the wish or the temptation to put an end 
 to one's life. The Stoic had unbounded faith in the 
 will of the universe, which for him was revealed in 
 events. With Epictetus he would say: 'Desire nothing 
 to happen as you wish, but wish things to happen as 
 they do'; 2 and with Marcus Aurelius : * Whatever is 
 agreeable to thee, O universe, is agreeable to me; 
 nothing is early or late for me that is seasonable for 
 you.' 3 Is it not a corollary from this that one 
 should be content to let life last as long as it can, 
 viewing the mere physical power to last as an indica- 
 tion of God's will ? Was it not an illogical as well 
 as an unworthy proceeding on the part of Zeno and 
 
 1 DissertationtSy I. xiii. I. 2 Enchiridion, cap. viii. 
 
 * Meditationes, Book iv. cap. xxiii. 
 
136 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Cleanthes to inaugurate the bad fashion of taking 
 the work of putting a period to their lives out of the 
 hands of nature? Then what need or temptation 
 to pursue this self-willed course could arise for one 
 who believed that disease and pain and all things 
 that tend to produce life-weariness are no real evils ? 
 Yet the legitimacy of suicide was maintained by 
 all Stoics, not excepting Seneca, Epictetus, and the 
 Emperor Aurelius. ' If you do not wish to fight/ 
 said Seneca, 'you can flee; God hath made nothing 
 easier than to die.' 1 'God hath opened the door,' 
 said Epictetus ; ' when things do not please you, go 
 out and do not complain.' 2 ' If the room smokes I 
 leave it/ 3 was the homely figure under which the 
 Stoic ruler of Rome still more cynically expressed 
 the right of men to renounce life when they were 
 tired of it. 
 
 That Stoicism gave an uncertain sound on the 
 future life is not surprising. A firm, consistent 
 doctrine on that subject could hardly be expected 
 from a philosophy whose theory of the universe 
 was a heterogeneous combination of materialism, 
 pantheism, and theism. Even the founders of the 
 school do not seem to have been of one mind 
 on the subject. Zeno thought that the souls 
 of men might survive death and maintain their 
 separate existence till the general conflagration 
 
 1 De Providentia, cap. vi. 2 Dissertationes> lib. iii. cap. viii 
 
 * McdilationeSi v. 29. 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 137 
 
 when, with the rest of the universe, they would 
 be absorbed into the primaeval fire. Chrysippus 
 restricted the honour of such a survival to the wise. 
 The Stoics of the Roman period seem to be in doubt 
 whether, even in the case of the wise, death will not 
 mean final extinction of being. To the question, 
 How can the gods suffer good men to be extin- 
 guished at death ? Marcus Aurelius replies : ' If it be 
 so then it is right, if it be not right then the gods 
 have ordered it otherwise.' 1 To a mother grieving 
 over the loss of a beloved son, all the consolation 
 Seneca has to offer is such as can be extracted from 
 reflections like these : ' Death is the solution and end 
 of all griefs, and restores us to the tranquillity in 
 which we reposed before we were born. Death is 
 neither good nor evil. That can be good or evil 
 which is something, but that which is itself nothing 
 and reduces all things to nothing, delivers us to no 
 fortune.' 2 
 
 But let our last word concerning the Stoics be one 
 of appreciation. They have added to the spiritual 
 treasures of the human race a devout, religious 
 tone and a serviceable moral temper. The religious 
 tone finds characteristic expression in the hymn of 
 Cleanthes, in some utterances of Epictetus, and in 
 the general strain of the Meditations of Aurelius. 
 
 1 Meditationes, xii. 5. 
 
 8 Ad Marciam Consolatio, cap. xix. But there are passages to a 
 different effect in SenecaVwritings. 
 
138 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 The keynote of Stoic piety is struck in the open- 
 ing sentences of the hymn. 'Thee it is lawful 
 for all mortals to address. For we are thy 
 offspring, and alone of living creatures possess a 
 voice which is the image of reason. Therefore I 
 will for ever sing thee and celebrate thy power.' 1 
 The sayings of Epictetus breathe throughout the 
 spirit of childlike trust in God, of thankfulness for 
 the blessings of Providence, and of cheerful sub- 
 mission to the divine will. The prevailing mood 
 finds culminating utterance in the closing sentences 
 of one of his discourses on the providential order. 
 1 What then, since most of you are blind, were it not 
 needful that some one should perform this function 
 (of praise), and on behalf of all sing a hymn to God ? 
 For, what else am I, an old man, good for except to 
 praise God? If I were a nightingale, I should do 
 the part of a nightingale, if a swan, the part of a 
 swan ; but being a rational creature I must praise 
 God. This is my work and I do it. I will keep 
 this post as long as I may, and I exhort you to join 
 in the chorus.' 2 The same spirit pervades the Medi- 
 tations of the Stoic Emperor, only in them the note 
 of sadness predominates. 
 
 The ethical temper of Stoicism is not faultless. It 
 is too self-reliant, too proud, too austere. Never- 
 
 1 From translation by Sir Alexander Grant in Oxford Essays, 1858, 
 p. 96. 
 
 1 Dissertations, lib. i. cap. 16. 
 
THE STOICS: PROVIDENCE 139 
 
 theless it is the temper of the hero, whose nature it 
 is to despise happiness so-called, to curb passion, 
 and to make duty his chief end and chief good. A 
 little of this temper helps one to play the man, and 
 fight successfully the battle of life, especially at 
 the critical turning-points in his experience. If the 
 mood pass with the crisis, and give place to a softer, 
 gentler mind, no matter. It is well to go from the 
 school of the porch to the Schola ChristL But 
 Stoicism has much in common with Christianity ; 
 this above all, that it asserts with equal emphasis 
 the infinite worth of man. It backs man against 
 the whole universe. In view of the importance of 
 the doctrine we can pardon the extravagance with 
 which it is asserted, and even think kindly of the 
 Stoic wise man. The very existence of a man like 
 Epictetus, a slave yet recognised within the school 
 as a good man and a philosopher, helps us to 
 measure the distance that had been travelled in the 
 direction of Christian sentiment since the time of 
 Plato and Aristotle. To both these philosophers 
 the very idea would have appeared a profanity. 1 
 
 1 Vide Bosanquet, Civilisation of Christendom, p. 43. 
 
LECTURE V 
 
 DIVINATION 
 
 IT is not unfitting that a study of Divination in its 
 bearing on the providential order should form the 
 sequel to our discussion of the opinions of the Stoics 
 on the same theme. For the philosophers of the 
 porch took a prominent place among the defenders 
 of the reality of divination, and of its importance 
 as a manifestation of the divine care for men. Zeno, 
 as we learn from Cicero, sowed the seeds of the 
 doctrine, Cleanthes adding somewhat to the store 
 of seminal utterances, while the third of the great 
 founders, Chrysippus, dealt with the subject in a 
 more elaborate manner in two books, adding another 
 on oracles, and a fourth on dreams. The tenets of 
 these masters became the orthodox tradition of 
 the school, which was followed without dissent till 
 Panaetius, who introduced the Stoic philosophy to 
 the knowledge of the Romans, about a century and 
 a half before the Christian era, ventured to hint a 
 modest doubt far from welcome to other members 
 of the sect. 1 It happens, however, that, while few 
 
 1 Cicero, De Divinationt^ lib. i. cap. iii. 
 140 
 
DIVINATION Ut 
 
 of the Stoics called in question the accepted doctrine 
 on divination, some of them have bequeathed to us 
 sayings which, possibly without any intention on 
 their part, can be used with effect in undermining 
 that very faith in the diviner's art which the 
 originators of the school had made it their business 
 to propagate. On this ground also it is suitable 
 that the topic should be taken up at this stage. 
 
 The Stoic interest in divination was mixed up 
 with the general conceptions of the school concern- 
 ing God and Providence. The three topics God, 
 Providence, and Divination formed a closely con- 
 nected group in their minds. Belief in any one 
 of the three was held to imply belief in the rest, 
 so that each of them in turn, assumed as admitted, 
 might be used to prove the others. According to 
 the purpose in view it was argued now, if there be 
 anything in divination then there are gods ; and 
 at another time, if there be gods then divination 
 must be a reality. Cicero has given us in short 
 compass the logic of the Stoics in plying the latter 
 of these two complementary arguments. It is as 
 follows. * If there be gods, and yet they do not 
 make known to men beforehand the things which 
 are to come to pass, either they do not love men, 
 or they do not know what is going to happen, or 
 they think that men have no interest in knowing 
 what is going to happen, or they think it beneath 
 their dignity to reveal the future, or such revelation 
 
i 4 * THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 is beyond their power. But they do love us, for they 
 are beneficent, and friendly to the human race : they 
 are not ignorant of things which they themselves 
 have ordained ; it is our interest to know what is 
 going to happen, for we will be more cautious if 
 we know ; the gods do not account revelation of the 
 future beneath their dignity, for nothing is more be- 
 coming than beneficence ; and it is in their power 
 to know the future. Therefore it cannot be affirmed 
 that gods exist, yet do not by signs reveal the future. 
 But there are gods, therefore they give signs. But 
 if they give signs they must also put within men's 
 reach the science of their interpretation, for the one 
 without the other would be useless. But this science 
 is divination. Therefore divination is a reality.' 1 
 Thus reasoned Chrysippus, Diogenes, and Antipater ; 
 acutely if not irrefutably. 
 
 Belief in divination was not the monopoly of a 
 school or a nation, but a common feature of all 
 ancient ethnic religion. 'What king,' asks the 
 apologist of the belief in Cicero's treatise, 'what 
 king ever was there, what people, that did not 
 employ the diviner's art?' 2 That art had great 
 vogue, especially in Greece and Rome. The fact, 
 it has been suggested, is to be accounted for by 
 the consideration that these energetic peoples 
 naturally found the chief interest of religion in its 
 
 1 Cicero, De Divinatione, lib. i. cap. xxxviii. 
 * Ibid., lib. i. cap. xliii. 
 
DIVINATION 143 
 
 bearing on this life. 1 But this remark holds true 
 not merely in reference to the Greeks and Romans ; 
 it applies to pagans generally. Absorbing concern 
 for the temporal is a characteristic of all peoples 
 in a rudimentary moral condition. 'After all these 
 things do the Gentiles seek.' Their very prayers 
 are for material benefits, as one can see in the Vedic 
 hymns. The summum bonum of crude religions 
 consists in the gifts of fortune. And wherever 
 these gifts are chiefly sought after, the arts of 
 divination will flourish. Who will show us any 
 good in store for us in the future? is the question 
 on the lips of many, and wherever keen curiosity 
 as to the secrets of to-morrow prevails, there will 
 always be men offering themselves who profess 
 ability to meet the demand, by drawing aside the 
 veil of mystery which hides things to come from 
 human eyes. 
 
 Divination may be regarded as a primitive form 
 of revelation, and when placed under this category 
 it gains in dignity. Nothing can be more natural, 
 rational, and praiseworthy, on the part of beings 
 endowed with reason, than the desire to know God.. 
 Show me Thy glory, show me Thy ways, show me 
 Thy will, are prayers of which not even the wisest 
 and most saintly have cause to be ashamed. What 
 is there better worth knowing than the nature, 
 
 1 A. Bouche-Leclerq, Histoire de la Divination dans ?Antiquile t 
 vol. i. p. 3. 
 
*44 ttt MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 thoughts, purposes of the great mysterious Being 
 who made and sustains this world ? But all depends 
 on the kind of knowledge sought. There are two 
 kinds of knowledge which a son may desire to have 
 concerning his father. He may wish to know his 
 father's thoughts about right and wrong, what he 
 approves and what he disapproves, what he loves 
 and admires, and what he hates and despises, that 
 he may order his own life so as to win the com- 
 mendation of one whom he instinctively reveres. 
 Or he may wish to know how much his father is 
 worth, and what share of his fortune will fall to 
 his own portion by his will when he dies, and to 
 what extent a life of pleasure will thus be put 
 within his reach in the years to come. The one 
 kind of knowledge is the desire of a noble-minded 
 son, the other of a son the reverse of noble-minded. 
 Equally diverse in character may be the revelations 
 men seek concerning God. The devout wish of 
 one man may be simply to know God's spirit, His 
 thoughts towards men, whether they be gracious 
 or the reverse, to be assured of His goodwill, and 
 to be informed as to the kind of conduct that 
 pleases Him. With this knowledge he will be 
 content, living a life of trust and obedience, and 
 for the rest leaving his times, his whole future, in 
 God's hands, without curiosity or care as to what 
 to-morrow may bring. The eager desire of another 
 man may be to obtain just that kind of know- 
 
DIVINATION 145 
 
 ledge concerning God's purposes about which the 
 first-named person is wholly indifferent, detailed 
 information as to coming events in his future 
 experience : when he is to die, how and where, 
 the ups and downs in his way of life, the good 
 and evil, fortune and misfortune, in his lot. The 
 first kind of knowledge alone deserves the name 
 of revelation. It is ethical in character, and it 
 makes for a life of righteousness and wisdom. The 
 second kind of knowledge, if attainable, is of no 
 moral value, and bears no worthy fruit in conduct. 
 The desire for it has its root in secularity of mind, 
 and the real or imaginary gratification of it can 
 only tend to a more abject bondage to the secular 
 spirit. 
 
 The agent of revelation in connection with the 
 higher kind of knowledge above described is the 
 prophet, in connection with the lower the diviner 
 or soothsayer. The characters of the two types of 
 agents are as diverse as their occupations. The 
 prophet is a man of simple, pure, unworldly spirit. 
 He has a consuming passion for truth. His one 
 desire is to know God as manifested in the world 
 He has made, and in the history of mankind, and 
 with absolute sincerity and unreserve to make 
 known to others the vision he has seen. He has 
 also a passion for righteousness as, in his judgment, 
 the highest interest of life, and he makes it his 
 business to preach the great doctrine that a people 
 
 K 
 
146 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 doing justly must prosper, has nothing to fear 
 from the future, can defy all adverse fortune. But 
 the diviner: what sort of a man is he? By the 
 impartial testimony of history, a repulsive com- 
 bination of superstition, greed, fraud, pretension, 
 and ambition. Anything but a simple-minded man 
 is the soothsayer ; rather is he dark, enigmatical, 
 inscrutable. ' Worthless, and full of falsehood are 
 the utterances of soothsayers,' asserts vehemently 
 Euripides. 1 ' The whole tribe of diviners are 
 covetous/ 2 declares, with no less emphasis, 
 Sophocles. With this scorn and contempt of the 
 Greek tragedians harmonises the tone in which 
 Hebrew prophets ever speak of the fortune-telling 
 tribe in their Semitic world. 
 
 Yet we must not judge of all who, in primitive 
 times, believed in and practised divination, by the 
 depraved character of the professional diviner of a 
 later age. The two kinds of knowledge above 
 contrasted might be combined as objects of desire 
 in the religious consciousness, and both might be 
 sought in perfect simplicity of heart. Why should 
 not God communicate both to them that loved 
 Him ; reveal to them the law of duty as summed 
 up in the Decalogue, and make known also the 
 good and evil that were to befall them in the 
 future? The law of chastity was written on the 
 heart of Joseph, as his behaviour in the house of 
 
 1 Helena, 745, 746. 2 Antigone, 1036. 
 
DIVINATION 147 
 
 Potiphar attests. He feared God from his youth, 
 and set moral duty above all considerations of 
 advantage. But Joseph was also a dreamer of 
 dreams, which he regarded as divine intimations of 
 coming events in his own life ; and he was an 
 interpreter of the dreams of others, in which he 
 found pre-intimations of years of plenty and of 
 famine in the near future of the land of Egypt. 
 Joseph had the prophet's love of righteousness, yet 
 he could divine. In those simple times men would 
 view his divining talent as the natural result of his 
 righteousness. To whom should the secret of the 
 Lord be revealed but to them that feared Him, to 
 a Joseph or to a Daniel? The Stoics said that 
 the wise man alone can divine. 1 That sentiment 
 was a survival of the feeling of far back antiquity. 
 In the mouth of the Stoics it seems an anachronism, 
 for by their time it had been made manifest that 
 the ways of the diviner and the ways of wisdom 
 and goodness were apt to lie far apart, and that 
 lovers of wisdom, like Sophocles and Euripides, 
 were inclined to show their bias by expressing 
 abhorrence for the diviner's character, and their 
 unbelief in the value of his pretended revelations. 
 But in claiming the diviner's vocation for the wise, 
 the Stoics were simply repeating the verdict of the 
 tragic poets in a different form. They acknowledged 
 the degeneracy, but refused to despair of the art. 
 
 1 Vide Stobaei, Eclog., lib. ii. 238. 
 
i 4 8 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 They aimed at reform rather than destruction. 
 ' Divination,' they said in effect, * is a sorry business 
 as actually practised, but put it into the hands of 
 the wise man and all will be well. 1 Perhaps so, but 
 what if the wise man declined the honour? That 
 is what we should expect from the wise man as 
 conceived by the Stoics. 
 
 The media of revelation at the diviner's disposal 
 were manifold. He could range over the wide 
 region of the fortuitous, the unusual, and the 
 marvellous, assumed to be specially significant. 
 Whatever in the heavens or the earth, or beneath 
 the earth, or in the aerial spaces, was fitted to 
 arrest attention or awaken the sense of mystery 
 and awe, might be expected to yield significant 
 omens to those who had the eye to see and the 
 ear to hear. The whole world was full of signs, 
 hinting meanings bearing on the fortunes of men, 
 and revealing to those who could understand the 
 secrets of the past and the present, and above all 
 of the future. There were signs in the stars, in the 
 thunder-storm, in the flight and song of birds, in 
 the murmur of the wind among the leaves of an oak- 
 tree, in the livers of sacrificial victims, in the visions 
 of the dreamer, and in the utterances of madmen. 
 The question was not, where could the voice 
 of God be heard, but where could it not be 
 heard ? There was a plethora of revelation, and it 
 was a matter of taste to which department in the 
 
DIVINATION 149 
 
 ample compass of the soothsayer's art any one 
 might devote himself. There was room and need 
 for specialisation, that every sort of divination 
 might have its experts. If one method of ascer- 
 taining the divine will went out of fashion, it did 
 not greatly matter, another was sure to take its 
 place. One people might learn from another. The 
 Chaldaeans were the masters of astrology. The 
 Greeks had their far-famed Delphic oracle. The 
 Etruscans were the inventors of fulgural divination 
 and of haruspicy. 
 
 Among the most ancient and most interesting 
 forms of divination was that of augury, which sought 
 to ascertain the will of the gods by observing the 
 flight and the song of birds. Its prevalence and 
 popularity in Greece from an early period is attested 
 by the fame of Tiresias and Calchas in mythological 
 story, and by the use of the Greek name for a bird, 
 opvw, in Athenian speech, as a generic name for all 
 presages. The chief place among the birds of fate 
 was assigned to the eagle, the vulture, the raven, and 
 the crow ; but before all to the high-flying birds of 
 prey which appear to reach heaven. 1 These messen- 
 gers of Zeus, on whose cries and movements so 
 much was believed to depend, filled the breasts of 
 simple-minded beholders with superstitious awe. 
 Even free - thinking philosophers, living after the 
 
 1 Vide Nagelsbach, Die nachhomerische Theologie des Griechischen 
 VolksglaubenS) p. 164. 
 
150 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 commencement of the Christian era, like Celsus and 
 Porphyry, ascribed to the eagle and other omen- 
 bearing birds greater importance than to man. The 
 feeling of more ancient times is happily reflected in 
 the Ion of Euripides. The foundling of that name is 
 temple-sweeper in the shrine of Apollo his father, at 
 Delphi. One of his menial duties is to keep the 
 birds from defiling the sacred edifice. But they 
 come one after another ; now an eagle, now a swan, 
 now some other winged creature, from Mount 
 Parnassus, or the Delian lake, or the banks of the 
 Alpheus. Ion warns them off, bids them return to 
 their accustomed haunts, even threatens them with 
 an arrow from his bow. But he has not the courage 
 to carry out his threat ; boy though he be, he is 
 restrained by religious awe. ' I am afraid to kill 
 you, who announce to mortals the messages of the 
 gods/ 1 Euripides had no faith in divination in any 
 form, but augury had a romantic side which would 
 appeal to him as a poet. 
 
 The same thing cannot be said of haruspicy, that 
 form of divination which sought divine omens in the 
 bowels of slaughtered animals. This contribution to 
 the resources of the soothsayer's art is as unromantic 
 and unpoetical, not to say repulsive, as can be con- 
 ceived. One can with difficulty imagine a people 
 
 y/ij aldovfj.au, 
 roift 6cut> dyyAXovraj <f) 
 ls.fon t 179, l8o. 
 
DIVINATION 151 
 
 like the Greeks adopting it, not to speak of originat- 
 ing it. Its proper home was among the Etruscans, 
 but it soon migrated to Rome, where it found a con- 
 genial harbour among a prosaic, utilitarian race. 
 Cicero, no believer in divination, thought the best 
 way of making this art ridiculous was to tell the 
 grotesque story of its discovery, which was to the 
 following effect. A certain person named Tages 
 suddenly arose in a deep-drawn furrow in a field 
 which was being ploughed, and spoke to the plough- 
 man. This Tages was described in the Etruscan 
 books as a boy in face but with an old man's wisdom. 
 The ploughman, amazed at the apparition, expressed 
 his surprise with a shout which drew a crowd to the 
 spot, to which the stranger with the boy's face and 
 the old man's mind communicated the rudiments of 
 the haruspicine art. What need, adds the narrator, 
 of a Carneades or an Epicurus to refute such absurdi- 
 ties ? Who can believe in a creature, call him god or 
 man, ploughed up in a field? 1 The conception is 
 certainly grotesque enough, and it seems to imply a 
 lurking feeling that the art which formed the subject 
 of this strange being's course of instruction could 
 never have entered into the mind of any ordinary 
 human being. And yet, to do the Etruscans justice, 
 it must be owned that if there was any reality in 
 divination, and if the assumptions on which it rested 
 had any validity, the inspection of entrails was just 
 
 1 De DivinationC) lib. ii. cap. xxii. 
 
152 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 as natural, and rational, as any other divinatory 
 practice. All who offered sacrifices to the gods had 
 a vital interest in making sure that the victims would 
 be acceptable, and so obtain the benefit sought. 
 External qualities, such as freedom from blemish, or 
 the possession of certain marks, could be ascertained 
 while the animal was living, but the interior of the 
 body could be inspected only after death. 1 But why 
 inspect the interior if the exterior was in order? 
 Because it was one of the assumptions on which 
 divination rested that the unusual was significant. 
 Suppose, now, some peculiarity was discovered, 
 possibly by accident, in the liver of a dead animal 
 intended for sacrifice. How natural the thought : 
 'This means something. What if a victim with this 
 peculiarity were unacceptable to the deity we desire 
 to propitiate? It may seem a small matter, but 
 nothing is small in the ritual of sacrifice, on which 
 so much depends.' The moment these thoughts 
 entered the mind of a priestly functionary the art of 
 haruspicy was on the point of being born. 
 
 One would think that the stars were too far away 
 to run any risk of falling within the diviner's cog- 
 nisance. Yet astrology prevailed in the East 
 generally, and especially in Chaldaea, and in Egypt, 
 from a very early time. It spread to the West 
 about the beginning of the Christian era, and, in 
 spite of severe discouragement at the hands of the 
 
 1 So Nagelsbach, Nachhomcrischt Theohgit, p. 167. 
 
DIVINATION 153 
 
 Imperial government, it steadily gained ground, 
 until it finally eclipsed all other forms of divination, 
 including haruspicy. Even since the era of modern 
 science dawned, some distinguished students of 
 nature have not been insensible to its fascinations. 
 Nor, when we reflect on the matter, is this difficult 
 to understand. The only postulate required to start 
 the astrologer on his career is that the stars, fixed 
 and wandering, like the sun and moon, are there for 
 the service of man. The service rendered by the 
 sun is immense. His light and heat are the life 
 of the world. The moon is emphatically the lesser 
 light, yet she does in a humbler way for the night 
 what the sun does more perfectly for the day : yields 
 light to guide the path of men. What then is the 
 function of the stars, so multitudinous in number? 
 The light they give, notwithstanding their vast 
 number, is insignificant ; they must therefore have 
 been set in the sky for some other purpose than that 
 of illumination. Or rather, may one not say: If they 
 also are to be regarded as luminaries, the light they 
 give must be not that which is appreciable by the 
 physical eye, but that rather which addresses itself to 
 the contemplative mind brooding over the mysteries 
 of human life? May the motions and positions of 
 the stars not give a clue to the diversity of human 
 experience? Suppose we. try. Let us divide the 
 starry sphere into twelve divisions, or houses, like 
 twelve liths of an orange, six above the horizon, 
 
154 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 and six below, assigning to each a distinctive char- 
 acter and its own measure of influence on human 
 destiny. Then let us observe the position of these 
 houses at the birth-hour of this or that human being, 
 say the child of a king, or of a prince or a sage, and 
 let us watch throughout the years which follow how 
 far the actual career of those whose nativity was cast 
 corresponds with what the astrological indications 
 led us to expect. If in the life-histories of some 
 notable men remarkable correspondences are dis- 
 covered, then the hypothesis that the positions of 
 the heavenly bodies, if they do not exert a causal 
 influence upon, do at least help us to predict, the 
 course of human destiny, may be regarded as estab- 
 lished. This conception of the movements of the 
 stars as in a pre-established harmony with the 
 changes in man's life has a certain magnificence 
 about it which appeals to the imagination ; and we 
 can easily understand how it should commend itself 
 to the Stoics, with their pantheistic theory of solid- 
 arity binding together all parts of the universe, and 
 even to an astronomer like Kepler. 
 
 The far-famed Delphic Oracle supplies an instance 
 in which the natural medium of revelation was a 
 subterranean influence in the form of an intoxicating 
 vapour, which, when inhaled by the priestess sitting 
 on the tripod over the chasm whence the exhalation 
 proceeded, inspired her with the gift of prophecy. 
 The unusual character of the phenomenon seemed to 
 
DIVINATION 155 
 
 point it out as available for divining purposes, and 
 the alleged effect, in an age when divination was 
 believed in, would be regarded as amply justifying 
 expectation. The solitude of the spot and its sublime 
 surroundings, hemmed in by mountain precipices, were 
 fitted to create on susceptible minds the impression 
 that here, if anywhere, the gods might be expected to 
 speak to men. In the Homeric hymn to the Pythian 
 Apollo that god is represented as seeking for a spot 
 where he may found an oracle, and on coming to 
 Crissa under Mount Parnassus, as finding there a 
 place manifestly marked out for the purpose by its 
 seclusion and by the grandeur of its environment. 1 
 The wisdom of his selection was proved by the 
 event. The oracle of Delphi became renowned 
 throughout Greece and beyond, and eclipsed all 
 other means of ascertaining the divine will. It was 
 noj/the only oracle in Greece. There were oracles 
 of gods, demons, and heroes ; and in particular one 
 at Dodona, sacred to Zeus, whose prestige lay in its 
 great antiquity. Its divine signs were the sound 
 of the rushing wind among the leaves of an oak, the 
 murmur of a spring at its foot, and a caldron or pan 
 of bronze suspended on its branches with a chain that 
 knocked in the breeze against its side and spoke 
 divine messages to the devout ear. In the old times 
 of orthodox Pagan faith they were wont to speak of 
 the basin that is never silent, and when a new faith 
 
 1 Ilgen's Hymni ffomerici, p. 13. 
 
156 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 had come in its adherents said in triumph : ' The oak 
 speaks no more,' 'the caldron prophesies no more.' 
 But Delphi outshone Dodona, and still more did it 
 extinguish the light of individual diviners of the type 
 of Calchas and Tiresias. It grew to be the centre of 
 a wealthy religious corporation, and it became an 
 important factor in the political history of Grecian 
 states, through the answers which it gave to those 
 who sought its guidance in affairs of grave import. 
 These answers were rendered more imposing by 
 being delivered at first in, or translated into, hexa- 
 meters. The poetry, if it came from the lips of the 
 Pythia, must be put to the credit of the inspiring 
 god ; for the qualification for being a good Pythian 
 prophetess was to be entirely passive under divine 
 influence, a mere mechanical mouthpiece of Apollo. 
 The time came when poetry gave way to plain prose, 
 and the fame of the oracle began to decline. It fell 
 into disrepute when Greece lost its independence 
 under Macedonia and Rome. From that time it 
 ceased to be a political power, and degenerated into 
 an establishment for carrying on the trade of vulgar 
 soothsaying. 
 
 This decline became a subject of anxious reflection 
 to devout adherents of the old religion. In an essay 
 on the cessation of oracles, Plutarch offers tentative 
 solutions. It was a natural subject of discussion for 
 one who had studied philosophy at Delphi, and had 
 an opportunity of observing how the glory of the 
 
DIVINATION 157 
 
 oracle had departed in the age in which he lived, the 
 first century of our era. In that essay Plutarch makes 
 one of his interlocutors say : ' Is it wonderful if, with 
 iniquity abounding, not only as Hesiod foretold, 
 reverence and justice have forsaken the earth, but 
 also the Providence of the gods, which provided the 
 oracles, hath everywhere departed ? ' Another, in a 
 similar strain, suggests that Providence having given 
 men, as a benevolent parent, many other things, had 
 refused them oracles for their sins. An entirely dis- 
 tinct theory is hinted at when the view is enunciated 
 by a third party in the discussion that not God but 
 demons are the cause of the cessation. Demons, un- 
 like the gods, are subject to change, decay, senility, 
 and religious institutions in which they act as the 
 agents of Deity may share their subjection to transi- 
 ency./' Cicero, discussing the same topic, in his work 
 on Divination, ignores this distinction between gods 
 and demons, and treats the theory as subjecting the 
 gods to the category of decay, and therefore as false 
 and untenable. Age, he contends, cannot affect the 
 divine, meaning to hint that the oracle, had it been 
 really divine, would have been eternal, and that the 
 simple explanation of its decay was that men began 
 to be less credulous. 1 
 
 This brings us face to face with the question, Is 
 divination a reality, or is it only a great delusion ? 
 The knowledge of the future which the diviner 
 
 1 Dt Divinatione, lib. ii. cap. Ivii. 
 
158 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 promises to put within men's reach by his art is 
 tempting, if there be such a thing; but is there? 
 Reflection suggests doubts of various sorts : as to 
 the possibility, the rationality, the certainty, the 
 utility, and the moral tendency of the foresight thus 
 acquired. On the first of these points Cicero presses 
 believers in divination with a dilemma. Fortuities, 
 he argues, cannot be foreseen, therefore there is 
 no divination ; fatalities can be foreseen, because 
 certain ; therefore again there is no divination, 
 because divination has to do with the fortuitous. 1 
 The reasoning is addressed to the Stoics, who 
 believed both in fate and in divination, and is 
 intended to convince them of the inconsistency 
 of their position. The Stoics were acute logicians, 
 and would have their own way of getting out 
 of the difficulty. Their idea of the matter seems 
 to have been this : that, from the beginning, the 
 world was so ordered that certain signs, discoverable 
 in different parts of nature, as in the stars of heaven, 
 or in the livers of animals, should precede certain 
 events, so that the law of connection between sign 
 and event being once ascertained, from the observed 
 sign the event could be predicted. 2 This view, 
 while recognising the superficial aspect of fortui- 
 tousness in the system of signs, regards them as, not 
 less than the events, pre-ordained, and certain. It 
 implies further that both signs and events, while 
 
 1 De Divination*, lib. ii, cap. z. f Ibid. , lib. i. cap. Hi. 
 
DIVINATION 159 
 
 Ideologically connected, may have physical causes. 
 The doctrine practically amounts to the assertion 
 that a fixed physical order and a providential order 
 are not mutually exclusive, but are simply different 
 aspects of the same universe. So stated, the 
 position of the Stoics is not easily assailed, and on 
 the whole it may be admitted that divination is not 
 to be got rid of by short-hand metaphysical argu- 
 mentation. The conception of a system of inter- 
 pretable signs inwoven into the frame of nature, 
 intended by Divine Providence to serve the purpose 
 of revealing the future, is not on the face of it absurd. 
 But abstract possibility is one thing, probability, 
 or rationality, is another. In the theory of divina- 
 tion the unusual is supposed to be the appropriate 
 region o/ the significant. If you want to find the 
 signs whose accurate interpretation yields the know- 
 ledge of future events, you must seek them above 
 all among the rarer phenomena of nature. This 
 proposition, while commending itself to men living 
 in a pre-scientific age as natural and reasonable, is 
 nevertheless very open to criticism. It is easy to 
 see, of course, how the unusual should be regarded 
 as the sphere of the divinely significant when the 
 unusual was conceived as that which had no natural 
 cause. Then a portent, such as that of a mule 
 having offspring, naturally passed for a vehicle of 
 special divine revelation. Against this popular way 
 of thinking, Cicero taught that every event has a. 
 
160 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 natural cause, and that, though praeter consuetu- 
 dinem, it is not praeter naturam. A mule bearing 
 offspring a miracle because it does not happen 
 often ! l If it could not have happened it would not ; 
 if it could, it is not a miracle. 2 Thus viewed, the 
 unusual can have no special significance as com- 
 pared with the usual. The only question is whether 
 it can have even as much significance, not to speak 
 of more. That there is a revelation of God and of 
 His will in nature is every way credible. But what 
 sort of revelation is to be expected, and where is it 
 chiefly to be looked for? If the knowledge desired 
 be that of special events in the future, as procured 
 by the diviner's art, then the unusual is necessarily 
 the significant, because there is nothing in the usual 
 to attract attention. That the sun rises every day 
 can mean nothing for any individual man or 
 people, but that the sun undergoes eclipse at a 
 critical juncture may be very ominous in reference 
 to an impending event, such as a battle. If, on 
 the other hand, the knowledge sought be that of 
 general laws, as revealing Divine Reason and Divine 
 Beneficence, then the usual is the significant and 
 the unusual the non-significant, or that in which 
 significance is obscure. Though both alike due to 
 physical causes, the usual and the unusual are 
 nevertheless both capable of being the vehicle of 
 revelation ; but if the revelation desired be of the 
 
 1 De Divinatione, lib. ii. cap. xxviii. * Ibid., lib. ii. cap. xxii. 
 
DIVINATION 161 
 
 nature last described, then the advantage lies not 
 with that which happens rarely, but with that which 
 happens regularly. I would sooner trust the lark's 
 song on a summer morning as a revelation of the 
 truth that the earth is full of the goodness of the 
 Lord, than believe that the issue of a battle depended 
 on the crowing of a cock, or the fortune of war on 
 the dropping of grain on the ground from the 
 greedy mouths of sacred chickens. 1 It is what one 
 can learn from the rule rather than from the ex- 
 ception, from the fixed order of nature rather than 
 from what seem breaches of that order, or random 
 chances subject to no order, that is important. The 
 Psalmist understood this when he wrote : * The 
 heavens declare the glory of God ... in them hath 
 He set a t/Cbernacle for the sun. . . . His going forth 
 is from the end of the heaven, and his circuit unto 
 the ends of it : and there is nothing hid from the 
 heat thereof.' 2 The sun in his daily course, not in 
 the rare eclipse, is for the Psalmist the declarer of 
 the Divine glory. And, granting for a moment 
 that the two kinds of revelation are possible, a 
 general revelation of the glorious reason, wisdom, 
 
 1 Observation of the feeding of the sacred chickens was another of 
 the prosaic forms of divination in use among the Romans. The more 
 greedily the chickens ate the more of the food would fall to the ground, 
 and this was regarded as a favourable omen. The omen was techni- 
 cally called tripudiitm terripavium, suggesting that the quantity 
 which fell from the mouth of the fowl was enough to make the earth 
 quake. Vide Cicero, De Divinatione^ lib. ii. cap. xxxiv. 
 
 2 Psalm xix. 1-6. 
 
162 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 justice, and goodness of God, and a special revela- 
 tion of particular events concerning the future 
 fortunes of individuals and peoples, there can be 
 little question in rightly conditioned minds as to 
 which of the two is the more important. The 
 diviner may possibly have his place, but it is far 
 in the background as compared with that of the 
 prophet. The prophet also has something to say 
 on the future fortunes of men and nations, but the 
 special events he takes an interest in are simply 
 concrete exemplifications of great moral principles. 
 The general ethical revelation of God is for him the 
 thing of supreme value. 
 
 The lack of certainty in the diviner's revelation 
 is a grave drawback. Not much is gained by the 
 existence of a system of interpretable signs. All 
 turns on the interpretations. Who is to be the in- 
 terpreter? Who is to fix the principles of inter- 
 pretation ? Are they to be determined by guessing 
 to begin with, and then by verifying the guesses by 
 subsequent observation ? Take dreams, for example. 
 Some appear utterly trivial, some grotesque ; few 
 reveal plainly what they are supposed to mean. 
 How shall we know which have any meaning, and 
 how shall we find out the import of those which 
 have, seeing their significance is for the most part 
 enigmatical? Cicero compares the gods, making 
 so-called revelations through dreams, to Cartha- 
 ginians or Spaniards speaking in the Roman Senate 
 
DIVINATION 163 
 
 without an interpreter ; l and he lays down the 
 peremptory principle that if the gods want men to 
 know, the signs they give ought to be clear, and if 
 they do not want men to know they ought not to 
 give any signs at all, not even occult ones. 2 There 
 is force in his contention. To what purpose fill the 
 world with an elaborate system of premonitory signs 
 which are as hard to interpret as hieroglyphics, and 
 by their obscurity offer a too tempting opportunity 
 to the pretender and the quack ? 
 
 Supposing the difficulty of interpretation to be 
 got over, the next question that arises is, cut bono ? 
 Is it useful to know beforehand what is going to 
 befall us ? Is it not rather a merciful arrangement 
 that the future is hidden from our eyes by a thick 
 veil, so that we can live in hope even when tragic 
 experiences lie before us? Does not that very 
 divine care for men which is the major premiss of 
 the argument in support of divination really raise a 
 presumption against it ? May we not argue : * Yes, 
 God does care for man, therefore He keeps the times 
 and seasons in His own power, so that neither men 
 nor angels know the day or hour.' ' Would Pompey, 
 think you/ asks Cicero, 'have rejoiced in his three 
 consulships, and his three triumphs, if he had 
 known that he was to be murdered in an Egyptian 
 solitude, after losing his army, and that after his 
 
 1 De Divinatione, lib. ii. cap. Ixiv. 
 * Ibid.) lib. ii. cap. xxv. 
 
1 64 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 death things were to happen which cannot be spoken 
 of without tears?' 1 
 
 On the relation of divination to the moral order 
 I shall have an opportunity of speaking in next 
 Lecture ; meantime I offer a few observations on its 
 moral tendency. Moral tendency is not to be put in 
 the forefront in criticising a system, but when evil 
 results are as prominent as they certainly are in the 
 history of divination, it is legitimate to refer to them 
 as raising a grave doubt whether the diviner has 
 any claim to be regarded as the instrument of 
 a beneficent Providence. Roman annals report 
 damning facts against the astrologers. They were 
 expelled from Rome in A.D. 139, as a public 
 nuisance and danger to the State. Tacitus describes 
 the Mathematicians as a race of men treacherous 
 to the powerful, deceitful to those whose hopes they 
 fed ; a race which would always deserve to be under 
 the ban, and which nevertheless would always re- 
 ceive encouragement. 2 A Christian bishop of early 
 date describes the same class of men as making 
 kings disappear by promising to their murderers 
 impunity. 8 Shakespeare recognised the justice of 
 the accusation in reference to the whole soothsaying 
 tribe when he made the salutation of the witches on 
 the blasted heath, 'All hail, Macbeth! that shalt 
 be king hereafter/ bear its natural fruit in murder. 
 
 1 De Divinatione, lib. ii. cap. ix. 
 
 * Historic, i. 22. a Hippolytus, Rtf. H*r., lib. iv. 7. 
 
DIVINATION 165 
 
 Such facts help us to understand, if not to sympa- 
 thise with, the stern injunction in the legislative 
 code of Israel: 'Thou shalt not suffer a witch to 
 live.' 1 
 
 Without insisting on the crimes of fortune-tellers 
 of all grades and descriptions, it may be affirmed 
 that the decline of faith in divination was bound to 
 keep pace with the growth of the moral conscious- 
 ness. In this connection the influence of the Stoics 
 deserves to be considered. For it is true of them, 
 as was remarked at the commencement of this 
 Lecture, that they were destroyers of the faith in 
 divination which they preached. They played two 
 mutually antagonistic parts. They furnished divina- 
 tion with a theoretic basis, and they supplied 
 scepticism with conclusive arguments against its 
 reality and value. The foundations of faith were 
 sapped by sayings uttered by leaders of the school. 
 Among these may be reckoned that which affirmed 
 that the wise alone could divine. This saying, on 
 the lips of the Stoics, had not the depth of spiritual 
 meaning that belongs to the Beatitude : ' Blessed 
 are the pure in heart, for they shall see God/ but it 
 looks in the same direction. For what is the wise 
 man of Stoicism ? He is one who sets little store on 
 the goods of fortune, in comparison with the supreme 
 good of virtue. If such a man alone can divine, the 
 trade of the diviner will be in danger of falling out 
 1 Exodus xxii. 18. 
 
1 66 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 of fashion. He will not care either to be himself a 
 diviner or to be a consulter of diviners. He will 
 regard the future events of outward fortune as not 
 worth ascertaining, and though the world be full of 
 signs by which these events can be predicted he 
 will not take the trouble either to discover or to 
 interpret them. Ultimately this mood must end in 
 scepticism as to the existence of such interpretable 
 signs ; for why credit the gods with taking pains 
 to provide means for obtaining a knowledge of the 
 future which wise men do not value? Probably this 
 feeling was the source of the doubt of Panaetius. 
 
 A disintegrating spirit lurks in certain sayings of 
 Epictetus on the subject of divination. Here is one 
 of them : * When you are about to consult the oracle 
 you do not know what is going to happen, but you 
 do know what sort of a thing, if you be a philosopher ; 
 for if it be one of the things that do not depend on 
 ourselves, of necessity it is neither good nor evil. 
 Therefore do not bring to the soothsayer either 
 desire or aversion.' 1 From consulting in this in- 
 different mood to not consulting at all is but a short 
 way. The doctrine, 'All things outward indifferent,' 
 must end in the doors of the oracle being closed. 
 It does not go so far as Paul's doctrine, 'All things 
 work for good,' which is still more hostile in spirit 
 to the practice of divination ; but another saying of 
 Epictetus shows that he had reached that point also. 
 
 1 Enchiridion^ cap. xxxix. 
 
DIVINATION 167 
 
 It is : * If the raven utter an unlucky cry do not be 
 disturbed ; you can make all things lucky if you 
 like/ 1 One who has reached this position is practi- 
 cally a Christian in temper. There are no unlucky 
 days for him ; he knows no fear concerning the 
 future. He takes no thought for the morrow ; his 
 motto is that of the Psalmist : * My times are in Thy 
 hand/ 2 How completely Epictetus had attained to 
 this moral attitude appears from his answer to the 
 question, What is ominous ? * Do we not call those 
 things ominous which are significant of coming evil? 
 Then cowardice is ominous, meansptritedness, mourn- 
 ing, grief, impudence,' 3 
 
 But of all the sayings of the Phrygian sage bear- 
 ing on the present topic, the most important are 
 those in which he defines a class of things about 
 which we may not consult the diviner. ' Many of 
 us/ he says, ' neglect many duties through unseason- 
 able resort to divination. What can the diviner 
 foresee except death, or danger, or disease, or some- 
 thing of that kind ? But if it be my duty to incur 
 danger, or risk my life for a friend, what room is 
 there for divination? Have I not a diviner within 
 which tells me the nature of good and evil, and 
 shows me the signs of both? What need is there, 
 besides, for haruspicy and augury?' 4 The use of 
 these in such a case he elsewhere pronounces not 
 
 1 Enchiridion , cap. xxiv. a Psalm xxxi. 15. 
 
 1 Discourses, lib. iii. cap. xxiv. 8. 4 Ibid., lib. ii. cap. vii. I. 
 
168 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 only needless, but wrong. ' When friend or country 
 has to be defended with risk, do not consult the 
 oracle. For if the prophet tell thee that the state 
 of the entrails is inauspicious, that points to death, 
 wounds, or exile. But after he has spoken, reason 
 has something to say, viz., that with friend and 
 country danger must be faced. Wherefore come to 
 the greater, Pythian prophet, who thrust out of the 
 temple a man who was not willing to help a friend 
 in danger of his life.' 1 In short, the doctrine of 
 this Stoic teacher is : 'In matters of duty consult 
 conscience, not the oracle ; before doing your duty 
 do not wish to know whether there are to be any 
 disagreeable consequences.' Cicero had already 
 taught the same high lesson. He praised the man 
 who, when fidelity to a cause was at stake, used the 
 auspices of virtue and did not look to the possible 
 event, and he laid down this golden rule : duty is 
 to be learned from virtue itself, not from auspices. 2 
 
 Under such teaching as that of Epictetus, the 
 diviner's occupation is gone. The upshot is this : 
 in reference to matters of outward fortune it is 
 not worth while consulting the diviner ; in refer- 
 ence to matters of duty it is not lawful to con- 
 sult him. It is heroic doctrine, and therein lies 
 the diviner's opportunity. Few, even in Christian 
 communities, have made up their minds once for 
 all to do their duty whatever betide. Many, before 
 
 1 Enchiridion, cap. xxxix. a De Divinatione, cap. xxxviL 
 
DIVINATION 169 
 
 deciding on their line of action, wish to know what 
 the consequences are going to be. In the old 
 Pagan world men of this time-serving type would 
 have made a pilgrimage to Delphi to get a prophetic 
 forecast of the future. In these Christian ages, when 
 the oracles have long ceased to speak, and the 
 astrologers and augurs are no more, the worldly- 
 wise man must be his own diviner. He must try 
 to guess the future by a sagacious instinct, or care- 
 fully study the signs of the times ; watch the forces 
 at work, estimate their relative strength, calculate 
 the probable resultant, and, when all this has been 
 done, make up his mind how he is to act. In the 
 rule, what he decides on is just the opposite of what 
 he ought to do, and would do if he took counsel 
 with the wisdom that is associated with moral sim- 
 plicity. Of course, he is satisfied in his own mind 
 that no other course was open in accordance with 
 the dictates of prudence. He is the wise man in 
 his own esteem, the man who does the right at all 
 hazards being the fool. He is the world's wise 
 man, but not God's. He is the Pagan sage, not 
 the Christian. He lives on the Pagan level, and 
 takes the spirit, if not the art, of the diviner for 
 his guide. That spirit will never die out till men 
 generally value worldly good less and ethical good 
 more. When food and raiment, and all that they 
 represent, have indeed been relegated to the second 
 place, then fortune-telling, and fortune-guessing, and 
 
170 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 fortune-hunting, and fortune-worshipping will finally 
 disappear. 
 
 With divination, say some in our time, Providence 
 and Prayer must go. According to the author of 
 an elaborate history of Divination in Antiquity, ' he 
 who believes in Providence and Prayer accepts all 
 the principles on which ancient divination rests.' 1 
 Surely not all the principles ! Some of them, of 
 course, he does accept, e.g., that there is a god, and 
 that he cares for man. These cover the doctrine 
 of Providence and Prayer, but they are not the 
 specific principles involved in the theory of divina- 
 tion. Besides the general truth of God's care for 
 man, that theory assumes that the divine care, if 
 real, must show itself by revealing to men the secrets 
 of the future. That assumption, we have seen, is 
 very disputable for various reasons ; and, moreover, 
 it implies a false estimate of the relative importance 
 of the good and evil of outward lot, as compared 
 with the good and evil of inward state. That as- 
 sumption therefore must go. But though it goes, 
 the more comprehensive truth of God's care for 
 man may remain, and if it remain the belief in 
 Providence and the practice of Prayer are justified. 
 When the theory of divination is abandoned, what 
 happens to that belief and that practice is not re- 
 jection, but purification or transformation. A divine 
 
 1 A. Bouch^-Leclercq, Histoir* dc la Divination dans 
 vol. i. p. 104. 
 
DIVINATION 171 
 
 care still exists, but it shows itself in a worthier 
 way; petitions are still offered to a benignant 
 divinity, but for higher benefits. That Providence 
 and Prayer must pass away with Divination is as 
 little true as that, with divination, everything of 
 the nature of prophecy must disappear. How far 
 from being the case this is, we know from the history 
 of prophecy in Israel. There were diviners in Israel 
 as elsewhere. But the time came when the men of 
 moral insight saw that their skill was a pretence 
 and their arts mischievous. What then ? Why, the 
 great ethical prophets appeared, laughing to scorn 
 the diviner and all his ways, and showing the people 
 a more excellent way through their noble passion 
 for righteousness, and their grand doctrine that the 
 only path to prosperity was to do God's will. Even 
 so, when the diviner has been turned adrift there 
 remains a doctrine of Providence which stands in 
 the same relation to that which was associated with 
 the practice of divination as the Hebrew prophet 
 bore to the soothsayers of the Semitic world. The 
 decay of divination signifies, not that belief in Pro- 
 vidence is growing faint, but rather that it is being 
 perfected. Absolute trust in Providence kills the 
 curiosity out of which springs the diviner's art. The 
 believer in God is so sure of His goodwill that he 
 does not want to know what is going to happen ; 
 enough for him that all will certainly go well. The 
 case of Prayer is similar. When divination ceases, 
 
17* THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 prayer for outward good as the summum bonum 
 must certainly come to an end, but not prayer in 
 every form. What happens is that the lower, Pagan 
 type of prayer gives place to the higher, whose chief 
 desire is that God's will may be done, and that His 
 kingdom may come. 
 
 A concluding reflection may appropriately be 
 added here. We can now in some measure under- 
 stand what a formidable barrier the practice of 
 divination presented to moral and religious progress. 
 It found men in possession of crude ideas of God, 
 Providence, and the highest good and chief end of 
 man, and its whole tendency was to keep them from 
 getting any further. It addressed itself to a secular 
 mind, and it worked steadily towards complete en- 
 slavement to secularity. Its power was strengthened 
 by its plausibility. What more natural than to place 
 the summum bonum in earthly good fortune; what 
 more tempting than the wish to know beforehand 
 what sort of fortune the future was to bring ; what 
 a willing ear those who cherished this wish would 
 lend to men who came to them and said : ' By the 
 kindness of the gods we are able to communicate 
 to you the knowledge you desiderate ' ! What weary 
 centuries of fruitless experiments and disappointed 
 hopes it would require to convince men inclined to 
 believe in it that the whole system was an impos- 
 ture! Perhaps this result could never have been 
 reached, unless a new religion had come capable of 
 
DIVINATION 173 
 
 lifting men at once into a higher, purer world of 
 religious thought and moral aspiration. Till the 
 new faith came, anything that could help to break 
 the diviner's evil spell was welcome. Even Epi- 
 cureanism, with its rude denial of divine care for 
 man, was from that point of view a boon. Better 
 no divine care at all than such a grovelling care as 
 the soothsayers ascribed to the gods. The Epicurean 
 denial, with all its onesidedness, was a relative and 
 beneficent truth, sweeping, away an imposing false- 
 hood, and preparing human hearts for receiving 
 from another quarter an idea of Divine Providence 
 possessing religious dignity and wholesome moral 
 tendency. Thanks to Christianity, divination, speak- 
 ing broadly, is a thing of the past. The fact helps 
 us to realise that the world is actually advancing in 
 religious faith and moral practice. 
 
LECTURE VI 
 
 THE HEBREW PROPHETS 
 
 IN passing from the subject of Divination to that 
 of Hebrew Prophecy and its characteristic doctrine 
 of Providence, we do not escape from the world in 
 which the spirit of soothsaying bore sway. That 
 spirit exercised an evil dominion over the Semitic 
 peoples not less than over the Greeks and Romans, 
 from the most ancient times. And Hebrew pro- 
 phecy stood to Semitic divination in a relation 
 partly of development, but mainly of uncompromis- 
 ing antagonism. The prophet therefore will be all 
 the better understood when he is placed in the light 
 of a contrast with his Pagan kinsman. The picture 
 of the diviner already hangs on the wall ; let us 
 place beside it that of the seer of Israel. And as 
 the picture of the Stoic philosopher hangs immedi- 
 ately to the left of the picture of the diviner, it will 
 make our comparative study complete if we allow 
 our eye to wander to it also for an instant. 
 
 The resemblances and contrasts between the three 
 types of men may be broadly stated thus. The 
 
 174 
 
THE HEBREW PROPHETS 175 
 
 Hebrew prophet agreed with the diviner against 
 the Stoic philosopher in attaching great, though 
 not supreme, importance to outward prosperity. He 
 agreed with the Stoic philosopher against the diviner 
 in attaching sovereign value to virtue or righteous- 
 ness. He differed from both in regarding outward 
 good as dependent on, and attainable through and 
 only through, righteousness 
 
 As the Stoics came centuries later than the pro- 
 phets, we do not expect x to find in the pages of 
 the latter any allusions to them and their tenets. 
 But as the diviner was a contemporary, and by 
 race a kinsman, of the prophet, we do expect to 
 discover occasional references to him. We do find 
 such, and they are so frequent and so emphatic 
 that we are not only entitled but bound to have 
 regard to them, and to use the class they so freely 
 characterise as a foil to set off by contrast the 
 thoughts and ways of the diviner's relentless critic. 
 
 The diviner and the prophet, or to describe them 
 more antithetically, the old Pagan type of prophet 
 and the new reformed type, are set in sharp ant- 
 agonism to each other in the Book of Deuteronomy. 
 The Hebrew legislator is represented, in one remark- 
 able passage, as warning the people, conceived as 
 about to enter the land of promise, against the 
 abominations they will find prevailing there. Of 
 these, two are selected for special mention : human 
 sacrifice and the practice of divination. Some of 
 
i76 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 the forms under which that practice was carried 
 on are enumerated. The black list is as follows : 
 ' There shall not be found among you any one . . . 
 that useth divination, or an observer of times, or 
 an enchanter, or a witch, or a charmer, or a con- 
 suiter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necro- 
 mancer.' 1 What arts are alluded to under these 
 various terms it may be difficult precisely to deter- 
 mine ; 2 but one cannot fail to be struck with the 
 detailed enumeration, as indicative of wide baleful 
 prevalence at the time when the Deuteronomic code 
 took shape : that is to say, according to modern 
 critics, in the seventh century B.C., when Josiah 
 reigned in Judah, and Jeremiah exercised his pro- 
 phetic functions. It was the dark hour of the 
 diviner's power in the Pagan Semitic world ; and 
 that it was not confined to that world, but extended 
 its malign influence within the pale of the chosen 
 people, may be inferred from the anxious manner 
 in which evil commerce with the unholy thing is 
 interdicted. 'Thou shalt not learn to do after the 
 abominations of those nations'; 3 i.e. thou shalt 
 neither practise divination thyself, nor consult the 
 diviners that swarm among thy heathen neighbours. 
 But what then? Is the Deuteronomic policy one 
 of mere suppression ? Is there to be no substitute 
 
 1 Deuteronomy xviii. 10-15. 
 
 Vide Driver's Commentary on Deuteronomy, in loc. 
 
 9 Deuteronomy xviii 9. 
 
THE HEBREW PROPHETS 177 
 
 for the diviner, no one who shall in a happier and 
 holier way satisfy the craving which gives the diviner 
 his chance of power ? Yes, a substitute is provided ; 
 the Prophet is his name, and his prototype is Moses. 
 'The Lord thy God will raise up unto thee a Pro- 
 phet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like 
 unto me ; unto him ye shall hearken.' l Unto him, 
 not unto those practisers of black arts who mislead 
 to their hurt those who cop^ult them, by their pre- 
 tended knowledge of the future. 
 
 This sharp antithesis of itself suggests inferences 
 as to the characteristics of the new type of 
 mantis. He also will be able in his way to divine ; 
 that is, to make shrewd forecasts of the future. He 
 will also use signs for this purpose. But the 
 signs on which he will base his predictions will 
 not be those of the heathen soothsayer. He will 
 draw his significant tokens, not from the stars of 
 heaven, or from the fowls of the air, or from the 
 spirits of the dead, but from human conduct. 'Tell 
 me how you live,' he will say to those who consult 
 him, ' and I will tell you how you will thrive.' He 
 will regard prosperity, not as a matter of luck, 
 determinable beforehand by the skilful interpreta- 
 
 1 Deuteronomy xviii. 15. ' Prophet' is to be taken here as referring 
 to a class, not to one individual, e.g. Christ. The reference to Christ 
 may be ultimately justifiable, but an exclusively Christian interpreta- 
 tion does away with the whole point of the statement, which consists 
 in a contrast between two classes of men who profess ability to reveal 
 God's will as to future fortune. 
 
 M 
 
i ;8 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 tion or manipulation of curious natural occurrences, 
 but as a matter of reward for right behaviour, in 
 accordance with a fixed moral order. Only when 
 thus conceived does the new type of diviner, the 
 prophet, present a radical contrast to the old one, 
 such as justifies the hailing of his advent as a great 
 reformation. 
 
 That our conjectural conception is correct, the 
 reference to Moses proves. 'A prophet like unto 
 me.' What sort of a prophet was Moses? The 
 long discourse in the first eleven chapters of Deuter- 
 onomy, forming a hortatory introduction to the 
 following body of laws, supplies the answer to this 
 question. The burden of that discourse, put into 
 the mouth of Moses, is : ' Do God's will and you will 
 prosper.' The statutes of the Lord in general, and 
 the Decalogue in particular, are the preacher's text. 
 ' Keep these statutes, these Ten Words,' he says to 
 his hearers, ' and it will go well with you throughout 
 all generations.' ' It shall come to pass, if ye shall 
 hearken diligently unto my commandments which I 
 command you this day, to love the Lord your God, 
 and to serve Him with all your heart and with all 
 your soul, that I will give the rain of your land in 
 its season, the former rain and the latter rain, that 
 thou mayest gather in thy corn, and thy wine, and 
 thine oil. And I will give grass in thy fields for thy 
 cattle, and thou shalt eat and be full.' 1 Here is a 
 
 1 Deuteronomy xi. 13-15. 
 
THE HEBREW PROPHETS 179 
 
 very simple and definite programme : Do right 
 and ye shall fare well. This is the doctrine of 
 Moses as the Deuteronomist conceives him. Hence 
 the prophet after the type of Moses, who is to 
 supersede the diviner, must be one who teaches the 
 same doctrine. He believes in a connection between 
 conduct and lot, such that from conduct lot can be 
 inferred. Therefore he tells aH^men that the one 
 thing needful is to give heed to their ways, to be 
 righteous. And it is obvious that if he be right the 
 diviner's occupation is gone. The prophet after the 
 manner of Moses will not only be a great improve- 
 ment on the diviner ; he will sweep the diviner and 
 all his craft off the face of the earth. To what end 
 consult the omens if all depends on conduct? 
 
 The occasional utterances of the prophets of Israel 
 concerning the future fortune of their nation and 
 its causes show how thoroughly they believed in the 
 creed ascribed to Moses, and how utterly futile the 
 practices of the soothsayer appeared in their sight. 
 Exhaustive citation is unnecessary here ; two ex- 
 amples will suffice, one taken from Jeremiah, the 
 other from an older prophet, Micah. Jeremiah has 
 before his mind the hard problem of Israel's duty and 
 destiny in connection with the overshadowing power 
 of Babylon. The diviners also, as the prophet 
 knows, are busy with the problem, and they deal 
 with it suo more. To king, princes, and all others 
 consulting them they speak smooth words, saying in 
 
i8o THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 effect : ' The omens are favourable ; no need to cringe 
 to the great despot of the East, ye may defy him 
 with impunity.' Jeremiah's counsel, on the contrary, 
 is : ' Submit to the king of Babylon ; submission is 
 inevitable, it is the penalty of your sin ; and it is 
 your wisdom ; you will fare worse if you obstinately 
 resist his power.' ' Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the 
 God of Israel ; Let not your prophets that be in 
 the midst of you, and your diviners, deceive you, 
 neither hearken ye to your dreams which ye cause 
 to be dreamed. For they prophesy falsely unto you 
 in my name. I have not sent them, saith the Lord. 
 For thus saith the Lord, After seventy years be 
 accomplished for Babylon I will visit you, and per- 
 form my good word towards you, in causing you 
 to return to this place.' 1 Micah, a contemporary of 
 Amos, Hosea, and Isaiah, and representing their 
 point of view, preaches a similar doctrine and with 
 the same conscious antagonism to the diviners. 
 Full of power by the spirit of the Lord, and of 
 judgment and of might, he declares unto Israel her 
 sin, and tells her that while she sins she must 
 suffer, whatever diviners may say to the contrary. 
 These false prophets he contemptuously describes 
 as biting with their teeth, and crying peace ; in other 
 words, as selling predictions of good fortune for 
 bread or money. As for him, all the signs in the 
 world cannot make him believe that the ways of 
 
 1 Jeremiah xxix. 8-10. 
 
THE HEBREW PROPHETS 181 
 
 transgressors can conduct to any other end than 
 disaster. To such as do evil his stern message is : 
 ' Night shall be unto you, that ye shall not have a 
 vision ; and it shall be dark unto you, that ye shall 
 not divine/ 1 
 
 As to the other side of the doctrine connecting 
 lot with conduct, the great prophets^of Israel were 
 equally well assured. They were firmly convinced 
 that while their countrymen walked in God's ways, 
 and in some considerable measure realised the ideal 
 of a chosen people, no serious harm could come to 
 them. Isaiah voiced the common prophetic senti- 
 ment when he said : ' Behold, I lay in Zion for a 
 foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner- 
 stone, a sure foundation,' 2 having in his view not so 
 much the actual material fortress, but 'the ideal 
 Zion, built upon righteousness and justice.' 8 A 
 nation doing righteousness had no occasion, accord- 
 ing to the prophetic theory, to fear either Sen- 
 nacheribs or soothsayers. The daughter of Zion 
 might laugh the invader* to scorn, and as for the 
 fortune-teller, his mercenary lying arts were utterly 
 impotent. ' Surely there is no enchantment against 
 Jacob, neither is there any divination against Israel.' 5 
 These words are put into the mouth of Balaam, the 
 Aramaean prophet, as a confession of his inability to 
 
 1 Micah iii. 6. 2 Isaiah xxviii. 16. 
 
 Renan, Histoire du Peupk d? Israel, vol. ii. p. 522. 
 
 4 Isaiah xxxvii. 22. B Numbers xxiii. 23. 
 
i8 2 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 curse the chosen people. Critics may dispute their 
 authenticity, and suggest that the oracles ascribed to 
 Balaam in the Book of Numbers reflect not so much 
 his thoughts as the self-consciousness of the people to 
 whom they refer. 1 However this may be, one thing 
 is certain, that the particular oracle quoted expresses 
 an important article of the prophetic creed. The 
 Hebrew prophet believed that blessing and cursing did 
 not belong to diviners, but to the moral order of the 
 world. ' Behold, I set before you this day a blessing 
 and a curse ; a blessing, if ye obey the command- 
 ments of the Lord your God ; . . . a curse, if ye will 
 not obey the commandments of the Lord yout God.' 2 
 The prophetic theory of Providence represents a 
 great advance of religious thought when compared 
 with that which underlies the practice of divination. 
 Its supreme merit lies in its profoundly ethical char- 
 acter. It has its origin in an intense personal sense, 
 on the part of the prophet, of the sovereign worth of 
 righteousness, and its issue in a firm conviction that 
 righteousness has not only subjective but objective 
 value, is the law not only of the individual con- 
 science but of the universe. The diviner, as such, 
 shared neither the prophet's personal estimate of 
 righteousness nor his conviction that justice and 
 judgment are the habitation of God's throne. He 
 assumed that to obtain good fortune was the chief 
 
 1 Renan, Histoire du Peuple (Thrall, vol. ii. p. 45. 
 Deuteronomy xi. 26, 27. 
 
THE HEBREW PROPHETS 183 
 
 end of man, and that the end was attainable irre- 
 spective of character. The system of signs on which 
 he founded his forecasts had no inherent connection 
 with the moral order. It was a merely physical 
 apparatus for determining the future ; skill, not 
 character, was required for its interpretation. And 
 as the diviner's knowledge had no connection with 
 personal morality, so the future which he professed 
 to know had no connection with morality in the 
 recipient of the predicted fortune. It was a matter 
 of luck, not of character. It might even be obtained 
 by immorality. The crown promised to Macbeth by 
 the witches was gained by murder; and that is by 
 no means the solitary instance in which the fortune- 
 teller's predictions have found fulfilment through 
 crime. If we were to regard the criminal as the 
 dupe and victim of designing persons more culp- 
 able than himself, we should in many cases not 
 be far from the truth. But without making the 
 diviner responsible for the moral aberrations of 
 his clients, we may at least assert that he pre- 
 dicts a future which, he cannot but know, may be 
 associated with crime as its procuring cause. He is 
 thus put on his defence, and we may conceive him 
 making for himself an apology of this sort : * If 
 my prognostications should be fulfilled by crime I 
 cannot help it. What I am responsible for is the 
 matter of fact. My science enables me to foretell 
 certain events that are to happen in a particular 
 
184 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 man's life, such as that he is to become a king or a 
 very wealthy man. How the result is to be brought 
 about I do not profess to know, nor, as a diviner, do 
 I care. Murder, fraud, and other crimes may lie on 
 the path that conducts to the goal. The way may 
 not be desirable, but, observe, the end is reached, 
 and my prescience is vindicated. The fact turns 
 out to be as I predicted.' 1 It is a lame apology, 
 but it is the utmost that can be said, and it is a 
 virtual confession of the non-moral, if not of the 
 immoral, character of divination. 
 
 In the light of this imaginary confession we can 
 see clearly how impossible it is for any one to 
 believe in divination who firmly grasps the truth 
 that morality has value for the divine Being. It is 
 not credible that a God who cares for righteousness 
 would introduce into the frame of nature a system 
 of signs, possessing significance irrespective of moral 
 interests. Such a system, as has already been ad- 
 mitted, may be abstractly possible from a merely 
 speculative point of view, but in a theory of the 
 universe which makes the ethical supreme it can 
 find no place. The moral order of the world crowds 
 out the diviner's order. It is the abiding merit of 
 the Hebrew prophets that they understood this 
 and chose the better part. They saw that there was 
 not room in the world for the two orders, and they 
 preferred the order of universal righteousness to the 
 1 Vide Lecture V. 
 
THE, HEBREW PROPHETS 185 
 
 order of omnipresent non-moral signs; Their vision 
 was clear and their preference decided because their 
 hearts were pure. The fundamental fact about 
 these seers of Israel is that they were men in whose 
 breasts burned the passion for righteousness. Out 
 of this pure fountain sprang, in vigorous flow, the 
 limpid stream of their religious faith. How easy for 
 men, with that sacred passion burning in their souls, 
 to believe in a God who loveth righteousness and 
 hateth iniquity ! And how natural for men believing 
 in such a God to seek and find in human history 
 traces of that divine love and hatred ; to see in the 
 good and ill of men's lot the reward and penalty 
 of righteous and unrighteous conduct! And just 
 because the prophet's creed was the natural outcome 
 of his ethical spirit, it has a presumption of truth on 
 its side. It is worthy to be true. The passion for 
 righteousness needs no apologist. It is its own 
 witness. It is the noblest thing in the world. 
 Were it universal it would go far to rid the world of 
 the many curses under which it groans. But this 
 noble passion, which needs no apology, is the best 
 apology for the creed which is congenial to it. It 
 demands, and therefore justifies, faith in an ethical 
 deity, and in a moral order revealing itself in the 
 lives of men and nations. 
 
 But how stands the fact? Is the order of the 
 world as moral as the prophetic theory requires ? 
 Are there not many things which seem to show that 
 
1 86 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 the lot of men is merely a matter of good or evil 
 fortune, and that events happen either in accordance 
 with a purely physical fate or by an utterly incal- 
 culable, inexplicable fortuity ? And, if the order of 
 the world be so non-moral in appearance, what 
 guarantee is there that the universe is not presided 
 over by a non-moral deity ? The phenomena which 
 raise such anxious questions did not escape pro- 
 phetic observation. How could they? The pheno- 
 mena are not new, a mere peculiarity of exceptional 
 modern experience. They are as old as the world, 
 and must always have been noticed by every person 
 of ordinary discernment, not to speak of men of rare 
 moral insight, like the prophets. Just because they 
 intensely desired that the moral order should be 
 perfect, the prophets would be keenly sensitive to 
 everything that seemed to contradict their theory. 
 It is, of course, a too common infirmity to shut the 
 eyes to unwelcome facts, or to interpret them in 
 harmony with theory. In the case before us that 
 would mean reasoning back from lot to conduct, so 
 inferring goodness from prosperity and wickedness 
 from adversity. A pedantic theorist might do that, 
 but hardly a Hebrew prophet. He was much more 
 likely to feel acutely the pressure of the problem 
 arising out of antagonism between theory and experi- 
 ence, and to be as one walking in darkness, simply 
 trusting when he could not see. For a time, indeed, 
 the problem might not exist in an acute form even 
 
THE HEBREW PROPHETS 187 
 
 for a prophet. The attention might be directed 
 chiefly to broad aspects of providence confirmatory 
 of theory, and facts of an opposite character might 
 be simply overlooked, or there might not happen to 
 be any such of a very arresting nature. But when 
 once the problem had fairly announced^fself, and be- 
 come a subject of reflection, it would create a sense 
 of ever-deepening perplexity, leaving the prophetic 
 mind no rest till it had found some clue to the 
 mystery. The faith of the earlier prophet might 
 thus be comparatively confident and cheerful, while 
 that of his brother belonging to a later generation 
 might be overshadowed with doubt, and for a third 
 seer of a still later time the darkness might pass into 
 the dawn of a new light upon the very phenomena 
 which had brought on the eclipse of faith. 
 
 Such differences in mood can be discerned in the 
 prophetic writings ; when we compare, e.g. Isaiah 
 with Jeremiah, and with the unknown prophet of 
 the Exile whose oracles form the later half of the 
 canonical Book of Isaiah. In their respective views 
 concerning the providential order these three pro- 
 phets are related to each other somewhat after the 
 manner of the three great tragic poets of Greece. 
 Isaiah, like ^Eschylus, has an unclouded faith in the 
 retributive justice of God ; Jeremiah, like Sophocles, 
 believes devoutly in the moral order, but not without 
 a keen perception of the mysterious, inexplicable 
 element in human life ; the prophet of the Exile, like 
 
i88 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Euripides, sees in the sufferings of the good, whereof 
 Jeremiah had complained, not merely a dark fate, 
 but an experience that is turned into a joy for 
 the sufferer when he accepts it as incidental to a 
 redemptive vocation. 1 
 
 For the first of these prophets, the sphere within 
 which divine justice displays itself is the nation as a 
 whole. His firm conviction is that the nation which 
 does God's will shall prosper, and that, on the con- 
 trary, the nation which fails to do God's will can- 
 not prosper. His theory is formulated in the first 
 chapter of the book which bears his name in these 
 precise terms : ' If ye be willing and obedient, ye 
 shall eat the good of the land ; but if ye refuse and 
 rebel, ye shall be devoured with the sword.' 2 The 
 actual moral state of Israel when Isaiah uttered his 
 prophecies was such as to demand insistence mainly 
 on the latter of these alternatives ; but the prophet 
 had equal faith in the validity of the other, given 
 the requisite moral conditions. When the spirit of 
 righteousness was poured out upon the community, 
 there would come a happy change in the social state 
 comparable to the transformation of a wilderness 
 into a fruitful field. 'The work of righteousness 
 shall be peace ; and the effect of righteousness quiet- 
 ness and assurance for ever. And my people shall 
 dwell in a peaceable habitation, and in sure dwellings, 
 and in quiet resting-places.' 8 Other prophets of the 
 
 Vide Lecture III. * Isaiah i. 19, 20. Ibid, xxxii. 17, 18. 
 
THE HEBREW PROPHETS 189 
 
 same period say the same thing. The message of 
 Amos to his countrymen is, * Seek ye the Lord, 
 and ye shall live,' or alternatively, ' Seek good, and 
 not evil, that ye may live,' * the life promised 
 including all that makes for national wellbeing. 
 Hosea reveals his faith in the cerfainty of the 
 connection between conduct and lot in national 
 experience by employing the figure of sowing 
 and reaping to convey his thought. 'They have 
 sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirl- 
 wind.' 2 'Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap 
 in mercy.' 8 
 
 A hundred years later an altered tone is observ- 
 able. The prophetic temper has become less buoyant 
 and hopeful, more sombre and dubitating. The 
 change may have been in part an effect of the sore 
 discouragement inflicted on the loyal worshippers of 
 Jehovah during the long, sinister reign of Manasseh, 
 by whom all the interests dear to the heart of his 
 father Hezekiah were treated with ungodly and 
 unfilial contempt. The very length of that reign, 
 as compared with the duration of the one preceding, 
 was of itself a trial of faith in Providence. The 
 godly father reigns only twenty-nine years, dying 
 at the early age of fifty-four ; the unworthy philo- 
 pagan son wears his crown for the exceptionally 
 long period of fifty-five years. What a blow to the 
 sacred interests of religion and morality, and how 
 
 1 Amos v. 6, 14. 2 Hosea viii'. 7. 3 Ibid. x. 12. 
 
190 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 hard to explain on the hypothesis that Jehovah cares 
 for the right. That dreary half-century of misrule 
 was an evil time for the faithful in the land. For 
 them there was nothing but the cold shade of 
 neglect or the fire of persecution, the royal favour 
 being reserved for those who obsequiously followed 
 a bad example. The anavim, the poor afflicted ones 
 of those dismal years, would be forced by their own 
 experience to meditate on a comparatively new pro- 
 blem, the reality of a Providence in the individual 
 life. That the divine care for the right should show 
 itself there also, as well as in the nation at large, was 
 a very natural thought. Still more natural was it to 
 expect that the divine care should show itself there 
 at least, when it was not apparent anywhere else. 
 Hence we are not surprised to find that in the pages 
 of Jeremiah the fortunes of the individual righteous 
 man have become a prominent subject of reflection. 
 These fortunes, in the case of Jeremiah himself, not 
 less than in the case of the like-minded of a previous 
 generation, were of a distressing character ; hence 
 the urgency with which he asks the question, ' Where- 
 fore doth the way of the wicked prosper?' 1 It is a 
 question which he cannot answer. He is simply 
 astonished that prosperity should so often be on the 
 wrong side ; bad men faring as if God loved them, 
 good men faring as if God hated, or at least cared 
 not, for them. 
 
 1 Jeremiah xiL I. 
 
THE HEBREW PROPHETS 191 
 
 The matter could not end there. Deep thought 
 on so vital a theme must issue in one or other of two 
 results. Either the theory of a righteous Providence 
 must be abandoned as untenable, or the sufferings of 
 righteous men must be discovered to serve some 
 good purpose in harmony with the supposed aim of 
 Providence. In the golden oracles of the unknown 
 prophet of the Exile we find the dialectic process 
 coming to rest in the latter of these alternatives. 
 The fifty-third chapter of the Book of Isaiah is the 
 classic formulation of the new doctrine. A question 
 vividly expressing the marvellous nature of the state- 
 ment about to be made forms an appropriate prelude. 
 1 Who hath believed our report ? ' asks the prophet, 
 not by way of complaint that no one believes, for no 
 one but himself yet knows what he is going to say, 
 but by way of hinting that what he is about to 
 declare is of so unheard-of a character that surprise 
 and incredulity on first hearing will be very excus- 
 able. ' Who can credit what I am going to tell ? it is 
 a great wonder ; listen ! ' And what then is the 
 wonder ? Is it that the righteous servant of Jehovah 
 is a great sufferer ? No ! that for a good while, ever 
 since the evil days of King Manasseh, has been a 
 familiar commonplace, known to all men through the 
 unwritten tradition of the sorrow of pious forefathers, 
 and through the outspoken complaints of Jeremiah. 
 Not that the servant of Jehovah suffers is the marvel, 
 but that through suffering he passes into world-wide 
 
192 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 renown. 1 The glory that is to follow the suffering, 
 not the suffering in itself, is the main theme of the 
 prophecy. It is true, indeed, that the picture of 
 the man of sorrow, exhibiting in sombre colours the 
 tragic details of his woful experience, is what chiefly 
 catches the eye of the reader. But the prophetic 
 artist spends his strength here not merely to elicit 
 the sympathetic exclamation, How great a sufferer ! 
 but to communicate insight into the source and the 
 issue of the suffering. Three things he desires to 
 teach those who can understand : that the suffering 
 of the righteous one is due to the sin of the unright- 
 eous ; that there shall be a great reversal of fortune 
 for the sufferer, humiliation passing into exaltation ; 
 and that those who made him suffer will participate 
 in the honour and felicity awaiting him. ' He was 
 wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for 
 our iniquities'; 'Jehovah hath laid on him the 
 iniquity of us all ' 2 there is the first lesson. ' There- 
 fore will I divide him a portion with the great, and 
 he shall divide the spoil with the strong' 3 there is 
 the second. ' He bare the sin of many, and made 
 intercession for the transgressors' 4 there is the 
 third. When these three truths are taken together, 
 light dawns on the connection between the suffering 
 and the subsequent glory, the humiliation and the 
 
 1 Vide B. Duhm, Das Buck fesata, p. 367. Duhm thinks that the 
 servant of Jehovah prophecies, including Isaiah lii. 13-liii. 12 are post- 
 exilian. 
 
 Isaiah liii. 5. Ibid. liii. 12. 4 Ibid. liii. 12. 
 
THE HEBREW PROPHETS 193 
 
 exaltation. It is seen to be a connection not merely 
 of sequence but of causality, the exaltation having 
 its root in the humiliation. For what is the state of 
 humiliation ? Viewed from the outside, it is simply 
 the state of one very miserable : despised of men, 
 stricken, abandoned, cursed by God. Btft from the 
 prophet's point of view it is the state of one who 
 suffers unjustly through the sin of the very men 
 who despise him, and who is all the while, in spite 
 of appearances to the contrary, not the accursed, but 
 the beloved servant of Jehovah. It is only a ques- 
 tion of time when the prophetic view will be accepted 
 as the true one. And when that time arrives the 
 great reversal shall have begun. The new view of 
 the old fact, embodied in the confession, 'surely he 
 hath borne our griefs,' 1 will bring about the grand 
 transformation : the despised one taking his place 
 among the great, and winning divine favour even for 
 the unworthy. 
 
 Such, in meagre outline, is the import of this 
 unique oracle concerning the redemptive virtue of 
 the sufferings of the good. The use made of it by 
 Christian theologians, following apostolic example, 
 to express the significance of Christ's death, is well 
 known. That use has its own rationale, but it does 
 not concern us here. We have to take this sublime 
 utterance of an unknown Hebrew prophet, not as 
 a miraculous anticipation of the theological theory 
 
 1 Isaiah liii. 4. 
 N 
 
i 9 4 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 of atonement, but as a vital part of the prophetic 
 doctrine of Providence. It is an attempt at a 
 solution of the problem : How are the sufferings of 
 the righteous to be explained and justified, so that 
 they may no longer be a stumbling-block to faith 
 in a righteous providential order ? As such it must 
 be understood as of universal application. It is the 
 announcement of a general law, not the explanation 
 of one exceptional case coming under no general 
 law of the moral world. Whether the prophet had 
 a dim vision of One in whose unique experience 
 should be absolutely realised his ideal picture of 
 the Man of Sorrow is a question which cannot be 
 authoritatively answered. In any case, it may safely 
 be assumed that there were phenomena belonging 
 to his own age to which he deemed the language of 
 this oracle applicable : a suffering servant of Jehovah, 
 collective or individual, whose strange tragic experi- 
 ence could be made intelligible and even acceptable 
 to a believer in a Divine Providence by investing it 
 with redemptive virtue. It may further be assumed 
 that he would have used the same key to unlock the 
 mystery of righteousness suffering, in whatever time 
 or place it might make its appearance. Every 
 instance of the kind demanded explanation, in his 
 judgment, because on the face of it it seemed, of 
 all the dark facts of human life, the one most in- 
 compatible with earnest faith in the righteousness 
 of God. It is such faith, deep-rooted in his soul, 
 
THE HEBREW PROPHETS 195 
 
 that has set his mind to brood on the facts which 
 seem to give it the lie, as he sits in sad exile by 
 the rivers of Babylon. And here at last is the 
 solution which brings rest and joy to his spirit : 
 To every suffering servant of God are appointed 
 ample compensations ; not merely a hagpy change 
 of outward personal fortune, as in the case of Job, 
 but the power of bringing blessing to a world un- 
 worthy of him, whose ignorance and perversity have 
 been the cause of all his woes. 
 
 This great thought is a splendid illustration of the 
 power of strong faith in a providential order to give 
 birth to new fruitful ideas. It is not a solitary 
 example of its fertility. The whole group of 
 prophetic oracles usually designated 'Messianic* 
 may be regarded as a fruitage springing out of 
 that faith as its seed. To this class belong those 
 pictures of a better national future which abound 
 in the pages of Isaiah, predicting a time when, 
 under a king reigning in righteousness, the people 
 will also be righteous and therefore happy. 1 These 
 bright pictures of a time when God's providential 
 action will take the form of blessing the good have 
 all to be relegated to the future, because the present 
 is prevalently bad, and affords scope mainly for the 
 punitive display of divine righteousness. That 
 there will ever be such a happy time is a matter of 
 faith for the prophet. But it is an essential part 
 
 1 Isaiah xi. and xxxii. 
 
196 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 of his creed. For he cannot but feel that a divine 
 Ruler who never does anything but punish is a very 
 unsatisfactory object of worship. The theory of a 
 righteous government of God in the world can 
 command acceptance only when there is a supply 
 of illustrations on both sides. If there are no 
 beneficent exemplifications in the present or the 
 past, they must be forthcoming in the future. In 
 the future accordingly they are placed by the 
 believing imagination of the prophet. In the 
 future of this present world, for that, not a world 
 to come beyond the grave, was the object of the 
 Hebrew prophet's hope. He believed that there 
 would come a time in the history of the people 
 of Israel when it would be possible for God to 
 show Himself on a grand scale as the rewarder of 
 righteousness by inaugurating a state of general 
 felicity. 
 
 This good time coming might, for a while, appear 
 an object of reasonable expectation even in the 
 ordinary course of things. Why should there not 
 come a day when an instructed people like Israel 
 should begin with one heart to seek the Lord and 
 to do His will, and so at length obtain the long- 
 deferred blessing ? Times did vary for better as 
 well as for worse ; why should there not arrive a 
 time of general and signal goodness, when it might 
 be said without much exaggeration that all the 
 people were righteous ? But when generation after 
 
THE HEBREW PROPHETS 197 
 
 generation had passed without the golden age 
 making its appearance, when what at first promised 
 to fulfil hope had turned out a chilling disappoint- 
 ment, when the lapse of one hundred and fifty years, 
 from the time when Isaiah uttered his oracles of the 
 mountain of the Lord's house, and the rod out of the 
 stem of Jesse, had brought, not a millennium but a 
 Babylonian captivity, then men might begin to 
 reason to an opposite intent and say : Since the good 
 time has been so long in coming, what ground is 
 there for thinking it will ever come at all? Such 
 seems to have been the mood of Jeremiah when he 
 uttered the famous oracle of the New Covenant. 
 Only that oracle is not the expression of doubt 
 pure and simple, but of faith victorious over doubt, 
 arguing in this wise : ' There is indeed no hope of 
 the good time coming in the natural course of things. 
 One might indeed expect the captives to return from 
 Babylon taught wisdom effectually by a , severe 
 lesson ; but there is too much reason to fear that 
 the exiles will come back only to repeat the follies 
 of their fathers, possibly in a new and worse form. 
 Yet God's purpose in Israel's election cannot fail ; 
 there must be a people on the earth keeping His 
 commandments and reaping the appropriate reward. 
 How can this be? Only on the footing of a new 
 Covenant. The law must be written on the heart, not 
 merely on tables of stone, so that men shall not only 
 know their duty but be disposed and enabled to do 
 
198 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 it. Yea, and the law shall be written on the heart 1 
 The time will come when that greater boon, eclipsing 
 the achievement at Sinai, shall be bestowed.' 
 
 Here was a great, bold, romantic idea born of 
 faith tried by doubt, a new hope springing out of 
 despair. Even if it were only a sweet dream, as the 
 prophet's own description of the thoughts which 
 filled his mind at that season might suggest, 1 yet 
 it would be worthy to be regarded with reverence 
 as one of the noblest dreams that ever visited the 
 mind of man. It was a dream possible only for 
 one who, with all his heart and soul, desired God's 
 will to be done, and believed that will to have for 
 its supreme object righteousness. It was a dream 
 inevitable for one cherishing such a desire and such 
 a faith. For if there be truth in the Hebrew idea 
 of God as, before all, an ethical being, righteousness 
 must be forthcoming in this world somehow. God 
 cannot be conceived as cherishing an impotent 
 desire for a thing supremely good in itself, but 
 beyond His reach. Either He does not care for the 
 right, or the right will enter into the world of reality. 
 If one means of bringing it about does not suffice, 
 another must be tried. Let Sinai, with its stone 
 tablets, if you will, be the first experiment, but if it 
 fail, then we must have the new Covenant with its 
 law written on the heart. You may, with some 
 
 1 Jeremiah xxxi. 26 : ' Upon this I awaked, and beheld ; and my 
 leep was sweet unto me.' 
 
THE HEBREW PROPHETS 199 
 
 call that idea of Jeremiah's, and the whole apparatus 
 of Messianic prophecy, extra belief > Aberglaube^ or, in 
 plain terms, superstition. For naturalistic agnosti- 
 cism it can be nothing else. But the prophets raise 
 a clear issue, and we must face the alternatives. 
 If God's chief end in this world be the reign of 
 righteousness, then a Messianic King and a Messianic 
 Kingdom, and the law written on the heart as a 
 means towards its realisation, are natural corollaries. 
 If these things are mere unrealisable ideals, then the 
 prophetic idea of God and of Providence was a great, 
 though a creditable, mistake. There is no God who 
 cares for righteousness, no Providence having for its 
 supreme aim the establishment of a kingdom of the 
 good. 
 
 There are some who do not hesitate to affirm that 
 the prophetic idea of God and of Providence was a 
 mistake. I cannot accept this view. In saying this, 
 however, I do not mean to assert that the prophetic 
 theory of Providence was without defects. The 
 prophet had the defects of his qualities, among 
 which three may be specified. 
 
 I. The first of these defects was a tendency to 
 assert in an extreme or crude form the connection 
 between the physical order and the moral order of 
 the world. That a close connection exists between 
 these two orders must be held by all who believe 
 in Divine Providence. This faith postulates that 
 physical facts and laws shall serve moral ends. But 
 
200 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 in the application of that general principle we must 
 be on our guard against setting up arbitrary relations, 
 by attaching every event in the physical world to 
 some particular action or habit in the moral world as 
 its reward or penalty. The moral government of 
 God, as Butler long ago pointed out, does not consist 
 of a number of single, unconnected acts of distributive 
 justice and goodness, but is a vast connected scheme 
 which can only be imperfectly comprehended, and 
 ought therefore to be cautiously interpreted. No 
 one duly mindful of this truth would feel warranted 
 in regarding seasonable rains and good crops as sure 
 marks of divine favour towards a virtuous community, 
 and disastrous storms as the unquestionable sign and 
 punishment of prevalent misconduct. It cannot justly 
 be affirmed that the Hebrew prophets indulged in 
 such superficial logic. They reasoned, indeed, with 
 confidence, from conduct to lot, present or prospec- 
 tive, but they did not reason with equal confidence 
 from lot to conduct. They were kept from doing so, 
 partly through the keenness of their moral percep- 
 tions, partly through well-balanced views of the 
 character of God. They did not need outward 
 events to tell them who were good men, and who 
 bad ; they could discern between the righteous and 
 the wicked by direct spiritual insight. And they 
 were forced to acknowledge that those whom they 
 perceived to be good did not always fare well, and 
 that those whom they perceived to be evil did not 
 
THE HEBREW PROPHETS *ot 
 
 always fare ill. Long life, e.g. a highly valued 
 blessing, was not, they could see, a monopoly of the 
 godly. The godly Hezekiah did not live much more 
 than half his days, while his godless son, Manasseh, 
 reached a comparatively old age. Then/ well-in- 
 structed conceptions of the divine character also 
 preserved the prophet from adopting blindly the 
 precarious logic of events. They knew that God 
 was patient as well as righteous, and that He dealt 
 with no man after his sins. In view of that truth 
 prosperity could not be certainly interpreted as a 
 sign of goodness ; it might only mean that, in any 
 particular instance, God was 'slow to anger, and 
 plenteous in mercy.' 
 
 Nevertheless, it may be admitted that there was 
 a tendency in the prophetic mind to assert with 
 excessive emphasis the connection between conduct 
 and lot, as if the two categories covered each other, 
 and the character of either might be inferred from 
 that of the other. Moses, as represented by the 
 Deuteronomist, confidently promises to Israel heark- 
 ening diligently to God's commandments, 'the first 
 rain and the latter rain/ 1 and when a dearth happens 
 Jeremiah appears to take for granted that it is a 
 divine visitation for sin. 2 Without seeming to dis- 
 parage the prophets, we may acknowledge frankly 
 that they did not grasp firmly, and apply con- 
 sistently, the truth proclaimed by Jesus in the 
 
 1 Deuteronomy xi. 14. a Jeremiah xiv. 
 
202 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Sermon on the Mount that God 'maketh His sun 
 to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain 
 on the just and on the unjust.' l In that respect the 
 great ones of the Old Testament come far behind 
 the greater Teacher who speaks to us in the New. 
 
 2. A second characteristic defect of the prophets 
 was a tendency to lay a onesided emphasis on the 
 punitive action of divine providence. They placed 
 judgment above mercy. The 'day of Jehovah' in 
 the prophetic dialect meant chiefly a day of judg- 
 ment. This was not due to any ignoble vice of 
 temper ; it was rather an infirmity arising out of the 
 passion for righteousness. The prophet loved right 
 so intensely that he could not bear the sight of evil. 
 4 Away with it ! ' he exclaimed impatiently, ' let the 
 stormy wind of divine judgment sweep it off the 
 face of the earth.' Then unhappily evil was usually 
 more plentiful than good. What the prophet longed 
 to see, justice and mercy, was too often conspicuous 
 by its absence. Can we wonder if, weary to death 
 of the monotonous dominion of bad custom, the 
 devotee of righteousness gave utterance in grim 
 tones to the sentiment, 'Let the sinners be con- 
 sumed out of the earth, and let the wicked be no 
 more.' 1 Then it has to be remembered that the 
 theatre of divine justice for the prophet was this 
 present world. He did not relegate the guerdons 
 of good and evil to a life beyond the grave, and take 
 
 1 Matthew T. 45. * Psalm civ. 35. 
 
THE HEBREW PROPHETS 203 
 
 philosophically the prevalence of any amount of 
 moral confusion in the present life. He desired to 
 see divine justice and goodness now, in the land of 
 the living. And when he did not see them, when 
 especially justice tarried long, and Vickedness 
 flourished like a green bay tree, he was wroth, 
 and demanded a judgment day in terms fierce 
 and peremptory, sounding possibly to our delicate 
 modern ears savage and brutal. This was partly 
 his merit, partly also his weakness. It was the 
 infirmity of John the Baptist, who could not imagine 
 the Christ coming without the axe of judgment to 
 cut down barren fruit-trees. John was great in 
 his holy rage against sin, but also little ; the least 
 in the Kingdom of Heaven was greater than he. 
 
 3. One other defect of the prophets remains to 
 be mentioned. It is the tendency to attach too 
 much value to outward good and ill as the reward 
 and penalty of conduct. Herein they went to the 
 opposite extreme from the Stoics. The Stoics 
 reckoned outward good and ill matters of indiffer- 
 ence ; to the Hebrew prophet, on the other hand, 
 these things appeared almost the summum bomim 
 and the summum malum. Such a view reveals 
 moral crudity, for the thoroughly instructed con- 
 science cannot possibly attach so high a value to 
 anything external. It also creates difficulty for one 
 who desires earnestly to believe in a providential 
 order. For character and outward lot are not so 
 
*6 4 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 uniformly correspondent as theory requires. The 
 theory that God loves the righteous and hates the 
 wicked breaks down unless marks of divine favour 
 and disfavour can be found elsewhere than in external 
 experience. That it is ever well with the good 
 man can be maintained only when felicity is placed 
 within, and made to consist in what a man is, not 
 in what he has. At this point the doctrine of Jesus 
 shows a great advance as compared with that of 
 Hebrew prophecy. In the Gospels the method of 
 outwardness gives place to the method of inward- 
 ness, and goodness becomes its own reward. Out- 
 ward good has still some value. But it is secondary, 
 not primary ; a means to an end, not an end in itself. 
 And outward ill can serve spiritual ends as well as 
 outward good, nay, even in a higher degree. A man 
 may have cause to rejoice in tribulation more than 
 in wealth, or health, or length of days. 
 
 To this purer vision Hebrew prophets did not 
 attain, though some came near to it, e.g. Habakkuk, 
 when he sang his triumphant song, 'Although the 
 fig tree shall not blossom.' 1 But though they fell 
 short, their very limitations rendered service to the 
 higher faith, They did the utmost possible for their 
 own theory, and prepared the way for a better by 
 making it manifest that, on their view of the con- 
 nection between lot and conduct, the problem of 
 Providence was insoluble. 
 
 1 Habakkuk ill. 17-19. 
 
THE HEBREW 
 
 While frankly acknowledging these defects, we 
 must not permit them to blind our minds to the 
 inestimable service rendered by the prophets to the 
 higher interests of humanity. Their characteristic 
 passion for righteousness was a virtue of ^Uch tran- 
 scendent worth that of itself it might cover a multi- 
 tude of infirmities. Their idea of God as an ethical 
 being is worthy of all acceptation, and intrinsically 
 fit to survive all other conceptions. They might be 
 mistaken as to the precise mode and measure in 
 which divine righteousness reveals itself in the world, 
 but their imperishable merit is to have seen clearly 
 that the only Divinity worthy of homage is one who 
 careth for the right, and who can be acceptably 
 served only by doing justly and loving mercy. Their 
 broad assertion of the reign of retributive law in 
 this present world, if too unqualified, was and will 
 continue to be a much-needed moral tonic for the 
 conscience of men. Let us not complain of them 
 because they had so little to say about a future life 
 and its compensations. It is possible to make a 
 bad use of these ; to be too meekly resigned to 
 iniquity on earth because all things will be put 
 right in the great Hereafter. The prophets were 
 not guilty of this sin. They said : If divine justice 
 be a reality, let it show itself here and now. It 
 will be a bad day for the social and moral well- 
 being of communities when their emphatic utter- 
 ances to this effect come to be treated as antiquated 
 
206 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 delusions. They were not, as has been sometimes 
 asserted, 'socialists/ but they strenuously insisted 
 on social well-being as a thing to be earnestly pro- 
 moted by all, according to their power ; and they 
 were never weary of advocating the claims of the 
 poor. 'Do justly and love mercy 'was the burden 
 of their prophesying. Lastly, we owe a debt of 
 gratitude to the great seers of the Hebrew race for 
 so strongly affirming a connection between conduct 
 and lot in the history of nations. Their declarations 
 are, if you will, over-peremptory, onesided, extreme. 
 That is the way of prophets. All things considered, 
 this prophetic onesidedness is a very excusable 
 fault. The truth they proclaimed is habitually over- 
 looked by many, and neglected truths need vehe- 
 ment, monotonously reiterated, assertion to win for 
 them an open ear. And what they thus asserted, 
 though much disregarded, is true. It is a fact that 
 righteousness makes for the well-being of a people, 
 and that prevalent unrighteousness is not only dis- 
 graceful but ruinous. Let him that hath an ear 
 heart 
 
LECTURE VII 
 
 THE BOOK OF JOB 
 
 No account of the history of human thought on the 
 subject of Providence, however slight and sketchy, 
 could omit the remarkable contribution made by 
 that book in the Hebrew canonical literature which 
 bears the name of Job. By its intrinsic merits it 
 takes a foremost place, not only in that literature, 
 but in the whole religious literature of the world. 
 Mr. Froude does not exaggerate when he speaks 
 of it as a book * unequalled of its kind, which will 
 one day, perhaps, when it is allowed to stand on 
 its own merits, be seen towering up alone, far 
 away above all the poetry of the world/ 1 As a 
 discussion of the question as to the reality of a 
 Providential order it is unique. There is nothing 
 like it either in the Hebrew Bible or outside of 
 it ; nothing so thorough, so searching, or so bold. 
 Surprise has been expressed that a work so 
 audacious and free-spoken should have obtained 
 a place in the Hebrew Canon, under the vigilant 
 
 1 Short Stiuties on Great Subjects, vol. i. p. 187. 
 
2o8 THE MORAL ORDER OP THE WORLD 
 
 supervision of the scribes. 1 But there is much 
 more in the Canon with which collectors and 
 editors belonging to that class would find it hard 
 to sympathise, e.g. many of the prophetic utterances. 
 The prophets paved the way for Job. They in- 
 augurated the type of doubting thought, and they 
 cast the shield of their prestige over an author who 
 went much further in the path of doubt than any 
 of them had ventured. If a prophet might be 
 allowed to ask: * Wherefore lookest thou upon 
 them that deal treacherously, and holdest thy 
 peace when the wicked swalloweth up the man 
 that is more righteous than he?' 2 why should not 
 another earnest student of God's mysterious ways be 
 permitted to make such an apparently irreverent 
 question the theme of a daring, elaborate discussion ? 
 If it entered into the plan of the compilers of the 
 Canon to let the perplexities of thoughtful men 
 on the subject of divine Providence find adequate 
 expression, no book could have a better claim to 
 recognition than the Book of Job. This is its very 
 raison d'etre: to give free rein to sincere, serious 
 doubt ; to probe the problem of the moral order 
 to the bottom by discussing the test question, Do 
 good men suffer, and why ? Its method lends itself 
 to ample exhaustive treatment. The author does 
 not speak in his own name ; he makes others speak, 
 introducing as many interlocutors as are necessary 
 1 Froude, Short Studies, vol. i. p. 187. * Habakkuk i. 13. 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 20? 
 
 to represent all shades of opinion. He is not 
 himself a dogmatist or theorist; he is much more 
 concerned to >h."w how the matter strikes other 
 men than to offer himself as one in possession of 
 a new, satisfactory, solution. He deahr with his 
 theme after the manner of a sage rather than after 
 the manner of a prophet. The prophet spoke 
 oracularly, delivering his belief in divine Justice 
 as an inspired message, prefaced with a ' Thus saith 
 the Lord.' The author of Job has no message from 
 God to offer. His mental burden rather is that 
 God does not speak, that He maintains an ominous, 
 oppressive silence as to the meaning of His doings, 
 leaving men to grope their way in the dark as best 
 they can. What he gives us is an animated picture 
 of these gropings, with an occasional illuminating 
 word thrown in here and there to mitigate the gloom 
 of night for such as understand. 
 
 As to the date of this priceless product of Hebrew 
 wisdom critics are far from agreement. Opinion, 
 ancient and modern, ranges from the time of 
 Moses the author according to the tradition of the 
 synagogue to the fourth century B.C., and even 
 later still. The topic cannot be discussed here. 
 Let it suffice to say that such a book, in the 
 natural course of things, could only be produced 
 when the question of Providence in the indhidual 
 life had become acute. That did not happen in 
 Israel, so far as we know, till the time of Jersmiah. 
 
 O 
 
210 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 It is probable, therefore, that our book was written 
 after that famous prophet had delivered his oracles 
 and expressed his doubts about the righteousness of 
 divine government. The reputation of the prophet 
 for borrowing has indeed led some to assign to 
 the author of Job the position of predecessor, both 
 Jeremiah and Job cursing their birth-day in very 
 much the same style. The similarity, however, 
 may be accidental, or, if borrowing took place, it 
 may have been on the other side. Our best 
 guide to the time of composition is a suitable 
 situation. Men write such books in times of dire 
 distress, when the iron of a pitiless destiny has 
 entered into their soul. From this point of view 
 the most congenial general date is that of the 
 captivity in Babylon. The unknown writer of the 
 book of Job may have been a contemporary and 
 companion in tribulation of the unknown prophet 
 to whom we owe the second half of the book of 
 Isaiah. 
 
 Coming to the book itself, we find it consists of 
 a prologue and epilogue, both in plain prose, and 
 lying between a long series of very impassioned 
 speeches in poetic dialect arranged in the form of 
 a dialogue, in which the speakers are the hero of 
 the book, three of his friends, another person 
 called Elihu, and finally Jehovah. The prologue 
 quaintly tells the story of a man in the land of 
 Uz, who was at once very good and, for a while, 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 211 
 
 very prosperous, till, by a series of calamities, he 
 was denuded of his prosperity and reduced to a 
 pitiful state of misery. It further lets us into the 
 secret of this change of state. In a gathering of 
 the 'Sons of God' an accuser called Satan/ appears 
 before the Lord, and insinuates a doubt whether 
 Job would cultivate goodness if his righteousness 
 and piety were to be dissociated from the well- 
 being with which they had hitherto been accom- 
 panied. 1 There was only one way in which this 
 sinister insinuation could be effectually disposed 
 of, viz., by experiment. Job must be deprived of 
 everything that entered into his cup of happiness 
 health, wealth, family to see how he would behave. 
 This happens accordingly, as we are shown in a 
 succession of tragic scenes. 2 The epilogue briefly 
 relates how the sufferer, after enduring patiently his 
 trial, was rewarded by a prosperity exceeding that 
 of which he had been temporarily bereft. 8 
 
 The question has been raised, in what relation the 
 author of Job stood to these opening and closing 
 sections of the book. A not improbable suggestion 
 is that he took these portions from a people's book 
 previously in circulation relating the eventful story 
 of the man of Uz, and inserted between them the 
 long dialogue which forms his personal contribution 
 to the discussion of the problem as to the connection 
 between character and lot. Whether the whole of 
 
 1 Job i. 6-12. 2 Ibid. i. 13-!!. 10. * Ibid. xlii. 10-17. 
 
212 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 the intercalated material, forming the main body 
 of the work, came from his pen is a point much 
 disputed. Many critics think that the speeches of 
 Elihu and Jehovah mar the unity of the book, 
 and must have proceeded from another hand. 
 This question does not greatly concern us. What 
 we are chiefly interested to note is that the 
 speeches of Elihu, whoever wrote them, contain a 
 distinct view of the question in debate. They are 
 on that account deserving of some notice in an 
 attempt to estimate the amount of light thrown 
 by the book of Job as it stands on the mysteries 
 of providence. Besides, it has been maintained 
 that, apart altogether from Elihu's utterances, the 
 theory broached therein can be shown to be that 
 which the author of the book meant to teach. 1 When 
 we come to consider the didactic value of the book 
 this opinion will have to be reckoned with. 
 
 The part of the work about whose genuineness 
 there is, on the whole, least room for doubt is that 
 in which Job and his three condoling friends hold 
 debate. It is by far the most important as well as 
 the most certainly authentic, and it will repay us to 
 make ourselves somewhat closely acquainted with its 
 contents by a detailed analysis. 
 
 Job begins the war of words by a soliloquy in 
 which he curses not God, but his day. Leprosy 
 has been long enough upon him to affect his 
 
 1 }'!<1c Karl Budde, Das Buck Hid\ KinYitnng. pp. xxi -x\\ix. 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 213 
 
 temper, and he indulges his melancholy humour 
 in fantastic imprecations on the day on which he 
 was born, in passionate longing for the advent of 
 death the great leveller, and for the sweet rest of 
 the tomb ; and in expressions of surpryse at the 
 continued existence of men so miserable as himself. 1 
 
 This unrestrained outburst opens the mouth of 
 friends who for seven days have sat in respectful 
 silence in presence of suffering. They have their 
 preconceived ideas about the cause of such suffer- 
 ings, but they might have kept these to themselves 
 had they not been provoked to speak. Now that 
 Job had spoken so plainly, they may speak with 
 equal plainness. They use their privilege to the 
 full. Eliphaz the Ternanite, Bildad the Shuhite, 
 and Zophar the Naamathite, deliver their sentiments, 
 if not with remarkable wisdom, at least with extra- 
 ordinary fluency, copiousness, and emphasis. 
 
 The long discussion between Job and his com- 
 panions divides itself into three cycles. The plan 
 of the debate is that each of the three friends speaks 
 in turn ; Eliphaz first, Bildad second, Zophar third, 
 Job replying to each in succession. The first en- 
 counter is described in Chapters iv.-xiv., the second 
 occupies Chapters xv.-xxi., and the third Chapters 
 xxii.-xxxi. In the third cycle Zophar does not speak. 2 
 
 1 Job ill 
 
 2 Some critics think that chap, xxvii. 8-10, 12-23, containing senti- 
 ments unsuitable in the mouth of Job, are really a part of Zophar 's 
 third speech which has strayed from its place. 
 
214 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 In the first cycle the combatants take up their 
 ground and reveal their idiosyncrasies. Eliphaz, 
 the oldest, wisest, and most considerate of the three 
 visitors, states at the outset the position held in 
 common by them. With perfect confidence that his 
 theory of Providence is correct beyond question, he 
 presents it for Job's consideration in these terms: 
 * Remember, I pray thee, who ever perished being 
 innocent? or where were the righteous cut off? Even 
 as I have seen, they that plough iniquity, and sow 
 wickedness, reap the same.' 1 This amounts to an 
 assertion that there is a perfect moral government 
 of God in the world rendering to every man accord- 
 ing to his deserts here and now. The problem of 
 the book, Do good men suffer, and why? is thus 
 solved by being voted out of existence. There is 
 no such thing as a really good man suffering such 
 calamities as have overtaken Job. The man who 
 so suffers, if not absolutely bad, must at least have 
 been guilty of some very heinous special sins whereof 
 his sufferings are the just penalty. Job is accord- 
 ingly invited by each of the three friends in succes- 
 sion to regard his afflictions as a call to repentance 
 in hope of recovering thereby lost prosperity. * Be- 
 hold/ exclaims Eliphaz, ' happy is the man whom 
 God correcteth : therefore despise not thou the 
 chastening of the Almighty.' 2 ' If,' chimes in Bildad, 
 'thou wouldest seek unto God betimes, and make 
 1 Job iv. 7, 8. 9 Ibid. v. 17. 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 215 
 
 thy supplication unto the Almighty, surely now He 
 would watch over thee and make thy righteous 
 habitation secure, and thy beginning should be small 
 (in comparison) and thy latter end should greatly 
 increase.' / 
 
 While all holding the same general view, each 
 of the three advocates of this na'fvely simple theory 
 supports the common thesis in his own way. Eli- 
 phaz bases his belief on observation, and also and 
 very specially on a revelation made to him in a 
 vision, which he introduces into his first speech with 
 an imposing solemnity, whose effect is marred by 
 theatricality in the style and exaggeration in the 
 sentiment. Startled by the night-vision, and with 
 hair standing on end, he hears this oracle uttered 
 by the voice of an invisible speaker: 'Behold, God 
 putteth no trust in His servants, and His angels He 
 chargeth with folly. How much more them that 
 dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the 
 dust?' 2 There may have been a time when such 
 courtly, obsequious sentiments could pass for sound 
 theology, but no one whose idea of God is Christian 
 can accept them as bearing the stamp of a veritable 
 divine revelation. 
 
 Bildad's stronghold is not special revelation, but 
 
 the voice of antiquity. Setting little value on the 
 
 opinion of such short-lived mortals as himself, he 
 
 falls back for proof of his theory on the traditions 
 
 1 Job viii. 5, 6. a Ibid. iv. 12-19. 
 
216 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 of the fathers. * Inquire of the former age, and 
 apply thyself to that which their fathers have searched 
 out (for v/e are but of yesterday and know nothing, 
 because our days upon earth are a shadow).' l And 
 what is the testimony of bygone generations? That 
 any prosperity which falls to the lot of the wicked 
 is unstable; his good fortune is like the frail reed, 
 or the delicate web of the spider. 2 
 
 Zophar has neither divine vision nor old saw to 
 enforce his argument. He finds in his own private 
 judgment sufficient evidence of the truth of his 
 views. He is a feeble, barren dogmatist, who makes 
 up for want of thought by bold assertion, and covers 
 the poverty of his imagination by violent language. 
 He speaks to Job more harshly than either of his 
 brethren. Eliphaz softens the charge of guilt by 
 merging the individual case in the general sinful- 
 ness of humanity : ' Man (for his sins) is born unto 
 trouble as the sparks fly upward/ 3 Bildad merely 
 insinuates that Job may be insincere in his piety, 
 by describing the end of a hypocrite. 4 But Zophar 
 calls Job to his face a babbler, a liar, and a fool, 
 and tells him that his sufferings are less than his 
 iniquity deserves. The only thing with any preten- 
 sions to originality in his speech is a brief, impotently 
 inadequate eulogium on the unsearchableness of 
 divine wisdom. ' Canst thou/ he insolently asks Job, 
 
 1 Job viii. 8. f Ibid. viii. 11-13. 
 
 * Ibid. v. 7. 4 Ibid. viii. 13. 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 217 
 
 'by searching find out God?' 1 as if it were Job, 
 and not rather he and his friends who virtually 
 claimed to have fathomed the depths and scaled 
 the heights of the Almighty's mind and way! 
 
 Each of Job's replies to these opening/speeches 
 of his opponents is divisible into two parts. First, 
 he answers his human adversary; then, forgetting 
 men, he lifts up his soul to God and speaks to Him 
 concerning his afflictions. To get a clear idea of 
 his state of mind, it will be convenient to consider 
 the replies to men and the addresses to God sepa- 
 rately, not forgetting, however, that these addresses 
 to the Deity are supposed to be heard by the 
 friends, and to have an argumentative bearing on 
 their position. 
 
 As against his human opponents, Job makes a 
 good defence. He brings a preliminary charge of 
 heartlessness against them all. Had they but sym- 
 pathetically realised the extent of his affliction, 
 he would have been spared the sermon which the 
 Temanite had preached at him. * Oh that my grief 
 were thoroughly weighed, and that my sufferings 
 were laid with it in the balances !' 2 'Doth the wild 
 ass bray when he hath grass ? or loweth the ox over 
 his fodder?' 8 That is to say: 'Do you imagine I 
 have cursed my day without reason?' To justify- 
 that passionate outburst of impatience, he repeats 
 the wish that his miserable life might forthwith 
 1 Job xi. 7. Ibid. vi. 2. 8 Ibid. vi. 5. 
 
218 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 end. 1 Then turning on his friends, he reproaches 
 them with lack of sympathy, comparing them to 
 streams in the south which, rolling in full, turbid 
 torrent in winter, dry up and disappear in the 
 scorching heat of summer, just when they are most 
 needed, to the grievous disappointment of travellers 
 passing in caravans through the desert. 2 
 
 While keenly hurt by his brethren's unkindness, 
 Job is utterly unimpressed by their arguments. In 
 replying to Eliphaz, he contents himself with flatly 
 denying the position he had laid down. 'My sin,' 
 he says in effect, ' is not the cause of my sufferings, 
 whatever the cause may be.' He knows this from 
 his own moral consciousness, whose testimony he 
 trusts implicitly as he trusts his palate for the taste 
 of food. 'Now therefore/ he says to Eliphaz with 
 irresistible directness, ' be so good as to look upon 
 me, look straight at me. I shall surely not lie to 
 your face. Return, I pray you ; don't be unfair. 
 Return, I say again ; my righteousness is at stake. 
 Is there iniquity in my tongue? cannot my palate 
 discern what is wrong?' 8 Do you think, that is to 
 say, I don't know the difference between good and 
 evil? 
 
 In his answer to Bildad the Traditionalist Job 
 repeats his denial of the current theory in the form 
 of an ironical admission. Bildad had concluded his 
 speech with the words : ' Behold, God will not cast 
 
 1 Job vi. 9. Ibid. vi. 15-20. * Ibid. vi. 28-30. 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 219 
 
 away a perfect man, neither will he help the evil 
 doer.' 1 To this Job replies: 'No doubt! I know 
 it is so of a truth.' 2 That this is ironically meant 
 appears from the fact that the speaker proceeds 
 immediately to state that no one can be /ust before 
 God, not because man is sinful and God holy, but 
 because man is weak and God mighty. Frail mortals 
 have no chance with One who is wise in heart and 
 great in strength, who can uproot mountains, shake 
 the solid earth, obscure the sun, seal up the stars, 
 tread on the waves, and rejoice in the storm. 3 With 
 such a powerful Being he, Job, would rather not 
 contend. He would not care to appear with Him 
 in court, either as pursuer or as defender. Even 
 if he were innocent he would not reply to His 
 charges, but would make supplication to his assail- 
 ant. Though he might deem himself wronged, he 
 would not call the Almighty One's doings in ques- 
 tion, lest he should bring on himself more bitter 
 plagues. 4 
 
 Such sentiments imply that a regard to equity 
 is not apparent in God's dealings with men. Not 
 right but might seems to rule the world. Job 
 accordingly openly, fiercely declares this to be his 
 opinion. ' I am guiltless ; I value not my life, I 
 despise existence. It is all one, therefore I will 
 out with it ; guiltless and guilty He destroys alike. 
 
 1 Job viii. 20. 2 Ibid. ix. 2. 
 
 Ibid. ix. 4-8. Ibid. ix. 14-20. 
 
220 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 When the scourge slays suddenly, He mocks at the 
 distress of the righteous. Earth is given by Him 
 into the hand of the wicked. He covereth the faces 
 of the judges thereof (so that their judgments are 
 unjust or erroneous). If not He, who then is it? 
 The fact at least is undeniable.' 1 
 
 In replying to Zophar, Job becomes contemptuous. 
 ' No doubt/ he exclaims, levelling the remark at all 
 the three friends, but aiming especially at Zophar ; 
 'no doubt but ye are the people, and wisdom shall 
 die with you. But I have understanding as well as 
 you ; I am not inferior to you : yea, who knoweth 
 not such things as these?' 2 such platitudes, i.e. as 
 Zophar had just uttered concerning Divine Might 
 and Wisdom. He takes it as an insult to have such 
 things said to him as if relevant to his case. They 
 are not against him, they rather make a point in 
 his favour ; for the mysteriousness of God's ways 
 was just the truth which his experience exemplified. 
 Far from denying that truth, therefore, he enlarges 
 on it, eloquently descanting on the wisdom and 
 power of God as manifested in the works of creation 
 and providence, and showing Zophar how far he 
 can excel him even in his own line. This eulogium 
 is one of the choice passages in the book. 8 
 
 Facts proving that God is wise and mighty abound 
 in the world. But what have they to do with the 
 question at issue? Does God's sovereign power 
 
 1 Job ix. 22-24. * MM* *" 2, 3. * Ibid. xii. 13-25. 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 221 
 
 prove that he, Job, is now suffering on account of 
 special sin? If Zophar had no better argument than 
 that, he would have done well to remain silent. So 
 to argue was to play the part of a sycophant towards 
 God, maintaining that all He does mu^ be right 
 because He is almighty. This odious role Job with- 
 out hesitation ascribes to his friends. He calls them 
 special pleaders for God ; charges them with speaking 
 wrong in God's behalf, talking deceitfully for Him, 
 accepting His person, taking His side because it is 
 safe, saying in effect, * The Almighty is of course 
 right, and you are not to be listened to. He has 
 grievously afflicted you, and that settles the matter ; 
 you are a wicked man.' 1 He warns them that God 
 will not thank them for this service. For God is 
 righteous, though His righteousness does not mani- 
 fest itself as they imagine, and He will be angry at 
 them for telling lies in His interest, and throwing a 
 poor mortal beneath the wheel of His omnipotence, 
 exclaiming, ' It is right that he should be crushed ; 
 it is the chariot of the Almighty that rolls over him !' 
 In his addresses to God the attitude of Job is 
 more questionable. He utters in these some senti- 
 ments of an unbecoming character which, if delibe- 
 rately entertained, would be blasphemous. In the 
 Authorised Version Job's sayings to and about God 
 do not appear so bad as they really are. The trans- 
 lators, having apparently been unable to conceive the 
 
 ] Job \v\. 6-8. 
 
222 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 possibility of any one pretending to piety addressing 
 to the Deity such audacious language as Job actu- 
 ally uses, have toned down or whitewashed some of 
 his utterances, so as to give to them an aspect of 
 devoutness which does not belong to them. This 
 is to be regretted, as one great religious use of the 
 book is thereby partially frustrated, that, viz., of 
 letting a suffering saint say the worst things about 
 God which can enter into the minds of good men 
 in their hours of temptation and darkness. There 
 need be no hesitation, therefore, in making the 
 afflicted patriarch appear as profane and irreverent 
 as he is in the Hebrew original. 
 
 In his first address, 1 after a sad lament over the 
 hard lot of man on earth, followed up by a piteous 
 appeal to the Divine Taskmaster to remember the 
 brevity of human life, fleeting as the wind, dissolving 
 into nothing like a cloud, the sufferer resolves to 
 indulge in unrestrained complaining. So he asks 
 God, ' Am I a sea, or a sea monster, that Thou settest 
 a watch upon me ?' 2 (as if afraid of me). He ascribes 
 to God the rdle of a gaoler, and tells Him that it 
 is not worth His while to trouble Himself about so 
 insignificant a creature as man. It is making too 
 much of a man to visit him every morning and try 
 him every moment. Why not look away and leave 
 the poor sufferer alone to swallow his spittle? 
 Granting said sufferer was a sinner, was it worth 
 1 Chapter viL Job vii. 12. 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 223 
 
 God's while to play the gaoler over him? Better 
 forgive his sin and so relieve Himself of the burden 
 of keeping guard over His criminal, all the more that 
 ere long the criminal will have gone the way of all 
 the earth, and his jealous Watcher will nof have the 
 opportunity of pardoning him even if He should 
 wish. 1 
 
 In his second address 2 Job waxes still more auda- 
 cious. He declares that God has made up His mind 
 to hold him, the sufferer, guilty, irrespective of the 
 merits of his case. ' I know that Thou wilt not 
 hold me innocent. I have to be guilty (right or 
 wrong) ; why then labour I in vain ? If I should wash 
 myself with snow-water, and make my hands ever 
 so clean, yet shalt Thou plunge me in the ditch, 
 and mine own clothes shall abhor me.' 8 He calls 
 God an oppressor : ' Is it good unto Thee that Thou 
 shouldest oppress, to reject the work of Thine hands 
 and shine upon the counsel of the wicked ? ' 4 Again : 
 * If I sin, then Thou markest me, and Thou wilt not 
 acquit me from mine iniquity. If I be wicked, woe 
 unto me ; and if I be righteous yet will I not lift 
 up mine head Thou wouldest hunt me as a fierce 
 lion, redouble thine indignation against me, marshal 
 host on host against me.' 5 
 
 In the third address 6 the tone becomes more 
 subdued. Still we hear defiant notes, as when, 
 
 1 Job vii. 17-21. % Ibid., chapter x. * Ibid. ix. 28. 
 
 4 Ibid. x. 3. Ibid. x. 14-17. e Ibid. xiii. 
 
224 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 according to the true translation, the sufferer says : 
 1 He may slay me, I expect nothing else, yet I will 
 maintain mine own ways before Him.' 1 But Job's 
 charge against God now is, not that He afflicts 
 without cause, but that, assuming the penal nature 
 of his sufferings, they are out of proportion to his 
 sins. He asks : ' How many are mine iniquities 
 that thou writest bitter things against me, and 
 makest me inherit the sins of my youth?' 2 He is 
 conscious of faults committed in bygone years, but 
 he wonders that God should remember them so 
 long, if it be indeed for them he is suffering. 
 
 Finally, Job abandons the tone of an accuser 
 altogether, and ends his third address and the first 
 cycle of debate with an elegiac strain of lamentation 
 over the sinful, sorrowful, fleeting character of 
 human life, whose subdued pathos is fitted to touch 
 the heart both of God and of man. Who can read 
 unmoved the chapter which begins : ' Man born of 
 woman is of few days and full of trouble ' ? 3 
 
 Can we say that in all these speeches to and 
 about God, Job sinned not with his lips ? . We 
 cannot. Must we then admit that Satan has gained 
 the wager, and that Job has been brought so far 
 as to curse God? By no means. For the point 
 at issue was not what Job, under the maddening 
 influence of disease, would say about God, but 
 whether he would continue to value virtue and a 
 
 1 Job xiii. 15. Ibid, xiii. 23, 26. Ibid., chapter xiv. 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 225 
 
 good conscience even after they had ceased to be 
 profitable. Now that he did so continue, his very 
 irreverences of speech conclusively demonstrate. 
 Righteousness is of such unspeakable value to him 
 that in defence of it he will put his b/ck to the 
 wall against the whole universe, even against God 
 Himself. He will rather die, he will rather pro- 
 nounce the government of the world an iniquity, 
 than belie his good conscience, and say that he is 
 wicked, because he is unhappy. He is not self- 
 righteous. He is aware that he has done wrong, 
 but he is also sure that he is not what is meant by a 
 wicked man. He loves right, and he will not, to 
 please God, or to make all His ways appear righteous, 
 or to gratify men by homologating their theories, 
 pretend that he does not. And in all this he un- 
 consciously glorifies the great Being whom he seems 
 to blaspheme, by showing himself to be the man 
 God had represented him to be in the assembly of 
 the sons of God, one, viz., to whom righteousness 
 was the dearest thing in all the world. 
 
 But this is not all. There is an aspect of Job's 
 bearing towards God which has not yet been looked 
 at. In the very addresses in which we have found 
 some very irreverent sentiments, Job expresses him- 
 self in a way which shows that in the depths of 
 his soul he still trusts the God of whom he com- 
 plains. He is divided against himself, and, corre- 
 sponding to this war within his soul, there is a 
 
 P 
 
226 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 dualism in his representation of God. God is set 
 against God, the God of appearance against the God 
 of reality ', the God of the present against the God of 
 the future. This comes out even in the speeches 
 of the first cycle, and it becomes more apparent as 
 the debate goes on. Thus in his reply to Zophar 
 he tells the friends that God will punish them for 
 playing the part of special pleaders, even though it 
 was in the divine interest. How could he more 
 strongly express his belief that, in spite of appear- 
 ances, God was just and would yet show Himself 
 to be just in his cause? In the same speech he 
 declares : ' Even He (God) shall be my salvation ; for 
 an hypocrite shall not come before Him.' * 
 
 Having analysed with some minuteness the first 
 cycle in the great debate, the other two need not 
 occupy us long. Little new matter appears in the 
 speeches of the friends. They repeat themselves as 
 dogmatists are wont to do. There are the same 
 exaggerated sentiments about God putting no trust 
 in His servants, and about the heavens not being 
 clean in His sight ; the same appeals to antiquity 
 in support of the theory advocated ; the same 
 laboured descriptions of the downfall of the wicked. 
 The three friends have but one or two ideas 
 in their head, on which they tiresomely ring the 
 changes. They have theoretic blinders on, that 
 prevent them from seeing all round. Job, on the 
 
 1 Job xiii. 1 6. 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 227 
 
 other hand, having no blinders on, sees in all 
 directions, never repeats himself, as the debate 
 advances becomes ever more fertile in ideas; not 
 an uncommon experience in the case of all who 
 keep their minds open, and do not imagine they 
 have got to the bottom of everything. 
 
 Another contrast reveals itself in these later dis- 
 cussions. The three visibly lose their temper, 
 while the afflicted man, though fighting against 
 odds, as if conscious that he is having the best of 
 it, grows more and more calm and dignified in his 
 tone. A slight ruffling of temper is manifest in the 
 speeches of the friends in the second cycle, but it 
 is avowed only by Zophar, who is the type of those 
 hot-headed zealots who fight fiercely for the cause 
 of truth, ostensibly, but whose zeal is largely the 
 product of wounded vanity. He gratifies his irri- 
 tated feelings by drawing a frightful picture of the 
 awful end of the ungodly man, the hypocrite, by 
 whom he means Job, which is effectively replied to 
 by another picture in more life-like colours of wicked 
 men prospering in all their ways, living to great age, 
 spending their days in wealth, and going down to 
 the grave without lingering disease, in a moment ; 
 men whose whole life said to God : ' Depart from 
 us, for we desire not the knowledge of Thy ways.' x 
 
 In the third cycle even Eliphaz loses command of 
 himself, and in his anger at Job's obstinacy goes 
 
 1 Job xxi. 7-15. 
 
228 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 the length of charging him with horrible crimes 
 without a particle of evidence, simply because the 
 exigencies of theory required him. 'Thou hast 
 taken a pledge from thy brother for nought, and 
 stripped the naked of their clothing. Thou hast 
 not given water to the weary to drink, and thou 
 hast withholden bread from the hungry.' 1 When 
 he began the debate, Eliphaz did not think so ill 
 of his friend as to imagine him capable of these 
 inhumanities. What will men not think and say of 
 each other when they have got fairly involved in 
 a religious controversy ! 
 
 In Job's later speeches two things are specially 
 noticeable : the sentiments he here utters concerning 
 God, and his grand, triumphant, concluding oration. 
 
 There is discoverable progress in Job's theology. 
 His sky is still stormy, but through the cloud-rack 
 bright stars glimmer. The dealing^ of Providence 
 with himself and with the world in general are still 
 very incomprehensible to him. He cannot under- 
 stand why God runs upon him like a giant, while 
 there is no injustice in his hands and his prayer is 
 pure, 2 and he asks why the Almighty does not 
 appoint legal terms for trying causes, so that good 
 men may be encouraged with the prospect of judg- 
 ment on sinners, but allows the ungodly to do as 
 they please with impunity to remove landmarks, 
 rob the poor, commit murder and adultery ; in short, 
 
 1 Job xxii. 6, 7. * Ibid. xvi. 14-17. 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 229 
 
 to break every commandment in the Decalogue. 1 
 But while the God of appearances continues 
 mysterious to him, his deep-seated faith in the God 
 of reality grows in strength and clearness. He 
 believes that somewhere in the universe there must 
 be One who can understand and sympathise with 
 him. He has been utterly disappointed in his 
 friends. Despairing of getting justice from men, 
 he is driven, as a last resource, to the very Being 
 who has smitten him, and to the upright light arises 
 out of the very darkness. ' O earth,' he exclaims with 
 unspeakable pathos, ' cover not thou my blood, and let 
 my cry have no place. Also now, behold, my witness 
 is in heaven, and my record is on high. My friends 
 scorn me, but mine eye poureth out tears unto 
 God.' z Then he gives utterance to a very bold para- 
 doxical thought, viz., that God will plead for the 
 afflicted one even against Himself, as one man 
 might intercede for another. The real idea escapes 
 in the Authorised Version, which runs : ' O that one 
 might plead for a man with God, as a man pleadeth 
 for his neighbour.' 8 What Job really says is : ' Mine 
 eye weeps to God that he would decide for the 
 man (himself) against God.' The thought recurs a 
 little further on : * Lay down now (a price), be surety 
 for me with Thyself, for who else will do me this 
 service?' Not the friends certainly, 'for,' he adds, 
 'Thou hast hid their heart from understanding.' 4 
 
 1 Job xxiv. I. a Ibid. xvi. 18-20. 3 Ibid. xvi. 21. 4 Ibid. xvii. 3. 
 
2 3 o THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 The next bright star shining through the gloom 
 of night is the famous passage : * I know that my 
 goel liveth.' 1 According to the traditional inter- 
 pretation Job expresses in explicit terms his faith 
 in One who, many centuries after, came to redeem 
 men from sin, and in the resurrection of the dead. 
 Recent expositors of all schools doubt whether such 
 a Christian meaning can fairly be extracted from 
 the words. The general import is clear enough. 
 The goel, or redeemer, is God, and Job expects Him 
 to appear for his vindication at some future time. 
 The point on which opinion chiefly differs is 
 whether the expected vindication is to be in this 
 present life, or in a life beyond. That faith in a future 
 existence should here make its appearance is not 
 incredible. It would be another instance of a new 
 hope springing out of despair. But we should be jus- 
 tified in imputing this new hope to Job only in case 
 his words admitted of no other sense. This does 
 not seem to be the fact. According to recent inter- 
 preters, the text can be translated with due regard 
 to Hebrew idiom so as to eliminate all reference to 
 a future life. The resulting sense is this : ' I know 
 that my vindicator liveth, and that he shall stand 
 as afterman (i.e. as one having the last word, pro- 
 nouncing final verdict) upon the earth : and from 
 behind my skin, out of (i.e. still in) the flesh, shall 
 I see God. Whom I shall see favourable to me, 
 
 1 Ibid. xix. 25-27. 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 231 
 
 inine eyes shall see, and not as a stranger my reins 
 in my body sigh for it.' 1 Job waits for God as they 
 that wait for the dawn. The winter night may be 
 long, cold, dreary, but the dawn, he is/ sure, will 
 come ; come while he lives in his mortal body ; 
 come, bringing the divine word: 'Yes! Job My 
 faithful servant is righteous.' 
 
 Now we pass to the grand final charge with which 
 our hard-pressed Hero, fighting single-handed, wins 
 his Waterloo. Job's last speech is very long, filling 
 six chapters. 2 First he replies to the last word of 
 his friends spoken by Bildad, consisting in a feeble 
 repetition in a few sentences of the now trite 
 commonplace : ' God is mighty ; who can contend 
 with Him ? God is holy, even the stars are not pure 
 in His sight: how much less man the worm !' 3 Job 
 ironically compliments Bildad on the profundity 
 and comprehensiveness of his speech, then launches 
 forth into the praise of divine power and wisdom in 
 a style far above Bildad's capacity, then announces 
 to him and his two companions his fixed determina- 
 ation not to abandon his position : ' God forbid that 
 I should justify you : till I die I will not remove 
 mine integrity from me.' 4 Then follows a magni- 
 ficent eulogium on Wisdom, as more difficult to be 
 found, and more worthy to be sought after, than the 
 
 1 Vide Budde's Commentary. The text of the passage is regarded 
 by scholars as rery corrupt. Vide Cheyne,y<? and Solomon, p. 33. 
 
 2 Chapters xxri. -xxxi. * Chapter xxv. * Chapter xxvii. 5. 
 
232 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 precious metals men dig for in the earth, ending 
 with the solemn announcement that this incompar- 
 ably precious thing consists in fearing God and 
 departing from evil j 1 an announcement conclusively 
 showing that in spite of his sufferings and his utter 
 perplexity as to their cause, Job has no thought of 
 bidding good-bye to piety, is indeed incapable of 
 such a thought. 
 
 Then finally comes a sublime monologue in three 
 parts : the first describing the lost felicity ; 2 the 
 second vividly picturing present misery : 3 sitting on 
 a dunghill, wasting into dust, the sport of gipsy 
 vagabonds whose fathers he would have disdained to 
 set with the dogs of his flock ; the third solemnly 
 protesting innocence of any crime that could possibly 
 account for such unparalleled woe, and depicting 
 in minute detail the character of the bygone life in 
 happier years. 4 
 
 This self-depiction is of importance as a com- 
 mentary on the brief characterisation at the begin- 
 ning of the book : a man perfect and upright, that 
 feared God and eschewed evil. Job, as described by 
 himself, justifies this encomium. His righteousness 
 is not pharisaical, but like that commended by Jesus 
 in the Sermon on the Mount. He is chaste, not only 
 in outward act but even in look and thought. He 
 is just even to his slaves, remembering that in God's 
 
 1 Chapter xxviii. a Chapter xxix. 
 
 * Chapter xxx. 4 Chapter xxxL 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 233 
 
 sight master and servant are on a level. He is 
 merciful as well as just. He eats not his morsel 
 alone, but gives the fatherless a share. The loins of 
 the unclad poor bless the man who covered them 
 with cloth made from the fleece of his sheep. He is 
 no purse-proud, grasping mammon-worshipper, no 
 idolator of gold as the summum bonum ; still less an 
 idolater in the common sense of the word. He has 
 never cast a superstitious look at the sun by day, or 
 at the full moon walking in brightness through the 
 sky by night. He is not vindictive ; he has never 
 rejoiced at the fall of an enemy, or wished a curse 
 upon his sons. He has attended to the duties of 
 hospitality, never allowing the stranger to lodge in 
 the street, ever opening his door to the traveller. 
 He keeps open table, so that it seems a proverb : 
 ' Who has not been satisfied with his flesh ? ' Finally, 
 he has not been a secret sinner, keeping up a fair 
 appearance before men, from fear of the multitude and 
 the contempt of families, and indulging private vices. 
 At home and in the market he is the same man. 
 
 What, now, is the didactic significance of this 
 solemn debate on Providence? Renan remarks 
 that the genius of the poem lies in the indecision 
 of the author on a subject where indecision is the 
 truth. 1 The observation is to a certain extent 
 just. The writer is as far as possible from being 
 
 1 Histoire du Peuple d* Israel, vol. iii. p. 82. 
 
234 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 a dogmatist, or from imagining that he has at last 
 found the key that will open the mystery. Still, he 
 is something more than a merely neutral listener 
 to a discussion in which other men air their opinions. 
 He has his bias. His sympathies, it is safe to say, 
 are decidedly with Job. The transcendent power of 
 Job's speeches, as compared with those of the other 
 interlocutors, reveals not only the high-water mark 
 of his poetic talent, but the secret source of his 
 inspiration in passionate personal conviction. He 
 indorses emphatically Job's position, and his main 
 interest in writing his book probably was to establish 
 it once for all. What, then, was that position ? It 
 was negative in form, but very important in import. 
 Job dared to maintain that the theory so confidently 
 contended for by the friends was unfounded. Rely- 
 ing on his moral sense, he is perfectly sure that a 
 good man may suffer as he is suffering, and that 
 any theory which denies this is false. Why such 
 a man suffers he does not profess to know, but that 
 he may suffer he regards as certain. As the proof 
 of his thesis is drawn from his own experience he 
 naturally states it, not with didactic calmness, but 
 with much heat and passion. Hence the imputation 
 of injustice to God. It is a way of putting the 
 theorists in a corner, saying in effect : You teach 
 that only the wicked suffer. I suffer, and I am not 
 wicked ; therefore your view is mistaken. The 
 accusation brought against God of being an un- 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 235 
 
 righteous judge has mainly argumentative value. 
 The same remark applies to the suggestion that 
 God uses His power to crush the weak without 
 regard to the merits of their cause. What Job 
 really asserts is the brutality of men whfe put him 
 down with a cut-and-dried theory. Their behaviour 
 appears to him to amount to the worship of power, 
 and to making might right. His own idea of God 
 rises far above that which would degrade Him into 
 an almighty arbitrary despot. It finds its clearest 
 expression in the great word : ' I know that my 
 goel liveth/ which amounts to a declaration of 
 belief that God would eventually indorse the self- 
 estimate of the sufferer, and say that he was not 
 wicked. That is all he expects from God : not 
 restoration of prosperity, simply a verdict in his 
 favour. The man who expects this believes that he 
 already enjoys the divine approval, his calamities 
 notwithstanding. And with this approval and that 
 of his own conscience he is content. It is not in- 
 dispensable to him to recover good fortune, how- 
 ever much he may appreciate it. He could, if need 
 be, live and die a leper. 1 Continuance of misery 
 will not shake his faith, or imperil his moral in- 
 tegrity. He can and does serve God for nought. 
 
 1 Budde maintains that an unhappy ending of his heroic life is for 
 the author of Job impossible, and he characterises the opposite view 
 as a Stoicism of which there is no trace in the Old Testament in 
 general, or in the book of Job in particular. Vide his Das Buck Hiob t 
 Einleitung, p. xxxvi. 
 
236 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 For the fear of God, wisdom, character, uprightness, 
 is more in his esteem than any amount of material 
 good. It is the summum bonum. It is of priceless, 
 incomparable worth ; ' it cannot be valued with the 
 gold of Ophir, with the priceless onyx, or the sap- 
 phire.' 1 
 
 This is a great advance on the time-honoured 
 theory of Eliphaz and his brethren. It brings us to 
 the borders of the New Testament. It may indeed 
 seem as if the epilogue of the book of Job stood in 
 the way of our ascribing to its author so enlightened 
 a view. It is there stated that 'the Lord blessed 
 the latter end of Job more than his beginning.' 
 If the writer thought that necessary, was his 
 theoretical position not essentially that of Job's 
 friends? If he regarded the return of prosperity 
 simply as an accidental fact vouched for by tra- 
 dition, ought he not to have passed it over in 
 silence, that there might be no doubt as to his 
 attitude towards the theory of the Temanite? Or did 
 he give to the tragic story of the man of Uz this 
 pleasant ending simply as a good-natured conces- 
 sion to popular ideas, trusting that wise readers 
 would take it for what it was worth? Or, finally, 
 is the epilogue an editorial appendix for which 
 the writer is not responsible, his last words being: 
 'The Lord also accepted Job'? 2 This is the critical 
 problem of the epilogue, with possible solutions. 
 
 1 Job xxviii. 16. * Ibid. xlii. 9. 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB $37 
 
 Good men, then, may suffer long, manifoldly, tragi- 
 cally that is a settled matter for the author. But 
 why do they suffer ? What is the rationale of their 
 affliction ? That question stands over. Three kinds 
 of answer are possible. First that there is no 
 rationale, that the sufferings of men through such 
 calamities as befell Job have no special significance, 
 that they belong to the chances of life which overtake 
 indifferently good and evil men alike. This view is 
 hinted at by Job when he says : ' He destroyeth the 
 perfect and the wicked.' 1 Next, it may be held that 
 the sufferings of good men have a meaning, and that 
 the meaning is to be found in their effect upon them- 
 selves by way of moral discipline or purification. 
 This is the view advocated by Elihu. 2 This inter- 
 locutor differs from his three friends in his judgment 
 of the sufferer. He regards Job as a sincere, pious, 
 but faulty man, and his sufferings he views as a 
 chastisement sent by a gracious God for his spiritual 
 improvement. Finally, it may be held that the 
 sufferings of good men have a meaning, and that 
 their highest meaning is to be found in their bearing 
 on others. What if, e.g. the rationale of such suffer- 
 ing should be to satisfy a sceptical world that there 
 is such a thing as disinterested goodness ? This is 
 the view suggested in the prologue. 
 
 Such thoughts as these do occur in Job, whatever 
 
 1 Job ix. 22. 
 
 * Vide his speeches in chapters xxxii. -xxxvii. 
 
238 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 the relation of the author to them may be, and they 
 are to be taken for what they are worth. But the 
 question may legitimately be asked, To what extent 
 does the writer make himself responsible for these 
 views, what value does he set upon them ? Perhaps 
 the answer which comes nearest the truth is, that 
 he regarded them all as worth stating, but accepted 
 none of them as a complete or ultimate solution. 
 He offers them simply as guesses at truth on a 
 dark subject. The position of a preferred theory is 
 claimed by some for the view propounded by Elihu. 1 
 If, however, the honour of being spokesman for the 
 author belongs to him, then it must be said that the 
 author's grasp of the problem at issue is not so deep 
 or so comprehensive as the power and boldness dis- 
 played in his work would lead us to expect. The 
 theme is: the sufferings of the righteous, their 
 reality and their rationale, and the supposed thesis : 
 the righteous may suffer, even grievously ; but they 
 suffer because, though righteous, they sin, and their 
 suffering is the divinely appointed means of their 
 purification. This view is true so far as it goes, but 
 it does not go to the root of the matter or cover the 
 
 1 This is the view of Budde. Kautzsch, on the other hand, thinks 
 that the Elihu speeches are utterly opposed to the aim of all the rest 
 of the book. He finds the key to solution of the riddle in the Jehovah 
 speeches, holding it to be so clear and simple there that no one who 
 does not shut his eyes can miss it, a very confidently expressed opinion 
 but very slightly founded. Vide Outline of the History of the Litera- 
 ture of the Old Testament (Williams and Norgale). 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 239 
 
 whole ground of the inquiry, To what extent and 
 why do the righteous suffer ? It says : A man may 
 suffer though righteous, because while righteous on 
 the whole he is still sinful. But is there iiot such 
 a thing as suffering for righteousness; the more 
 righteous the more suffering, the perfectly right- 
 eous one presumably the greatest sufferer of all ? 
 Think of the tribulations of a Jeremiah, for example. 
 If, as is probable, these were known to our author, 
 it is not credible that he could offer as the final word 
 on the subject at issue : discipline, purification. It 
 is altogether too partial and shallow a solution. 
 
 The theory of the prologue goes much deeper. It- 
 contemplates the case of a man suffering for right- 
 eousness, not merely though righteous. The more 
 righteous the man, the more urgent the demand for 
 a testing experience. A sceptical Satan (or world) 
 says: 'Yes, here are phenomenal piety and good- 
 ness ; but see how prosperous is the state of this 
 saint ! Deprive him of his enviable fortune, and will 
 not even he break down ? ' It is the signal character 
 of the virtue that makes the experiment worth 
 trying. And it takes place, not for the sufferer's 
 moral improvement, which is not much needed, but 
 to silence doubt as to the reality of goodness. 
 
 The author of Job, it may be assumed, recognised 
 in the representation of the prologue at least one 
 point of view from which the sufferings, .of the 
 righteous might be contemplated. If he did, he 
 
*4 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 could not have intended to offer Elihu's contribution 
 as an exhaustive solution, or indeed as indicating 
 anything higher than a secondary, subordinate use 
 of affliction. The pregnant hint of the prologue 
 directs attention to a service of much greater im- 
 portance to the moral order, for which there is ever 
 a need in this world. There are always plenty of 
 people ready to play Satan's part, and to ask the 
 sneering question : 'Doth Job fear God for nought?' 
 The ruling spirit of the world is selfishness, and the 
 majority are sceptical as to the possibility of any 
 man aiming at a higher end than personal advantage. 
 How can this plausible lie be met ? For the good of 
 mankind, for the sake of all the higher interests of 
 society, it is indispensable that it be conclusively 
 refuted. How can this be done? Only by the 
 noble-minded, who believe in something loftier than 
 mere happiness, enduring suffering for their con- 
 victions. Persecutions must come. When they do 
 come the sceptical, base-minded, self-seeking world 
 is struck dumb. The accuser of the brethren is 
 silenced and confounded when he sees how the 
 white-robed army of martyrs scorn fear and face 
 torture and death. 'They overcame him by the 
 blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their 
 testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the 
 death^ 
 
 It is to be noted that the sufferings which in the 
 
 1 Revelation xii. IX. 
 
THE BOOK OF JOB 241 
 
 prologue are reported to have overtaken Job are not 
 of the nature of persecutions. They are of an out- 
 ward, accidental character, not such as arise directly 
 out of the doing of righteousness, as in thfc case of 
 Jeremiah, who was persecuted for the faithful fulfil- 
 ment of his prophetic vocation. The afflictions of 
 the prophet did not consist in the accidental loss of 
 property, family, and health, but in misunderstand- 
 ing, derision, illwill, the immediate inevitable effect 
 of his moral fidelity. It is only in such a case as 
 his that the idea of suffering for righteousness 
 reaches full realisation. It is not to be hastily 
 supposed that the conception of this type of suffer- 
 ing had not risen above our author's mental horizon, 
 even if we regard the prologue, not as a datum 
 lying ready to his hand, but as a composition of 
 his own. The afflictions of his hero are skilfully 
 adapted to the simple conditions of life in ancient 
 times, and to popular capacities in all times. An 
 experience like that of Jeremiah could hardly occur 
 in a patriarchal age, and if it did, its lessons could 
 not easily be made generally intelligible. But there 
 is more than this to be said. The sufferings of Job 
 correspond to the theory which it is the object of 
 the book bearing his name to criticise. The theory 
 assumed that piety and prosperity must go together. 
 The criticism consists in showing that piety and 
 prosperity must sometimes be dissociated, if it were 
 only to let piety have an opportunity for evincing its 
 
 Q 
 
242 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 sincerity. 1 An experience like that of Job could 
 alone serve that purpose. Jeremiah's experience 
 could be turned to higher account. The fifty-third 
 chapter of Isaiah reads its peculiar lesson. 
 
 Is there any trace of that lesson in the book of 
 Job ? There is, and, strange to say, it is found in 
 the last speech of Eliphaz, where, speaking of the 
 good Job might do by his repentance, he says : 
 1 He (Job) shall deliver the not-innocent ' (that is, the 
 guilty) ; ' he (the guilty) shall be delivered by the 
 pureness of thine hands.' 2 Eliphaz seems to ascribe a 
 vicarious merit to the righteousness of a saint purified 
 from sin by the fires of affliction. It is remarkable 
 that at the close of the book this stray thought of the 
 Temanite finds actual fulfilment. The function and 
 influence of an intercessor are assigned to the much- 
 tried man of God, and Eliphaz himself gets the 
 benefit of Job's mediation. Here again is an 
 anticipation of Christian thought. The book of 
 Job, for as dark as it seems, and in many respects 
 is, yet touches the New Testament here and there in 
 sudden flashes of insight, and surprisingly adven- 
 turous turns of thought. 
 
 1 The history of the patriarchs in Genesis presents an actual example 
 of piety tested by loss. Abraham must give up Isaac to show that he 
 really fears God (Gen. xxii. 12). 
 
 1 Job xxii. 30. Vide the Revised Version. 
 
LECTURE VIII 
 
 CHRIST'S TEACHING CONCERNING DIVINE 
 PROVIDENCE 
 
 IN passing from the pages of the prophets and of 
 Job to the Gospels, we are conscious of a great 
 change in the 'psychological climate. 1 The change 
 is all the more remarkable that it takes place in 
 the same spiritual territory. In the words of Jesus 
 there is the same intense faith in the moral order, 
 the same passion for righteousness, the same faith 
 in the blessedness of the righteous that we have be- 
 come familiar with as the outstanding characteristics 
 of the Hebrew seers. There is also the same 
 conviction that the experience of the righteous 
 man is by no means one of uniform happiness, 
 which finds pungent expression in some burning 
 utterances of the later prophets, and reaches white 
 heat in the book of Job. But the prophetic ideals 
 of righteousness and its rewards have undergone 
 transformation. The querulousness of Jeremiah 
 and the bitterness of the man of Uz have utterly 
 disappeared. The storm is changed into a calm, and 
 
 243 
 
244 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 the accents of complaint have been replaced by a 
 spirit of imperturbable serenity. 
 
 Our statement of Christ's doctrine of Providence 
 may conveniently begin with an expansion of this 
 brief comparison between His thoughts and the 
 thoughts of those who in a very real sense were 
 preparers of His way. 
 
 The prophetic ideal was a righteous nation enjoying 
 prosperity ; an ideal far from being realised in Israel 
 in any present time known to any particular prophet ; 
 but which, when it did arrive, would be a veritable 
 Kingdom of God : God's will done, and the doing 
 of it rewarded with general well-being by the Divine 
 Governor, the happy people having for its creed : 
 ' The Lord is our Judge, the Lord is our Lawgiver, 
 the Lord is our King; He will save us.' 1 When 
 Jesus came, He too proclaimed a Divine Kingdom. 
 The burden of His Galilean gospel was: 'The 
 Kingdom of God is at hand.' 2 But the Kingdom 
 of Hebrew prophecy and the Kingdom of the 
 Evangel, while the same in name, were different in 
 essential characteristics. The Messianic Kingdom 
 of the prophets, especially of the earlier prophets, 
 was national and political ; the Kingdom whose 
 advent was heralded by Jesus is spiritual and 
 universal. The immediate subject of God's reign 
 in this new Kingdom is the individual man, not 
 a whole people, and the seat of dominion is the 
 
 1 Isaiah xxxiii. 22. 3 Mark i. 15. 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING ON PROVIDENCE 245 
 
 human heart. All may become citizens who possess 
 the receptivity of faith, Gentiles as well as Jews, 
 the worst not less than the best. The heart is the 
 seat of the blessedness of this kingdom, as well as 
 of its rule. The reward of righteousness is within, 
 not, as of old, without. And because it is within 
 it is certain, subject to none of the chances of all 
 outward felicity. 'Blessed are they which do 
 hunger and thirst after righteousness : for they shall 
 be filled,' 1 not merely maybe. And none but they 
 who hunger shall be filled. It cannot by any chance 
 happen that the satisfactions proper to the righteous 
 shall fall to the lot of the unrighteous. ' Wicked- 
 ness is never rewarded, and righteousness is never 
 punished. It is no reward to lose one's life ; it is 
 no punishment to save one's life.' 2 
 
 This programme of a moral order, spiritual and 
 inward in its rewards not less than in its require- 
 ments, leaves room for any amount of troublous 
 experience in the outward lot. The citizen of this 
 kingdom may suffer, not only in spite but on 
 account of citizenship. Blessed ones may be, on 
 a secular estimate, miserable. The Beatitudes of 
 the Teaching on the Hill are a series of paradoxes, 
 which seem to say : Blessed are the unblessed. 
 Speaking generally, the doctrine of Jesus concerning 
 outward good and evil is startling. It may be 
 
 1 Matthew v. 6. 
 
 8 Watson, Christianity and Idealism^ p. 86. 
 
246 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 summed up, in so far as it is peculiar, in three 
 propositions: (i) that external good and evil are 
 to a large extent common to men irrespective of 
 character ; (2) that there are sufferings which 
 inevitably overtake all who devote themselves to 
 the highest interests of human life ; (3) that those 
 who so suffer are not to be pitied, either by them- 
 selves or by others ; that, on the contrary, they have 
 good cause, as also capacity, for joy. 
 
 The classic text for the first of these positions is 
 that in which it is taught that the Divine Father 
 * maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the 
 good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the 
 unjust.' 1 A companion text, setting forth the dark 
 aspect of the same general truth, may be found in 
 the words : ' Suppose ye that these Galilaeans were 
 sinners above all the Galilaeans, because they suffered 
 such things ? I tell you, Nay : but, except ye repent, 
 ye shall all likewise perish. Or those eighteen, upon 
 whom the tower in Siloam fell, and slew them, think 
 ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt 
 in Jerusalem? I tell you, Nay: but, except ye 
 repent, ye shall all likewise perish.' 2 These state- 
 ments sound commonplace now, but they were by 
 no means commonplaces, as coming from the mouth 
 of a Jewish teacher nineteen centuries ago ; they were 
 rather startling novelties. To perceive the truth of 
 this assertion in reference to the saying about the 
 1 Matthew v. 45. * Luke xiii. 2-5. 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING ON PROVIDENCE 247 
 
 sun and the rain you have only to compare it with 
 the text in Deuteronomy wherein the first rain and 
 the latter rain necessary for a gooji harvest are 
 guaranteed to those who keep God's command- 
 ments. 1 The other saying concerning disasters 
 which befell certain men of Galilee and Jerusalem 
 is seen to be equally novel in tone when we 
 remember how customary it was with prophets and 
 sages of Israel, in ancient times, to regard signal 
 calamities as the punishment of special sins. In 
 the case of the men of Galilee and Jerusalem the 
 calamities were signal enough, but, in opposition 
 to popular opinion inherited from past ages, it is 
 expressly denied that there was necessarily any 
 corresponding speciality in sin. That is to say, it 
 is denied that the disasters in question were of the 
 nature of judgments on sin. It is implied, though 
 not said, that they might have overtaken men 
 remarkable for goodness rather than for wicked- 
 ness, that among the men on whom the tower in 
 Siloam fell might have been some of the best people 
 in Jerusalem. 
 
 The two sayings just commented on do not signify 
 that sunshine and shower, and disastrous casualties 
 visiting good and evil alike, are entirely destitute of 
 moral significance. On the lips of Jesus, they only 
 meant that in such matters Divine Providence does 
 not proceed according to the law of retributive 
 
 1 Deuteronomy xi. 14. 
 
248 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 justice. Though the justice of God is not apparent 
 in them, some other attribute may be revealed. In 
 the case of the saying concerning sun and rain, we 
 are not left to guess what the attribute may be. In 
 the universal and indiscriminate bestowal of these 
 vitally important boons, Jesus read divine magna- 
 nimity. He saw in the fact proof that God is some- 
 thing more and higher than a Moral Governor, that 
 to a very large extent He deals not with men after 
 their sins, that * the Lord is good to all, and His 
 tender mercies are over all His works.' In the 
 accidents named in the other saying Jesus saw not 
 a judgment on the dead, but a warning to the living. 
 He said to His hearers in effect : * You have listened 
 to these reports with superstitious awe, and have 
 wondered what heinous crimes the miserable victims 
 have been guilty of. Think not of them, but of 
 yourselves. They may or may not have been 
 sinners exceedingly, but there is no doubt how it 
 stands with you, the men of this generation. You 
 are in a bad way ; a judgment day is coming on 
 Israel for her sins, and if you will moralise on the 
 recent events in Galilee and Jerusalem, I advise you 
 to see in them emblems of approaching horrors 
 on a larger scale, whose connection with sin is 
 unquestionable/ 
 
 The second thesis in Christ's doctrine of suffering 
 is contained in the saying: ' If any man will come 
 after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING ON PROVIDENCE 249 
 
 and follow Me.' 1 The cross stands for the most 
 ignominious and cruel form of penalty for crime, as 
 inflicted by the Romans, and the gefferal lesson is 
 that the criminal's lot may overtake the devoted 
 servants of the loftiest moral ideal ; that notable 
 suffering, exciting horror or pity in the beholder, 
 may befall those who of all men least deserve it. 
 Not only may but shall ; it happens not by accident 
 but by law ; not necessarily, of course, literal 
 crucifixion, or the maximum of possible suffering 
 in every case, but acute, soul -wringing anguish, 
 from which sensitive nature shrinks, in some form : 
 loss of home, brethren, lands, love, reputation, life. 
 This is the hard lot appointed to those who are 
 the sons of God indeed, to those who let their 
 light shine when the temptation is to hide it, to 
 the moral pioneers of humanity, the path-finders, 
 and their early disciples. 
 
 The third article in the doctrine of suffering as 
 taught by Jesus, viz., that the sufferers for righteous- 
 ness are not proper subjects of pity, is set forth in 
 one of the Beatitudes in these glowing terms : 
 ' Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteous- 
 ness' sake : for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. 
 Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and 
 persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil 
 against you falsely, for My sake. Rejoice, and be 
 exceeding glad : for great is your reward in heaven : 
 
 1 Matthew xvi. 24. 
 
250 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 for so persecuted they the prophets which were 
 before you.' x The blessedness of the persecuted is 
 not, in Christ's view, merely prospective, a share in 
 the future beatitude of heaven compensating for 
 present trouble. It may be enjoyed now. It comes, 
 in the first place, through an exceptional capacity 
 for joy. * Rejoice,' says the Master to His disciples. 
 The exhortation means : ' Give full play to the sunny, 
 light-hearted temper with which you are favoured.' 
 For it is a fact that the spirit of the persecuted is 
 irrepressibly buoyant. It knows nothing of habitual 
 depression ; it can mount up on wings like an eagle ; 
 it has the nimble feet of the hind ; it can walk, and 
 even leap, on rugged, rocky high places like the 
 chamois. 2 That is the hero's primary consolation 
 for the hardships of his life. But there are other 
 consolations. He knows, e.g. that he is in good 
 company. 'So persecuted they the prophets.' It 
 is a privilege to be associated with earth's noblest 
 ones even in tribulation. The thought brings a sus- 
 taining sense of dignity not to be confounded with 
 vainglory, which is but its caricature. Then, since 
 the Christian era began, it has been an open secret 
 that the persecuted suffer not in vain. They may 
 have to die for the cause to which they are devoted, 
 but their lives are not thrown away. The sacrifice 
 
 1 Matthew v. 10-12. Christ's words may have undergone expansion 
 in this passage, but the Beatitude as it stands is true to the spirit of 
 His teaching. 
 
 Habakkuk iii. 19. 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING ON PROVIDENCE 251 
 
 has redemptive virtue. So Jesus taught in reference 
 to His own case, thereby revealing^ through the 
 supreme instance a universal law. * Greatness/ He 
 said to disciples ambitious to be first, * comes by 
 service ; service in its highest form means self- 
 sacrifice ; but a life laid down in such sacred 
 ministry is not lost : it is a ransom for many/ 1 
 
 It is obvious that these new, inspiring thoughts of 
 conduct and lot, and the cheerfulness with which 
 they are uttered, presuppose a new idea of God. 
 There is a bright light on the morning landscape, 
 which, when we turn our eyes to the east, is seen 
 to mean that the sun has risen. The sun of Divine 
 Fatherhood rose on the world when Jesus began to 
 teach. God is no longer the mere Moral Governor 
 rendering to every man according to his works, but 
 a God of inexhaustible patience, not prone to 'mark 
 iniquities,' and reward accordingly, but removing 
 transgression from men as far as east is from west. 2 
 Grace reigns instead of retributive justice, which has 
 not indeed become obsolete, but retires into the 
 background as a partial truth absorbed into a larger 
 whole. Benignancy is the conspicuous attribute of 
 Providence in the doctrine of Jesus. This will 
 become apparent when we consider attentively the 
 relative sayings. 
 
 Jesus taught that the Father in heaven exercises 
 a beneficent Providence over all His creatures : 
 
 1 Matthew xx. 28. 2 Psalm ciii. 8-13. 
 
252 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 plants, birds, men, evil men as well as good men ; 
 and over all the interests of all men. He clothes 
 the grass of the field with beauty, 1 such as we see 
 on a summer day in a meadow enamelled with 
 buttercups and daisies. He feeds the fowls of the 
 air. 2 He cares both for the valueless sparrow 
 devoid of beauty and of song, and for the pro- 
 pagators of a new, precious faith. A sparrow, 
 struck dead it may be by a stone thrown by a 
 schoolboy, falls not to the ground without His 
 notice ; and as for the apostle, the very hairs of 
 his head are all numbered. 3 But not he alone, the 
 consecrated missionary of a religion destined to 
 bless the world, is the object of providential care. 
 The Divine Father regards all men as His children, 
 and by means of sun and rain confers on them in 
 every clime food and raiment all things needful 
 for temporal well-being. 4 Nor does He provide 
 for their bodily life alone ; He remembers that 
 they are men made in His image, and that their 
 spiritual nature needs food convenient. He does 
 not overlook even the moral outcasts ; them also 
 He invites to the spiritual feast. 6 He despises not 
 the ignorant ; He reveals the things of the Kingdom 
 unto 'babes.' 6 He welcomes the return of the 
 prodigal to the forsaken paternal home. 7 The 
 
 1 Matthew vi. 30. Ibid. vi. 26. * Ibid. x. 29-31. 
 
 4 Ibid. v. 45. Luke xiv. 21. 
 
 Matthew xi. 2$. r Luke xv. 11-24. 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING ON PROVIDENCE 253 
 
 God of Jesus will have all men saved : * yet there 
 is room.' 1 He is the Father, not of jthe few but of 
 the many, not of the privileged cultured class, but 
 of the uncultured, unsanctified mass of mankind ; 
 and it is His desire that in even the most un- 
 promising members of the human race all the 
 moral possibilities of man's nature may be realised. 
 'Go to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.' 2 
 
 The spiritual welfare of man is, of course, in the 
 view of Jesus, the most needful and worthy object 
 of God's care. But it reveals the considerateness 
 of His conception of Divine Goodness that He 
 makes it embrace the lower interests of life. Out- 
 ward good is not, in His view, beneath the notice 
 of Providence. It is second ; the Kingdom of 
 heaven and its concerns are first and supreme ; 
 yet food and raiment have their place. 3 Note here 
 the soundness and sanity of Christ's doctrine, as 
 compared with the onesided extravagance of ideal 
 Stoicism, for which outward good was a matter of 
 indifference. Jesus avoids the falsehood of extremes. 
 He places the Kingdom first ; but temporalities are 
 not overlooked. * These things shall be added.' 4 
 * Your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need 
 of all these things.' 6 They may be prayed for. 
 'Give us this day our daily bread.' 6 Thus the 
 providence of the Father is very homely and 
 
 1 Luke xiv. 22. a Matthew x. 6. * Ibid. vi. 33. 
 
 4 Ibid. vi. 33. 5 Ibid. vi. 32. 6 Ibid. vi. u. 
 
254 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 kindly, and concerns itself about the humble wants 
 of the ordinary man, not merely about the sublime 
 aspirations of the wise man. 
 
 Christ's doctrine of Providence is thus, in the first 
 place, eminently genial. But it is also distinguished 
 by reasonableness, judged even by a modern scientific 
 standard. Providence accomplishes its purposes 
 through what we call the course of nature. The 
 providential order and the natural order are not 
 mutually exclusive spheres ; they are the same thing 
 under different aspects. * Those things ' food and 
 raiment shall be added : how ? Through the 
 ordinary action of sun and rain, by whose beneficent 
 influence bread-stuffs are reared and the raw mate- 
 rial, out of which cloth is manufactured, is produced. 
 God does for all what no man by any amount of 
 care could do for himself: adds, viz., a cubit (and 
 more) to the stature of every one who has reached 
 maturity. 1 How does He accomplish that apparently 
 impossible feat? By the slow, insensible, noiseless 
 process of growth, whereby we pass unawares from 
 the stature of infancy to that of manhood. That 
 is the work of a beneficent Providence, in the view 
 of Jesus. But it is not the miraculous product of 
 immediate divine activity ; it is throughout the 
 effect of physiological law, and if you are so minded 
 you can exclude Providence altogether and make it 
 throughout an affair of vital mechanics. It is just 
 1 Matthew vi, 27. 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING ON PROVIDENCE 255 
 
 the same in the higher region of the spirit. God 
 gives the Kingdom,the first object of desire, to His 
 servants, as He gives to them food and raiment, and 
 increase of bodily stature. How? Again by the 
 operation of natural law. 'So is the kingdom of 
 God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground ; 
 and should sleep and rise, night and day, and the 
 seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not 
 how. For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself; 
 first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn 
 in the ear.' 1 The coming of the Kingdom in the 
 individual and in the community is a matter of 
 growth, just like the coming of bread, gradual 
 growth passing through well-marked stages, like the 
 growth of grain under the influence of sun and 
 shower first blade, then ear, then ripe corn. The 
 whole process is so natural that one who thinks of 
 divine action as occasional, transcendent, arresting, 
 will be apt to inquire : Where is the hand of God, 
 where is His spirit ? 
 
 Christ's doctrine of Providence is manifestly of 
 an optimistic character. His conception of God is 
 optimistic. God is a Father, and His spirit is 
 benign. His idea of the world is not less optimistic. 
 The course of nature lends itself as a pliant instru- 
 ment for the working out of the Divine Father's 
 beneficent purposes. 
 
 But is this optimistic view of Providence not con- 
 1 Mark iv. 26*28. 
 
256 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 tradicted by facts? It seems to be, and Jesus was 
 not ignorant of this ; nor did He pass over in discreet 
 silence whatever appeared irreconcilable with His 
 sunny faith. The dark side of nature, indeed, He 
 did not discourse on ; but He boldly faced the 
 discouraging phases of human experience. In our 
 study on Job we had occasion to note a distinction 
 made in the utterances of the afflicted man between 
 the God of appearance and the God of reality. I 
 now remark that Christ was fully alive to the neces- 
 sity of making this distinction. He has made it 
 with a vividness and impressiveness which leave the 
 impassioned words of Job far behind. The parables 
 of the Selfish Neighbour and the Unjust Judge^ 
 depict God as He appears in Providence to faith 
 sorely tried by the delayed fulfilment of desires. 
 The didactic drift of both is : Pray on, delay not- 
 withstanding ; you shall ultimately prevail. In both, 
 the power of persistence to obtain benefit sought is 
 most felicitously illustrated. The man in bed can 
 be compelled by ' shameless ' knocking to give what 
 is asked, were it only to be rid of a disturbance 
 which would be fatal to sleep. It is, of course, very 
 rude, unmannerly, even indecent, to continue knock- 
 ing in the circumstances. Any one would desist 
 who had the smallest regard to propriety. But the 
 man outside the door has no regard to propriety. 
 He is desperate, and without compunction goes on 
 1 Luke xi. 5-8; xviii. 1-7. 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING ON PROVIDENCE 257 
 
 using his power o^annoyance till he gains his 
 end, a supply of loaves to meet the emergency. 
 Similarly in the case of the unjust judge. He 
 neither fears God nor regards man, as he con- 
 fesses with cynical frankness ; but he has a very 
 pronounced regard to his own comfort. He hates 
 bother, and as the widow in her frantic deter- 
 mination to get justice seems likely to give him 
 plenty of it, he decides the cause in her favour to 
 get quit of her. 
 
 The relevancy of these parabolic narratives to the 
 moral they are designed to point requires us to 
 regard the two unlovable characters depicted as 
 representing God as He appears in Providence to 
 tried faith. In the weary time of delayed fulfilment 
 He seems as unfriendly as the man in bed, as 
 indifferent to right as the unprincipled judge. No 
 more unfavourable view of the divine character 
 could be suggested. But in the case of Jesus such 
 dark thoughts of God have their source, not in per- 
 sonal doubt, as in the case of Job, but in acute 
 sympathy with perplexed souls. 
 
 In both the parables, which have for their common 
 aim to inculcate perseverance in prayer, the chief 
 object of desire is supposed to be the interests of the 
 divine kingdom. It is therefore important to notice 
 that delay in the fulfilment of desire is regarded by 
 Christ as a likely experience even in this region. 
 Men have to wait even here. They cannot obtain 
 
 R 
 
258 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 moral benefit, spiritual good, for themselves or for 
 others, off-hand. Jesus regards that as a certain 
 fact, and He makes no complaint. It is God's way 
 in the moral order of the world, and it is right 
 such is His fixed, unalterable conviction. Com- 
 paratively few thoroughly realise the fact ; fewer 
 still are completely reconciled to it as fitting and 
 reasonable. Why, men are inclined to ask, should 
 the kingdom of God not come per saltum ? Why 
 should the realisation of the moral ideal in the 
 individual, or in the race, be a matter of slow pro- 
 cess during which hope deferred makes the heart 
 sick ? Could the process not be accelerated, or even 
 resolved into an instantaneous consummation, by 
 sufficiently earnest desire ? Christ says, No : though 
 you break your heart it will be a slow movement, a 
 gradual growth from seed to fruit. Growth is the 
 law of the natural world ; it is also the law of the 
 spiritual world. This great truth Jesus taught in 
 the most explicit manner and with exquisite felicity 
 in the parable of the Blade, the Ear, and the full 
 Corn. No more significant statement of it is to be 
 found in the Bible, or indeed anywhere else. By 
 the utterance of this word Jesus showed himself 
 more philosophic than some modern philosophers, 
 who, while recognising the universal sway of the law 
 of growth or evolution, maintain that process in the 
 moral sphere is inadmissible on theistic principles. 
 A God infinite in goodness and might must make 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING ON PROVIDENCE 259 
 
 the moral world perfecoat once. 1 From the parable 
 just referred to, as well as from the two parables 
 inculcating perseverance in prayer, it is clear that 
 Christ felt no such difficulty. He accepted process 
 as the law of the moral world, and He saw in it 
 no reflection on divine goodness and power. The 
 paternal love of God appeared to Him to be suffi- 
 ciently vindicated by the result. Eventual fulfilment 
 of aspiration supplied an adequate theodicy. The 
 Father in heaven, whose character undergoes eclipse 
 for weak faith during the period of waiting, is shown 
 to be in reality worthy of His name if, after years in 
 the case of the individual, or after centuries in the 
 case of a community, spiritual desire be at length 
 satisfied. If Jesus Christ had lived in our time, and 
 had heard Mr. John Fiske bring his indictment 
 against the theistic creed on the ground that the 
 moral progress of society is a matter of slow secular 
 growth, He would have administered to him the 
 gentle rebuke : Man, where is thy faith ? 
 
 The faith of Jesus in the benignity of Providence 
 was absolute. While fully acknowledging all the 
 facts on which the pessimist might construct his 
 dismal creed of a non-moral or malignant Deity, He 
 claimed for the Divine Father implicit trust. * Take 
 no thought for the morrow/ 2 He said to His disciples 
 on the hill. The counsel implies cheerful confidence 
 
 1 Vide The Providential Order of the World my first course of 
 Gifford Lectures p. 137. 2 Matthew vi. 34. 
 
260 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 in the future, assurance that under the Providence of 
 the Father all will go well. Not that the possibility 
 of evil on the morrow is denied. It is recognised 
 that each future day may have its own trouble. 1 
 But the Master's advice to disciples is : Wait till it 
 comes ; do not anticipate evil. And He means, 
 though He does not say, When the day comes its 
 evil will be transmuted into good ; the things that 
 beforehand seem to be against you will, on their 
 arrival, be found to be in your favour. Leave your 
 times in God's hands. 
 
 Jesus lived His own philosophy; witness that 
 sublime devotional utterance: 'I thank thee, O 
 Father'! 2 For what does He give thanks? For 
 the boon of a few illiterate disciples who lovingly 
 follow Him while the scholars and religionists of 
 Israel treat Him with disdain. Their unbelief is the 
 evil of the day, and in view of it the prayer of Jesus 
 looks like an act of resignation under defeat. But 
 it is more than that. Jesus speaks, not under 
 depression, but in buoyant hopefulness. In the 
 adhesion of the ' babes' He sees the promise and 
 potency of a great future for His cause. Hence the 
 note of triumph: 'All things have been delivered 
 unto Me of My Father/ which means, ' The future is 
 Mine ; the faith I preach shall become the faith of 
 the world. Scornful Rabbis and haughty Pharisees 
 
 1 xaicia : physical, not moral evil. 
 
 2 Matthew xi. 25-30; Luke x. 21, 22. 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING ON PROVIDENCE 261 
 
 \ 
 
 will pass away, and these little ones will grow into 
 
 a great community of men in every land who shall 
 worship the Father in spirit and in truth.' What 
 spiritual insight is here ! What power to estimate 
 the relative force of contemporary currents of 
 thought, to discern in the belief of babes a more 
 potent factor than the unbelief of influential religious 
 leaders, the representatives and strenuous upholders 
 of a venerable but decadent tradition ! What faith 
 in the law of growth : calm conviction that the little 
 one shall become a thousand, the small one a strong 
 nation, the handful of corn scattered on the moun- 
 tain top a mighty harvest waving in the wind of 
 autumn ! How impossible depression for one pos- 
 sessing such insight, such unlimited reliance on the 
 action of moral laws, such sunny trust in the good- 
 will of the Father ! 
 
 Such trust, habitually practised by Jesus under 
 extreme difficulties, is possible for all, and worth 
 cultivating. It banishes from the heart care and 
 fear. Where it is, the diviner's occupation is gone. 
 What chance is there for the fortune-teller with one 
 who does not want to know what the future will 
 bring? He does not want to know in detail, because 
 he knows already in general that all will be well. 
 The childlike trust in a paternal Providence incul- 
 cated by Christ is one of the forces by which the 
 Christian religion is raising the world above 
 Paganism. Paganism has three characteristics : (i) 
 
262 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 It cherishes low ideals ; material good is its summtim 
 bonum : ' after all these things do the Gentiles seek.' 1 
 (2) It is not a religion of trust : it is not sure that 
 God cares for man. (3) It seeks after diviners to 
 reveal a future which is dark, and whose uncertainty 
 appeals at once to hope and to fear. Christ's teach- 
 ing cuts the roots of all three defects. It lifts the 
 heart up to higher things than food and raiment. 
 It tells us that God is a Father who loves and cares 
 for men as His children. It promises good, what- 
 ever betide, to those who live for the highest. 
 
 About the loftiness of Christ's ideal of life there 
 will be no dispute. It may, however, be questioned 
 whether it be not too high and one-sided, treating 
 the Kingdom of heaven not merely as supreme, but 
 as everything, and all else the world of nature, the 
 present life, secular interests and callings, social 
 well-being as nothing. To this question it might 
 be enough to reply that such a way of contemplating 
 the universe is more Aryan than Semitic, more 
 Indian than Hebrew. The Hebrew, as we see him 
 in the Old Testament, took a firm hold of the pre- 
 sent material world, and a very slight hold of the 
 world to come. The life beyond, indeed, at least 
 in the earlier period, seems to have had a very small 
 place in his mind. But the lapse of time brought 
 considerable modifications in Hebrew thought. 
 Gentile ideas gradually obtained an entrance 
 
 1 Matthew vi, 32. 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING ON PROVIDENCE 263 
 
 into the Jewish creed, and faith in immortality as- 
 sumed an importance in the post-captivity period 
 which it did not possess in ancient ages. This faith 
 Jesus espoused and preached with emphasis, and it 
 is not inconceivable that the dazzling light of the 
 eternal world might extinguish for His eye the 
 feeble starlight of time. But we have ample evi- 
 dence that nature, time, sense, the transient and 
 the temporal, counted for something in His esteem. 
 In the first place, the physical world could not 
 be a nullity for one who found in it, everywhere, 
 God. That world, in the view of Jesus, was the 
 habitation of God a theatre in which God's power 
 and beneficence were displayed. God does all 
 that happens therein : clothes the lily with beauty, 
 feeds the birds, sends sunshine and rain in their 
 season, makes the child grow from the tiny dimen- 
 sions of infancy to the full stature of manhood. 
 Then all in nature that appeals to the senses 
 was for Jesus a source of intense aesthetic enjoy- 
 ment. ' Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed 
 like one of these.' 1 What a keen sense of the 
 beautiful, in its simplest form, as seen even in 
 the wayside wild-flowers, is revealed in that reflec- 
 tion ! It could not have been uttered by any man 
 of ascetic habit and morbid fanatical mood. A man 
 of this type would not notice the charm of the lily, 
 or the sweet song and graceful movement of the 
 
 1 Matthew vi. 29. 
 
264 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 lark, or the music of a mountain stream. Even the 
 sublimity of the thunder-storm, so eloquently de- 
 picted in the epilogue of the Sermon on the Mount, 
 would scarcely succeed in arresting his attention. 
 'Descended the rain, came the floods, blew the 
 winds ' it was not a weary-of-the-world hermit who 
 drew that picture. The world of nature had a value 
 for Jesus such as it has for a poet or a painter. 
 
 Human life also, with its ordinary occupations, 
 had substantial meaning for the Galilaean Teacher. 
 This appears from realistic descriptions of scenes 
 from common every-day life contained in several of 
 the parables, e.g. the housewife leavening the dough 
 or searching for a lost coin, the shepherd going 
 after the straying sheep, the farmer taking life 
 leisurely between the seed-time and the harvest. It 
 may be said, indeed, that these are simply incidental 
 references in parabolic narratives wherein the 
 natural is utilised to emblem the spiritual. But the 
 point to be noted is that the spiritual use pre- 
 supposes lively, sympathetic interest in the natural. 
 The scenes introduced into the parables would not 
 have occurred to the mind of one who had not a 
 genuine love for the common ways and work of 
 men, as these might be seen in and around Nazareth ; 
 still less would they have been so felicitously de- 
 picted. In His parabolic teaching Jesus is shown 
 not merely as a sage, but as a man with a poet's 
 eye, and with a kindly human heart Impossible 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHIjfc ON PROVIDENCE 265 
 
 for Him to say : What boots all that daily toil from 
 dawn to sunset? It is vanity and vexation of spirit; 
 the Kingdom of heaven and the life beyond alone 
 deserve a thought. 
 
 The healing ministry of Jesus has much signifi- 
 cance as an indication of a rational interest in the 
 physical well-being of man. This department of 
 Christ's activity has been a battle-ground of natur- 
 alistic critics and supernaturalistic apologists, the 
 former concerned to eliminate it from an otherwise 
 attractive story, the latter bent on utilising it as 
 a miraculous attestation of the evangelic doctrine. 
 The relation of the healing acts to physical law has 
 monopolised attention. It is time to turn away 
 from that comparatively barren debate, and to con- 
 sider more carefully the healing ministry as a 
 revelation of the spirit of the worker* When thought 
 is concentrated on this topic, the curative phase of 
 Christ's public life ceases to repel as a thaumaturgic 
 display which one would gladly forget, and is seen 
 to possess permanent didactic value. Duly to 
 estimate that value we must begin by accepting the 
 healing ministry as an emphatic reality. It is a 
 simple fact that Jesus healed disease extensively, 
 one might say systematically ; a fact all the more 
 remarkable that activity of that kind on a great 
 scale was a new thing in the history of the religious 
 teachers of Israel. The bare fact, altogether apart 
 from the apparently preternatural character of some 
 
266 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 of the cures, is full of significance. Suppose there 
 was nothing unusual in any of them, and that Jesus 
 simply did what ordinary physicians were doing 
 every day, still it would be worthy of remark that 
 He too did such things. He, the herald of the King- 
 dom of God, the original, inspired Teacher of lofty, 
 spiritual thought, did not disdain to play the 
 physician's part. The human body was not be- 
 neath His notice. Physical health interested Him. 
 He was the sworn foe of disease. He wanted all 
 men to enjoy life while it lasted, to have the full use 
 of their eyes and ears and hands and feet, to be 
 sound and sane in body and in soul. The humanity 
 of all this is, of course, apparent, but the thing to 
 be specially noted in the present connection is the 
 evidence supplied by the healing ministry that the 
 healer was free from all morbid, one-sided spiritualism 
 which despises the body and thinks it does not 
 matter in what condition the earthly tabernacle 
 may be during the short time the immortal soul 
 occupies it as a tenant. This healer throws Himself 
 into this humble part of His work with the enthusi- 
 asm which a less many-sided man would have 
 reserved for the higher function of teaching. He 
 regards this work as in accordance with God's will, 
 nay, as God's own work. He claims to cast out 
 devils ' by the finger of God.' l The cure of the 
 maniac of Gadara is, through Him, an act of divine 
 1 Luke xi. 20. 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHllfc ON PROVIDENCE 267 
 
 Providence. Whatever makes for health has the 
 sanction and blessing of the Father in heaven. And 
 the presumption is that the world that Father has 
 made is amply stored with the means of health, 
 that a remedy for every disease is hidden somewhere 
 in nature, that the day will come when there will 
 be no malady under which man suffers which 
 medical skill will not know how to conquer. That 
 Jesus cherished this hopeful creed is a fair inference 
 from the well-attested fact that, as He went about 
 from place to place, He never failed to lay a healing 
 hand on the bodies of the sick. 
 
 ' Christ's doctrine of man supplies good ground for 
 the faith that social well-being falls within the scope 
 of Divine Providence. It does not teach or imply 
 that social health is the chief end for God. That 
 prerogative it assigns to the Kingdom of God, which 
 in the first place means an order in which right re- 
 lations are established between man and God. But 
 the doctrine involves that social health will be a 
 secondary result of the chief end being realised. 
 Jesus taught generally that man as such, in virtue 
 of his human attributes, is inherently superior to the 
 beasts. 'Are ye not much better than they?' 1 i.e. 
 than the birds. * How much is a man better than 
 a sheep?' 2 The fact is stated in the first case as 
 justifying the assertion that man is an object of 
 special care to God, in the second as supporting a 
 
 1 Matthew vi. 26. z Ibid. xii. 12. 
 
268 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 claim on behalf of every man to benevolent treat- 
 ment by his fellow-men. Jesus taught further, and 
 more specifically, that man as such stands inde- 
 feasibly in the relation of a son to God. All men 
 indiscriminately are God's sons, the only difference 
 being that some by divine grace, and in virtue of 
 their spirit and life, are worthy to be called sons, 
 while others are not worthy of the honourable appel- 
 lation. God treats all as sons, performing a father's 
 part towards them according to the requirements 
 of each case. Hence arise for all men certain 
 obligations. The first and fundamental obligation 
 is to realise the dignity of man. It is the duty of 
 all to respect themselves and to respect each other, 
 as men. It is incumbent on every man to remember 
 that he is by nature better than a beast, and to be 
 in life superior to the lower animals. It is incum- 
 bent on every man to treat his fellow- men as better 
 than a sheep or an ox, or a horse. The next duty 
 arising out of Christ's doctrine of man is to cherish 
 and give practical effect to the sense of a common 
 brotherhood. Sons of God, therefore brethren. All 
 sons of God, therefore all brethren, whether re- 
 generate or unregenerate, religious or irreligious, 
 Christian or heathen. Finally, there is the obligation 
 to acquiesce in no cleavage between man and man 
 as absolute and insurmountable. Chasms must be 
 bridged, partition-walls broken down, common 
 humanity asserted against all that divides and 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHltffr ON PROVIDENCE 269 
 
 alienates. Wherever this obligation is virtually 
 denied, the Christian faith, though formally con- 
 fessed, is renounced in spirit. 
 
 Christ loyally worked out the logical implications 
 of His own teaching. He treated the lowest and 
 worst of men as still a man, and therefore a potential 
 son of God. He despised no man ; He despaired 
 of no man. He maintained fraternal, comrade-like 
 relations with men whom one might be strongly 
 tempted to despise and despair of. He entered into 
 friendly relations with classes which on political, 
 moral, or religious grounds were shunned as social 
 outcasts. If there was anything settled in current 
 Jewish opinion, it was that a publican was to be 
 treated as an unclean Pagan. Jesus dared to dis- 
 regard this deep-rooted prejudice, and met and ate 
 with publicans. 1 By so doing He implicitly pro- 
 claimed a great principle, admitting of manifold 
 applications ; this, viz., that no class of men may, 
 on any account, be allowed to fall into or remain in 
 the position of persons having no claims on their 
 fellow-men to human relationship, fair treatment, 
 and friendly offices. The working out of this 
 principle would of itself go a long way towards 
 bringing social health to a community. When it is 
 considered how many class distinctions still exist 
 which are, or tend to become, inhuman, and how 
 extensively the spirit of class interest and class 
 
 1 Matthew ix. 9-13. 
 
270 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 pride still prevails, it will be seen that there is plenty 
 of scope for the application of the principle. Its 
 thorough-going application would not necessarily 
 mean the abolition of distinctions. There might 
 still be rich and poor, high-born and low-born, 
 employers and employed. Distinctions essentially 
 inhuman, or powerfully gravitating towards in- 
 humanity and barbarism, the principle, taken in dead 
 earnest, would sweep away. Hence the disappear- 
 ance in European civilisation of slavery, which at 
 length became intolerable to the Christian spirit. 
 There are distinctions which cannot be abolished, 
 e.g. that based on colour. No amount of Christianity 
 can make the skin of a black man white. But a 
 Christianity worthy of the name ought to be able 
 to humanise the relations between black men and 
 white men. It is a hard problem for a community 
 where the two races co-exist ; but not harder than 
 the problems with which the apostolic Church had 
 to deal those arising out of the distinctions between 
 Jews and Gentiles, and between freemen and bonds- 
 men, successfully solved by the union of both classes 
 in one faith and fellowship. 
 
 Reviewing all that has been said on the range of 
 providential action as conceived by Jesus, we find 
 it to be very comprehensive. God's providence 
 embraces all men and all human interests, and its 
 aim is to make the life of man full of righteousness, 
 peace, and pure hallowed joy. It is the enemy of 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHIN^ ON PROVIDENCE 271 
 
 all evil ; of moral evil first, of physical evil in the 
 second place. Its goal is the redemption of man 
 from all evil. 
 
 But how is there evil at all in a world presided 
 over by so beneficent a Being? Is He subject 
 to some fatal limitation of power? Not so thought 
 Jesus. He conceived of the Divine Father as Lord 
 of heaven and earth, i.e. of the whole universe. 
 How evil came into the world He does not in 
 any of His recorded words explain. He deals with 
 evil as a fact. He sees it all around, in the heart 
 and in the life, in the individual and in the com- 
 munity, among the religious not less than among 
 the irreligious ; and He makes it His business to 
 fight it wherever He sees it. But He does not seem 
 to have theorised about the origin of evil. In par- 
 ticular, there is no trace of theoretic dualism in the 
 Gospels. There is indeed a malign being who flits 
 like a ghost over the evangelic pages. He is men- 
 tioned a few times in later books of the Old 
 Testament, and during the period between the close 
 of the Hebrew Canon and the beginning of the 
 Christian era he seems to have attained increasing 
 definiteness of shape and width of function in 
 popular Jewish theology. His name is Satan, alias 
 Beelzebub. He is represented as working mischief 
 in two ways : killing souls by tempting to moral 
 unfaithfulness, 1 taking baleful possession of men's 
 
 1 Matthew x. 28 ; xvi. 23. 
 
272 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 bodies in connection with diseases which present to 
 the eye the appearance of subjection to a foreign 
 power such as insanity, epilepsy, rheumatism. 1 
 
 This conception appeals to the religious imagina- 
 tion, giving to evil the aspect of an awful mystery, 
 and it makes it possible to think of man as a victim 
 rather than as the sole or prime agent in sin. Some 
 are of opinion that Satan was not more than a 
 convenient pictorial thought for the mind of Jesus. 
 That He used current ideas with a measure of 
 freedom is evident from His identifying the Elijah 
 that was expected to appear with John the Baptist. 
 In any case, there is nothing to show that He re- 
 garded the idea as offering an adequate explanation 
 of the evil that is in man and in the world. He 
 did not assign to Satan the place of antigod, but 
 only that of an adversary who can be controlled 
 and subdued. As a tempter he can be foiled, not 
 only by the Father in heaven, but by any son of man 
 on earth who with pure, firm will says to him, ' Get 
 thee behind me, Satan.' 2 As a tyrant, in person 
 or by deputy, over men's bodies through disease, he 
 can be cast out of his victims by the finger or spirit 
 of God, as lightning is ejected from the clouds in a 
 thunder-storm. 8 
 
 1 Matthew viii. 28-34; xvii. 14-18; Luke xiii. 10-13. Beelzebub 
 possesses men through the devils of which he is prince. The Scribes 
 seem to have thought Jesus an incarnation of Beelzebub. They said, 
 ' He hath Beelzebub ' (Mark iii. 22). 
 
 9 Matthew iv. 10 ; xvL 23. * Luke x. 18. 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHINOON PROVIDENCE 273 
 
 Some forms of evil are ascribed directly to divine 
 agency in the teaching of Christ ; such, viz., as can 
 be viewed as the penalty of moral transgression. To 
 this category belonged the spiritual blindness of 
 the Scribes. God sent it upon them as the punish- 
 ment of their self-complacency and self-righteous- 
 ness. 'Thou hast hid these things from the wise 
 and prudent.' 1 To the same category belonged 
 the fearful ruin which, a generation later, overtook 
 the Jewish nation, the natural result of the judicial 
 blindness of its religious leaders. That ruin also 
 Jesus regarded as the work of the Father in heaven. 
 'What shall therefore the lord of the vineyard do? 
 He will come and destroy the husbandmen, and will 
 give the vineyard unto others.' 2 The impending 
 judgment of Israel He foretold as certain and ac- 
 quiesced in as right. It is at this point that Jesus 
 comes into closest contact with the Hebrew pro- 
 phets. They were largely prophets of judgment. 
 He, too, was a prophet of judgment, though not 
 principally or by preference. In the exercise of this 
 function He was severe. But severity was tempered 
 by tender pathos, as in the piteous lament, ' O Jeru- 
 salem, Jerusalem!' 8 In that lament He protested 
 that He had tried to save the holy city and the 
 people it represented. It was no vain boast. Jesus 
 had not only tried to save Israel, but He would 
 have succeeded had that infatuated people laid to 
 
 1 Matthew xi. 25. 2 Mark xii. 9. 3 Matthew xxiii. 37. 
 
 S 
 
274 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 heart His words. He had sought to save His country- 
 men by exposing the delusions and vices of their 
 religious guides, and by emancipating their minds 
 from the idolatry of legal tradition and from the 
 spell of a spurious Messianic hope. If they had 
 listened to Him, they would have been saved. If 
 they had accepted Him as their Messiah, instead of 
 clinging to the vain expectation of a Christ who 
 would restore Israel to political independence, they 
 would have become a regenerate people at peace 
 with God and safe under the yoke of Rome. But 
 they 'would not.' They rejected and crucified the 
 true Christ, cherished their fond Messianic dream, 
 fought for it with the obstinacy which only religious 
 fanaticism can inspire, and perished in the unequal 
 struggle. What a tragedy it was we know from 
 contemporary historians. With the clear eye of a 
 prophet Jesus foresaw it all, not without tears, but 
 without rebellion against the will of Providence. 
 In the judgment of Israel He saw the righteous 
 moral order of the world asserting itself. He bowed 
 His head, and said in effect : ' Even so, Father, for 
 so it seemed good in Thy sight.' 
 
 We thus see that Christ's doctrine of Divine Pro- 
 vidence had its stern side. It was not an insipid 
 optimism. It could look awful facts in the face. 
 It presented to faith a genial, winsome idea of God 
 as Father, in which grace or benignity had the 
 dominant place. But retributive justice is not 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING^N PROVIDENCE 275 
 
 excluded or slurred over. The Father will have all 
 men saved, and spares no pains to bring sinners 
 to repentance; but they who being often reproved 
 harden their neck must at last be destroyed. So 
 it is in the world of fact, so it is also in Christ's 
 world of theory. He does not impose on facts a 
 theoretic conception with which they cannot be 
 made to square. He simply reads the world with 
 enlightened eyes, and frames His idea of God to 
 correspond. He finds in the world national cata- 
 strophes like that of Israel, and He recognises these 
 as the work of God acting as Ruler through the 
 eternal laws of the moral order. But this dark 
 aspect of Providence does not blind His mind to 
 the paternal benignancy of God which He makes 
 it His main business to proclaim. A benign God 
 is His gospel. The Lord God is for Him not mainly 
 a Storm-God, but above all a sun and a shield. 
 Jesus preferred to think so of God. He believed 
 also that the facts of history justified Him in so 
 thinking. 
 
 The methods by which Providence works out its 
 beneficent designs election, solidarity, and sacrifice 1 
 find distinct, if not copious, recognition in the 
 teaching of Jesus. He was conscious of being Him- 
 self an Elect Man, one charged with a mission, * sent 
 unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.' He 
 
 1 Vide The Providential Order of the World, Lectures X., XI., 
 XII. 
 
276 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 acted on the principle of election in the execution 
 of His own plans. ' He ordained twelve that they 
 should be with Him, and that He might send them 
 forth to preach.' 1 He explained by apt emblems 
 the nature or aim of election, as a destination, not 
 to exceptional privilege, but to a beneficent function 
 for the benefit of others. 'Ye are the salt of the 
 earth/ 'ye are the light of the world,' 2 He said 
 to chosen disciples. He acknowledged the prin- 
 ciple of solidarity when He gave to these disciples 
 the direction, 'Let your light so shine before men, 
 that they may see your good works.' This rule 
 may be violated in two ways : by hiding the light 
 in fear of trouble, or by removing it too far away 
 from the eye of the beholder. The former is the 
 mistake chiefly in view, but both may be held to 
 be covered by the prescription of the Master. He 
 would have His disciples, in the performance of 
 their duty as the propagators of a new religion, 
 show respect for the law of solidarity in a twofold 
 form : first, by not shrinking from the personal 
 discomfort resulting from the conservative reaction 
 of the social mass against new ideas ; second, by 
 taking care to present their message in a form at 
 once luminous, sympathetic, and self-commending. 
 Thought is to be uttered, not buried in the breast, 
 and it is to be uttered, not to show how far the 
 thinker is in advance of his time, but that it may 
 1 Mark iii. 14. 8 Matthew v. 13, 14. 
 
CHRIST'S TEACHING ON PROVIDENCE 277 
 
 find lodgment in other minds. The parable of the 
 leaven is another tribute to the law of solidarity. 
 The leaven is placed in the mass of dough that it 
 may leaven the whole lump. Finally, the law of 
 sacrifice is conspicuously recognised as a condition 
 of moral power. It is he who lays down his life 
 as a ransom that becomes the great one. How 
 death in the form of self-sacrifice may issue in 
 multiplied life is felicitously illustrated by a saying 
 recorded in the Fourth Gospel, in which Jesus likened 
 Himself, as about to suffer on the cross, to a corn 
 of wheat falling into the ground and through death 
 bringing forth much fruit. The analogy does not 
 explain how self-sacrifice becomes spiritually fruit- 
 ful, but it shows that it may an important service 
 when the truth taught appears an incredible paradox. 
 Christ's doctrine of Providence is acceptable in 
 every point of view. It satisfies the demands alike 
 of heart, conscience, and reason. It satisfies the 
 heart by offering to faith a God whose nature is 
 paternal, and whose providential action has for its 
 supreme characteristic benignancy. It satisfies the 
 conscience by ignoring no dark facts in the world's 
 history ; by looking moral evil straight in the face ; 
 and by recognising frankly the punitive action of 
 the moral order. It satisfies the reason by avoiding 
 abstract antitheses between providential action and 
 natural law, by viewing that action as immanent 
 and constant rather than transcendent and occa- 
 
278 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 sional pervading the course of nature and working 
 through it, rather than interrupting it by super- 
 natural incursions. Its rationality is further revealed 
 by its unreserved acceptance of growth, progress, as 
 the law of 'the spiritual, not less than of the natural, 
 world. In this respect modern evolutionary philo- 
 sophy, far from superseding the teaching of Christ, 
 only tends to illustrate its wisdom, and helps us to 
 a better understanding of its meaning. 
 
LECTURE IX 
 
 MODERN OPTIMISM: BROWNING 
 
 WE now make a sudden great leap over eighteen 
 hundred years from the beginning of the Christian 
 era to our own time. My apology must be that 
 our limits are narrow, and that, whatever is to be 
 omitted under pressure of controlling conditions, we 
 cannot afford to pass over in silence the outstanding 
 features of contemporary thought on our chosen 
 theme. And, great as is the interval between the 
 Founder of the Christian religion and the present 
 age, one is not conscious, in making the transition, 
 of passing into an entirely different thought-world. 
 On the contrary, we are sensible rather of close 
 affinity, as if the leading thinkers of our time had 
 come to their task fresh from the study of the 
 Gospels, and had derived their main inspiration from 
 Jesus of Nazareth. Therefore, while, for the full 
 comprehension of any system of ideas current at 
 a particular period, exhaustive knowledge of the 
 history of opinion on the subject to which they 
 relate may be necessary, it would seem as if we 
 might, without serious loss of insight, proceed from 
 
 279 
 
280 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 the study of the teaching of Christ on Divine Pro- 
 vidence to a brief consideration of the kindred 
 wisdom of the nineteenth century. 
 
 In a previous course of lectures I had occasion 
 to advert to a prevalent pessimistic temper as one 
 of the evil influences which make faith in a pro- 
 vidential order difficult for the men of this genera- 
 tion. I do not regret that I pointedly directed 
 attention to the portentous phenomenon called 
 modern pessimism. But it is comforting to reflect 
 that that type of thought, so anti- Christian in 
 temper, is not in undisputed possession of the field. 
 There is a vigorous, exhilarating modern optimism 
 as well as a baleful, blighting modern pessimism. 
 It is a river of faith in God as 'our refuge and 
 strength,' which makes glad the city of God and 
 all its citizens. Of this river of life, * clear as 
 crystal,' and making ' sweet music with the enamell'd 
 stones,' I propose now to speak. 
 
 The optimism of the century now approaching 
 its close is of a much weightier and worthier type 
 than that of the century preceding. The optimist 
 of the eighteenth century gained his victory over 
 evil, physical and moral, far too easily. He under- 
 estimated greatly the strength of the antagonist. 
 In physical evil, even death, he saw good in dis- 
 guise, and in moral evil sin, crime only infirmity. 
 Of the tragic element in human life he had no 
 adequate conception ; as far as possible he shut his 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM: BROWNING 281 
 
 eyes to it, and in so far as he was aware of its exist- 
 ence, he fathomed neither its source nor its rationale. 
 The summum bonum, for him, consisted in happiness 
 rather than in goodness, and his theory of the uni- 
 verse provided 'for its realisation by conceiving of 
 God as a Being with one predominant attribute, 
 benevolence, and of the world as a complicated ap- 
 paratus for supplying sentient creatures with pleasant 
 sensations. There were no clouds in his sky, save 
 such as relieved and beautified the blue. 
 
 Widely different in tone and tendency is the more 
 recent optimism as expounded by its best repre- 
 sentatives. Echoes of the eighteenth century type 
 can indeed be heard in some nineteenth century 
 utterances. When, e.g., Theodore Parker declares 
 that there must be another world a heaven for the 
 sparrow as for man, and that all mankind must be 
 eternally saved as a mere matter of justice from the 
 Creator to the creature, and shall be, in spite of 
 the small oscillations of human freedom within the 
 bounds of beneficent omnipotent predestination, 1 
 we have not only deism revived but deism out- 
 deismed, if we take a Rousseau as its spokesman. 
 Of Emerson also, though a wiser, calmer, and more 
 discriminating man, it may be said with a measure 
 of truth that his optimism is *a plunge into the 
 pure blue and away from facts/ 2 * I own/ he writes 
 in one of his charming essays, * I am gladdened by 
 
 1 Works, vol. xi. pp. 115-119. 2 Professor Jones, Browning, p. 78. 
 
282 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 seeing the predominance of the saccharine principle 
 throughout vegetable nature, and not less by be- 
 holding in morals that unrestrained inundation of 
 the principle of good into every chink and hole that 
 selfishness has left open, yea, into selfishness and 
 sin itself; so that no evil is pure, nor hell itself 
 without its extreme satisfactions.' 1 A still more 
 recent American author, the well-known poet, Walt 
 Whitman, outdoes both his fellow-countrymen in 
 optimistic audacity ; witness these lines : 
 
 * Omnes ! Omnes ! let others ignore what they may, 
 I make the poem of evil also, I commemorate that part also. 
 I am myself just as much evil as good, and my nation is 
 
 and I say there is in fact no evil 
 (Or if there is, I say it is just as important to you, to the 
 
 land or to me, as anything else).' 2 
 
 Witness also the poem entitled ' Chanting the 
 Square Deific,' which turns the Trinity into a Quater- 
 nity, and represents the Holy Spirit as including 
 all life on earth, touching, including God, including 
 Saviour and Satan. 
 
 Such extravagances as these are not to be found 
 in any important English expounder of optimism, 
 least of all in Browning, the greatest modern apostle 
 of that buoyant, hope-inspiring creed. Browning's 
 optimism is sober as well as bold, circumspect as 
 well as uncompromising. It is not a matter of 
 genial temperament and robust health, but the well- 
 considered faith of one who has thought earnestly 
 
 1 Essayt t No. X. f Starting from Paumanok* 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM: BROWNING 283 
 
 and long, and who understands and accepts the 
 philosophic implications of his creed. It is not an 
 eclectic system, but a belief resolutely maintained 
 in view of all relevant facts, and aiming at a com- 
 plete vindication of God's ways. It asserts its 
 position with earnest purpose not to compromise 
 moral interests, with ample knowledge of the evil 
 that is in man, and with fearlessness in looking 
 into its darkest depths, as revealed, e.g. in the char- 
 acter of a Guido. 1 When a man of whose intel- 
 lectual and moral attitude all this can be said, 
 announces as his conviction that love is the divinest 
 thing in the universe, and the key to all mysteries ; 
 that, though manifested in its true nature only at a 
 late stage in the evolution of the world it explains 
 all that went before ; that it is the light of the 
 present and the hope of the future ; that there are 
 seeds of goodness in even the most depraved char- 
 acters ; that by conflict with evil good is reached ; 
 that not otherwise can it be attained ; that evil is 
 here, not to be tolerated but to be overcome, 
 and that it is not invincible ; that the conflict is 
 going on more or less strenuously in all, and that it 
 will continue beyond the grave with good hope, if 
 not with absolute certainty, of universal ultimate 
 victory, we are bound to give him a respectful, 
 candid hearing. It is not blameworthy to hold and 
 try to establish such a bright creed. The attempt 
 
 1 Vide The Ring and the Book, v. 
 
284 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 may fail, but it is legitimate and even noble. Success 
 in the endeavour would be fraught with much moral 
 advantage. It would cure the paralysis resulting 
 from doubt whether God be a Being of infinitely 
 good will, and whether the victory of good over evil 
 be possible : 
 
 ' So might we safely mock at what unnerves 
 Faith now, be spared the sapping fear's increase 
 That haply evil's strife with good shall cease 
 Never on earth.' 1 
 
 Debatable questions apart, this creed of Brown- 
 ing's, in its general spirit and tendency, is Christian 
 and, I may add, Biblical. For an optimistic strain 
 runs through the whole sacred literature of the 
 Hebrews : through Psalms, Prophets, Gospels, and 
 Epistles. * The earth is full of the goodness of the 
 Lord'; 2 'Thou hast made summer and winter'; 3 
 ' Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all ye lands . . . 
 for the Lord is good, His mercy is everlasting ; 
 and His truth endureth to all generations': 4 thus 
 cheerily sing the lyric poets of Israel. Messianic 
 prophecy, with its Utopian pictures of the good time 
 coming, is the outcome and triumphant expression 
 of Hebrew optimism. Jesus, with His inspiring 
 doctrine of a Father-God who careth for all, and His 
 invincible hope for the redemption of the worst of 
 men, was emphatically optimist Even Paul, sombre 
 
 1 Vide Parleying! : * Bernard de Mandeville. 1 
 
 * Psalm xxxiii. 5. * Psalm Ixxiv. 17. * Psalm c. 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM : BROWNING 285 
 
 though his theology in some aspects seems, was, in 
 His general religious tone, in sympathy with the 
 Master. He believed that if sin abounded grace 
 abounded more, that all things work together for 
 good to them that love God, and that God's mercy 
 is over all. The most orthodox and devout ad- 
 herents of the Christian faith may, therefore, open 
 their ears to the teaching of the fervent apostle 
 of modern optimism, without timidity or distrust, 
 assured that they listen to a friend, not to a foe. 
 
 Let us consider in detail the salient features in 
 Browning's creed. 
 
 Foremost stands his doctrine of God. It is, in 
 brief, that God is love and love is God. In Brown- 
 ing's view love is the greatest, mightiest, most 
 all-pervasive thing in the world. Where it is, 
 even in the smallest measure, and in the meanest 
 guise, there is something divine ; where it is not, 
 were the lack even in God Himself, there is no 
 divinity. Man, nay even the lowliest worm, loving 
 were greater than God not loving. 
 
 * For the loving worm within its clod 
 Were diviner than a loveless God 
 Amid His worlds, I will dare to say.' 1 
 
 ' Do I find love so full in my nature, God's ultimate gift, 
 That I doubt His own love can compete with it ? Here 
 
 the parts shift ? 
 
 Here, the creature surpass the Creator the end, what 
 Began?' 2 
 
 1 Christmas Eve. a Saul. 
 
286 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 But the poet cherishes no such doubt. God, in 
 his view, is the fountain of all love. 
 
 * I believe it ! 'Tis thou, God, that givest, 'tis I who receive : 
 In the first is the last, in Thy will is my power to believe. 
 All's one gift.' 1 
 
 God is the perfect exemplar of love. Whatever 
 man can do in the way of heroic love, God can do 
 still more : 
 
 * Would I suffer for him that I love? So wouldst Thou 
 
 so wilt Thou ! 
 So shall crown Thee, the topmost, ineffablest, uttermost 
 
 crown 
 
 And Thy love fill infinitude wholly, nor leave up nor down 
 One spot for the creature to stand in !' a 
 
 No other attribute of God, however august, is al- 
 lowed to eclipse his love. The ' All-Great ' is also 
 the 'All-Loving'; 3 the Almighty and Omniscient 
 One the infinitely good : 
 
 * So, gazing up, in my youth, at love 
 As seen through power, ever above 
 All modes which make it manifest, 
 My soul brought all to a single test ; 
 That He, the Eternal First and Last, 
 Who, in His power, had so surpassed 
 All man conceives of what is might 
 Whose wisdom, too, shewed infinite 
 Would prove as infinitely good ; 
 Would never (my soul understood), 
 With power to work all love desires, 
 Bestow e'en less than man requires.'* 
 
 1 Saul. z Ibid. 
 
 9 An Epistle containing the Strange Medical Experience of Karshish. 
 
 4 Christmas Eve. 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM: BROWNING 287 
 
 God's love is revealed in the universe not less 
 clearly than His power and His wisdom. It is 
 'immanent in the constitution of the world and 
 manifested through the laws of nature : 
 
 * I have gone the whole round of creation : I saw and I 
 
 spoke ; 
 I, a work of God's hand for that purpose, received in 
 
 my brain 
 And pronounced on the rest of His handiwork returned 
 
 Him again 
 His creation's approval or censure : I spoke as I 
 
 saw, 
 I report, as a man may of God's work all's love, yet 
 
 all's law.' 1 
 
 God's love, finally, is immanent and operative in 
 human life, in its sin and sorrow, transporting, trans- 
 forming aspiring souls from worst to best ; there ever 
 really, though not always plainly : 
 
 ' I have faith such end shall be : 
 From the first, Power was I knew 
 
 Life has made clear to me 
 
 That, strive but for closer view, 
 
 Love were as plain to see.' 2 
 
 Browning's doctrine of man is in full sympathy 
 with his genial idea of God. He accepts the view, 
 confirmed by modern science, of man's place in the 
 universe as the crown of the creative process ; and 
 in man's history he sees the continuation of the 
 
 1 Saul. * Asolando \ * Reverie, 
 
288 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 evolutionary movement, carrying him upwards ever 
 nearer to the moral ideal : 
 
 ' All tended to mankind. 
 And, man produced, all has its end thus far : 
 But in completed man begins anew 
 A tendency to God.' 1 
 
 The Godward tendency is admitted to be faint 
 enough in many instances, but it is not believed to 
 be in any case altogether wanting. Our poet 
 would subscribe to the sentiment of Emerson: 
 'That pure malignity can exist is the extreme pro- 
 position of unbelief. It is not to be entertained by 
 a rational agent ; it is atheism ; it is the last profana- 
 tion.' 2 To character as well as to lot he would 
 apply the words he puts into the mouth of the 
 Persian sage Ferishtah: 
 
 ' Of absolute and irretrievable 
 And all-subduing black black's soul of black, 
 Beyond white's power to disintensify, 
 Of that I saw no sample.' s 
 
 He finds dim traces of good in most unexpected 
 quarters, in a Fifine at the Fair, eg. the gipsy trull 
 who traffics in ' just what we most pique us that we 
 keep'; in her freedom from pretence, her kindness 
 to parents, her capacity of devotion, common to her 
 sex, and notable when compared to that of men : 
 'women rush into you, and there remain absorbed'; 4 
 
 1 Paracelsus. f Representative Men : ' Swedenborg.' 
 
 9 FerishtaVs Fancies : A Bean-Stripe.' 4 Fifine at the Fair, Ixxi. 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM: BROWNING 289 
 
 * women grow you, while men depend on you at 
 best/ 1 Even in her case he believes 
 
 ' That through the outward sign, the inward grace allures, 
 And sparks from heaven transpierce earth's coarsest 
 covertures.' 2 
 
 With reference to all beings, animate and inani- 
 mate grains of sand or strolling play-actors his 
 confident persuasion is that 
 
 * No creature 's made so mean 
 But that, some way, it boasts, could we investigate, 
 Its supreme worth : fulfils, by ordinance of fate, 
 Its momentary task, gets glory all its own, 
 Tastes triumph in the world, pre-eminent, alone.' 8 
 
 Not merely alongside of evil, but even in evil 
 itself, our poet can descry good, or the promise and 
 potency of good ; in its energy, for example. He 
 admires above all things earnest purpose, vigorous 
 will, and demands these qualities of all men, what- 
 ever their aims. Indifference, lukewarmness, half- 
 heartedness, is for him the unpardonable sin : 
 
 * Let a man contend to the uttermost, 
 For his life's set prize, be it what it will.'* 
 
 Does a man leap from a tower to test his faith, 
 he holds his act rational, though it ends in death : 
 
 ' Hold a belief, you only half-believe, 
 With all-momentous issues either way, 
 And I advise you imitate this leap, 
 Put faith to proof, be cured or killed at once." 
 
 It will be evident that one holding such views as 
 
 1 Fifine at the Fair, Ixxi. a Ibid., xxvii. 3 Ibid., xxix. 
 
 4 7 he Statue and the Bust. B Red Cotton Night- Cap Country, iv. 
 
 T 
 
2 9 o THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 to the presence of good even in characters to all 
 appearance desperately evil, can recognise no hard- 
 and-fast line of demarcation between good men 
 and bad men, saints and sinners, sages and fools. 
 Character becomes fluid, dividing-lines melt away, 
 a little of the saint is found in every sinner, and not 
 a little of the sinner in every saint. In view of 
 accepted theological classifications, this may seem a 
 dangerous doctrine, but it is little more than was 
 said long ago by so good a Christian as Richard 
 Baxter. In a comparative estimate of his religious 
 experience in youth and age, he sets down this 
 shrewd observation : * I now see more good and 
 more evil in all men than heretofore I did. I see 
 that good men are not so good as I once thought 
 they were, and find that few men are so bad as 
 their enemies imagine.' 1 Baxter lived before the 
 days of evolutionary philosophy, and had only an 
 open eye and a candid mind to guide him. Besides 
 these, Browning had the benefit of a theory of de- 
 velopment which, applied to the moral sphere, means 
 that at no time can you say of any man that he 
 altogether is free, rational, good, or the reverse, but 
 only that he is becoming such to a greater or less 
 extent. The one valid distinction between men is 
 one of tendency and momentum. 
 
 It goes without saying that a benevolent estimate 
 of human character and conduct which discovers a 
 
 1 Reliquia: BaxUrianae. 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM: BROWNING 291 
 
 soul of goodness in things evil, will have no difficulty 
 in assigning value not only to the victories and 
 successes, but even to the defeats and failures of the 
 good. Human life even at the best is full of such ex- 
 periences : of wishes that have not ripened into pur- 
 poses, of purposes that have remained half executed, 
 of ideas unrealised, of aspirations that have not got 
 beyond impotent longing. It is the consciousness of 
 this that so often clouds the evening sky with sad- 
 ness. Browning would fain remove this shadow from 
 the mind of the aged. By the mouth of a wise Rabbi 
 he bids them be of good cheer, and preaches to them 
 this comfortable doctrine : 
 
 ' Not on the vulgar mass 
 Called " work," must sentence pass, 
 Things done, that took the eye and had the price ; 
 O'er which, from level stand, 
 The low world laid its hand, 
 Found straightway to its mind, could value in a trice : 
 
 But all the world's coarse thumb 
 
 And finger failed to plumb, 
 
 So passed in making up the main account : 
 
 All instincts immature, 
 
 All purposes unsure, 
 
 That weighed not as his work, yet swelled the man's amount : 
 
 Thoughts hardly to be packed 
 
 Into a narrow act, 
 
 Fancies that broke through language and escaped : 
 
 All I could never be, 
 
 All, men ignored in me, 
 
 This, I was worth to God, whose wheel the pitcher shaped.' l 
 
 There is a truth here, though the teaching of Ben 
 
 1 Rabbi Ben Ezra. 
 
292 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Ezra certainly goes counter to the adage : ' Hell 
 is paved with good intentions ' ; and it is question- 
 able whether one should be very ready to accept 
 its consolation, even in old age, not to speak of 
 youth, which assuredly should not be content to 
 dream, but take heed that dreams pass into vows 
 and vows into performances. 
 
 Browning's optimism reveals itself conspicuously in 
 his mode of dealing with the problem of evil. That 
 problem, in his view, lies chiefly in the phenomena 
 of moral evil in the lives of individual men. He 
 does not altogether overlook physical evil ; character- 
 istic utterances on that topic also are scattered up 
 and down his pages. FerishtaWs Fancies, one of 
 Browning's later works, supplies good samples. In 
 one of these * Fancies ' a disciple of the sage, having 
 got his thumb nipped by a scorpion while culling 
 herbs, asks: 'Why needs a scorpion be?' nay, 
 'Wherefore should any evil hap to man?' assuming 
 that 'God's all-mercy mates all-potency.' The 
 answer in brief is : 
 
 * Put pain from out the world, what room were left 
 For thanks to God, for love to Man ?' 
 
 The connection between pain and sympathy is illus- 
 trated by supposing the case of the Shah wasting 
 with an internal ulcer. As Shah, born to empire, 
 he is nothing to his subjects ; his very virtues are 
 discounted as matters of course. But speak of the 
 ulcer, and anon pity wells up : 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM: BROWNING 293 
 
 * Say'st thou so ? 
 
 How should I guess ? Alack, poor soul ! But stay 
 Sure in the reach of art some remedy 
 Must lie to hand?' 
 
 To the suggestion that it does not matter though 
 the malady should end in death in the case of 
 one ' Odious, in spite of every attribute commonly 
 deemed loveworthy,' the disciple exclaims : 
 
 * Attributes ? 
 
 Faugh ! nay, Ferishtah, 'tis an ulcer, think? 
 Attributes quotha ? Here 's poor flesh and blood, 
 Like thine and mine and every man's, a prey 
 To hell-fire ! Hast thou lost thy wits for once ? Jl 
 
 In another * Fancy ' the question is propounded : 
 
 'A good thing or a bad thing Life is which?' 
 The answer is given in a parable of beans repre- 
 senting the days of man's life, the question being 
 which colour in a handful predominates black or 
 white. The disciple agrees with Buddha in thinking 
 that black is the reigning colour. The master finds 
 that no beans or days are absolutely black, and that 
 the blackish and whitish qualify each other, yielding 
 a prevailing grey. Joys are bettered by sorrow gone 
 before, and ' sobered by the shadowy sense of sorrow 
 which came after or might come.' Such has been 
 his own experience ; others, he knew, may not fare 
 so well. What then ? Why : 
 
 * God's care be God's ! 'Tis mine to boast no joy 
 Unsobered by such sorrows of my kind 
 As sully with their shade my life that shines.' 2 
 
 1 Mihrab Shah. 2 A Bean- Stripe. 
 
294 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 This is not ambitious philosophy. 
 
 A different judgment may be supposed to be 
 called for on the poet's solution of the problem of 
 moral evil. 
 
 Browning's theory may be summed up in these 
 six propositions : 
 
 1. Morality, the realisation of the moral ideal, is 
 the highest good. 
 
 2. Process, progress by conflict, is necessary to 
 morality. 
 
 3. Evil is the foe with which man has to fight. 
 
 4. Evil is needed to make a struggle possible. 
 
 5. Ignorance of the true nature of evil is necessary 
 to give strenuousness and even reality to the struggle. 
 
 6. The struggle will have a happy issue in all. 
 That the first of these theses has a place in the 
 
 poet's scheme of thought needs no proof. The con- 
 viction that righteousness, goodness, is the summum 
 bonum for God and for men, and that all else in 
 human life is to be valued by its bearing thereon, 
 is the underlying assumption of all he has written. 
 The Moral development of the soul is, in his view, 
 the one thing in human life of supreme interest : 
 ' little else is worth study.' So he thought at an 
 early period when he wrote Sordello ; * so he con- 
 tinued to think nearly fifty years later when he 
 published his Parleying* with certain People? To 
 
 1 Bearing date 1840 : vide prefatory letter to the poem. 
 * Bearing date 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM: BROWNING 295 
 
 evolutionists who look from above downwards seek- 
 ing to explain man by the fiery cloud, he says by 
 the mouth of Francis Furini : 
 
 ' Have you done 
 
 Descending ? Here 's ourself man, known to-day, 
 Duly evolved at last ; so far, you say, 
 The sum and seal of being's progress. Good ! 
 Thus much at least is clearly understood 
 Of power does Man possess no particle ! 
 Of knowledge just so much as shows that still 
 It ends in ignorance on every side : 
 But righteousness ah, man is deified 
 Thereby, for compensation.' 1 
 
 Righteousness is man's prerogative : 
 
 * Where began 
 Righteousness, moral sense, except in man?' 3 
 
 and the crown of creation is due to him on that 
 account : 
 
 , * Rather let it seek thy brows, 
 
 Man, whom alone a righteousness endows 
 Would cure the world's ailing I Who disputes 
 Thy claim thereto ? ' 3 
 
 But the crown is not one of moral perfection, but 
 only of indefinite moral capability. 
 
 The moral ideal is a far-off goal, to be reached 
 only by arduous effort. This is a very fundamental 
 item in Browning's creed, affirmed and re-affirmed 
 with unwearying iteration. Perfect goodness, he 
 holds, is not attained per saltum ; cannot be, would 
 
 1 Francis Furini, ix. 2 Ibid., ix. s Ibid., ix. 
 
296 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 not be worth having even if it could. Progress is 
 'man's distinctive mark': 
 
 ' Not God's and not the beasts' : God is, they are, 
 Man partly is and wholly hopes to be.' 1 
 
 He should not be sorry that the fact is so. He 
 should rather 
 
 * Welcome each rebuff 
 That turns earth's smoothness rough, 
 Each sting that bids nor sit nor stand but go ! 
 Be our joy three-parts pain ! 
 Strive, and hold cheap the strain ; 
 
 Learn, nor account the pang ; dare, never grudge the 
 throe!" 8 
 
 The smooth life of effortless virtue and un- 
 chequered joy no want, no growth, no change, no 
 hope, no fear, no better and no worse were an 
 utter weariness from which one would be glad to 
 escape into a world where all these things were 
 familiar facts of experience. The inhabitant of 
 the star Rephan, the imagined scene of the smooth 
 life, grows tired of its monotonous felicity, yearns 
 for a 'difference in thing and thing' that might 
 shock his sense ' with a want of worth in them all,' 
 and so startle him up 'by an Infinite discovered 
 above and below.' He would 
 
 c Strive, not rest, 
 
 Burn and not smoulder, win by worth, 
 Not rest content with a wealth that's dearth.' 3 
 
 He is past Rephan ; his proper place is Earth. 
 
 1 A Death in the Desert. 2 Rabbi Ben Ezra, * Asolando : ' Rephan.' 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM: BROWNING 297 
 
 Earth is the scene of struggle, and it is the struggle 
 with evil that gives zest, value, tragic significance, to 
 
 life: 
 
 * When the fight begins within himself, 
 A man's worth something. God stoops o'er his head, 
 Satan looks up between his feet both tug- 
 He's left, himself, i' the middle : the soul wakes 
 And grows. Prolong that battle through his life ! 
 Never leave growing till the life to come ! ' l 
 
 But does this not amount to saying that evil is in 
 its own way good, or at least that it is a necessary 
 means to good as its end, as supplying the stimulus 
 to a heroic struggle without which life would lack 
 moral interest? It does, and Browning does not 
 shrink from this daring conception. He puts into 
 the mouth of the bishop who gives such a graphic 
 description of man's fight, with God and Satan for 
 spectators, the bold expression: 'the blessed evil/ 
 Evil is deemed blessed for various reasons. One is, 
 because it helps to hide God : 
 
 * Some think, Creation 's meant to show Him forth : 
 I say it's meant to hide Him all it can, 
 
 And that's what all the blessed evil's for. 
 
 Its use in Time is to environ us, 
 
 Our breath, our drop of dew, with shield enough 
 
 Against that sight till we can bear its stress.' a 
 
 Another reason is because without power and temp- 
 tation to do evil goodness would lose its value : 
 
 * Liberty of doing evil gave his doing good a grace.'* 
 
 Yet another reason is that for our poet the struggle 
 
 1 Bishop Bloug)'an?s Apology. a Ibid. * La Saisiaz, 
 
298 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 with evil is an end in itself, more important than the 
 
 victory. 
 
 ' Aspire, break bounds 1 I say, 
 Endeavour to be good, and better still, 
 And best 1 Success is nought, endeavour's all.* 1 
 
 One who so worships ' endeavour ' cannot be content 
 with the bare liberty to do evil. There must be 
 actual moral aberration to give zest to the struggle 
 to make it sublime, nay, even to make it real : 
 
 * Type needs antitype : 
 
 As night needs day, as shine needs shade, so good 
 Needs evil.' 
 
 This doctrine seems to come perilously near to 
 confounding moral distinctions and making evil 
 good in disguise, with equal rights to existence in 
 the universe, as Spinoza contended. But Browning 
 is no Spinozist, though he fails, as has been pointed 
 out, 8 to grasp clearly the distinction between pan- 
 theistic optimism and that of which he himself is the 
 champion. He regards evil not as a thing to be con- 
 templated with philosophic complacency, but rather 
 as a foe to be resolutely fought with ; and that makes 
 all the difference. And yet he is in the position 
 of a man divided against himself. His robust 
 moral sense constrains him to view moral evil as a 
 great tremendous reality which might conceivably 
 assert its power in the universe victoriously and 
 permanently. On the other hand, his assured 
 conviction that, under the reign of a God of love, 
 
 1 Red Cotton Night- Cap Country. 2 Parleying*: 'Francis Furini.' 
 * Vide Professor Jones, Browning as a Philosophical and Religious 
 Teacher^ p. 309. 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM: BROWNING 299 
 
 this cannot be, tempts him to think of sin as part 
 of the divine plan : no detail, not even the vice of 
 a Fifine, but, in place allotted to it, 'prime and 
 perfect.' How, then, does he get out of the dilemma ? 
 He takes refuge in ignorance, and asserts that it is 
 impossible for us to know whether sin be a grim 
 reality, or only a shadowy appearance. And he 
 thinks that this ignorance is beneficent, that with- 
 out it one could not be in earnest in the struggle 
 against evil, that certainty either way would paralyse 
 moral energy, or even make moral action impossible. 
 This curious doctrine of ignorance and the use it 
 serves occupies a prominent place in Browning's 
 later poems, and the seeds of it are to be found 
 even in the earlier. The need for ignorance as a 
 spur to action is broadly asserted in these lines : 
 
 * Though wrong were right 
 
 Could we but know still wrong must needs seem wrong 
 To do right's service, prove men weak or strong, 
 Choosers of evil or of good.' l 
 
 That uncertainty is necessary to give action moral 
 quality is not less explicitly affirmed in this passage : 
 
 * Once lay down the law, with nature's simple : " Such effects 
 
 succeed 
 Causes such, and heaven or hell depends upon man's earthly 
 
 deed 
 
 Just as surely as depends the straight or else the crooked line 
 On his making point meet point or with or else without 
 
 incline " 
 Thenceforth neither good nor evil does man, doing what he 
 
 must.' 2 
 
 1 Parkyings: * Francis Furini.' 2 La Saisiaz. 
 
300 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 This doctrine is plausible but sophistical ; one 
 wonders how so robust and healthy a mind as 
 Browning's could have anything to do with it. 
 Certainty as to the deep radical distinction between 
 good and evil is not paralysing to the moral 
 energies; it is uncertainty that paralyses. Firm, 
 unfaltering conviction as to the reality of moral 
 distinctions is the foundation on which strong 
 character is built, the most powerful aid to 
 moral achievement, and one of the most con- 
 spicuous characteristics of all who have fought 
 well the good fight. No man ever made a great 
 figure in the moral world whose state of mind 
 was that of Francis Furini deeming it possible 
 that wrong might be right, but adopting as a 
 working hypothesis that wrong is wrong in order 
 to a decided choice between good and evil. Decided 
 choices cannot rest on make-believe. Decision in 
 will demands decision in thought. Then, as for 
 the supposed compulsory and therefore non-moral 
 character of action arising out of belief in the 
 certainty of the law connecting lot with conduct, 
 it is a fallacious notion due to not distinguishing 
 between physical and moral necessity. Man is 
 under no brute-compulsion to do right because he 
 is morally certain that wrong-doing will bring 
 penalties. He may be ever so sure that his sin 
 will find him out and yet commit sin ; ever so 
 sure that it shall be well with the righteous and 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM : BROWNING 301 
 
 yet take his place among the unrighteous. Faith 
 in a moral order which acts with the certainty of 
 the law of gravitation is a motive to well-doing 
 which may be powerful, but is never irresistible. 
 Its power is greatest over those who freely follow 
 the dictates of reason, least over those who are 
 the slaves of evil desire and habit. The citizens 
 of the Kingdom of heaven have no doubt that 
 those who hunger after righteousness shall be filled. 
 Does that conviction annihilate their righteousness? 
 On the whole, this doctrine of uncertainty has no 
 proper place in a truly optimistic theory. Its 
 metaphysical presupposition is an agnostic theory 
 of knowledge ; it introduces a dualism between 
 thought and conduct which cannot fail to be a 
 source of moral weakness ; it suggests a view of 
 the illusoriness of life whose true affinities are with 
 pessimism. 
 
 The last article in Browning's theory for the 
 solution of the problem of evil is that the struggle 
 will in all cases have a happy issue. There will 
 be no final irretrievable failure, not even in the 
 case of those who can hardly be said to have 
 struggled, because they have been through life 
 the abject slaves of evil passion. There will be no 
 failure even in the case of a Guido the reprobate, 
 though in his case salvation should mean un- 
 making in order to remake his soul a soul in 
 which there is nothing good save the raw material 
 
302 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 as it came from the hands of the Creator. The 
 trust in such a case cannot, of course, be in the 
 will of man, but solely in the unchangeable gracious 
 purpose of God, which is assumed to have for its 
 aim the realisation in all human souls of all moral 
 possibilities. That being the aim, failure to realise 
 it in any instance would mean a soul made in vain, 
 the divine purpose frustrated by its perdition, 
 which, though the soul be that of a Guido, ' must 
 not be.' 1 
 
 The scene of the unmaking and remaking is the 
 world beyond the grave. There, in general, the 
 problem of evil finds its adequate solution, accord- 
 ing to the firm conviction of our poet, who in this 
 belief is true to the spirit of optimism. Not that 
 all optimists believe in the future life. Some find 
 it unnecessary to go outside the present life for 
 support and vindication of their sunny creed. 
 Emerson writes : ' Men ask concerning the im- 
 mortality of the soul, the employments of heaven, 
 the state of the sinner, and so forth. They even 
 dream that Jesus has left replies to precisely those 
 interrogatories. Never a moment did that sublime 
 spirit speak in their patois. ... It was left to His 
 disciples to sever duration from the moral elements, 
 and to teach the immortality of the soul as a 
 doctrine, and maintain it by evidences. The 
 moment the doctrine of immortality is separately 
 
 1 Tht Ring and the Book : ' The Pope,' 2132. 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM : BROWNING 303 
 
 taught man is already fallen. In the flowing of 
 love, in the adoration of humility, there is no 
 question of continuance. No inspired man ever 
 asks this question, or condescends to those evi- 
 dences. For the soul is true to itself, and the 
 man in whom it is shed abroad cannot wander 
 from the present, which is infinite, to a future 
 which would be finite.' 1 Far otherwise thinks 
 Browning, who sees in this life without a life 
 beyond only a hopeless muddle. 
 
 ' There is no reconciling wisdom with a world distraught, 
 Goodness with triumphant evil, power with failure in the aim, 
 If you bar me from assuming earth to be a pupil's place, 
 And life, time with all their chances, changes just proba- 
 tion-space.' 2 
 
 In the light of a life to come all the ills of this 
 life seem easily bearable : 
 
 * Only grant a second life, I acquiesce 
 In this present life as failure, count misfortune's worst 
 
 assaults 
 Triumph, not defeat, assured that loss so much the more 
 
 exalts 
 Gain about to be.' 3 
 
 'Grant me (once again) assurance we shall each meet each 
 
 some day, 
 Walk but with how bold a footstep 1 on a way but what a 
 
 way ! 
 Worst were best, defeat were triumph, utter loss were 
 
 utmost gain.' 4 
 
 1 Emerson : Essays : * The Oversoul.' 
 
 2 La Saisiaz. 3 Ibid. 
 
304 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 These two great teachers of our century represent 
 two different types of optimism. That of Emerson 
 is so serene that the present satisfies, and leaves 
 little room for wistful questionings regarding an 
 unknown future. That of Browning is so pain- 
 fully conscious of the abounding sin and sorrow 
 of the present world as to be ready to exclaim 
 with St. Paul, * If in this life only we have hope, 
 we are of all men most miserable/ Mood and 
 theory in either case correspond, and both in mood 
 and in theory the two representative men will always 
 have their followers. Philosophers of tranquil didactic 
 temper will teach that a solution of life's problem 
 must be found here or nowhere, and that it can 
 be found here ; theologians brought more or less 
 closely face to face with the dark side of life will 
 tell you that without faith in immortality the 
 moral conception of the universe is untenable. A 
 momentous issue is thus raised, and those who 
 worthily take part in the debate will not lack 
 eager listeners. The minds of many are in a state 
 of suspense. They know not what to think as to 
 the life hereafter, either as to its reality or as to 
 its nature. Old arguments for its reality have 
 ceased to tell, and old conceptions as to its nature 
 have ceased to interest. Nothing will win attention 
 or produce faith but fresh, free, fearless, while 
 reverent, discussion ; and those who bring con- 
 tributions of this character should be welcomed 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM: BROWNING 305 
 
 even when their reasonings conduct to conclusions 
 we would rather not adopt. It is a hopeful sign 
 of the times that such contributions are not want- 
 ing. I gladly recognise one in a work recently 
 published, Immortality and the New Theodicy ', by 
 Dr. George Gordon of Boston. 1 
 
 This book has something to say deserving a 
 respectful hearing both as to the reality and as -to 
 the nature of the life to come. Dr. Gordon recog- 
 nises three postulates of immortality, three positions 
 on which faith in a hereafter depends, and from 
 which it surely follows. These are: 'The moral 
 perfection of the Creator, the reasonableness of the 
 universe, and the worth of human life.' 2 On the 
 first he remarks that 'the belief in the moral per- 
 fection of God is an assumption for which there is 
 proof, but by no means complete proof. Its deepest 
 justification is that it is the assumption without 
 which human life cannot be understood ; without 
 which the ideals and the higher endeavours, the best 
 character and hope of man, are unaccountable and 
 insane.' 3 With reference to the second postulate, 
 he observes that * death as a finality is the demon- 
 stration of the delusion of belief in the universe as 
 intelligible. For it is man's universe that in the 
 
 1 This work reproduces in printed form a lecture delivered by the 
 author as first Ingersoll Lecturer on * The Immortality of Man ' in 
 Harvard University. It has been published in this country by James 
 Clarke and Co., London. 
 
 2 Page 46. 3 Page 53. 
 
 U 
 
306 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 first place is supposed to be intelligible, not the 
 absolute universe, whatever that may mean. And 
 a universe that defeats his best life, that contradicts 
 his deepest thought, cannot be considered by man 
 at least as the expression of Supreme Reason.' 1 
 The third postulate, the worth of human life, is 
 held to be a corollary from the Christian idea of 
 God as a Father. 'The worth of human life to 
 such a God is beyond dispute. It must be of 
 permanent value, not only in those solitary in- 
 stances when it becomes the flowering of moral 
 beauty and disinterested service, but also in our 
 total humanity so long as the bare possibility of 
 noble character continues.' 2 
 
 According to the author of whose views I now 
 give an account, the foregoing postulates compel 
 faith not only in immortality but, and in order to 
 that faith, revision of current opinions as to the 
 nature and conditions of the immortal life. Illogical 
 limitations of divine interest in mankind must, above 
 all, be discarded. Of these Dr. Gordon specifies 
 three : the Hebrew idea of the remnant, the Augus- 
 tinian doctrine of election, and restriction of the 
 opportunity of salvation to this life : character for 
 eternity fixed in time. Setting aside all three, he 
 holds that God's interest covers the whole of 
 humanity, including prehistoric man, and that the 
 future life will be no Rephan-Y\Vz stagnation in a 
 
 1 Page 57. * Page 58. 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM: BROWNING 307 
 
 character that has assumed final form, but a life 
 subject to the law of evolution assumed to hold 
 sway there not less than here. In maintaining these 
 positions, he does not regard himself as an advocate 
 of universalism, which has to do with matters of fact, 
 and contends that, as a matter of fact, all men will 
 be finally saved. What he is concerned with is 
 God's relation to mankind, His disposition towards 
 the human race, the scope of His moral purpose. 1 
 
 The thesis of the theologian, broadly stated, is 
 identical with that of our optimistic poet : A life 
 to come, a life under conditions favourable to the 
 culture of goodness, a life open to all, a life not of 
 stagnation but of perpetual progress : 
 
 * Greet the unseen with a cheer 1 
 Bid him forward, breast and back as either should be, 
 " Strive and thrive ! " Cry " Speed fight on, fare ever there 
 as here." ' 2 
 
 What is to be said of it? That, regarded from the 
 point of view of natural theology, and in connection 
 with the general principles involved in the provi- 
 dential order as set forth in a former course of 
 lectures, it possesses a considerable measure of pro- 
 bability. If man be, as has been steadfastly main- 
 tained, a chief end for God, a life after death is 
 highly probable. There is no apparent reason a 
 priori why the divine interest in man should be 
 restricted either in the number of its objects or in 
 
 1 Page 67. 2 Browning, Asolando: 'Reverie.' 
 
3o8 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 the aims it cherishes for their benefit. The pre- 
 sumption is that the beneficent Father in heaven 
 seeks the good of all His children, in all possible 
 ways and in all worlds ; that He ' willeth that all 
 men should be saved,' in the highest sense of the 
 word, here and hereafter. Election, historically 
 interpreted, is not incompatible with this view. As 
 one of the methods by which Providence seeks to 
 accomplish its beneficent purposes it does not imply 
 partial interest or exclusive regard. It simply means 
 the use of one man or people to bless the many. 
 So far is it from involving a monopoly of favour for 
 the elect that in the light of history we might rather 
 be tempted to think that the lot of chosen vessels 
 was to convey a cup of blessing to others, then to be 
 dashed in pieces. In no case is benefit confined to 
 them. 1 If this be the fact in the providential order, 
 why should it be otherwise in the spiritual order, 
 either in the divine intention or in actual result ? It 
 is true, indeed, that in the spiritual sphere we have 
 become so accustomed to associate election with 
 exclusive benefit to favoured individuals that it is 
 difficult to dissociate the two ideas. Yet even here 
 changes have taken place in the significance of 
 phrases which ought to help us over the difficulty. 
 The phrase 'elect infants dying in infancy' 2 does 
 not now mean, whatever it may have meant origi- 
 
 1 Vide The Providential Order of the World, Lecture X. 
 Westminster Confession, chapter X. 3. 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM: BROWNING 309 
 
 nally, that some of the class denoted are chosen to 
 salvation and others doomed to perdition. The 
 term ' elect * is now taken as applying to the whole 
 class. This extension of reference has been brought 
 about, not by the exegesis of relative texts, but by 
 the imperious logic of human feeling pronouncing 
 infant damnation an intolerable thought. That logic 
 is a formidable force to encounter, which may be 
 expected to assert its power on a larger scale in con- 
 nection with the whole subject of eschatology, and 
 it will be well if the theology of the future shall be 
 able to avoid a collision which may give rise to a 
 disastrous eclipse of faith. Some say that this can 
 be done simply by giving due heed to Bible texts 
 which have been * severely let alone as leading the 
 mind in unorthodox directions/ and which, when 
 taken in earnest, will 'create a literature more 
 abundant and infinitely nobler than that which 
 other sentences, isolated from them, and thus made 
 to conflict with them, have generated.' 1 It does 
 not suit my temper to speak oracularly. I am con- 
 tent to occupy the humble position of one who feels 
 keenly the pressure of the question. 
 
 In the same spirit would I contemplate the other 
 issue raised by recent discussions, viz., the extension 
 of the principle of evolution into the future world. 
 One who believes in evolution as a law of the uni- 
 verse in all stages of its history is bound to admit 
 
 1 Gordon, Immortality and the New Theodicy, pp. 94-95. 
 
310 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 that the presumption is in favour of its operation 
 continuing in the state after death. As Bishop 
 Butler said : ' There is in every case a probability that 
 all things will continue as we experience they are, in 
 all respects, except those in which we have some 
 reason to think they will be altered.' 1 He applied 
 the principle to the continuance of life after death, 
 holding that there was no reason to regard death as 
 a change sufficiently great to involve destruction of 
 the living powers. But may we not apply the prin- 
 ciple to the quality of the future life, and say, a 
 fortiori^ that there is no reason to regard death, great 
 change though it be, as involving the abrogation of 
 the great universal law of development according to 
 which things become what it is in them to be, not 
 per saltum, but by a slow, insensible process ! Sup- 
 pose that law obtains there as here, what will it 
 mean ? Judging from analogy of what goes on 
 here, this : those who pass out of this world with 
 some appreciable measure of goodness growing 
 slowly better, moving steadily onwards towards, if 
 never reaching, the moral ideal ; those who die with 
 only the barest rudiments of good in them finding 
 opportunity for quickening those dormant seeds into 
 life ; and for this also, I fear, must be contemplated 
 as a possibility those who in this life have gone 
 on from bad to worse, evolving character in a down- 
 ward direction, undergoing ever-deepening degene- 
 
 1 Analogy, chapter i. 
 
MODERN OPTIMISM: BROWNING 311 
 
 racy. That this bad possibility might be kept from 
 becoming a realised fact by the action of divine love 
 incessantly at work with redemptive intent is con- 
 ceivable ; but there it is, in the mysterious Beyond, 
 an unwelcome alternative to be reckoned with by 
 those who would cherish the larger hope. We may 
 not lightly dispose of it by exaggerated notions of 
 irresistible grace, which in effect cancel human 
 freedom and responsibility, and degrade divine love 
 into a physical force. Rather let the shadow remain, 
 dark and awful though it be. Dark and awful it 
 surely is. Degeneracy, or say even arrested growth, 
 what a fate ! It is Hell enough : 
 
 * However near I stand in His regard, 
 So much the nearer had I stood by steps 
 Offered the feet which rashly spurned their help. 
 That I call Hell ; why further punishment ? ' 1 
 
 1 FerishtaVs Fancies : * A Camel-Driver.' 
 
LECTURE X 
 
 MODERN DUALISM : SCIENTIFIC AND 
 PHILOSOPHIC ASPECTS 
 
 MODERN DUALISM, under all its phases, is a totally 
 different phenomenon from the Pessimism which we 
 had occasion to consider in connection with our first 
 course of Lectures. The pessimist sees in the uni- 
 verse nothing but evil. God is evil, man is evil, the 
 world is evil, and there is no hope of improvement. 
 The best thing were that whatever exists ceased to 
 be, and that nothing remained but an infinite eternal 
 void. Dualism, on the other hand, believes in good, 
 above all in a good God. The very rationale of 
 theistic dualism is zeal for the goodness of God, the 
 wish to relieve the Divine Being of responsibility 
 for whatever evil may be in the world. Various 
 expedients may be resorted to for that end ; but 
 their common aim is to guard the moral purity of 
 Deity against stain, and to maintain intact the creed 
 that ' God is light and in Him is no darkness at all.' 
 This is an attitude which all can honour, even when 
 not convinced that the need for guarding the divine 
 character is as great as the dualist supposes. Nor 
 HI 
 
MODERN DUALISM 313 
 
 can the opinion of those who think the need is 
 urgent be treated lightly, when it is remembered 
 that it has been entertained by some of the greatest 
 religious and philosophic thinkers of the past, such 
 as Zoroaster in Persia, and Plato among the Greeks. 
 The Zoroastrian method of guarding the divine 
 purity was to invent an antigod, an evil spirit sup- 
 posed to be the ultimate author of all the evil in the 
 world, the good being credited to the benign spirit, 
 Ahuramazda. Plato's method was different. He 
 conceived of matter as existing independently of 
 God, a datum for the divine Architect of the cosmos, 
 unalterable in its essential character, and presenting 
 a certain intractableness to divine Power, so that, 
 with the best intentions, God could not make the 
 world absolutely good. 1 By comparison with this 
 Greek idea the device of Zoroaster may appear 
 crude, but even it commands our respect in virtue 
 of its aim. And when, amid such diversity in the 
 nature of the solutions, we find the great thinkers of 
 both peoples agreed in the feeling that there was a 
 problem to be solved, we must pause before waiving 
 the question aside as not worthy of consideration. 
 
 1 So in the Timceus^ where we find such thoughts as these : * God 
 desired that all things should be good and nothing bad, in so far as 
 this could be accomplished.' ' The creation is mixed, being made up 
 of necessity and mind. Mind, the ruling power, persuaded necessity 
 to bring the greater part of created things to perfection, and thus in the 
 beginning, when the influence of reason got the better of necessity, the 
 universe was created.' Jowett's Plato, vol. iii. pp. 613, 630. For 
 another view, from The Laws, vide the end of this Lecture. 
 
314 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 The mental activity of our age has given birth not 
 only to a theistic dualism kindred to that of ancient 
 times, but to what may be characterised as an 
 agnostic dualism, of which the chief representative 
 is Mr. Huxley. This distinguished scientist took a 
 pessimistic view of nature, seeing in its methods of 
 pursuing its ends in the process of evolution a brutal 
 indifference to morality, which, apart from all other 
 grounds of doubt, made the hypothesis of a divine 
 Creator hard of credence. Yet Mr. Huxley was not 
 a pessimist out and out. What saved him from 
 sinking to that level was, besides his English good 
 sense, his robust manly faith in the supreme worth 
 and imperious obligations of morality. He was a 
 dualist after a fashion : the conflict in his theory of 
 the universe being not between a good God and a 
 bad God, as Zoroaster conceived, or between a good 
 God and an intractable primitive matter, as Plato 
 imagined, but between Evolution and Ethics, or 
 between a physical nature entirely innocent of 
 morality and man, in so far as earnestly-minded to 
 realise an ethical ideal. Man ethically-minded is a 
 gardener cultivating a small patch of ground wherein 
 he seeks to rear the fruits and flowers of human 
 virtue, striving heroically to keep out the weeds 
 of the wilderness beyond the fence, that is to say 
 the moral barbarism of Nature. In the value which 
 it sets on moral endeavour this agnostic dualism is 
 Christian, though in his temper its author and 
 
MODERN DUALISM 315 
 
 advocate is a disciple of the Stoics rather than of 
 Christ. The zeal for morality which it inculcates 
 may well appear an alien phenomenon in a universe 
 which is, so far as we know, without a good God 
 or indeed a God of any kind, and is itself the 
 product of a cosmic process that 'has no sort of 
 relation to moral ends' ; x and one may very reason- 
 ably doubt whether such zeal can long survive the 
 theistic creed of which it forms an integral part. 
 But let us be thankful that it does still survive here 
 and there in agnostic circles, and acknowledge those 
 who, without the support of faith, manfully fight 
 for the right as friends, not foes, to the great cause 
 which all true theists have at heart. 
 
 With this passing reference to a type of thought 
 which discovers no divine element in the world 
 save in man, I pass to speak more at length of 
 dualism in the proper sense of the term, that is to 
 say, of the religious philosophy which, believing in 
 a Deity, makes it its business to protect his character 
 from being compromised by evil. The view of 
 Nature entertained by the representatives of this 
 philosophy is not so dark as that of Mr. Huxley. 
 It discovers some good in the cosmic process 
 whereon an argument may be founded for goodness 
 as an attribute of the Great First Cause. But it 
 discovers also so much that is not good that it 
 professes itself unable to retain faith in the divine 
 
 1 Evolution and Ethics^ p. 83. 
 
316 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 goodness except on the hypothesis that its beneficent 
 purpose has been thwarted by some counterworking 
 power. 
 
 The rudiments of this dualistic theory may be 
 discovered in Mr. John Stuart Mill's Three Essays 
 on Religion. The author of these posthumous 
 essays is indeed far from being a satisfactory re- 
 presentative of the theory. He is almost as pessi- 
 mistic in his conception of Nature as Mr. Huxley, 
 and he is at the best a very faint-hearted and 
 hesitating theist. The indictment he brings against 
 the physical system of the universe for the brutalities 
 it daily perpetrates is tremendous, and his summing 
 up of the net results of Natural Theology on the 
 question of the divine attributes is very disenchant- 
 ing. Here it is. * A Being of great but limited 
 power, how or by what limited we cannot even con- 
 jecture; of great, and perhaps unlimited intelligence, 
 but perhaps, also, more narrowly limited than his 
 power : who desires, and pays some regard to, the 
 happiness of his creatures, but who seems to have 
 other motives of action which he cares more for, 
 and who can hardly be supposed to have created 
 the universe for that purpose alone.' 1 The sum- 
 mation is not only meagre in its total, but it adds 
 together attributes suggestive of incompatible con- 
 ceptions. The phrase 'of great but limited power* 
 fits into the hypothesis of a Being absolutely good 
 
 1 Three Essays, p. 194. 
 
MODERN DUALISM 317 
 
 in his intentions, but unable to do all he wishes 
 the conception proper to dualism. On the other 
 hand, the formula in the last part of the statement 
 referring to the divine motives of action goes on 
 the assumption that the power of Deity is unlimited, 
 that he is therefore responsible for all that happens, 
 and that his moral character is to be judged 
 accordingly an idea emphatically negatived by 
 the dualist. 
 
 The interest and value of Mr. Mill's views lies 
 not in their adequacy or in their consistency, but in 
 the fact that he was a man feeling his way. With 
 an open, unprejudiced eye, and without the blinders 
 of a philosophical or theological theory, he looked all 
 round on the world, trying to learn from the things 
 he observed what sort of a Being its Maker must 
 be, assuming that it has one, and then honestly 
 reported how it struck him. Every statement in 
 the report of such an observer is worth noting, 
 whether it agree with other statements or not. 
 Accordingly, I note with interest what I have called 
 the rudiments of a dualistic theory in the essay on 
 Nature. It is contained in this significant sentence: 
 'If we are not obliged to believe the animal creation 
 to be the work of a demon, it is because we need 
 not suppose it to have been made by a Being of 
 infinite power.' 1 The facts to which the suggestive 
 remark refers are those alluded to in the sentence 
 
 1 Three Essays, p. 58. 
 
3 i8 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 preceding, which runs thus : ' If a tenth part of the 
 pains which have been expended in finding benevo- 
 lent adaptations in all nature had been employed 
 in collecting evidence to blacken the character of 
 the Creator, what scope for comment would not 
 have been found in the entire existence of the lower 
 animals, divided, with scarcely an exception, into 
 devourers and devoured, and a prey to a thousand 
 ills from which they are denied the faculties 
 necessary for protecting themselves ! ' l It is im- 
 plied that the blackening process might be carried 
 the length of making out the Creator to be a very 
 demon, and the suggested escape from that un- 
 welcome conclusion is limitation of the Creator's 
 power by what we may suppose to be the thwarting 
 power of another demon. Malign influence is at 
 work somewhere. If God be not the demon, then 
 he must be discovered in an antigod of diabolic 
 nature. 
 
 There is no evidence that Mr. Mill seriously en- 
 tertained the project of reviving Persian dualism as 
 the best possible solution of the problem raised by 
 the conflicting phenomena of the universe. The 
 notion of a demon counterworking the Good Spirit 
 seems to have been a passing thought thrown out 
 by an active mind fertile in suggestion. 2 But one 
 
 1 Three Essays, p. 58. 
 
 2 In the essay on ' The Utility of Religion ' (second of the Three 
 ssays) t p. 116, Mr. Mill speaks with respect of dualism both in the 
 Persian or Manichrcan, and in the 1'latonic form, as the only theory 
 
MODERN DUALISM 319 
 
 can never be sure that the stray hint of one thinker 
 will not become the deliberate theory of another, 
 especially in a time like the present, when men are 
 extensively leaving the safe havens of traditional 
 opinions and launching out on new voyages of dis- 
 covery. At such a time long-extinct theories may 
 be revived with the ardour and confidence inspired 
 by fresh revelations, and crude notions propounded 
 with all the gravity of scientific method. It is not 
 the part of wisdom to treat such escapades of 
 modern religious thought with contempt. They at 
 least serve to show that there is some problem 
 troubling men's minds which has not yet received 
 a generally accepted solution, and when a sincere 
 thinker frankly tells us that he is among the mal- 
 contents and has something better to offer, the 
 least we can do is to listen respectfully. Ardent 
 optimists may exclaim : * After Browning who 
 would have expected a recrudescence of dualism, 
 not to speak of pessimism ! ' Yet dualists may 
 make their appearance just because there are men 
 amongst us who have learned the lesson of Browning 
 too well, and who judge the world by the standard 
 of an extravagant abstract optimism for which the 
 great poet cannot be held responsible. 
 
 respecting the origin and government of the universe which stands 
 wholly clear both of intellectual contradiction and of moral obliquity. 
 But he pronounces the evidence for it as shadowy and unsubstantial, 
 and mildly characterises its possible truth as a ' pleasing and encour- 
 aging thought.' 
 
320 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 A really capable and well-reasoned defence of a 
 dualism of the Persian type has recently been 
 given to the world in a book entitled Evil and 
 Evolution, by the author of The Social Horizon. 
 Its sub-title is : 'An attempt to turn the light of 
 modern science on to the ancient mystery of evil.' 
 The author accepts without reserve the theory of 
 evolution by the survival of the fittest, involving 
 struggle and the destruction of the less fit, as true 
 to the actual facts of this universe. But he does 
 not regard the actual as the only possible, or the 
 necessary, state of matters. Something, he holds, 
 went wrong in the evolutionary process at a far- 
 back stage, whence came in all the dark features 
 which have perplexed theists and supplied writers 
 like Mill with copious material for a Jeremiad 
 against Nature. And who or what caused the 
 wrong? The unhesitating answer of our author is : 
 ' The devil.' As a man living in the nineteenth 
 century, imbued with the scientific spirit, and aware 
 that in the view of many the idea of a devil is 
 finally and for ever exploded, he feels that an 
 apology is due to his readers for reviving so anti- 
 quated a conception. His apology is that that con- 
 ception renders the origin and nature of evil com- 
 paratively simple and intelligible, and that 'to 
 eliminate Satan is to make the moral chaos around 
 us more chaotic, the darkness more impenetrable, 
 the great riddle of the universe more hopelessly 
 
MODERN DUALISM 321 
 
 insoluble,' while retention of belief in his existence 
 is ' the only condition upon which it is possible to 
 believe in a beneficent God.' 1 For taking up this 
 position he has received the thanks of reviewers in 
 religious periodicals, not so much, apparently, be- 
 cause it offers a satisfactory solution of a vexed 
 question, as because it is in one point a return to 
 old-fashioned orthodoxy. But he himself professes 
 no interest in orthodoxy as such. He rests his 
 claim to consideration solely on the arguments by 
 which he endeavours to show that the hypothesis 
 of a devil or an antigod, bent on doing all the 
 mischief he can, throws light on phenomena con- 
 nected with the evolution of the universe not other- 
 wise explicable, and irreconcilable with that good- 
 ness of God in which he firmly believes. 
 
 The author of Evil and Evolution is not so pessi- 
 mistic in his view of Nature as Mr. Huxley or even 
 Mr. Mill. He believes the good to be the stronger 
 force in the world. 2 He is not inclined to exagge- 
 rate the physical evils of the animal world ; he is 
 rather disposed to believe that they are enormously 
 less than they are often represented. The well- 
 known phrase to which Tennyson gave currency : 
 ' Nature red in tooth and claw/ conveys, he thinks, 
 a very false impression. * Nature on the whole/ 
 he maintains, 'is nothing of the kind. Nature is 
 all aglow with pleasure dashed with pain just here 
 
 1 Evil and Evolution, p. 7. 2 Ibid. t p. 64. 
 
 X 
 
322 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 and there. The rule everywhere is the prevalence 
 of happiness. Evil is the comparatively trivial 
 exception. It cannot reasonably be disputed that, 
 taking the world all over, and all its phases of life, 
 the laws of Nature are overwhelmingly productive 
 of good, and that evil though frightful enough in 
 the aggregate regarded absolutely is after all only 
 what might be produced by a very slight disturbance 
 of the perfect adjustment of things.' 1 He finds in 
 the animal kingdom not merely voracity, but al- 
 truism, at work. It came in just at the point where 
 it was needed, at that stage in the evolution of the 
 animal world when it became possible for selfishness 
 to be in any sense an evil. 2 He sees the evidence 
 of the presence and power of the new principle of 
 love in the predominance of parental affection over 
 selfishness, in the case of animals with their young, 
 and in the attachments which, apart from parental 
 affection and sexual passion, animals are capable of 
 towards one another. 
 
 On the whole, the world is so good that one cannot 
 sufficiently wonder why it is not better. It cannot 
 be the Creator's fault. The prevalence of happy 
 life, and the inbringing of a beneficent principle 
 counteractive of selfishness just at the proper point, 
 reveal what the Creator aimed at. His benignant 
 will is further shown in other instances in which, 
 when a law of nature is in danger of becoming a 
 
 1 Evil and Evolution, p. 98. ' Ibid., p. 158. 
 
MODERN DUALISM 323 
 
 source of evil, its action is suspended by the action 
 of another law. A case in point is : water contract- 
 ing and becoming denser by cold down to a certain 
 temperature, below which it begins to expand and 
 grow lighter, having for result that ice floats on the 
 surface instead of sinking to the bottom, to lie there 
 for ever and go on accumulating till the sea became 
 a solid mass and life impossible. 1 Such facts, it is 
 argued, show what the world might have been, and 
 would have been, had the Creator been able to carry 
 out his intention : laws always modified or counter- 
 acted when in danger of becoming hurtful ; love 
 made so strong as to keep in due subjection the 
 selfishness which has filled the animal world with 
 internecine strife. 
 
 Whence the great miscarriage? From the inter- 
 ference of a being possessing 'the intellect and the 
 power of a god and the malignity of a devil.' 2 He 
 is to be conceived as looking out upon the work of 
 creation, watching his chance of doing mischief on a 
 great scale, and finding it at the point where, ' in the 
 slow unfolding of life, love and selfishness first came 
 into conflict.' 3 Not that that is supposed to be the 
 time at which the Satanic monster began to exist, or 
 even to act suo more. Both his existence and his 
 malign activity are dated as far back as the 'day- 
 dawn of creation, or shortly after.' 4 But his first 
 
 1 Evil and Evlution, p. 74. 2 Ibid., p. 138. 
 
 8 Ibid., p. 158. Ibid., p. 64. 
 
324 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 serious stroke of business as a marrer of God's work 
 consisted in altering the relative strength of selfish- 
 ness and love, so as, against the Creator's intention, 
 to secure for selfishness the predominance. If you 
 ask how that was done, the modern reviver of Persian 
 dualism cannot tell ; he can only speak of the fell 
 achievement as a disturbance of the divinely ordered 
 adjustment by some inscrutable modification of law. 
 The Satanic method generally is to bring about 
 maladjustment. He is not a law-maker, or a worker 
 according to law, but a disturber of law. The good 
 Spirit, the Creator, works, we are told, ' by means of 
 law and only by means of law/ but his arch-enemy 
 works by the disturbance of law to the effect of pro- 
 ducing ' flaws and failures ' in the established order 
 of nature. 1 
 
 This one disturbance of the divinely intended 
 balance between the principle of selfishness and 
 the counter-principle of love was momentous and 
 tragic enough. We have only to imagine what 
 evolution without this maladjustment might have 
 been, to realise in some degree the extent of the 
 mischief. In the unmarred world of God the 
 struggle for existence would have had no place. 
 In consequence of that, birds and beasts of prey 
 would not have been evolved. 2 Tigers and hyaenas, 
 vultures and sharks, ferrets and polecats, wasps 
 and spiders, puff-adders and skunks, would have 
 
 1 Evil and Evolution, p. 93. * Ibid., p. 142. 
 
MODERN DUALISM 325 
 
 been as conspicuous by their absence as Neros 
 and Buonapartes and millionaires. 1 For it is the 
 struggle for existence that has produced birds and 
 beasts of prey, and in all probability it is the 
 malignity of the struggle that has produced the 
 venom of so many reptiles. 2 Then, in a world in 
 which there was no wholesale destruction there 
 would be no need for the immense fertility that 
 characterises many species of living creatures, which 
 at once supplies food for foes and makes foes 
 necessary to keep teeming life within bounds. The 
 cod-fish would produce only as many young as are 
 left after its predatory enemies have done their 
 utmost to destroy its millions of progeny. For 
 the fertility of the actual world is to be conceived 
 as the result of the destruction that goes on, and 
 the destruction in turn as the effect of the fertility. 
 Destruction demands and produces superabundance, 
 and superabundance destruction. 3 
 
 Within the human sphere, in the world of divine 
 intention, the state of things would have corre- 
 sponded to that of the ideal animal world. War 
 would have been unknown. Animals would not 
 have been killed for food. The hunting and pastoral 
 occupations of primitive society would have had no 
 existence. Men would have been content to live on 
 such fruits and vegetables as they could find till they 
 learned the arts of agriculture. Vegetarianism would 
 
 1 Evil and Evolution , p. 144. 2 Ibid., p. 142. 3 Ibid., p. 150. 
 
326 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 have been the order of the day. 1 Verily a different 
 world from the one we actually live in ! And all 
 the difference is due to the one act of interference 
 whereby a malignant spirit secured for the selfish 
 principle preponderant power in the universe. 
 
 How are we to conceive this malevolent being, 
 and what precise place are we to assign him in 
 the scale of being? At first view he appears 
 mightier than God, possessed of skill and power 
 to get and keep the reins of the universe in his 
 hands. How he ever came to be is a question 
 that will have to be looked at hereafter ; mean- 
 time we wish to know what idea we are to form 
 of his nature and endowments. Our guide here 
 must be his achievements ; and these suggest a 
 being of very imposing attributes. The modern 
 dualist, accordingly, while careful to place him 
 beneath God, invests him with very godlike quali- 
 ties. The Satan of most recent invention is a 
 being after this fashion. He was in existence 
 from the beginning of the world, and from the 
 beginning was on evil bent, not, like Milton's 
 Satan, a good angel at first, who subsequently 
 fell. 2 He has a nature akin to that of God ; is, 
 like God, a spiritual power endowed with similar 
 faculties combining the intellect and energy of 
 God with the malignity of a devil. 3 He has god- 
 like perception, enabling him to comprehend the 
 
 1 Evil aiid Evolution, p. 157. a Ibid., p. 64. * Ibid., pp. 62, 138. 
 
MODERN DUALISM 327 
 
 intricacies of the cosmic system, the possibilities 
 latent in primordial matter, and the hidden nature 
 of all physical forces such as that of gravitation. 1 
 He can impose his will on the elementary particles 
 of matter, lay down laws, fit one law for modifying 
 or balancing another, and disturb the adjustments 
 made by the Creator. 2 He cannot wreck creation, 
 but his power is equal to unsettling the balance 
 and seriously disturbing the divine adjustment of 
 things. 3 He has been engaged in this bad work 
 during the millions of years that have elapsed 
 since the world began, and, as we must suppose 
 that the good Spirit would gladly have put an 
 end to his evil influence long ago, if it had been 
 possible, the inference is that the wicked Spirit is 
 too potent to be readily subdued and overcome ; 
 that his power, indeed, approximates to that of 
 the Supreme Being himself. 4 Yet this approxima- 
 tion must be taken cum grano. The supremacy of 
 the Great First Cause must be guarded, and in 
 order to that it must be held as an article of 
 faith, in spite of all appearances to the contrary, 
 that between the potency of the evil Spirit and 
 that of the good Spirit there is 'an infinity of 
 difference.' 5 Satan could neither create a world, 
 nor prevent another from creating it ; he could 
 only mar a world already made. 6 And though he 
 
 1 Evil and Evolution, p. 63. 2 Ibid., p. 63. 3 Ibid., p. 63. 
 
 4 Ibid., pp. 48, 62. 6 Ibid., p. 91. Ibid., p. 92. 
 
328 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 be so strong that the Maker of the Universe, 
 however desirous, cannot destroy him and his in- 
 fluence offhand, yet his doom is eventual defeat 
 and destruction. The time will come in the far 
 future when the benignant Creator 'shall reign 
 with a sway absolutely undisputed.' 1 
 
 In proceeding to criticise this latest attempt at a 
 dualistic theory of the universe, I frankly own at the 
 outset that it deserves at least the praise of ingenuity. 
 The modern Satan is skilfully constructed. The 
 construction proceeds on the inductive method of 
 modern science. First, all the good elements and 
 beneficent aspects of the universe are picked out, and 
 from these are formed the idea of the Being to whom 
 is assigned the honourable position and name of the 
 Creator. Then the remaining features, forming the 
 dark side of nature, are collected and examined. From 
 their wholly diverse character it is inferred, in the first 
 place, that they must owe their existence to a Being 
 whose spirit is absolutely antagonistic to that of the 
 Creator. From the proportion which the evil element 
 bears to the good, and from the relation in which 
 the former stands to the latter, the status, attributes, 
 and modus operandi of the evil Spirit are determined. 
 The whole process bears a look of patient investiga- 
 tion which seems to justify the claim made for Evil 
 and Evolution ' that it is an attempt to turn the light 
 of modern science on to the ancient mystery of evil.' 
 
 1 Evil and Evolution t p. 184. The words quoted above are the last 
 in the book. 
 
MODERN DUALISM 329 
 
 The attempt, however, is very open to criticism. 
 
 i. I remark in the first place, that the scheme of 
 thought whereof an outline has been given has for 
 its underlying postulate what may be characterised 
 as an extravagant optimism of a peculiar type. 
 There are at least three distinguishable forms of 
 optimism. There is the type of which Browning 
 is the best - known modern representative, which 
 says : * In the actual world there is much wrong, 
 but all is in course of becoming right/ and 
 thinks that enough to justify God and content 
 reasonable men. Then there is the optimism of 
 the pantheist, which says : * The actual world as it 
 is is right.' There is, finally, the optimism of the 
 modern dualist, which differs from both the pre- 
 ceding types : from pantheistic optimism by main- 
 taining that in the actual world there is much 
 that is wrong, and from optimism of the Browning 
 type by maintaining that the mere fact that the 
 wrong is in course of being set right does not 
 furnish a sufficient vindication of Providence. Faith 
 in an absolutely good God it holds to be untenable 
 on the hypothesis that God is responsible for the 
 actual world, though all the evil that is in it be 
 destined to be ultimately eliminated. Therefore it 
 takes refuge in the ideal world, the world of might- 
 have-been, and which would have been if God 
 had got his own way. That world, as it lives 
 in the dualistic imagination, might be described 
 
330 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 as a paradise never lost, and therefore not needing 
 to be regained. Pain practically unknown, predatory 
 instincts non-existent, the wolf dwelling with the 
 lamb, and the leopard lying down with the kid ; 
 man from the beginning 'a perfect creature in 
 a perfect environment/ 1 thinking always right 
 thoughts on questions of good and evil, showing 
 no desire to do wrong ; even primitive man utterly 
 free from savagery, and innocent of hunting and 
 warring propensities ; development possible but 
 ever normal and free from sin, and deriving its 
 moral stimulus, not from pain and sorrow, but 
 from pleasure and joy. 2 In that happy, harmless 
 world death would not be unknown, but it would 
 come merely as sleep after a long day's work, or 
 like ' the fading of a flower, the dropping of fruit 
 in the late autumn, the dying out of the light of 
 day to the dreamy music of the birds and the 
 babbling of the brooks.' 8 It would be as easy to 
 die in such a world as 'in a world of perfect 
 health, there is abundant reason to believe, it 
 would be to be born.' 4 It would be such a de- 
 lightful world, indeed, that merely to live in it for, 
 say, a hundred years, would satisfy all legitimate 
 cravings for existence ; a hereafter would not be 
 felt to be necessary. 6 
 
 Such is the ideally best world of dualistic dreams. 
 
 1 Evil and Evolution, p. 103. * Ibid., p. 33. 
 
 Ibid., p. 176. * Ibid., p. 177. 8 f^id., p. 177- 
 
MODERN DUALISM 331 
 
 It may be a very good world, so far as sentient 
 happiness is concerned, but is it in any true sense 
 a moral world? The demand of the theory is that 
 in the lower animal creation there shall be little 
 pain, 1 and in the human sphere not only little pain 
 but no sin. It postulates not merely that there 
 may be a world without sin, but that there must 
 be, in so far as divine intention is concerned, if 
 we are to believe that God is good. Such is the 
 kind of world we should have had but for diabolic 
 interference. The author of Evil and Evolution 
 assumes that at this point he is in accord with 
 the author of Genesis. He credits the book of 
 Genesis with the view that God made man ab- 
 solutely perfect, and that man would have con- 
 tinued such had not Satan seduced him into evil. 2 
 There is reason for thinking that, following the 
 example of scholastic theologians, our author has 
 read into the story of Adam a meaning which its 
 statements will not bear. But there can be no doubt 
 that the opinion he imputes to the sacred writer 
 is at least his own. He believes that the primitive 
 man, the outcome of a slow secular process of 
 evolution, was in the strict sense morally perfect. 
 
 1 The author of Evil and Evolution thinks that in the world which 
 might have been, pain would have been 'comparatively infinitesimal in 
 amount, that it would have had a self-evident cause and purpose, that 
 it would have been remedied by nature, and that it would never have 
 been caused by the direct operation of law. Vidz p. 87. 
 
 2 Vide pp. 23, 24. 
 
33* THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 This conception raises some hard questions. How 
 did it come about that a morally perfect man was 
 so easily tempted even by a tempter of diabolic 
 skill? Ought not a morally perfect being to be 
 temptation-proof? Then, if, as is supposed, the 
 good God was able to conduct the evolution of 
 the human creature, with entire success, up to that 
 point, in spite of all Satanic attempts at marring 
 the great work of making a morally perfect being, 
 why should he encounter such fatal frustration after 
 that consummation had been reached? Lastly, and 
 above all, one is forced to ask : Is this notion of a 
 moral subject made perfect and guaranteed against 
 lapse by Divine power not destructive of morality? 
 The reality of moral distinctions may be undermined 
 in more than one way. One way is that of the 
 pantheist who affirms that moral evil, so called, is 
 in its own place good. But another way is that of 
 the modern dualist, who in effect affirms that in a 
 divinely ordered universe moral evil would be im- 
 possible. May one not venture to say that the 
 actual universe, full though it be of wrong, is 
 preferable to the imaginary universe from which 
 wrong is excluded by divine omnipotence? Com- 
 pulsory holiness is not holiness ; it is simply the 
 mechanical service of a tool. 
 
 2. The exemption of the good Spirit from re- 
 sponsibility for the misery and sin of the actual 
 world is purchased at a great price. That price is 
 
MODERN DUALISM 
 
 not merely, or even chiefly, the sacrifice of divine 
 omnipotence; it is rather the reluctant acceptance 
 of the repulsive, hideous conception of an absol- 
 utely bad, unmitigatedly malignant antigod. One's 
 whole soul rises in rebellion against this revolting 
 notion. Is it possible to believe that such a being, 
 evil from the beginning, can exist? How could he 
 ever come to be ? The author of Evil and Evolution 
 declines to look at this question, but it cannot be 
 evaded by any radical advocate of dualism. There 
 are just two alternatives : either the evil Spirit, like 
 the good Spirit, is unoriginated, eternal ; x or he 
 owes his being, like all other creatures, to the good 
 Spirit. The former alternative amounts to this, that 
 good and evil are both alike divine ; a position which 
 involves at once the cancelling of moral distinctions 
 and the destruction of Deity. If good and evil be 
 both alike divine, then there is no ground for pre- 
 ferring good to evil save personal liking. If there 
 be two gods with equal rights, though radically 
 opposed to each other, then there is no god. Two 
 rival gods, like two rival popes, destroy each other, 
 and leave the universe without a divine head. 
 
 With the other alternative Satan the creature 
 of the good Spirit we are in an equally hopeless 
 predicament. What is gained by relieving God of 
 
 1 The author of Evil and Evolution seems to incline to this view. 
 He says : ' I can no more undertake to say how such a being as Satan 
 came into existence than I can account for the existence of the Deity ' 
 (p. 8). 
 
334 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 responsibility for all other evil in the world, if we 
 end by making him responsible for the existence 
 of the malign being by whom all the mischief has 
 been wrought? Is not the presence in the uni- 
 verse of such an absolutely wicked spirit an in- 
 finitely greater evil than all the other evils put 
 together? Better make God the Creator of evil 
 under mitigated forms than the Creator of a hideous 
 being who is an unmitigated evil, and through whose 
 diabolic agency He becomes indirectly the cause 
 of all the evil that happens. There is, doubtless, 
 one door by which the Deity may seem to escape 
 responsibility for the badness of Satan and his work, 
 viz., by the hypothesis that Satan was created good 
 and afterwards lapsed into evil. But it is observ- 
 able that our author does not avail himself of this 
 way of escape. He could not, consistently with 
 his view of God's relation to moral agents as that 
 of one able and willing to guard a moral world 
 conceived as good against the intrusion of evil. If 
 Satan was once good, why did not God keep him 
 from falling? 
 
 3. The dualistic scheme under review, while mak- 
 ing pretensions to scientific method, is unscientific, 
 in so far as it destroys the unity of the universe. 
 The universe ceases to be the homogeneous result 
 of a uniform process of evolution, and becomes the 
 heterogeneous effect of two processes counterwork- 
 ing each other. And the two processes are not 
 
MODERN DUALISM 335 
 
 only opposite in tendency, but discrepant also in 
 their method of working. The Creator works only 
 by law, his antagonist works by occasional dis- 
 turbance of law. The Creator's action is natural, 
 that of his antagonist is unnatural, and in a sense 
 supernatural or miraculous. The Creator is im- 
 manent in the world, and works in it from within 
 through its inherent laws and forces. His antagonist 
 is transcendent, and works upon the world from 
 without as a disturbing influence. The whole con- 
 ception implies a separation between the evil and 
 the good in nature which has no existence. The 
 two in reality are closely interwoven, and are to 
 be regarded as complementary effects of the same 
 causes. Such is the judgment of Mr. John Stuart 
 Mill, who, while not committing himself to the 
 dualistic hypothesis, has, more than any other scien- 
 tific man of modern times, expressed himself favour- 
 ably regarding it. Discussing the attributes which 
 observation of nature justifies us in ascribing to 
 God, he thus writes : ' The indications of design 
 point strongly in one direction the preservation of 
 the creatures in whose structure the indications are 
 found. Along with the preserving agencies there 
 are destroying agencies, which we might be tempted 
 to ascribe to the will of a different Creator; but 
 there are rarely appearances of the recondite con- 
 trivance of means of destruction, except when the 
 destruction of one creature is the means of pre- 
 
THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 servation to others. Nor can it be supposed that 
 the preserving agencies are wielded by one Being, 
 the destroying agencies by another. The destroy- 
 ing agencies are a necessary part of the preserving 
 agencies : the chemical compositions by which life 
 is carried on could not take place without a parallel 
 series of decompositions. The great agent of decay 
 in both organic and inorganic substances is oxida- 
 tion, and it is only by oxidation that life is con- 
 tinued for even the length of a minute.' 1 The 
 conclusion to be drawn from such facts is ex- 
 pressed by Mr. Mill in these terms: * There is 
 no ground in Natural Theology for attributing 
 intelligence or personality to the obstacles which 
 partially thwart what seem the purposes of the 
 Creator.' 2 
 
 4. The advocates of dualism may justly be charged 
 with morbid views of the evil that is in the world. 
 They look on some things as evil that are not, 
 they exaggerate the evils that do exist, and they 
 largely overlook the fact that evil is good in the 
 making, or a possible good not understood. The 
 author of Evil and Evolution regards vegetarianism 
 as a necessary feature in the world as it ought to 
 be. Is that dictum to be accepted as final? He 
 reckons birds and beasts of prey as creatures of the 
 evil Spirit Have they not some useful functions 
 in the world the vulture, e.g. y as one of Nature's 
 
 1 Three Essays, p. 185. s Ibid., p. 186. 
 
MODERN DUALISM 337 
 
 scavengers? Of the exaggerative habit we have an 
 interesting instance in Mr. Mill's remarks on child- 
 birth, which are as follows : ' In the clumsy provi- 
 sion which she (Nature) has made for that perpetual 
 renewal of animal life, rendered necessary by the 
 prompt termination she puts to it in every individual 
 instance, no human being ever comes into the world 
 but another human being is literally stretched on 
 the rack for hours or days, not unfrequently issuing 
 in death/ 1 Compare with this the saying of Jesus : 
 *A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, 
 because her hour is come : but as soon as she is 
 delivered of the child, she remembereth no more 
 the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the 
 world.' 2 Which of these two utterances is the 
 healthier in sentiment and the truer to the feelings 
 of the sufferers concerned ? 
 
 It might help to 'cure the dualistic mood if those 
 who suffer from it would make a study of the good 
 that is in evil. They might take a course of lessons 
 from Emerson, and con well such a passage as this: 
 'Wars, fires, plagues, break up immovable routine, 
 clear the ground of rotten races and dens of dis- 
 temper, and open a fair field to new men. There 
 is a tendency in things to right themselves, and the 
 war or revolution or bankruptcy that shatters a 
 rotten system allows things to take a new and 
 natural order. The sharpest evils are bent into 
 
 1 Three Essays, p. 30. 2 John xvi. 21. 
 
 Y 
 
338 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 that periodicity which makes the errors of planets 
 and the fevers and distempers of men self-limiting. 
 Nature is upheld by antagonism. Passions, re- 
 sistance, dangers, are educators. We acquire the 
 strength we have overcome. Without war, no 
 soldier ! without enemies, no hero ! The sun were 
 insipid if the universe were not opaque. And the 
 glory of character is in affronting the horrors of 
 depravity to draw thence new nobility of power. . . . 
 And evermore in the world is this marvellous 
 balance of beauty and disgust, magnificence and 
 rats. Not Antoninus, but a poor washerwoman, 
 said, " The more trouble the more lion ; that 's my 
 principle." ' l 
 
 From the same master the dualist might learn 
 how many so-called evils are evil only relatively to 
 man's ignorance. The world for the savage is full 
 of devils which become good angels for -the man 
 who knows their use. Water, air, steam, fire, elec- 
 tricity, have all been devils in their time. ' Steam,' 
 writes Emerson, 'was, till the other day, the devil 
 which we dreaded. Every pot made by any human 
 potter or brazier had a hole in its cover to let off 
 the enemy, lest he should lift pot and roof and carry 
 the house away. But the Marquis of Worcester, 
 Watt, and Fulton bethought themselves that where 
 was power was not devil, but was God ; that it must 
 be availed of, and not by any means let off and 
 
 1 Works t vol. ii. p. 417 ('The Conduct of Life,' Essay VH.). 
 
MODERN DUALISM 339 
 
 wasted.' 1 This is wholesome teaching, though it 
 come from one whose optimism may be deemed ex- 
 treme. I had rather think with Emerson than with 
 Huxley and Mill concerning Nature. Of Huxley 
 one has said that ' he is as positive, and, one might 
 add, as enthusiastic, in his faith that all things work 
 together for evil to those who love, as Plato and 
 Paul were that all things work together for good.' 2 
 It is easy to see on which side the superior sanity 
 of thought lies. 
 
 But at this point we may be reminded that there 
 was a dualistic element both in the Platonic and in 
 the Pauline system ; and the fact may be pointed to 
 in proof that even with the utmost desire to take 
 an optimistic view of things strenuous and candid 
 thinkers find dualism in some form unavoidable. 
 Plato believed in an intractable matter, Paul in a 
 Satan ; not identical, indeed, in all respects with the 
 Satan of modern invention, still occupying a some- 
 what similar position in the universe as the malignant 
 marrer of God's work. 
 
 The statement cannot be denied, and it certainly 
 suffices to show that to carry out the programme 
 of absolute optimism is difficult if not impossible. 
 The intractable matter of the Greek philosopher 
 and the Satan of the Christian apostle testify to 
 the presence in the physical and moral universe of 
 
 1 Works, vol. ii. p. 322 ('The Conduct of Life,' Essay I.). 
 
 2 Gordon, Immortality and the New Theodicy, p. 23. 
 
340 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 a perplexing mystery which speculative reason finds 
 it hard to clear up. Whether either of the solutions 
 does more than confess the mystery and call it by 
 a peculiar name is another question. We may, if 
 we choose, consider which of the two names is to 
 be preferred. The impersonal abstraction of Plato 
 is more in accordance with Western habits of thought, 
 while the embodiment of evil in a malignant per- 
 sonality commended itself to the realistic Semitic 
 mind. Then the suggestion that the imperfection 
 of the world is due to the unmanageableness of the 
 raw material out of which it was built, is free from 
 the moral repulsiveness attaching to the concep- 
 tion of an intelligent agent absolutely devoted to 
 the bad vocation of doing all the mischief in the 
 world he can. But the more important question 
 is, Whether our minds can find final rest in either 
 of the suggested solutions of the problem ? The in- 
 tractableness of matter why intractable ? Because 
 matter is independent of God, and with its inherent 
 properties pre-exists as a ready-made datum for the 
 divine Architect who proposes as far as may be to 
 turn it into a cosmos. Can rea ^n rest in this view 
 of God's relation to the world ? How much more 
 satisfactory to think of the physical universe, whether 
 eternal or not, as having its origin in God, as exist- 
 ing through spirit and for spirit, and thoroughly 
 plastic in the hands of its divine Maker? On this 
 view the intractableness vanishes ; there is nothing 
 
MODERN DUALISM 341 
 
 in matter which God has not put there, and which 
 He cannot use for His purposes. 1 
 
 Turn now to the Semitic conception of a personal 
 obstructer, which may or may not have come into 
 Jewish theology from Persia, and consider how far 
 it offers a final resting-place for thought wrestling 
 with the problem of evil. We note first, with satis- 
 faction, that the Biblical Satan has a much more 
 restricted range of action than the Satan of modern 
 dualism. The latter begins to meddle almost at 
 creation's dawn, and becomes specially active at the 
 point where the principle of altruism first makes 
 its appearance in the animal world that is to say, 
 ages before the evolution of life culminated in man. 
 The Satan of Scripture, on the other hand, becomes 
 active, for the first time, in the human sphere, his 
 one concern being to wreck the moral world whose 
 possibility was provided for by the advent of man. 
 The writer of Genesis conceives of the creation up 
 to that point as good, no fault to be found in the 
 inanimate or lower animate world ; herein differing 
 both from Plato, who imagined that even the primi- 
 tive hyle was not free from fault, and from the author 
 of Evil and Evolution, who places Satanic activity 
 
 1 In his latest work, The Laws, Plato seems to teach that mind was 
 before matter, soul prior to body, so that the intractableness of matter 
 can no longer be the source of evil for him. In this Dialogue he seems 
 to adopt, instead, the Zoroastrian hypothesis of two spirits or souls 
 one the author of good, the other of evil. Vide Jowett's Plato, v. 
 pp. 467, 468. 
 
342 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 far back in the history of creation. Satan appears 
 in Scripture as the enemy of moral good, as an 
 unbeliever in it, and as a tempter to moral evil. 
 In Genesis the conception of an external tempter, 
 in the mythological guise of a serpent, is employed 
 to make more easily comprehensible the origin of 
 sin, the doing of wrong by human beings previously 
 free from transgression. In later Scriptures the 
 same being, now called Satan, appears in the same 
 capacity, endeavouring to seduce good men David, 
 Job, Jesus to do evil actions contrary to their 
 character. 
 
 Such is the function of Satan in the Bible. Waiv- 
 ing the ontological question of objective reality, 
 what we have to ask is, Does the idea of a super- 
 human tempter really solve the problem as to the 
 origin of evil in the first man or in any man? 'Who 
 can understand his errors?' asks the Psalmist. 
 Sometimes it is not easy ; and in such cases we may 
 employ the hypothesis of a transcendental tempter as 
 a way of expressing the difficulty which impresses 
 the imagination while it fails to satisfy the reason. 
 This is all that it does, even in the case of Adam. 
 'Who,' we naturally inquire, 'can understand his 
 error ? ' the error ex hypothesi of a previously errorless 
 man. But do we understand it even with the aid 
 of the tempting serpent, on any view of the primitive 
 state ? If it was a state of moral perfection in the 
 strict sense, ought not the first man to have been 
 
MODERN DUALISM 343 
 
 temptation-proof, especially against such rudimentary 
 forms of temptation as are mentioned in the story ? 
 If it was only a state of childish innocence, does not 
 the introduction of supernatural agency invest with 
 an aspect of mystery what is in itself a comparatively 
 simple matter, the lapse of an utterly inexperienced 
 person? The same remark applies to the case of 
 David. In the pages of the Chronicler David 
 appears as a saint, his moral shortcomings, faithfully 
 recorded in the earlier history, being left out of the 
 account ; and Satan is represented as tempting him 
 to number the people, as if to make conceivable 
 how so good a man could do an action displeasing 
 to God. But it is not difficult to imagine how even 
 a godly king might be betrayed into a transaction of 
 the kind specified by very ordinary motives. In the 
 case of saints generally it may be remarked that 
 their moral lapses would not appear so mysterious 
 as they are sometimes thought to be, if the whole 
 truth as to their spiritual state were known. The 
 habit of referring these lapses, as otherwise incom- 
 prehensible events, to Satanic temptation is not free 
 from danger. It tends to self-deception, and to the 
 covering over of some hidden evil in the heart which 
 urgently needs looking after. 
 
 Such abuses of the Biblical idea of a supernatural 
 tempter are carefully to be guarded against. But 
 the mischief they work is a trifle compared with the 
 havoc produced by ascribing to Satanic agency the 
 
344 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 whole moral evil of mankind. That means that, but 
 for Satanic interference, the page of human history 
 would have been a stainless record of the lives of 
 perfect men kept from falling by the gracious power 
 of God. Such a view carries two fatal consequences. 
 It convicts God of impotence, and it relieves men of 
 responsibility. The one mighty being, and the one 
 sinner in the world, is Satan. The story of our race 
 is dark enough, but it is not so dark as that. It is 
 the story of a race of free moral agents who are not 
 the puppets of either Deity or devil. The sin of 
 man is not a witness to a frustrated God, but to a 
 God who would rather have sin in the world than 
 have a world without sin because tenanted by beings 
 physically incapacitated to commit it. The very 
 transgression of a free responsible being is in God's 
 sight of more value than the involuntary rectitude of 
 beings who are forcibly protected from going wrong. 
 If there is to be goodness in the world, it must be 
 the personal achievement of the good. Not indeed 
 of the good unaided. The Divine Being is more 
 than an onlooker. He co-operates in every way com- 
 patible with due respect for our moral personality. 
 ' Our Redeemer, from everlasting, is Thy name/ 
 That t God has been from the first, and throughout 
 the entire history of man. More an absolute pre- 
 venter of evil, e.g. He cannot be, simply because He 
 values morality. But a Redeemer He truly is, and His 
 work as such cannot be frustrated by any number of 
 
MODERN DUALISM 345 
 
 Satans, ancient or modern. If a Satan exists, it must 
 be because it is always possible for a moral subject 
 to make a perverted use of his endowments. If such 
 a perverted being tempt man, his malign influence 
 is simply a part of the untoward environment amid 
 which they have to wrestle with evil. He cannot do 
 more than make a subtle use of the evil elements in 
 our own nature, with which alone we need concern 
 ourselves. Let us watch our own hearts, and Satan 
 will never have a chance. If he do gain an advantage 
 over us, it may be for our ultimate benefit by showing 
 where unsuspected weakness lies. Let us throw off 
 the incubus of an omnipotent devil conjured up by 
 modern dualism, and go on our way with good hope, 
 and full faith that God is with us, and that He is 
 stronger than all powers, visible or invisible, that may 
 be arrayed against us. 1 
 
 1 That the diabolic element is held in check in human history take 
 this in proof from Carlyle : ' It is remarkable how in almost all world- 
 quarrels, when they came to extremity there have been Infernal 
 Machines, Sicilian Vespers, Guido [Guy Fawkes] Powder-barrels, and 
 such like called into action ; and worth noting how hitherto not one 
 of them in this world has prospered. ... In all cases I consider the 
 Devil an unsafe sleeping-partner, to be rejected, not to be admitted at 
 any premium ; by whose aid no cause yet was ever known to prosper.* 
 Historical Sketches, p. 68 (1898). 
 
LECTURE XI 
 
 MODERN DUALISM: RELIGIOUS AND 
 SOCIAL ASPECTS 
 
 I ASK attention now to a type of dualism for which 
 human reason is the antagonist of the Deity. 
 
 That human reason, in the exercise of its proper 
 functions, might become the enemy of God, is the 
 last thing that would occur to one who holds the 
 view of man's place in the universe which I have 
 made the foundation of my argument for a provi- 
 dential order of the world. On that view man is the 
 crown of the creative process, the key to the meaning 
 of the process, and also to the nature of its Divine 
 Author. But reason is an essential ingredient in the 
 distmctively human, therefore a part of the image 
 of God, a ray of the divine. How unlikely that it 
 should prove to be inherently inaccessible to the 
 knowledge of God, and unserviceable to the great 
 purpose for which He made the creature whom He 
 endowed with so noble a faculty ! Ought not reason 
 rather to be a source of the knowledge of God, a 
 revelation of God in part, and also of the world : 
 man rational revealing a rational God, and unfolding 
 
MODERN DUALISM 347 
 
 the meaning of a world interpretable to reason? 
 Ought not this same faculty to be a willing instru- 
 ment in the hand of God for furthering the moral 
 evolution of humanity, bringing to full fruition the 
 latent possibilities of human nature ? 
 
 This genial view of reason's promise and potency 
 has not by any means found universal acceptance. 
 On the contrary, there has ever been a tendency, 
 especially among theologians, to the vilification of 
 reason. Concisely formulated, the depreciatory 
 theory of man's rational faculty is this : it cannot 
 find God ; it is unwilling to receive a revelation of 
 God coming to it from without ; it is reluctant to 
 serve God so revealed as an instrument for ad- 
 vancing His glory and the higher interests of 
 humanity. It is a very dismal and depressing 
 theory. The dualism considered in last Lecture is 
 sombre enough. It finds in the lower stages of 
 evolution manifold traces of an antigod counter- 
 working the beneficent purposes of the Creator. 
 But it does not leave the Creator without a witness 
 at any stage in the world-process ; even its most 
 pessimistic exponent, John Stuart Mill, being com- 
 pelled to own that some faint evidence of divine 
 benevolence is discoverable. But suppose it were 
 otherwise, suppose the sub-human world were with- 
 out a ray of divine light, unmitigated diabolic 
 darkness brooding over all, what a comfort if, on 
 arriving at the human, we found that we had 
 
348 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 emerged at last out of the kingdom of darkness 
 into the kingdom of light with reason and conscience 
 for our celestial luminaries ! Another type of dual- 
 ism, however, deprives us of this comfort, telling us 
 in effect that with reason we are not yet in the 
 kingdom of light, but still in a godless region ; that 
 reason in truth is simply a faculty enabling its 
 possessor more cleverly and successfully to counter- 
 work the moral purpose of the Creator. The 
 Ahriman, the Satan, of this new form of dualism is 
 a human endowment which we had fondly imagined 
 to be a link in the chain of filial affinity connecting 
 man with God. This view, if accepted, upsets our 
 whole doctrine of a providential order based on 
 man's place in the cosmos ; therefore it is our 
 imperative duty to subject it to careful scrutiny. 
 
 The first step in the vilification of reason is the 
 assertion that it cannot find God. This position, in 
 itself, does not necessarily involve a depreciatory 
 estimate of reason's capacity. Inability to find 
 may conceivably be due, not to any fault in the 
 searcher, but to lack of clues to the thing sought. 
 Such lack of clues to God in nature is asserted 
 by many, some of whom at least have no wish to 
 disparage reason. In our time men of different 
 schools, theological and philosophical, agree in this 
 position. Thus an English Nonconformist minister, 
 an adherent of the Ritschlian school of theology, 
 expounding its views, writes : 'If we will use words 
 
MODERN DUALISM 349 
 
 carefully, there is no revelation in nature.' 1 From 
 the opposite extreme of the ecclesiastical horizon 
 comes the peremptory voice of Cardinal Newman, 
 telling us that from the surface of the world can be 
 gleaned only 'some faint and fragmentary views of 
 God/ and that the fact can mean only one of two 
 things : l either there is no Creator, or He has dis- 
 owned His creatures.' 2 A Transatlantic philosopher, 
 who describes his philosophical position as that of 
 radical empiricism^ in harmony with these utterances 
 declares that natural religion has suffered definitive 
 bankruptcy in the opinion of a circle of persons, 
 among whom he includes himself, and that for such 
 persons 'the physical order of nature, taken simply 
 as science knows it, cannot be held to reveal any 
 one harmonious spiritual intent.' 3 
 
 These oracular verdicts on the nullity of natural 
 theology are pronounced in different interests : the 
 first in support of the thesis that Jesus Christ is 
 the sole source of knowledge of God ; the second 
 with the view of making dependence on the Church 
 for such knowledge as complete as possible ; 4 the 
 
 1 P. T. Forsyth on * Revelation and the Person of Christ ' in Faith 
 and Criticism , p. 100. 
 
 2 Newman's Grammar of Assent, p. 392. 
 
 3 W. James, Tke Will to Believe, p. 52. 
 
 4 In his Apologia, p. 198, Newman lays down the position that there 
 is no medium in true philosophy between Atheism and Catholicity. On 
 his whole doctrine concerning the impotence of reason in religion vide 
 Principal Fairbairn's Catholicism, Roman and Anglican, pp. 116-140, 
 and pp. 205-236. 
 
350 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 third to inculcate the necessity of faith in an unseen 
 supernatural order 'in which the riddles of the 
 natural order may be found explained.' 1 The first- 
 mentioned bias, that of the Ritschlians, possesses 
 special interest and significance. It certainly means 
 no disrespect to human reason. It denies not to 
 reason an eye capable of discerning the light ; it 
 simply affirms that from the world, apart from 
 Christ, no light is forthcoming. The Ritschlian is 
 an Agnostic so far as natural theology is concerned, 
 affirming that the course of nature supplies no sure 
 traces of the being or the providence of God. Christ 
 is for him 'the one luminous smile upon the dark 
 face of the world.' 2 If reason, baffled in its quest 
 after God, can recognise in that smile a light from 
 heaven, her affinity for the divine is sufficiently 
 vindicated. 
 
 It does not fall within the scope of this Lecture 
 to criticise at length the Ritschlian programme: 
 Outside Christ nothing but agnosticism. Suffice it, 
 therefore, to remark that it seems to me to play into 
 the hands of the absolute agnostic quite as effectu- 
 ally as the attitude of Cardinal Newman, whose 
 watchword was : No knowledge of God except through 
 the CJiurch. To Newman the agnostic reply is this : 
 Your position means that to follow reason lands in 
 agnosticism as the only creed possible or rational for 
 
 1 James, The Will to Believe, p. 51. 
 
 * Forsyth in Faith and Criticism^ p. loo. 
 
MODERN DUALISM 351 
 
 all outside the Catholic Church. Why, then, should 
 we cease being agnostics and become Catholics? 
 Those who maintain that no knowledge of God is 
 possible save through Christ must be prepared for 
 a similar response. * Why,' it may be asked, ' must 
 we become theists at the bidding of Jesus, if there 
 be nothing in the universe witnessing to God's being 
 and benignity? If Jesus be in possession of the 
 truth, how is he so isolated ? Is the isolation not a 
 proof that he was mistaken in his doctrine of a 
 Divine Father who cares for those who, like himself, 
 devote their lives to the doing of good?' 
 
 If Christ's doctrine of God be true, there ought to 
 be something in the world to verify it. There can 
 hardly be a real Divine Father in the Gospels if there 
 be no traces of that Father outside the Gospels, in 
 the universe. If God can be known by any means, it 
 is presumable that He can be known by many means. 
 It is intrinsically probable that some knowledge of 
 God can be reached by more than one road. Why 
 should we be so slow to believe that the Divine can 
 be known? The bankruptcy of natural theology is 
 a gratuitous proposition. The Apostle Paul ex- 
 presses only the judgment of good sense when he 
 indicates that there is ' that which may be known of 
 God ' even by Pagans, and charges the heathen 
 world, not with incapacity to know God, but with 
 unwillingness to retain God in their knowledge. 1 
 1 Romans i. 19, 20, 28. 
 
352 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 This is the reasonable view still for men who walk 
 in the light of modern science. In view of man's 
 place in the cosmos, it is a priori credible that there 
 is a revelation of God in nature, and that man in the 
 exercise of his cognitive faculties is capable of de- 
 ciphering it. Man being rational, the presumption 
 is that God is rational, and that Divine Reason is 
 immanent in the world, Man being moral, the pre- 
 sumption is that God is moral, and that traces of a 
 moral order of the world will discover themselves 
 to a discerning eye. These two positions being 
 conceded, it results that we men are God's sons, 
 and that Goc] is our Father. Christ's doctrine is 
 confirmed. The new light is the true light. By 
 intuition Jesus saw and said what modern science 
 seals. 
 
 Thus far of reason's power to find God in nature. 
 We have next to consider its capacity to receive 
 what it cannot by its own unaided effort find. 
 Has reason an open eye for light coming from above ? 
 
 To simplify the question, let us suppose the 
 celestial light to be the teaching of Jesus as reported 
 in the Synoptical Gospels. 
 
 Now, even absolute agnostics can so far accept 
 that light as to recognise its beauty and its worthi- 
 ness to be true. If they are constrained to regard 
 it as the poetic dream of an exquisitely endowed 
 mind, they can frankly admit that the dream is very 
 lovely, and that it would be well for the world if the 
 
MODERN DUALISM 353 
 
 fair vision corresponded to the outward fact. It is 
 with regret, not with pleasure, they find themselves 
 compelled by observation to arrive at the conclusion 
 that such correspondence does not exist. Their 
 reason hesitates to accept the idea of a Divine 
 Father as objectively true, not for lack of liking but 
 for lack of evidence. 
 
 Christian agnostics advance beyond this position. 
 They accept the doctrine of Jesus as not only 
 beautiful but objectively true, the one ray of divine 
 light in an otherwise dark, godless universe. In 
 doing so they do not consider themselves to be per- 
 forming an ultra-rational act of transcendental faith. 
 Christ's teaching in their view possesses a quality 
 of ' sweet reasonableness ' towards which receptivity 
 is the only rational attitude. Christ's light, like 
 that of the sun, appears to them self-evidencing, 
 needing no supernatural attestation by miracles, 1 
 or enforcement by awful sanctions or compul- 
 sory imposition as a legal creed by ecclesiastical 
 authority. The Christ of history can dispense with 
 these aids of uncertain value, and stand upon His 
 own merits, making His appeal directly from reason 
 to reason, from soul to soul. 
 
 Not thus has the relation between reason and 
 revelation been conceived by all. A hard anti- 
 
 1 For the illustration of this attitude Mr. Matthew Arnold's Litera- 
 ture and Dogma may be consulted. Mr. Arnold, the agnostic, finds 
 in Christ's doctrine a ' sweet reasonableness ' which needs no miracle to 
 win for it acceptance. 
 
 Z 
 
354 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 thesis has been set up between reason and faith, 
 and men have been conceived as accepting revela- 
 tion, so to speak, at the point of the bayonet, as 
 if such acceptance could possibly have anything to 
 do with either reason or faith. This has come about 
 through two causes : an artificial view of the sub- 
 stance of revelation, and a disparaging view of 
 human reason. As to the former, a notion long 
 prevailed that revelation consists chiefly in a body 
 of doctrines incomprehensible by reason, therefore 
 unacceptable to reason, possessing no self-evidenc- 
 ing or self-commending power, needing therefore 
 an elaborate apparatus of external evidences, chiefly 
 miracles, to give them a chance of acceptance. This 
 was the view generally adopted by the older 
 apologists. One of its ablest and best-known 
 exponents and advocates was Dean Mansel, who, in 
 his Bampton Lectures on The Limits of Religious 
 Thought, employed the Hamiltonian philosophy of 
 the Conditioned for the defence of the Christian 
 Faith. The position that philosophy led him to 
 take up was something like this. Recognising that 
 certain doctrines deduced by theologians from Scrip- 
 ture such as the Trinity, the Incarnation, the 
 Atonement, Eternal Punishment were open to 
 cavil from the point of view of reason, he inter- 
 dicted criticism on the plea that the metaphysical 
 and the moral nature of the absolute Being are both 
 alike beyond human ken. The doctrines of atone- 
 
MODERN DUALISM 355 
 
 ment and eternal punishment, e.g., might appear 
 very liable to objection on ethical grounds ; but we 
 must remember that the absolute morality of God 
 must be very different from the relative morality 
 of men, and that therefore we may not presume to 
 comprehend or judge divine action, but with the 
 meekness of an uncomprehending faith accept what 
 from reason's point of view appears revolting. It 
 was not to be expected that this way of silencing 
 objectors by the bugbear of the Absolute would pass 
 unchallenged. Troublesome questions were sure to 
 be asked. There is, it seems, an absolute morality 
 whose nature we cannot know. If we cannot know 
 the nature of such morality, how do we know that 
 it exists ? By revelation ? But how can we be sure 
 that it is revelation? If the morality ascribed to 
 God in the Bible presents itself to our moral nature 
 as immorality, can we help rejecting it as a false 
 representation ? And if we are asked to distinguish 
 between the aspect under which God is presented 
 to us in Scripture and the real truth of His Being, 
 between what He is in Himself and what He would 
 have us think of Him, can this properly be called 
 revelation? How much better to give up pretend- 
 ing to know God either through reason or through 
 revelation, and settle down in the conviction that 
 the Being philosophers call the Infinite and the 
 Absolute is altogether unknowable ! So the agnostic 
 apologetic of Mansel was likely to end. So it did 
 
356 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 end. The relative agnosticism of the disciple of 
 Hamilton landed in the absolute agnosticism of 
 Herbert Spencer and Leslie Stephen, who employed 
 the weapons put into their hands by the theologian 
 to undermine and subvert the foundations of all 
 possible theology. The sooner this spurious apolo- 
 getic was swept away the better, for we are worse off 
 with it than with the modicum of knowledge con- 
 cerning God allowed us by the philosophy of Kant. 
 While denying access to God to the theoretic reason, 
 Kant held a Divine Moral Governor to be a neces- 
 sary postulate of the practical reason. This view 
 implies that God's moral nature is essentially the 
 same as man's ; that God is interested in righteous- 
 ness in the sense in which we understand it, and will 
 use His power to promote its ascendency. Mansel, 
 on the contrary, represents our ideas of God even 
 on the moral side as anthropomorphic and unreal. 
 God's righteousness, for anything we know, may 
 be something very like what we should account 
 unrighteousness. Kant's view is decidedly the more 
 wholesome and acceptable. With such knowledge 
 as he allows concerning God we could be content 
 to remain in ignorance as to His metaphysical 
 nature. It is on the moral side that knowledge of 
 God is urgently needed, and, if I have reason to 
 believe that on that side God is like man, I know 
 where I am and what I have to expect. The belief 
 that the human and the divine are essentially one in 
 
MODERN DUALISM 357 
 
 the moral sphere is the very light of life. On the 
 other hand, extend the shadow of the absolute into 
 the moral world by proclaiming that morality is 
 not the same thing in essence for God and for man, 
 and you envelop human life in midnight darkness, 
 and leave us without God and without hope. Faith 
 in any so-called revealed truth which really implies 
 the contrary is impossible. In such a case faith can 
 only be feigning, make-believe. 
 
 The alleged antagonism between reason and faith 
 is further based in part on disparagement of reason. 
 The commonplaces here are : the pride of reason, 
 its aversion to mystery, its reluctance to receive as 
 truth whatever exceeds its comprehension. It is 
 possible to quote with plausibility in support of such 
 depreciatory reflections the Apostle Paul, as when 
 he writes, * The natural man receiveth not the things 
 of the Spirit of God : for they are foolishness unto 
 him : neither can he know them, because they are 
 spiritually discerned.' 1 But the expression rendered 
 the natural man does not mean the rational or 
 reasonable man ; it signifies the psychical man, the 
 man, i.e. who is under the dominion of the lower 
 animal soul, instead of the higher reasonable soul, 
 the spirit. The natural man is one who is in bond- 
 age to passion, instead of being under the free 
 guidance of enlightened reason. The contrast 
 suggested is analogous to that indicated in another 
 
 1 I Corinthians ii. 14. 
 
358 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Pauline text: 'With the mind I serve the law oi 
 God, but with the flesh the law of sin.' 1 The mind 
 that serves the law of God will not be shut to the 
 truth of God. And this service to divine law, and 
 this openness to divine truth, are in accordance with 
 the true nature of man as a rational and moral 
 being. The ' psychical ' man is not man in his true 
 normal nature. He is psychical because he is not 
 man enough, because he is more of the brute than 
 of the man. In so far as he is unspiritual, neither 
 knowing nor valuing the things of the spirit, he is 
 irrational. For, be it carefully noted, it is a purely 
 arbitrary conception of reason which regards the 
 ethical and the spiritual as lying wholly outside its 
 sphere. Reason, morality, and religion are but 
 different phases of the one essential nature of 
 man of that which constitutes the distinctively 
 human. And these three are one ; they imply each 
 other and cannot exist separate from each other. 
 'Thought/ it has been well said, 'may for certain 
 purposes abstract rational intelligence from moral 
 character. But, in fact, there is no such thing in 
 human experience as rational intelligence by itself; 
 rational intelligence that is not the intelligence of a 
 moral person ; that has not, therefore, inseparably 
 from its rational existence and activity, a moral 
 character. Neither can there exist any moral which 
 has not also a rational aspect and character. There 
 
 1 Romans vii. 25. 
 
MODERN DUALISM 359 
 
 is no such thing as a non-moral rational. There is 
 no such thing as a non-rational moral.' 1 In the 
 same way it may be maintained that spiritual insight 
 and appreciation presuppose morality and rationality. 
 It is the pure in heart that see God. And seeing 
 means knowing, thinking true, wise, worthy thoughts 
 of God the highest function of the faculty of reason. 
 
 In the exercise of this function reason may become 
 unduly elated. Divine philosophy may be lifted up 
 with pride, and through pride fall into foolish pre- 
 sumption. But reason is not the only thing that is 
 exposed to this danger. There is a pride of morality 
 and a pride of spirituality as well as a pride of 
 reason. The righteous man and the saint have need 
 to be on their guard not less than the philosopher. 
 Each, through pride, may be led into the devious 
 paths of false judgment. The complacent righteous 
 man despises his fellow-men ; the * saint,' in the 
 proud consciousness of his spirituality, looks down 
 with contempt on the world ; the philosopher, in 
 self-reliant arrogance, may be unduly agnostic, or 
 unduly gnostic, either sceptically reducing that which 
 may be known of God to zero, or presumptuously 
 affirming that there is nothing which may not be 
 known through and through, and that whatever can- 
 not be so known has no reality. All mystery, or 
 nothing mysterious : such are the two extremes. 
 
 Reason as such has no inherent inclination to 
 
 1 R. C. Moberly, Reason and Religion, p. 17. 
 
3 6o THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 assume so presumptuous an attitude. On the con- 
 trary, it is thoroughly reasonable to recognise limits 
 to the ken of reason. And in regard to that which 
 presents an aspect of mystery to human thought, 
 reason may be divided in its sympathies. By the 
 metaphysical side of the mystery it may be repelled, 
 by the moral side it may be attracted. Take the 
 idea of incarnation as an illustration. That idea is 
 not wholly repugnant to philosophic reason. On 
 the metaphysical side it may appear to involve an 
 impossibility the finite taking into itself the infinite. 
 But on the moral side it offers compensating attrac- 
 tions: God not dwelling apart in solitary majesty, 
 enjoying his own felicity indifferent to man's destiny, 
 but sharing in the sorrows of humanity, a hero in 
 the strife. In virtue of its innate affinity with 
 morality, reason can appreciate that conception. The 
 reason of the Aryan race especially takes kindly to 
 it. It loves to think of God as immanent rather 
 than as transcendent. Its tendency, as Professor 
 Tiele in his Gifford Lectures has pointed out, 1 is 
 theanthropic, as distinct from that of the Semitic 
 mind, which is theocratic ; whence it comes that 
 apotheosis and incarnation find frequent recognition 
 a*nd exemplification in Aryan religions. 
 
 In spite, however, of all that one may say in 
 defence of reason against plausible but ill-founded 
 charges, men will persist in ascribing to it, in refer- 
 
 1 Elements of the Science of Religion, part i. pp. 156, 166. 
 
MODERN DUALISM 361 
 
 cnce to things divine, an intractableness analogous 
 to that ascribed by ancient philosophers to matter. 
 Reason on this view is one of the chief obstructives 
 to the work of God as the Maker of the spiritual 
 world. Its anti-divine bias is as inveterate as that 
 of Satan. It cannot be converted ; it can only be 
 curbed and put in chains, so that its power for mis- 
 chief may be as restricted as possible. And what 
 are the chains by which it is to be bound ? Miracles 
 and fears of eternal loss have been tried, but the 
 fetters most in fashion for the present are those of 
 authority the authority of the past or of custom, 
 or the authority of the Church. There is a con- 
 spiracy on the part of many who underestimate 
 reason's power to find God, and reduce to a minimum 
 that which may be known of God independently of 
 ecclesiastical illumination, to reinstate the Church in 
 mediaeval dominion in matters of faith and practice. 
 In reference to this portentous reaction it has been 
 well remarked : ' It is devout agnosticism that to-day 
 is becoming the mother of a menacing institu- 
 tionalism that is exerting itself to instal over the re- 
 ligious mind extreme high-churchism. Let it be 
 understood that the movement originates and derives 
 all its vigour from the acknowledged incompetency 
 of the moral reason of man to fix the object of his 
 worship, and Protestants will see the alternative that 
 divides the field against them with Atheism.' 1 
 
 1 G. Gordon, Immortality and the New Theodicy (Boston, 1897), p. 69. 
 
362 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Now, with reference to the claims of authority 
 under all aspects, traditional, social, or ecclesiastical, 
 let it be at once frankly admitted that much that is 
 true, useful, and wholesome can be said by way of 
 asserting its legitimacy, necessity, and vast extent. 
 But care should be taken that it be not said to 
 the prejudice of reason. When we find reason and 
 authority pitted against each other, and the praise 
 of authority descanted on in a manner that sets 
 reason by contrast in an unfavourable light, our 
 suspicions are awakened, and we cannot help 
 feeling that an attempt is being made, doubtless 
 in all good faith, to give to authority in religion 
 a place and power to which it is not entitled, 
 and which, if conceded, would bear disastrous 
 fruit. A tendency in this direction may be dis- 
 covered in all statements to the effect that the 
 influence of reason in the production of belief 
 is trifling compared with the 'all-prevailing in- 
 fluence emanating from authority,' and that the 
 fact is no cause for regret, inasmuch as reason 
 'is a force most apt to divide and disintegrate; 
 and though division and disintegration may often 
 be the necessary preliminaries of social develop- 
 ment, still more necessary are the forces which 
 bind and stiffen, without which there would be no 
 society to develop/ l 
 
 Such language indicates heavy bias, and is very 
 
 1 A. J. Balfour, The Foundations of Belief , pp. 228, 229. 
 
MODERN DUALISM 363 
 
 provocative of criticism. Take, e.g., the representa- 
 tion of the influence of reason, compared with that 
 of authority, as insignificant. This is a very super- 
 ficial judgment, all the more misleading that it wears 
 an aspect of truth. It may with great plausibility 
 be maintained that the great mass of our beliefs and 
 actions rest on authority or custom. Yet, quite 
 compatibly with the admission of this contention, it 
 might be asserted that, after all, reason is the more 
 important and even the mightier factor. Reason 
 like the word or Logos of God, is 'quick and power- 
 ful/ as the tiny acorn out of which the great forest 
 oak grows. The analogy of seed or of buds helps 
 us to grasp the real significance of reason, as may 
 be seen from the following sentences taken from a 
 recent work by an American writer, entitled Evolu- 
 tion and Religion. 'Seeds have not much bulk, but 
 the potentialities of the world are in them. The 
 buds of a tree are but a small portion of its entire 
 mass, yet they alone are the significant parts. All 
 has been built up in due order by them. The 
 thoughts of men, as swayed by reason and recon- 
 structed under it, are the intellectually vital points 
 in the spiritual world. Here it is that human life 
 takes on new forms, new powers, new promise. 
 Reason leaves behind it a great deal of authority 
 as the succulent bud deposits woody fibre but no 
 authority goes before it. Evolution is always 
 directing our attention to the next significant 
 
364 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 change ; and that is sure to be, in the spiritual 
 world, the fresh product of thought.' x 
 
 The reference to evolution in the last sentence of 
 this extract reminds us of the part played in the 
 evolutionary process by the complementary forces 
 of variation and heredity. Both of these are alike 
 necessary to the process, and no scientist would 
 think of indulging in a one-sided partiality for either 
 of them as against the other. We do not find in 
 any scientific book such statements as this : ' Varia- 
 tion is no doubt necessary, but much more necessary 
 is heredity.' Why, then, should we find in works 
 on the foundations of religious beliefs such biassed 
 observations as this : ' Reason is doubtless needful, 
 but still more indispensable is authority'? Why 
 not put them on a level, viewing reason as the 
 analogue of variation, and authority as the analogue 
 of heredity ? Why set up between them an invidious 
 antagonism? Why not rather conceive them as 
 counterbalancing forces serving the same purpose 
 in the spiritual world as the centrifugal and centri- 
 petal forces in the planetary system ? 
 
 It may indeed be deemed a sufficient justifica- 
 tion of prejudice against reason that its tendency is 
 to divide and disintegrate. That fresh prophetic 
 thought does always act more or less in this manner 
 is not to be denied. But what if it has more of this 
 work to do than there is any need for, just because 
 
 1 John Bascom, Evolution and Religion^ pp. 100, 101. 
 
MODERN DUALISM 365 
 
 of the prevalence in undue measure of an unreason- 
 ing partiality for authority and custom ? ' Have 
 any of the rulers or of the Pharisees believed on 
 him?' No, and just on that account the rejected 
 one came, in spite of himself, to send not peace but 
 a sword. Do not throw all the blame on the pro- 
 phetic thinker. Perhaps he is not to blame at all, 
 but is simply the man who happens to see clearly 
 the truth the time needs, and to have the sincerity 
 and courage necessary for proclaiming it. In any 
 case, do not lay the whole burden of blame on his 
 shoulders ; let him share it with the man who sets 
 an overweening value on custom. It takes two to 
 make a quarrel : the man who wishes the world to 
 move on, and not less the man who wants the world 
 to stand still. 
 
 It is when we look at the question at issue in the 
 light of a great crisis like the birth of the Christian 
 religion, that we see what a serious thing it may be 
 to lean too heavily in our sympathies to the side of 
 authority. If those who do this now, in our nine- 
 teenth century, possibly in lauded attempts to sup- 
 port the Christian faith as an established system of 
 belief, had lived in the first, what would have been 
 their attitude? Would they have been with Jesus 
 or against Him? It might be invidious to offer a 
 direct answer to this question ; but something may 
 be learned from the behaviour of the friends of 
 authority among contemporary Jews. We may fail 
 
3 66 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 to see the moral, because Jesus is now for Christians 
 the ultimate authority in religion. But Jesus did 
 not, in His time, represent the principle of authority 
 in the sense under discussion. He represented 
 rather the principle of prophetic vision, of fresh re- 
 ligious intuition, of devout reason acting within the 
 spiritual sphere. He spake with moral authority, not 
 by authority of the legal, institutional, traditional 
 type. He appealed from the schools to the human 
 soul, and spake from the heart to the heart truth 
 carrying its own credentials, and needing, as little 
 as it enjoyed, backing from custom or Rabbinical 
 opinion. The common people heard him gladly. 
 Not so the supporters of authority. It is not their 
 way to espouse any cause when it has nothing but 
 reason, spiritual insight, and intrinsic truth on its 
 side. They wait till the new has become old and 
 customary, and the little flock a large influential 
 community. Their patronage at that stage may in 
 some ways be serviceable ; but one cannot forget 
 that, but for the existence of some who were open 
 to other influences than those of authority, there 
 never would have been any Christianity to patronise. 
 And what were these other influences? Does 
 reason comprehend them all? Yes, if you take 
 reason in a sufficiently, yet not unjustifiably, large 
 sense. In the antithesis between reason and autho- 
 rity we are entitled to include under reason all that 
 is usually found opposed to authority in critical 
 
MODERN DUALISM 367 
 
 periods, new eras, creative times, and gives to the 
 prophet his opportunity of gaining disciples healthy 
 moral instincts, affinity for fundamental spiritual 
 truth, openness to the inspirations of God. The 
 antithesis, in short, is essentially identical with that 
 taken by our Lord, in reference to Peter's faith, at 
 Caesarea Philippi, between * flesh and blood ' and the 
 revelation of the Father in Heaven. It is therefore 
 a hopelessly inadequate view of reason which reduces 
 it to a faculty of reasoning having arguments as its 
 sole instruments for producing conviction. 1 It is 
 before all things a faculty of seeing with the spiritual 
 eye of an enlightened understanding, 2 and of receiv- 
 ing truth seen with a pure heart. The Bible is the 
 literary product and inestimable monument of this 
 rare, precious gift. It is a divine protest against 
 the domination of custom and authority in religion. 
 Prophets and apostles were all in a state of revolt, 
 in the interest of personal inspiration, against the 
 brute force of a traditional belief at whose hands 
 they all more or less suffered. Defences of Biblical 
 religion by idolaters of authority are simply tombs 
 built in honour of men whom kindred spirits in their 
 lifetime persecuted and killed. If any one should 
 be startled at the close affinity between human 
 reason and divine inspiration implied in these state- 
 ments, it may be well to remind him that the 
 
 1 Mr. Balfout seems to take reason in this narrow sense. Vide The 
 Foundations of Belief , p. 212. 2 Ephesians i. 18. 
 
368 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 common antithesis between reason and faith is un- 
 known to Scripture. 1 
 
 We pass now to the third charge against reason, 
 that, viz., of being a rebel against God's will con- 
 ceived as having for its aim the moral and social 
 progress of mankind. It was reserved for the author 
 of Social Evolution to bring this charge in the 
 most explicit and uncompromising terms. Mr. Kidd 
 leaves us in no doubt as to his meaning, though it 
 is difficult on a first reading of his book, or even a 
 second, to make up one's mind that his statements 
 are to be taken in earnest His position, in short, 
 is that reason cares only for the present interest of 
 the individual, not at all for the interest of society 
 or of the remote future. The teaching of reason 
 to the individual must always, he thinks, be 'that 
 the present time and his own interests therein are 
 all-important to him/ 2 In startlingly strong lan- 
 guage he describes reason as 'the most profoundly 
 individualistic, anti-social, and anti-evolutionary of 
 all human qualities.' 8 Thus it results that man, 
 in so far as he is merely rational, is a selfish 
 animal, who uses his reason as an instrument en- 
 abling him more cleverly than other animals to 
 gratify his desires. Fortunately for the interests 
 of society and of human progress, man is not merely 
 rational ; he is also religious. Religion supplies the 
 
 1 Vide Moberly, Reason and Religion, p. 85. 
 
 1 Social Evolution, p. 78. * Ibid., p. 293. 
 
MODERN DUALISM 369 
 
 antidote to the egoistic tendency of reason ; it works 
 for the good of society, making the religious man 
 willing to sacrifice his own interest for the benefit of 
 the community, in spite of reason's constant counsel 
 to care solely for himself. It follows from this, of 
 course, that religion and reason have nothing in 
 common. They are necessarily antagonistic in 
 nature as in tendency. Reason is irreligious, and 
 religion is irrational. This also is plainly declared. 
 ' A rational religion/ we are informed, ' is a scientific 
 impossibility, representing from the nature of the 
 case an inherent contradiction of terms.' l Religion 
 has neither its source nor its sanction in reason ; 
 its doctrines are supernatural, and its sanctions ultra- 
 rational. And these two powers are constantly at 
 war with each other. The social organism is the 
 scene of an incessant conflict between a disintegrat- 
 ing principle ' represented by the rational self-asser- 
 tiveness of the individual units/ and an integrating 
 principle ' represented by a religious belief providing 
 a sanction for social conduct which is always of 
 necessity ultra-rational, and the function of which 
 is to secure in the stress of evolution the continual 
 subordination of the interest of the individual units 
 to the larger interests of the longer-lived social 
 organism to which they belong.' 2 
 
 What a revolting, incredible account of human 
 nature and of human society ! Mr. Kidd's view is not 
 
 1 Vide Social Evolution, p. 101. 2 Ibid., p. 102. 
 
 2 A 
 
370 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 caricatured when it is graphically depicted in these 
 terms : ' Reason a sort of more-thah-animal clever- 
 ness, of purely selfish animal cunning; social morality, 
 the demand upon individuals to sacrifice themselves 
 and their reason for the sake of the community; 
 and religion as a sort of non-rational bogey-police- 
 man coming in to enforce the non- rational demand 
 of society.' 1 One would be justified in stubbornly 
 refusing to surrender to such a libellous misrepre- 
 sentation, even though he found himself unable to 
 refute in detail the subtle and plausible argumenta- 
 tion based on false assumptions ; saying as he laid 
 down the book, 'Very able, unanswerable at least 
 by me for the moment, yet utterly unconvincing.' 
 
 This modern scheme of social evolution involves a 
 veritable dualism a double dualism indeed. There 
 is first a psychological dualism, a constant deadly 
 warfare in man between his reason and his religious 
 instincts. This is a dualism unknown to Greek 
 philosophers and Christian apostles, who knew of a 
 conflict between flesh and spirit, but never dreamed 
 of reason and religion being deadly foes. Plato 
 and Paul would have said : the more rational the 
 more religious, and the more religious the more 
 rational. Then there is a latent theological dualism, 
 an antagonism between the gods who are the objects 
 of worship in the various religions and the reason 
 of their worshippers. For the gods, at least the 
 
 1 Moberly, Reason and Religion, p. 4. 
 
MODERN DUALISM 371 
 
 gods of religions which happen to have a whole- 
 some, humane, ethical ideal, desire the moral and 
 social progress of mankind, and use religion to 
 promote that end. And reason constantly and 
 strenuously resists the divine goodwill resists with 
 such persistency and passion that religion must 
 be provided with the awful sanctions of eternal 
 penalties to give it a chance of keeping reason in 
 a due state of subordination. 
 
 As is usually the case with theories of the un- 
 answerable yet unconvincing type, the weakness of 
 Mr. Kidd's position lies in his initial assumptions, 
 which are that reason is inherently selfish, and re- 
 ligion inherently non- rational. Neither of these 
 assertions is true. Reason is not inherently selfish. 
 Reason may indeed be used for selfish purposes by 
 men in whose nature animal passion predominates. 
 But that is not the proper function of reason free 
 to work according to its own nature ; it is the abuse 
 of its powers when in a state of degradation and 
 bondage. Man, in so far as he is rational, is also 
 social. Sociality is not a thing imposed on man 
 from without and reluctantly submitted to by his 
 reason. It is an essential element of human nature, 
 without which a man would not be a man, and 
 reason readily acknowledges its claims. It is rational 
 to care for others, and for this generation to care 
 for future generations, as parents care that it may 
 be well with their children after their decease. We 
 
372 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 do not need to be religious, still less to be under 
 the influence of ultra-rational religious sanctions, 
 to perceive the reasonableness of altruism or the 
 nobleness of self-sacrifice. Heroism, self-devotion, 
 is latent in every man. It has been truly said that 
 'the service of society is not, as Mr. Kidd assumes, 
 the sacrifice of the individual : it is his gratification 
 and realisation. Though labour leaders and social- 
 istic agitators usually appeal to selfishness, yet it 
 is not the selfishness of the working men, it is their 
 nobleness, their fidelity to what they believe to be 
 a principle, their loyalty to their order or union, or 
 class, which responds to these appeals, and gives 
 to strikes and labour movements whatever strength 
 they have. It is not individualism, but a new 
 manifestation of the social spirit that is blindly 
 struggling for expression in the labour movements 
 of our day.' 1 
 
 If reason as such is not selfish, as little is religion 
 as such irrational. Only by taking Mediaeval Chris- 
 tianity as the type can the contrary position be 
 maintained with a show of plausibility. To form a 
 sound judgment of the true relation of Christianity 
 to reason, we must study it as it appears in the 
 Gospels in the teaching of Jesus. Do we not all 
 feel the ' sweet reasonableness' of that teaching 
 
 1 W. De Witt Hyde, Outlines of Social Theology, .p. 47. On the 
 social nature of reason, vide Lectures and Essays on Natural Theology 
 and Ethics, by the late Professor Wallace, edited by the Master of 
 Balliol College, Oxford (1899), p. no. 
 
MODERN DUALISM 373 
 
 in its doctrine of God and of man, and in its ethical 
 ideal ? Does it need ultra-rational sanctions in the 
 shape of miracles or eternal fears to commend to 
 our reason the Father in heaven, our filial relation 
 to that Father, and our fraternal obligations arising 
 out of our common privilege as the sons of God? 
 Is it not when our reason is eclipsed, and the baser 
 part of our nature is in the ascendant, that the self- 
 evidencing, self-commending power of these truths 
 becomes obscured and the need for appeals to our 
 superstitious fears arises ? 
 
 Mr. Kidd's conception of religion is doubtless in 
 harmony with a widely prevalent religious mood, 
 manifesting itself in the portentous combination of 
 agnosticism with traditionalism previously spoken 
 of. This consideration only makes it more in- 
 cumbent on every man to be fully persuaded in 
 his own mind, and to speak out his mind with all 
 possible plainness. My own view is this : Mediaeval- 
 ism, Sacerdotalism, is opposed to reason, but not 
 true religion, not genuine Christianity. Mediaeval- 
 ism is a caricature of Christianity, as much so as 
 Rabbinism was a caricature of the religion of the 
 prophets. The power of Christianity lies not in 
 the fear of hell, or even in the hope of heaven, but 
 in the intrinsic credibility of the truths it teaches ; 
 in the words of wisdom and of grace spoken by 
 Jesus, which, with Paul, we feel to be credible 
 sayings and worthy of all acceptation. I trust what 
 
374 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 is before us in the future is not a return to the 
 Middle Ages, but a better acquaintance with, and 
 a growing appreciation of, the Galilaean gospel. 
 Therein lies, I believe, the true ground of hope for 
 social progress. 
 
 It is certainly hard to see how such a hope can 
 be based on an external power brought to bear on 
 man's nature forcing it into a line of action with 
 which it has no affinity. This conception of com- 
 pulsory goodness has nothing in common with the 
 Biblical view of man's relation to divine influence. 
 The Bible presents a sombre picture of man's natural 
 condition as vitiated by a depraving process from 
 which human reason has not been exempted. But 
 nowhere do we meet with the idea that, purely by 
 the constraining force of religion appealing to their 
 fears, men can be compelled to seek the good of 
 their fellows contrary to their own permanent in- 
 clination. Scriptural theology saves itself from this 
 crudity by its doctrine of regeneration, or of a moral 
 renewal bringing with it a new heart delighting to 
 do God's will and a clarified reason in sympathy 
 with the true and the good. Modern philosophers 
 may have their own ideas as to the possibility of 
 such a change ; but it will not be denied that if 
 the alleged renewal be possible it provides within 
 man something to which religion, duty, social obliga- 
 tion can appeal and on which they can work, some- 
 thing akin to the moral law and the divine purpose 
 
MODERN DUALISM 375 
 
 a mind approving the right, a heart loving to do 
 it. The doctrine indeed implies that there is some- 
 thing of the kind even in irregenerate man, a germ 
 of the divine, and of the humane, of what is now 
 called altruism, dormant in the soul and capable of 
 being quickened into active, vigorous life. And the 
 very existence of the doctrine implies that, in the 
 view of those who taught it, nothing can be made 
 of man until his own rational and moral nature has 
 been brought into a state of sympathy with the 
 good, that he cannot be compelled into doing the 
 right by threats or the most awful penal sanctions. 
 This, indeed, as is well known, is the plain teaching 
 of Scripture in both Testaments. It finds expression 
 in Jeremiah's oracle of the New Covenant, with its 
 great thought of the law written on the heart as 
 distinct from the law written on stone tablets, and 
 remaining a dead letter because written there alone. 
 St. Paul caught up the prophetic idea and gave it 
 a further development, teaching that the law with- 
 out is worse than a dead letter, even an irritant 
 to transgression, provoking into rebellious reaction, 
 rather than restraining, the evil principle within. 
 
 Paradoxical as it may seem, the apostle's doctrine 
 is no whimsical exaggeration but the statement of 
 a fact. And if we put religion in the place of law 
 the formula still holds. Religion with its penal sanc- 
 tions, without, powerless to make men unselfish ; 
 rather, provocative of more violent manifestations of 
 
376 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 selfishness. Religion indeed, so conceived, is simply 
 a law, as distinct from an inward spirit of life. 
 Religion as it ought to be, as defined in the Bible, 
 means : loving God with all the heart, and all the 
 soul, and all the mind', in a word, with all that is 
 within us. Religion, as the supposed driving-power 
 of social evolution, is an outward commandment to 
 be altruistic addressed to a stubbornly non-altruistic 
 subject, with the whip of an ' ultra-rational sanction ' 
 held over his head to subdue his recalcitrant heart, 
 soul, and mind into sullen submission. It is an 
 affront to our common sense to ask us to see in 
 such a slave-driving invention the sole and all- 
 sufficient guarantee for social well-being. Its utmost 
 achievement would be to induce moribund world- 
 lings to bequeath part of their wealth for pious 
 uses, in hope thereby to save their souls from per- 
 dition. It never could bind into a coherent social 
 brotherhood a race of men devoid of a social nature. 
 As Dr. Bascom puts it : ' An altruism induced, as an 
 irrational habit, on a spiritual nature alien to it, 
 could never become the ground of permanent order. 
 The inner conflict uncorrected would fret against 
 the restraints put upon it, and might at any moment 
 break out afresh. The spiritual development, when 
 it comes, must be supremely natural.' 1 
 
 Perhaps, if the issue were thus clearly put before 
 him, the author of Social Evolution would not care 
 
 1 Evolution and Religion , pp. 1 1 6, 117. 
 
MODERN DUALISM 377 
 
 to meet the position so clearly stated with a direct 
 negative. For it has to be borne in mind, in justice 
 to Mr. Kidd, that he does not credit every religion 
 with the power, through its sanctions, to compel men 
 into involuntary altruism, but only such a religion as 
 Christianity, which happens to have a humane spirit 
 and an eminently social ethical ideal. This is in- 
 dicated in the following sentences : ' The Christian 
 religion possessed from the outset two characteristics 
 destined to render it an evolutionary force of the first 
 magnitude. The first was the extraordinary strength 
 of the ultra-rational sanction it provided. . . . The 
 second was the nature of the ethical system associated 
 with it.' * It is indeed an evil omen that he places the 
 ultra-rational sanction first, as if his chief reliance 
 were on its compulsory power. But one may hope 
 that he would not deny to the second characteristic 
 of Christianity, its humane ethical ideal, power to 
 work on men after its own manner, that is, not as 
 a mere outward commandment saying : this is the 
 road along which you must go ; but as an ideal, by 
 its 'sweet reasonableness' commending itself to the 
 human soul. Who can doubt that it has such power 
 when he reflects whence that ideal came ? It had its 
 source in the mind or reason of Jesus. Altruism 
 was not imposed on Him at least by ultra-rational 
 sanctions. He was a friend of man by nature. His 
 reason was not anti-social and individualist, but 
 
 1 Social Evolution, p. 130. 
 
378 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 emphatically the reverse. Are we to hold that in 
 this respect He was utterly isolated, the only man 
 in the world who in any measure cared for others ? 
 How much more credible that in His spiritual nature 
 was revealed the normal constitution of human 
 nature generally ; that He was what all men ought 
 to be, what all men in some degree are, what every 
 man is in proportion as he is rational ! If this be 
 true, then the ethical ideal of Christianity can, by 
 its intrinsic reasonableness, work independently of 
 all supposed ultra-rational sanctions. And it is the 
 first motive-power, not the second. The ideal takes 
 precedence of the sanction, and can even dispense 
 with its aid. Without the self-commending ethic, 
 the sanction, however tremendous, is impotent; 
 where the power of the ethic is felt the sanction is 
 unnecessary. ' The law is not made for a righteous 
 man/ 
 
 Our main reliance, then, for social progress must 
 be on ' the law written on the heart/ the law of love 
 accepted by reason and enforced by conscience. 
 Religion can reinforce the power of the moral ideal, 
 but it does this, not chiefly by offers of future 
 rewards and threats of future punishments, but 
 by setting before men, as the object of faith and 
 worship, a God whose inmost nature is love. And 
 because God is love, and because man is truest to 
 his own rational and moral nature when he cares not 
 only for his own things, but for the things of others, 
 
MODERN DUALISM 379 
 
 the form of modern dualism which turns human 
 reason into the enemy of God and of the social well- 
 being ordained under His benignant Providence, may 
 be treated as a bugbear having no terrors for those 
 who walk in the daylight of truth. The unwelcome 
 conception may be dismissed from the mind as the 
 theoretic exaggeration of a powerful intellect re- 
 joicing in its logical acumen, and accepting fearlessly 
 the most startling results of bold ratiocination, with- 
 out having sufficiently considered the premises from 
 which the ultimate conclusions are drawn. As a 
 theorist Mr. Kidd is chargeable with great incon- 
 sistency. He has made it his chief business to 
 exhibit human reason to all who desire social well- 
 being as an object of deadly distrust, and in 
 performing this ungenial task he has put unlimited 
 confidence in his own individual reason and its 
 powers of argumentation. It would have been well 
 if he had had a little less faith in his own logic, and 
 a little more faith in the social instincts of average 
 humanity. 
 
LECTURE XII 
 
 RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 
 
 WE have come to the end of our pilgrimage through 
 the ages in quest of wise, weighty, light-giving words 
 concerning the moral order of the world and the 
 Providence of God. It remains now to cast a fare- 
 well glance backward and a wistful anticipatory 
 glance forwards, that we may sum up our gains 
 and fortify our hopes. 
 
 Looking back, then, on the thought of the 
 ancients, we see that the sages of various lands, in 
 far-past ages, unite in the emphatic assertion of a 
 Moral Order as the thing of supreme moment for 
 the faith and life of man. This message, handed on 
 from antiquity, the wisest of our own time earnestly 
 re-affirm, saying to their contemporaries in effect: 
 ' Believe this and thou shalt live/ The consensus 
 gentium firmly supports this cardinal article in the 
 religious creed of mankind. 
 
 The consensus in favour of a moral order is the 
 more remarkable that it is associated with the 
 most discrepant theological positions, having for 
 
 880 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 381 
 
 their respective watchwords : no god (in the true 
 sense of the word) as in Buddhism, two gods as in 
 Zoroastrianism, many gods as in the religion of the 
 Greeks, one God as in the religion of the Hebrews. 
 In view of this theological diversity, the common 
 faith in an eternal august moral order may be 
 regarded as the fundamental certainty, the vital 
 element in the religion of humanity. 
 
 The root of this basal faith is an intense moral 
 consciousness. Men believe in a moral order in 
 the cosmos, because they have found a commanding 
 moral order in their own souls. The prophets of 
 the moral order on the great scale Buddha, 
 Zoroaster, ^Eschylus, Zeno, Isaiah, Jesus have all 
 been conspicuous by the purity and intensity of 
 their own moral nature. In the clear authoritative 
 voice of conscience they have heard the voice of 
 God, or of what stands for God. It is ever so. 
 For no man has a moral order in the universe 
 been a dread, awe-inspiring reality for whom the 
 sense of duty has not been the dominant feeling 
 within his own bosom. Only the pure in heart 
 see God whether He be called Karma, Ahura, 
 Jove, Jehovah, the Father-in-heaven, or by any 
 other name, or remain nameless. For all others 
 the faith in a moral purpose pervading the world 
 is but a hearsay, and all the elaborate theologies 
 built on that faith which they profess to believe 
 are of little account. 
 
382 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Yet the theological position, though secondary, 
 is not indifferent. Because we see men of all con- 
 ceivable attitudes towards the question of God's 
 being concurring in a primary belief we are not 
 to argue : * It does not matter what we believe 
 concerning the Gods, whether that there are none, 
 or that they are two or many or one, so long as 
 we believe that it goes well with the righteous 
 and ill with the wicked, and join ourselves heart 
 and soul to the company of the righteous.' It 
 does matter. It is well to believe that there is a 
 reward for the righteous, but it is also well to 
 believe that there is a God who confers the reward. 
 We need a theory of the universe congruous to 
 our ethical faith. It would have been better for 
 Buddha, and for the vast portion of the human 
 race who confess his name, if he had found in the 
 universe a Being who realised his own moral ideal. 
 One who, like Euripides, admires self-sacrifice in 
 noble-minded men and women needs faith in a 
 God who shares his admiration and who is the 
 fountain of all self-sacrificing love. Moral sentiment 
 and theological theory act and react on each other. 
 Our moral nature creates faith in God, and faith in 
 God invigorates our moral nature. Therefore it is 
 by no means a matter of indifference whether we 
 affirm or deny the being of a God, or what kind 
 of a God we believe in. 'No faith' means the 
 individual heroically asserting his moral personality 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 383 
 
 over against an unsympathetic universe. 'Unworthy 
 faith' means a man divided against himself, his moral 
 nature asserting one thing, his religious nature hold- 
 ing on to another, with fatal weakness in character 
 and conduct for result. 
 
 We have seen that the common faith in a moral 
 order has been associated, not only with diverse 
 theological positions, but with conflicting judgments 
 about human life. In India life appeared an un- 
 mixed evil, in Persia a mixture of good and evil, in 
 Israel the prevailing tendency of religious thinkers 
 was to a more or less decided optimism, which found 
 much good in life and viewed the evil as capable of 
 being transmuted into good. In each case the mood 
 corresponded to the estimate. The pessimistic 
 Buddhist was despairing, the dualistic Zoroastrian 
 defiant, and the optimistic Israelite cheerfully trust- 
 ful. The mood of the Greek also was buoyant and 
 joyous, but his gaiety was eclipsed by the gloomy 
 shadow of fate or destiny which turned trust in a 
 wise, benignant Providence into a grim submission 
 to the inevitable. It is helpful to have it thus 
 conclusively shown that the faith in a moral order 
 and the earnest moral temper congenial to it can 
 maintain themselves alongside of all conceivable 
 moods ; that a Buddhist with his pessimism, and a 
 Stoic with his apathy, can be as loyal to duty and 
 as fully alive to the truth that the ethical interest 
 is supreme, as the Zoroastrian with his severe sense 
 
384 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 of the radical distinction between good and evil, or 
 the Hebrew with his unwavering faith in the un- 
 challengeable sovereignty of a just God. Only we 
 must beware here also of imagining that the mood 
 does not matter so long as the ethical spirit remains. 
 The mood affects the quality of the morality. The 
 Buddhist at his best is as earnest as any one can 
 desire. He is devoted to his moral ideal with a 
 fervour which few adherents of other faiths can 
 excel or even equal. But his ideal takes its shape 
 from his pessimism, and under its influence becomes 
 such as finds its proper home in a monastery. The 
 ethical fervour of the Stoic likewise was above re- 
 proach, but his ideal also suffered under the influence 
 of his characteristic mood. If the Buddhist errs on 
 the side of passivity and gentleness, the Stoic erred 
 on the side of inhuman sternness. Strong in the 
 pride of his self-sufficiency, he had no sympathy 
 with the weak who could not rise to the height of 
 his doctrine that pain is no evil. 
 
 These remarks lead up to the observation that in 
 all the types of ancient religious thought which have 
 come under our consideration (leaving Christianity 
 for the present out of account) strength and weak- 
 ness are curiously combined. It may be worth 
 while to note the strong points and the weak 
 points, respectively, in each case. 
 
 The strength of Buddhism lies in its gentle virtues 
 and in its firm faith in the imperious demands of 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 385 
 
 Karma for a retributive moral order under which 
 moral actions shall receive their appropriate awards. 
 Its weaknesses are numerous. There is, first of all, 
 the lack of a religious ideal answering to its ethical 
 ideal, what we may call its atheism. Then there is 
 the extravagant form in which it applies the principle 
 of retribution, viewing each good and evil act by 
 itself and assigning to it its appropriate reward or 
 penalty, instead of regarding the conduct or character 
 of a moral agent as a whole. To these glaring 
 defects must be added the pessimistic estimate of 
 life characteristic of the system, the conception of 
 the summum bonum as consisting in Nirvana or 
 the extinction of desire, and the consequent con- 
 viction that the only way in which a wise man can 
 worthily spend his days on earth is by the practice 
 of asceticism within the walls of a monastery. 
 
 The strength of Zoroastrianism lay in its manly, 
 militant, moral ideal, and in its devout belief in a 
 Divine Good Spirit for whom moral distinctions are 
 real and vital, and who is the Captain, the inspiring, 
 strengthening Leader, of all who fight for good 
 against evil, as soldiers in the great army of right- 
 eousness. Its weakness lay in its dualism, its faith in 
 an antigod, and in its hard, abstract, unsympathetic 
 antithesis between good and evil men. The second 
 of these two defects was probably the true source of 
 the first : the harsh Puritanic ethics the fountain of 
 the crude theology. Had the Persian prophet been 
 
 2B 
 
386 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 able to look on those whom he regarded as the 
 children of Ahriman, even on the neighbouring 
 Turanian nomads, as his brethren, to have thought 
 of them as men and not mere devils, as weak and 
 not absolutely wicked, as having in them, with all 
 their pravity, some rudimentary possibilities of 
 human goodness, and of himself and others like- 
 minded, on the other hand, as far enough from 
 spotless moral purity, it would have been possible 
 for him to conceive of Ahura as the common 
 Father of all men, and to dispense with an antigod 
 in his theory of the universe. 
 
 The Greeks were not a whit behind the Asiatics 
 in respect of faith in the reality of a moral order 
 in the life of nations and of individual men. The 
 assertion of this order was a leading didactic aim 
 for the three great dramatists. Taken together, 
 they taught a very full doctrine on the subject. 
 ^Eschylus laid the foundation in a grand broad 
 proclamation of the principle of nemesis, taking no 
 note of exceptions, either because he was unaware 
 of them, or because he was not in the mood to 
 recognise them. Sophocles followed, saying : ' The 
 foundation laid by my predecessor is unassailable, 
 but there are exceptions, numerous, perplexing, 
 mysterious, inexplicable.' Euripides came last, not 
 gainsaying the law enunciated by ^Eschylus, still 
 less disputing the fact of exceptions insisted on 
 by Sophocles, but throwing light on the darkest 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 387 
 
 cases in the list of exceptions those presented in 
 the sufferings of the eminently good by exhibiting 
 them as instances of self-sacrifice for the benefit of 
 others. Yet each of the three was one-sided as a 
 teacher of the common doctrine. ^Eschylus was, 
 consciously or unconsciously, inobservant of in- 
 stances in which the great law of Nemesis failed ; 
 Sophocles was too conscious of the exceptions ; 
 Euripides found in his heroes and heroines of self- 
 sacrifice the one source of light and consolation 
 in an otherwise dark, unintelligible world. And 
 common to all three was this defect, that behind 
 the moral order they saw the dark shadow of 
 necessity (ananke)> a blind force exercising a morally 
 indifferent sway over gods and men alike. This 
 was the tribute paid by the Tragic Drama of 
 Greece to the principle of dualism embodied in 
 the Persian doctrine of the Twin Spirits, and 
 which in one form or another has so often made 
 its appearance in the history of religious thought. 
 
 The Stoics were strong in their conception of 
 man's sovereign place in the universe, and in their 
 firm, cheerful faith in the rationality of the cosmos. 
 They saw and said that in the world, after God, 
 there is nothing so important as man, and in man 
 nothing so important as reason ; that, therefore, 
 the true theology is that which offers to faith a 
 rational divinity, and the true life that which 
 consists in following the dictates of reason as 
 
388 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 active in the individual and immanent in the 
 universe. But their errors were serious. They 
 starved and blighted human nature by finding no 
 place or function for passion, and worshipping as 
 their ethical ideal apathetic wisdom. They shut 
 their eyes to patent facts of experience by pre- 
 tending to regard outward events as insignificant 
 and pain as no evil. They silenced the voice of 
 humanity in their hearts by indulging in merciless 
 contempt for the weak arid the foolish ; that is to 
 say, for the great mass of mankind who have not 
 mastered the art of treating pain as a trifle, and 
 gained complete victory over passionate impulse. 
 
 Passing from the Stoic philosophers to the Hebrew 
 prophets, we find in them more to admire and less 
 to censure. They do not, by extravagances like 
 those of the Stoics, lay themselves open to ridicule. 
 Their sound Hebrew sense keeps them from think- 
 ing that any part of human nature is there to be 
 extirpated, or that any part of human experience 
 can be valueless or meaningless. Passion has its 
 place in their anthropology as well as reason, and 
 prosperity in their view is worth having and 
 adversity a thing by all legitimate means to be 
 shunned. These are among their negative virtues. 
 To their positive merits belong their inextinguish- 
 able passion for righteousness ; their faith in a God 
 who loves right and hates ill, and in one God over 
 all, or, putting the two together, their great doctrine 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 389 
 
 of ethical monotheism \ and, finally, their firm belief 
 that the present world is, if not the sole, at least 
 a very real theatre wherein the moral government of 
 God is exercised. But even they had the defects 
 of their qualities. While doing full justice to the 
 prophetic doctrine of the moral order as against 
 the diviner's doctrine of a merely physical order of 
 interpretable signs premonitory of the future, we 
 were constrained to acknowledge three defects in 
 their teaching. These were: (i) a tendency to 
 assert in an extreme form the connection between 
 the physical order and the moral order, between 
 particular events in national or individual history, 
 and particular actions of which they are supposed 
 to be the reward and punishment ; (2) a tendency 
 to lay undue emphasis on the vindictive action of 
 divine providence ; and (3) the tendency to attach 
 too much value to outward good and ill as the 
 divinely appointed rewards and penalties of conduct. 
 In the first of these defects, the prophetic doctrine 
 bears a certain resemblance to the atomistic way 
 of applying the principle of Karma characteristic 
 of Buddhism, according to which each separate act 
 finds in some future time its own appropriate 
 recompense. It is, however, unnecessary to remark 
 that of the extravagance wherewith Buddhism doles 
 out the awards due to separate deeds there is no 
 trace in prophetic literature. In the third of the 
 defects above specified the Hebrew prophet presents, 
 
390 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 not a resemblance, but a contrast to the Greek 
 Stoic. While the Stoic reckoned outward good 
 and ill matters of indifference, the prophet, on the 
 other 'hand, all but found in these things the chief 
 good and the chief ill. At this point the Stoic 
 position represents an advance in ethical thought ; 
 but both positions are one-sided : the truth lies 
 between them. 
 
 One does not need to be a clergyman or a 
 professed apologist, but only a candid student of 
 comparative religion, to satisfy himself that the 
 teaching of Christ combines the merits and avoids 
 the defects specified in the foregoing review. On 
 all subjects that teaching shuns absolute antitheses, 
 onesidedness, the falsehood of extremes. In its 
 moral ideal it unites the gentleness of Buddhism 
 with the militant virtue of Zoroastrianism. Its 
 doctrine of God satisfies all rational requirements. 
 In contrast to Buddhism it teaches that there is 
 a God, to Zoroastrianism that there is one God 
 over all, Lord of heaven and earth ; for the 
 Jehovah of Hebrew prophecy, whose chief attribute 
 is retributive justice, it substitutes a Divine Father 
 in whose character the most conspicuous quality 
 is benignity, mercy, gracious love. Its doctrine of 
 man equally commends itself to the instructed 
 reason and conscience as all that can be desired. 
 With Stoicism it affirms the supreme, incomparable 
 worth of man, but, unlike Stoicism, it does not 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 391 
 
 nullify the significance of its affirmation by creating 
 a great impassable gulf between wise men and fools, 
 saints and sinners. Its assertion of the moral order 
 reaches the highest degree of emphasis. In common 
 with the sages of India, Persia, Greece, and Israel, 
 Jesus found in the world clear traces of a Power 
 making for righteousness and against unrighteous- 
 ness ; and, far from exempting His own people from 
 the scope of its action, He saw in her approaching 
 doom the most terrific exemplification of its destruc- 
 tive energy. But He interpreted the laws of the 
 moral order with unique discrimination. He did 
 not, like Buddha, and to a certain extent the 
 Hebrew prophets also, assert the existence of a 
 retributive bond between individual moral acts and 
 particular experiences, but broadly recognised that 
 there is a large sphere of human life in which good 
 comes to men irrespective of character, and wherein 
 not Divine Justice but Divine Benignity is revealed. 
 With the Stoics He recognised the inner life of the 
 soul as the region within which the rewards and 
 punishments of conduct are chiefly to be sought ; 
 but He did not, like them, regard outward events 
 as wholly without moral significance. With the 
 Greek poet Euripides, and the author of the fifty- 
 third chapter of Isaiah, He perceived that the doom 
 of the best in this world is to suffer as the worst, but 
 more clearly than either He saw that such sufferers 
 need no pity, that to describe them as men of sorrow 
 
392 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 is to utter only a half-truth, that an exultant, irre- 
 pressibly glad temper is the concomitant and 
 appointed guerdon of all heroic conduct. 
 
 Christ's doctrine of Providence possessed the same 
 circumspect, balanced character. He taught that 
 God's providence is over all His creatures plants, 
 animals, human beings ; over all men, good or evil, 
 wise or foolish, great or small. ' God cares for great 
 things, neglects small/ said the Stoic. ' A sparrow 
 shall not fall on the ground without your Father; 
 the very hairs of your head are all numbered,' said 
 Jesus. Yet this minutely particular Divine Care 
 is not conceived of as working spasmodically and 
 miraculously, but quietly, noiselessly, incessantly, 
 through the course of nature. God adds a cubit 
 and more to the stature of men, but not per saltum, 
 rather through the slow unobserved process of 
 growth from childhood to maturity. Growth is the 
 law everywhere, even in the moral world, there 
 trying to an uninstructed faith which expects con- 
 summation of desire in a day. The clear recogni- 
 tion of this law by Jesus shows that, if His habitual 
 mood was optimistic, His optimism was not blind 
 or shallow. He saw that the highest good in all 
 spheres was to be attained only gradually, and He 
 was content that it should be so. One other 
 element in His doctrine of Providence remains to 
 be specified. Providence, as He conceived it, is not 
 only universal, and at the same time minutely 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 393 
 
 particular, but likewise mindful of all human 
 interests. It cares for the body as well as for the 
 soul, for time as well as for eternity, for social as 
 well as for spiritual well-being. Yet an order of 
 importance is duly recognised. To the Kingdom 
 of God is assigned the first place, to food and 
 raiment and all they represent only the second. 
 By this balanced view of .providential action the 
 teaching of Jesus steers a middle course between 
 the opposite extremes of asceticism and secu- 
 larism, between the morbid mood for which the 
 temporal is nothing, and the worldly mind for 
 which it is everything. 
 
 From all this it would seem to follow that the 
 path of progress for the future must lie along the 
 line of Christ's teaching ; that the least thing men 
 who seek the good of our race can do is to serve 
 themselves heir to the thoughts of Jesus concerning 
 God, man, the world, and their relations, and work 
 these out under modern conditions. Reversion to 
 the things behind is surely a mistake. No good can 
 come of a return, with Schopenhauer, to the pessi- 
 mistic despair of Buddhism, or, with other modern 
 thinkers, to the dualism of Zoroaster, or, under the 
 sturdy leadership of a Huxley, to the grim, defiant 
 mood of Stoicism. Such movements are to be re- 
 garded as excusable but temporary reactions, and 
 the Christian attitude is to be viewed as that which 
 must gain more and more the upper hand. For 
 
394 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 men thus minded the summary of faith and practice 
 will be : ' One supreme Will at the heart of the 
 universe, good and ever working for good ; man's 
 chief end to serve this supreme will in filial freedom, 
 and in loyal devotion to righteousness ; life on 
 earth on these terms worth living, full of joy if not 
 without tribulation, to be spent in cheerfulness and 
 without ascetic austerities ; life beyond the tomb 
 an object of rational hope, if not of undoubting 
 certainty.' 
 
 It would, however, be too sanguine a forecast 
 which would anticipate for this short Christian creed 
 a speedy universal acceptance even within the 
 bounds of Christendom. It is natural that we who 
 stand on the margin between two centuries should 
 wistfully inquire, What is before us? what is our 
 prospect for the future? By way of answer to this 
 question three competing programmes present 
 themselves. One has for its watchword: * No 
 religion with a definite theological belief, however 
 brief; at most, a purely ethical religion/ A second 
 offers us a perennial ultra-rational religion, with 
 awful sanctions steadily promoting social well-being. 
 A third claims that for all the higher interests of 
 life the best thing that could happen would be the 
 revival of the simple Christianity of Christ and the 
 working out of His great thoughts. 
 
 The first of these programmes indicates fairly 
 well the position of those who have devoted their 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 395 
 
 efforts to the promotion of what is known as the 
 ethical movement. This movement, which originated 
 in America and is spreading in Europe, is one of 
 the significant spiritual phenomena of our time. Its 
 avowed aim is to insist upon the supreme import- 
 ance of the moral nature of man, apart altogether 
 from theological dogmas and religious sanctions. 
 Its promoters think that, without bringing a railing 
 accusation against the Church, it may be affirmed 
 with truth that organised Christianity does not 
 provide for ethical interests in a manner so effectual, 
 and in all respects so satisfactory, as to make a 
 special effort outside the Churches by men having 
 that one end in view superfluous. This opinion it 
 is not necessary to contest. Churchmen have no 
 occasion to be jealous of a new departure in the 
 interest of morality, or to resent any criticism on 
 the Church as an institute for the culture of morality 
 offered by supporters of the movement in justifica- 
 tion of their conduct. There need be no hesitation 
 in recognising the value of the aim which the ethical 
 movement sets before itself. It directs attention to 
 what is undoubtedly the main interest of human 
 life, the maintenance in strength and purity of the 
 moral sentiments. If it can do this more impres- 
 sively than the Church, which has many other 
 interests to care for besides ethics creed, ritual, 
 government, finance why, then, in God's name let 
 it bestir itself in the good work. Let ethical societies 
 
396 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 spring up on every side, and do their utmost to 
 impress on men's minds that conduct is the 
 supremely important matter, the test of the worth 
 of all religion and the fruit by which it is known 
 what any religion is good for, and that this life and 
 its affairs are the theatre in which right conduct is 
 to be practised. If they succeed in this, a one-sided 
 emphasis on ethics as man's exclusive concern, and 
 as an interest much neglected by religious com- 
 munities, will be very pardonable. 
 
 The representatives and literary interpreters of 
 this new movement do not repudiate the Christian 
 name. They accept in the main the ethical teaching 
 of Jesus, and they value Christian civilisation. One 
 of the most influential of their number, Mr. 
 Bosanquet, advises the brotherhood to keep their 
 minds alive to the grand tradition of their spiritual 
 ancestry, 'the tradition that human or Christian 
 life is the full and continuous realisation in mind 
 and act of the better self of mankind.' x Neither he 
 nor any other representative man connected with 
 the movement would care to be described as irre- 
 ligious, or would, with M. Guyau, adopt as his 
 watchword 'Non-Religion,' as the goal towards 
 which Society is moving. They seem rather in- 
 clined to claim for their cause a religious character, 
 and to give Duty something like the place of Deity. 
 Their tone, indeed, is not quite uniform. Mr. Leslie 
 
 1 Bernard Bosanquet, The Civilisation of Christendom, p. 98. 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 397 
 
 Stephen, e.g. says: 'We, as members of ethical 
 societies, have no claim to be, even in the humblest 
 way, missionaries of a new religion ; but are simply 
 interested in doing what we can to discuss in a 
 profitable way the truths which it ought to embody 
 or reflect.' 1 But another of more devout temper, 
 and not less intellectual competency, Mr. Sheldon, 
 speaks in this wise : ' To me this movement is not 
 a philosophy but a religion.' 2 Of the sense of duty 
 he writes : ' It is to me what the word " God " has 
 stood for; it represents to me what the phrase " for 
 Christ's sake " has implied ; it means to me what I 
 once attributed to the unconditional authority of 
 the Bible.' 8 Mr. Bosanquet expressly repudiates 
 the designation 'agnostic' for this significant reason: 
 
 * Strictly, to be an agnostic is to be a heathen, and 
 we are not heathens, for we are members of Christen- 
 dom.' * His dislike of the title is so strong that he 
 devotes a whole discourse to the discussion of the 
 question, ' Are we Agnostics ? ' his answer being an 
 emphatic negative : not, of course, because he has no 
 sympathy with the agnostic's position, but because 
 he does not care to be defined by a negative, or to 
 spend his life in reiterating the barren thesis that 
 God is unknowable, and would rather be occupied 
 
 * with the life and with the good that we know, and 
 
 1 Social Rights and Duties, vol. i. p. 43. 
 
 2 W. L. Sheldon, An Ethical Movement, p. 13. 
 Ibid., p. 63. 
 
 4 The Civilisation of Christendom, p. 79. 
 
398 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 with what can be made of them.' 1 This position 
 one can understand and respect. At the same time, 
 it cannot be said that great injustice is done by 
 applying the epithet 'agnostic' to a system which 
 recognises Mr. Leslie Stephen as one of its accredited 
 teachers, and whose raison d'etre is to exalt ethics 
 as the supremely important interest, as the one in- 
 dubitable certainty in the region of the spirit, and 
 as able to stand alone without theistic and theo- 
 logical buttressing. 
 
 The importance, certainty, and independence of 
 ethics no earnest man can have any zeal in calling 
 in question. Least of all the first of these three 
 affirmations. On the contrary, we must wish god- 
 speed to all who make it their business to impress 
 upon their fellow-men that duty is the supreme fact 
 of human life, duty understood as 'the command of 
 our highest self, bidding us, in scorn of transient 
 consequences, to act as if we belonged not to our- 
 selves, but to a universal system or order, and to 
 render unconditional obedience to the highest law 
 or highest measure of value that we know of.' 2 In 
 spite of the variations in moral judgments, we admit 
 with equal readiness the second proposition : the 
 certainty of man's moral nature as a great fact. 
 Whatever may pass away, the human soul remains. 
 Theologies may come and go, but conscience abides. 
 
 1 The Civilisation of Christendom, p. 35. 
 1 Sheldon, An Ethical Movement, p. 57. 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 399 
 
 Mr. Leslie Stephen says : ' I believe in heat, and I 
 believe in the conscience. I reject the atoms, and 
 I reject the doctrine of the atonement.' 1 The 
 meaning is that heat and conscience are ultimate 
 undeniable facts, while atoms and the atonement 
 are but theories about these facts. So be it ; let 
 the theories go for what they are worth, and let it 
 be admitted that the facts do not depend on the 
 theories, and that they would remain if the theories 
 were demonstrated to be fallacious. This is tanta- 
 mount to admitting the third contention also : the 
 capacity of ethics to stand alone without theistic 
 or theological buttresses. The admission is made 
 willingly. The dilapidation of the buttresses would 
 not, I acknowledge, involve the tumbling into ruin 
 of the moral edifice. I do not believe that the decay 
 of religious faith would necessarily lead to the 
 withering of moral sentiment and the demoralisation 
 of conduct. So far from thinking that religion 
 creates conscience, I rather incline to the view that 
 conscience creates religion. 
 
 But just on this account I am persuaded that the 
 new ethical movement will not long remain merely 
 ethical. If it has real vitality and fervour, it will 
 blossom out into a religious creed of some kind. 
 It will do so if it enlist in its service all the powers 
 of the soul, the heart and the imagination as well as 
 the conscience and the reason. It must do so if 
 
 1 Social Rights and Duties, vol. ii. p. 218. 
 
400 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 it is to escape from the aridity of prose into the 
 fertility and beauty of poetry. It must do so, once 
 more, if it is to pass from the lecture-hall into the 
 market-place and become a great power in the 
 community. Indications are not wanting that the 
 apostles of the new movement are half-conscious 
 that this is their inevitable destiny. Germs of a 
 new creed indeed can be discovered in their writings. 
 They do not care for the word ' God ' ; they sympa- 
 thise with those who, like Goethe, Carlyle, and 
 Arnold, have tried to invent new names for the 
 Ineffable, but they acknowledge that there is Some- 
 thing in the universe calling for a name, a mystery, 
 a unity, yea even a bias on the side of goodness. 
 One writes : ' We fancy somehow that the nature of 
 things "takes sides," as it were, in the struggle going 
 on within itself not, however, in reference to every 
 form of conflict, but in the great battle between 
 good and evil' is, in short, ' on the side of those 
 who devote themselves to the ideally Good.' 1 Hence 
 the comforting assurance that ' a divine providence 
 is taking our side in the conflict,' or, if you prefer to 
 put it so, ' that we are taking sides with the divine 
 providence.' 2 To the same effect another writes: 
 ' I do not believe that ethical faith faith in the 
 reality of the good is the spirit of a forlorn hope, 
 though, if it were so, it would still be the only spirit 
 
 1 Sheldon, An Ethical Movement, pp. 94, 95. 
 Ibid., p. 96. 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 401 
 
 possible for us.' 1 He means thereby to express 
 faith in God, shorn of some useless or distracting 
 accessories, that faith which still governs life under 
 the new name of faith in the reality of the good. 2 
 The same author ascribes to the universe ' a reason- 
 able tendency,' 8 and even 'grace,' manifesting itself 
 through heredity and education, which confer on 
 the individual unmerited good gifts, 4 and declares 
 'that man's goodness consists in being effectually 
 inspired by divine ideas.' 5 
 
 Here are germs of a new faith in a wise, righteous, 
 benignant Providence. They are only germs, but 
 all vital beginnings are significant and potent. 
 They are very vague and colourless in expression. 
 They are indeed but the shadowy ghosts of old 
 Christian beliefs which were embodied in fuller, 
 richer, more inspiring forms of language. The 
 Father in heaven of Jesus has become the universe, 
 or nature endowed with reasonable, righteous, and 
 gracious tendencies, but denuded of personality and 
 intelligence. The question forces itself upon us : 
 What is gained by the change of nomenclature ? At 
 most, a temporary escape from religious phrases 
 which had become threadbare, or debased by vulgar, 
 unintelligent, insincere use. The dislike of cant in 
 religion all earnest men feel, but, that allowed for, 
 
 1 Bosanquet, The Civilisation of Christendom, p. 115. 
 * Ibid., p. 115. * Ibid., p. 114. 
 
 4 Ibid., p. 121. * Ibid., p. 121. 
 
 2C 
 
402 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 it may reasonably be maintained that for permanent 
 purposes the old dialect is better than the new. 
 Better every way, even in point of intellectual con- 
 sistency. Surely it is more philosophic to connect 
 reasonable, righteous, gracious tendencies in the 
 universe with personality and intelligence than to 
 dissociate the two sets of qualities! As for im- 
 pressiveness, there is no comparison between the 
 two dialects. You could not go before a popular 
 audience with such bloodless phrases as Mr. 
 Bosanquet has coined. They would appear either 
 unintelligible or ludicrous. But speak of a Father 
 in heaven, then all people, learned and unlearned, 
 know what you mean when you talk of the reason, 
 justice and grace immanent in the universe. They 
 not only understand you, but they are touched by 
 what you say. They admire the felicitous fitness 
 between name and thing ; they are moved by the 
 pathos of the name ; they are stirred to religious 
 affection to faith in the goodwill of the Supreme, 
 to cheerful confidence in His providence, to an 
 inspiring, invigorating sense of dignity as His sons, 
 and of the high responsibilities arising out of filial 
 relations. The ethical movement aspires to be a 
 new reformation. If it desires to realise the ambition 
 implied in the name it will have to recognise more 
 unreservedly the Mastership of Jesus. 1 The Ethical 
 
 1 In harmony with this statement, Professor Tiele closes his second 
 course of Giffoi'd Lectures with the declaration ' that without preach- 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 403 
 
 Movement must become an Ethical Theism, with this 
 for its message to men : ' We love virtue for its own 
 sake and desire the prevalence of disinterested de- 
 votion to the good. But it is no easy thing in this 
 world to live up to one's moral ideal. We need 
 Divine inspiration and aid. And what we need we 
 have. There is an Almighty One who sympathises 
 with our aim, and who will help and guide us in our 
 endeavour after its attainment' Morality must be 
 touched with emotion to become infectious, and 
 emotion springs out of religious faith. The world 
 belongs to the religious ' enthusiast, for enthusiasm 
 is necessary to mankind ; it is the genius of the 
 masses and the productive element in the genius of 
 individuals.' 1 
 
 2. Of the theory which offers non-rational religion 
 as the great propelling power in social evolution, 
 enough has already been said in the way of ex- 
 position and criticism. Only a few words need here 
 be added regarding it as an alternative gospel of 
 hope for the future. 
 
 It will be obvious in what radical antagonism this 
 theory stands to the view which has just been 
 considered. Morality independent of religion and 
 capable of flourishing in vigour when religion has 
 become a thing of the past such is the watchword 
 
 ing, or special pleading, or apologetic argument,' the science of religion 
 ' will help to bring home to the restless spirits of our time the truth that 
 there is no rest for them unless they arise and go to their Father.' 
 1 M. Guyau, The Non-Religion of the Future^ p. 401. 
 
404 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 of men like Guyau and Renan, and, less bluntly 
 expressed, as becomes the gravity of English-speak- 
 ing men, of the American aud British apostles of 
 the ethical movement. Morality, in the sense of 
 altruism, devoted self-sacrificing regard for the 
 well-being of others, impossible without the com- 
 pelling influence of non-rational religious beliefs, 
 supported by sanctions which powerfully appeal to 
 men's hopes and fears, and make it their interest 
 to be disinterested such is the watchword of the 
 author of Social Evolution and of all who accept him 
 as their spokesman. Positions more utterly opposed 
 it is impossible to conceive. It is surprising and 
 discouraging that at this time of day views so 
 absolutely incompatible in their direct statements 
 and in their whole implications can find advocates 
 in a Christian community. Both positions are 
 tainted with the falsehood of extremes. The motto, 
 Morality without religion, divorces two things which 
 nature has joined together as cause and effect, as 
 reality and ideal. Given morality with the needful 
 depth and intensity, and it will inevitably create a 
 Deity and a religion congenial to itself wherein all 
 the cherished ideals towards which it incessantly 
 aspires and struggles find rest-giving realisation. 
 The motto: Altruistic morality impossible, without 
 religion furnished with compulsory sanctions, means, 
 in the ultimate result : such morality impossible even 
 with such a religion. For it implies that love, care 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 405 
 
 for others, sociality, is foreign to human nature. 
 That being so, how vain to think of driving men 
 into love through fear ! It can at most only produce 
 a simulated love, an interested disinterestedness 
 which may bear some fruit in socially beneficial 
 acts, but has no part or lot in the spirit of self- 
 devotion. That even so much good will be reaped 
 is far from certain ; for, as we saw in last Lecture, 
 the law without to which nothing within responds 
 is more likely to produce reaction against itself than 
 to ensure even feigned submission to its behests. A 
 loveless nature will either sweep away a religion 
 which seeks to curb its individualistic impulses, or 
 it will alter it to suit its taste. It will have no 
 affection for a religion with a lofty, pure, humane, 
 ethical ideal. It will eliminate the humanity and 
 transform the religion in question, retaining the 
 name, into a scheme of self-salvation for the next 
 world, combined with a life dominated by covetous- 
 ness in this world. 
 
 Neither of these extremes is to be accepted as a 
 satisfactory programme, but of the two evils the 
 first-named is the lesser. It gives at least one 
 good thing altruism, social instinct, as an inalien- 
 able element of human nature. This undoubtedly it 
 is. There is more to be said of man in the average 
 than that he is rational, and that he has religious 
 instincts even this, that he is essentially social. 
 When you tell him that God is a Father, there is 
 
406 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 that in him which helps him in some measure to 
 appreciate the moral significance of the name. 
 Though there be much evil in him, yet he has the 
 heart to give good gifts to his children. 1 Man had 
 in his nature the rudiments of sociality from the day 
 he began to belong to a family. Sociality in the 
 form of family life is the primary datum, the founda- 
 tion, of human civilisation, and its root and source 
 was, not any religion furnished with awful sanctions, 
 but the prolonged dependence of the human child 
 upon the care of its parents. And there is still 
 a real, valuable morality independent of religion, 
 depending simply on 'the facts that men have 
 certain emotions ; that mothers love their children ; 
 that there are such things as pity, and sympathy, 
 and public spirit, and that there are social instincts 
 upon the growth of which depends the vitality of 
 the race.' 2 
 
 3. But there is a better way than either, even the 
 acceptance of the teaching of Jesus concerning God 
 and man and Providence as the wisest and most 
 reasonable the world has yet known, and the surest 
 guide to all who seek the higher good of humanity. 
 On the religious side, those who adopt this position 
 differ from both the parties previously described. 
 They differ from the ethicists in attaching import- 
 ance to the religious element, that is to say, to a 
 
 1 Matthew vii. n. 
 
 * Leslie Stephen, Social Rights and Duties, vol. ii. p. 219. 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 407 
 
 definite, earnest belief in a God who is best named 
 Father, and in a benignant providence answering to 
 the name. In this faith they find inspiration for 
 endeavour, and hope for ultimate success, and in the 
 correlate conception of man as son of God they find 
 a strong support to that sense of the moral worth of 
 human nature which is the fundamental postulate 
 of Christian civilisation, but which many anti-social 
 influences tend to weaken. On the other hand, while 
 at one with the class of thinkers of whom Mr. Kidd 
 is the spokesman in attaching high value to religion, 
 they differ radically from them in their conception 
 of the nature of the Christian religion and in their 
 views as to the secret of its power. That religion 
 appears to their minds intrinsically reasonable, 
 credible, and acceptable, and in their judgment its 
 power lies, not in mystery revealed either in dogma 
 or in sacrament, nor in awe-inspiring vistas of a future 
 existence, but in its capacity to satisfy the whole 
 spiritual nature of man, including reason, conscience, 
 and heart. Its great, grand thoughts of God, man, 
 and duty are its best credentials and persuasives. 
 These speak for themselves to the human soul ; 
 they awaken a response in manly natures utterly 
 indifferent to eternal terrors ; their very elevation is 
 their charm, for lofty ideals appeal to the heroic in 
 our nature, and so make way when low accommo- 
 dating ideals are treated with contempt. * " Love 
 ye one another; by this shall all men know that ye 
 
408 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 are My disciples, if ye have love one to another." 
 In this admirable and eternal precept there is more 
 of inexhaustible, practical power than in : Ye shall 
 be cast into the fire ; there shall be wailing and 
 gnashing of teeth.' 1 The fact is so, because there is 
 that in man which is able to respond to such teach- 
 ing, and which gives its response with the greatest 
 promptitude and earnestness when the doctrine is 
 made to rest on its own intrinsic merits. 
 
 Men who profess to be disciples of Jesus cannot 
 consistently ignore the hope of a life beyond the 
 tomb, or refuse it a place among the motives to right 
 conduct. But, if they be intelligent disciples, they 
 will not allow the eternal to swallow up the 
 temporal. They will recognise the substantial value 
 of the present life, and see in social well-being the 
 practical outcome of the Christian faith. In this 
 respect leaders of thought, amid all variations of 
 opinion, are happily agreed. Secularism, in a good 
 sense, is a phase of the modern spirit. There is no 
 reason in this fact for alienation from the Christianity 
 of Christ. For Christ's doctrine of providence, as 
 we saw, included all the good elements of secularism, 
 asserting divine care for man's body as well as for 
 his soul, for social as well as for spiritual health. 
 
 While that doctrine should commend itself to all 
 men of goodwill, it contains little or nothing that 
 can offend philosophers and men of science. For 
 
 1 Guyau, The Non- Religion of the Future, p. 406. 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 409 
 
 Jesus taught a providence that works and achieves 
 its ends through the processes of nature, and that 
 reaches the accomplishment of its purpose gradually, 
 not per saltum. In His conception of Divine Pro- 
 vidence Jesus gave no undue prominence to the 
 unusual and the catastrophic. His watchwords were : 
 Nature God's instrument ; and, Growth the law of 
 the moral as of the physical world. 
 
 Men of all schools, therefore moralists, reli- 
 gionists, philanthropists, philosophers, scientists 
 might reasonably be expected to march together 
 under Christ's banner, and fight with one heart for the 
 sacred cause of humanity in the name of God the 
 Father, for men, His sons. Or, if it be too much to 
 hope for general agreement as to the religious aspect 
 of Christ's teaching, one may surely count on a cordial 
 consensus as to the rational, wholesome, beneficent 
 tendency of the ethical principles enunciated in His 
 recorded sayings ! Dissent, vehement contradiction, 
 may indeed be encountered even here ; but those 
 who at present take up this attitude are not a 
 numerous body, and it may be hoped that they will 
 become fewer in the course of time. Intelligent, 
 cordial acceptance of the Christian ethic will mean 
 much, e.g., a conservative view of marriage, the 
 family, and the state, as institutions rooted in the 
 nature of things, the subversion of which is not to 
 be thought of, but at most only their improvement 
 in the light of experience. Whether it should mean 
 
410 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 conservation of certain other things, e.g., private pro- 
 perty, is a question on which much wider divergence 
 of opinion may be looked for. There are some so 
 hostile to property, or * capital,' that to destroy it 
 they would be ready to destroy other things hitherto 
 held sacred Deity, government, wedlock. One can 
 guess what such revolutionaries would have to say 
 to the Founder of the Christian faith. They would 
 offer Him the peremptory alternatives : * Take our 
 side, or we renounce you/ 
 
 What the bearing of Christ's teaching on the 
 Socialistic movement of our day really is, is not a 
 question that can be answered offhand. It is not, 
 as religious conservatives may imagine, a matter 
 of course that it is against that movement simply 
 because the latter would amount to a social revolu- 
 tion ; for the words of Jesus have acted, in certain 
 instances, as a revolutionary force in the past, and 
 they may do so again. As little is it a matter of 
 course that it is on its side. As to the general 
 tendency of Christ's doctrine, there is no room for 
 doubt. It is emphatically humane. Jesus was on 
 the side of the weak, of the little child and all that 
 the little child represents. Therefore He was the 
 friend of the poor ; and were He living amongst us 
 now He would regard with intense compassion the 
 many whose lives are made wretched by the burden 
 of abject, hopeless poverty. In not a few instances 
 His keen eye might perceive that the poverty was 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 411 
 
 the natural penalty of the poor man's folly. But in 
 many others He would with equal clearness discern 
 in poverty the undeserved result of social injustice, 
 and therefore a wrong to be righted by a return to 
 justice and mercy on the part of the wrong-doers. 
 
 What such a return would imply is the abstruse 
 question. The humanity of the Gospel ultimately 
 led to the abolition of slavery, because slavery was 
 slowly discovered to be an inhuman thing. Must 
 it likewise, sooner or later, lead to the abolition of 
 property or capitalism and the introduction of a 
 Collectivist millennium ? That depends on the char- 
 acter of said millennium. Is it to be an economical 
 one mainly, or is the ethical to be in the ascendant? 
 For Christianity the ethical is the supreme category, 
 and it judges all things by their bearing thereon. 
 How, then, does it stand with Socialism ? Does it 
 place ethical interests first? does it even tend to 
 promote the higher morality as a secondary interest? 
 That it does is by no means so clear as one could 
 desire. It is a significant fact that the thinkers of 
 the day who have devoted themselves to ethical 
 propagandism express grave doubts on the subject. 
 Mr. Bosanquet is of opinion that Economic Socialism 
 does not tend to Moral Socialism, or altruism, but 
 rather to Moral Individualism, or selfishness. 1 Mr. 
 Leslie Stephen contends for the moral value of com- 
 petition, and hints that the Socialist ideal is a land 
 
 1 Civilisation of Christendom, pp. 315 ff. 
 
412 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 in which the chickens run about ready-roasted, and 
 the curse of labour is finally removed from mankind. 1 
 M. Guyau bluntly describes the Socialist ideal as 
 'a life which is completely foreseen, ensured with 
 the element of fortune and of hope left out, with the 
 heights and the depths of human life levelled away 
 an existence somewhat utilitarian and uniform, 
 regularly plotted off like the squares on a checker 
 board, incapable of satisfying the ambitious desires 
 of the mass of mankind.' 2 Mr. Sheldon is more 
 sympathetic in his tone. Taking his stand 'at a 
 spiritual distance from all the scramble, the strikes 
 and the lock-outs, the boycotts, the turmoil and the 
 violence, the accusations and recriminations,' 3 he 
 tries to see what the movement implies as a whole, 
 what it means ' as a historic wave-movement.' He 
 hopes that in spite of all the materialism, selfishness, 
 petty rivalries and ambitions connected with it in 
 the meantime, the trend is towards higher moral 
 manhood, and that at the end of another century, 
 when the ideal industrial system of Socialist expecta- 
 tions shall have been proved to be a dream, the pre- 
 vailing enthusiasm will be for the ethical ideal. 4 
 Socialists will probably not thank him for his 
 charitable forecast. It virtually makes their case 
 analogous to that of the Jews, who looked for a 
 
 1 Social Rights and Duties, vol. i. pp. 133-173. 
 8 The Non- Religion of the Future, p. 369. 
 8 An Ethical Movement, p. 288. 
 * Ibid., p. 298. 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 413 
 
 political Messiah and an ideal national prosperity 
 that never came, and got instead a spiritual Christ and 
 a Kingdom of heaven which they did not appreciate. 
 
 But no estimate of Socialism emanating from the 
 ethical school is so unfavourable as that formed by 
 Mr. Kidd. It is to the following effect : The aim of 
 Socialists is perfectly natural. It is simply a case 
 of men who toil trying to better themselves by 
 asserting what they believe to be the just claims of 
 labour against capital. Nevertheless the carrying 
 out of the Socialist programme would be ultimately 
 ruinous. But on mere grounds of reason that is no 
 sufficient answer to advocates of Socialist principles. 
 They are entitled to reply : ' What do we care for 
 the future of the country ? our sole concern is for 
 our own present personal interest/ Against this 
 quite rational yet ruinous movement the only 
 barrier is the altruistic spirit which ultra-rational 
 religion engenders. What graver indictment could 
 be brought against any movement than this, which 
 represents Socialism as destructive of public well- 
 being sooner or later, indifferent to the ruin it will 
 ultimately entail, and bound in self-defence against 
 anti-socialistic altruism to assume an attitude of 
 uncompromising antagonism towards religion ? 
 
 Mr. .Kidd is a biassed witness, as he is chiefly 
 concerned to make out a case for the necessity of 
 a religion mysterious in its doctrines and armed 
 with supra-rational sanctions as the sole guarantee 
 
414 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 of social progress. I should be sorry to think so ill 
 of any movement which has for its professed aim to 
 improve the economic condition of the industrial 
 part of the community. I have no right and no 
 intention to pronounce any opinion on the question 
 at issue. My general attitude is one of mingled 
 sympathy and apprehension. I care greatly more 
 for the million than for the millionaire. But I dread 
 leaps in the dark. It will be wise to move slowly, 
 lest too great haste in well-meant but ill-instructed 
 endeavour should have a disastrous issue. Evolu- 
 tion, not revolution, should be the motto. Of one 
 thing I am sure, viz., that no ultimate good will 
 come of movements which set economic above moral 
 interests. It is true that in the case of many the 
 pressure of poverty is so heavy as to make the higher 
 life all but impossible, and that there is need for 
 ameliorative measures that will bring goodness within 
 easier reach. But it must never be forgotten that 
 the chief end to be striven after is moral manhood 
 character. The ethical must take precedence of the 
 economical in our thoughts and aspirations. First 
 righteousness, second food and raiment. If this 
 order be not observed, national character will 
 deteriorate, and with deteriorated character pro- 
 sperity will wane. The wise of all ages, we have 
 seen, have believed in a moral order as real and 
 certain as the planetary system. If they are not 
 all mistaken, there is such an order as a matter of 
 
RETROSPECT AND PROSPECT 415 
 
 fact, whatever theological phrase we employ to 
 describe it. Call it a moral government of God, 
 or a tendency in the universe : it is all one ; there 
 it is. And we have to reckon with it. It cannot be 
 disregarded with impunity any more than the ship 
 of Carlyle's parable could get round Cape Horn, 
 with whatever unanimity of the crew, if they dis- 
 regarded the conditions ' fixed with adamantine 
 rigour by the ancient elemental powers, who are 
 entirely careless how you vote.' x I trust that in the 
 time to come an increasing number of men will be 
 thorough believers in the moral order. Let all in 
 their various spheres do their utmost to propagate 
 this faith. The pulpit of the future will have to 
 devote more attention to it, and strive to impress 
 on men's minds that God is, and that He is the 
 Rewarder of them that diligently seek Him. To do 
 this with effect is not, I am aware, every preacher's 
 gift. Special spiritual discipline is needed for the 
 task. But it will be well for the community when, 
 in every considerable centre of population, one man 
 at least has the prophetic vocation and impulse to 
 propagate the passion for righteousness, and the 
 faith that this sacred passion burns in the heart of 
 the Great Being who guides the destinies of the 
 universe. The promoters of the Ethical Movement 
 contemplate the ultimate disappearance of the 
 Church, and the advent of a time when it will 
 
 1 Latter-Day Pamphlets^ p. 40. 
 
416 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 become a practical question, What use can be made 
 of ecclesiastical edifices no longer needed for their 
 original purpose? If that ever happen, it will be 
 the Church's own fault. If she forget the adage, 
 * By their fruits ye shall know them/ if she lose sight 
 of the truth that morality is the ultimate test of the 
 worth of religion, if she get out of sympathetic touch 
 with the ethical spirit of Jesus, then she will be 
 perilously near the awful doom of savourless salt. 
 But there will be no risk of such a doom overtaking 
 her so long as the ethical ideal of the Gospels has a 
 sovereign place in her heart, and it is manifest to all 
 the world that she cares more for righteousness than 
 for anything else, and that her deepest desire is, that 
 God's will may be done upon this earth as it is in 
 heaven. 
 
INDEX 
 
 A 
 
 ^Eschylus 
 
 attitude towards mythology, 68. 
 
 belief in retributive justice of providence, 71* 
 
 an innovator in moral thought, 75. 
 
 Nemesis in individual experience, 76. 
 
 is disciplinary as well as punitive, 78. 
 
 theories as to his doctrine of Prometheus, 78. 
 
 Prometheus a culture hero, 80. 
 
 defects of the Prometheus legend, 8l. 
 
 Eumenides, doctrine of Nemesis in, 82-84. 
 Agnosticism 
 
 of Huxley, 314-15. 
 
 of Ritschlian theology, 350. 
 
 of Cardinal Newman, 350. 
 Ahriman 
 
 place in Gathas, 39. 
 
 an ethical being, 41. 
 
 a mere negation of the good Spirit, 42. 
 
 conception of, natural though crude, 46. 
 
 used as a foil to Ahura, 56. 
 Ahura-mazda. See Ormuzd. 
 Amschaspands, doctrine of, 44. 
 Angra-mainyu. See Ahriman. 
 
 Arnold, Matthew, ' sweet reasonableness ' of Christ's doctrine, 353. 
 Aurelius, Marcus 
 
 legitimacy of suicide, 135-6. 
 
 on future life, 137. 
 
 religious tone of his writings, 137-8. 
 
 B 
 
 Balfour, Arthur James 
 
 authority in belief, 362. 
 
 narrow conception of reason, 367. 
 Bascom, John 
 
 reason and authority, 363-4. 
 
 futility of ' ultra-rational ' sanction, 376. 
 2D 
 
4i8 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Baxter, Richard, no hard-and-fast line between good men and bad, 290. 
 Blackie, John Stuart- 
 purpose of Greek tragic drama, 72. 
 
 translation of ^Eschylus quoted, 76, 78, 80, 
 Bosanquet, Bernard 
 
 Stoical idea of worth of man, 139. 
 
 does not repudiate Christianity, 396. 
 
 is not agnostic, 397-8. 
 
 necessity for ethical faith, 400-1, 
 
 on Socialism, 411. 
 Browning, Robert 
 
 general character of his optimism, 282-3. 
 
 his creed Christian, 284-5. 
 
 his doctrine of God, 285-7. 
 
 and of man, 287-9. 
 
 good even in evil, 289. 
 
 no hard-and-fast line between good men and bad, 290. 
 
 value even in failures of the good, 291. 
 
 mode of dealing with problem of evil, 292. 
 
 his theory of moral evil : 
 
 (1) morality the highest good, 294. 
 
 (2) progress by conflict necessary to morality, 295-6. 
 
 (3) evil the foe to be fought, 297. 
 
 (4) evil needed to make a struggle possible, 297-8. 
 
 (5) ignorance of true nature of evil necessary to give reality 
 
 to struggle, 299-301. 
 
 (6) struggle will always have a happy issue, 301-2. 
 problem finds its solution in world beyond the grave, 302-3. 
 his optimism compared with Emerson's, 304. 
 
 Budde, Karl, on Book of Job, 212, 231, 235 (note), 238 (note). 
 Buddha- 
 originator of Buddhism, 4. 
 
 contrast between Buddhism, Vedic Indian and Brahman re- 
 ligions, 5. 
 
 essence of his doctrine, 6-7. 
 
 emphatic assertion of moral order, 8. 
 
 theory of transmigration, 9-10. 
 
 Buddhist Birth Stories, II, 12. 
 
 doctrine of Karma, 13-17. 
 
 desire, the will to live, 17. 
 
 doctrine of Nirvana, 18. 
 
 theory of future rewards and punishments, 21. 
 
INDEX 419 
 
 Buddha 
 
 function of a Buddha, 22. 
 
 plurality of Buddhas a necessity, 23. 
 reason for this theory, 26. 
 
 six great virtues necessary to a Bodishat, 25. 
 
 knows no overruling Providence, 25. 
 
 criticism of his doctrine, 27. 
 
 relation to caste, 28. 
 
 strength and weakness of his teaching, 29-32, 384-5. 
 
 links with Zoroastrianism, 35-6. 
 Bunsen, Baron 
 
 on ameliorating influence of Buddhism, 33. 
 
 on scepticism of Euripides, 91-2. 
 Burnouf, Eugene 
 
 Buddhist doctrine of transmigration, 12-13. 
 
 the making of a Buddha, 22. 
 
 Buddhism of the North, 24. 
 
 Buddhism and Siva-worship, 33. 
 Butler, Bishop, continuance of life after death, 310. 
 
 Campbell, Dr. Lewis, estimate of Euripides, 92 (note). 
 Carlyle, Thomas, on diabolic element in life, 345 (note). 
 Caste, relation of Buddhism to, 28. 
 Cheyne, Professor T. K., on Book of Job, 231 (note). 
 Christ- 
 comparison between His teaching and that of Hebrew Prophets, 
 
 243-5- 
 His teaching in so far as peculiar in re external good and evil 
 
 paradoxical, 245. 
 His teaching may be summed up in three propositions : 
 
 (1) external good and evil common to all men, 246-8. 
 
 (2) suffering inevitable for the righteous, 248-9. 
 
 (3) those who suffer not to be pitied, 249-51. 
 these propositions involve new idea of God, 251. 
 
 His teaching as to God, 251-4. 
 geniality of His doctrine, 254, 
 His optimism, 255-61. 
 
 takes account of adverse facts, 256-9. 
 His teaching contrasted with Paganism, 262. 
 His estimate of the value of the temporal, 263-4. 
 
420 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Christ- 
 significance of His healing ministry, 265-6. 
 
 the worth of man, 267-70. 
 
 comprehensiveness of conception of providential order, 270. 
 
 conception of Satan, 271-2. 
 
 the stern side of His teaching, 273-5. 
 
 methods of Providential working election, solidarity, sacrifice- 
 recognised, 275-7. 
 
 His doctrines acceptable, 277-8. 
 
 His teaching combines merits and avoids defects of all systems, 
 390-3- 
 
 future progress must lie along line of His teaching, 393. 
 Cicero 
 
 criticism of Stoicism, 119. 
 
 on Stoic doctrine of Providence, 128, 129, 132. 
 
 on divination, 140, 142, 151, 157-8, 160, 161 (note), 163, 164, 168. 
 Conversion, Zoroastrian belief in, 50, 51. 
 
 Darmesteter, James 
 
 on origin of Zoroastrianism, 36. 
 
 dualism latent in primitive Aryan religion, 39. 
 
 Vedic dualism, 40. 
 
 character of Ahriman, 42. 
 
 doctrine of Amschaspands, 44. 
 Davids, Thomas William Rhys 
 
 Buddhist Birth Stories quoted, 12. 
 
 on doctrine of Karma, 14. 
 
 Buddha's theory of desire, 1 8. 
 
 on Nirvana, 19 
 Desire 
 
 the will to live, 17. 
 
 its place in Brahmanism and Buddhism, 17. 
 Divination 
 
 attitude of Stoicism to, 140-1. 
 
 belief in, common to all ancient ethnic religion, 142. 
 
 a primitive form of revelation, 143-4. 
 
 compared with prophecy, 145-6. 
 
 media of revelation the fortuitous^ the unusual, and the 
 marvellous, 148. 
 
 augury, 149. 
 
INDEX 421 
 
 Divination 
 
 haruspicy, 150-1. 
 
 astrology, 152-4. 
 
 the Greek Oracles, 154-5. 
 
 decline of Oracles, 156-7. 
 
 a reality or a delusion ? i57 - 6o. 
 
 objections to, 162-3. 
 
 its moral tendency, 164-6. 
 
 Epictetus on, 166-8. 
 
 modern attitude to, 168-9. 
 
 effects of its abolition on doctrines of Providence and prayer, 
 170-1. 
 
 a barrier to moral and religious progress, 172-3. 
 
 relation to Hebrew prophecy, 174. 
 Dualism 
 
 Zoroastrian, 39, 49. 
 
 is characteristic of all primitive religions, 39. 
 
 fact-basis of Persian, 46. 
 
 defects of do., 57. 
 
 influence of do. on Hebrew and Manichsean religions, 61-2. 
 Dualism, Modern 
 
 two types, 3. 
 
 distinct from pessimism, 312. 
 
 agnostic type, 314-15- 
 
 John Stuart Mill's, 316-19. 
 
 of author of Evil and Evolution, 320-28. 
 his theory of Satan, 323-28. 
 criticism of his theory, 328-37. 
 
 cure for dualistic mood, 337-39. 
 
 human reason as antagonist of the Deity, 346. 
 
 tendency to vilify reason, 347. 
 
 assertion that reason cannot find God, 348-9. 
 
 in Ritschlian theology, 350. 
 
 denies revelation of God in nature, 351-2. 
 
 capacity of reason to appreciate revelation, 352-3. 
 
 causes of antithesis between reason and faith : 
 
 (1) artificial view of substance of revelation, 354~7 
 
 (2) disparagement of reason, 357. 
 reason, morality, and religion inseparable, 358. 
 authority of the Church, 361-3. 
 
 criticism .of theory that influence of reason as compared with 
 authority insignificant, 363. 
 
422 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Dualism, Modern 
 
 antagonism between reason and authority non-scientific, 364. 
 
 evils of trusting too much to authority, 365-6. 
 
 Kidd's theory that reason anti-social, 368-9. 
 
 criticism of this theory, 371-9. 
 Duhm, B., on Hebrew prophets, 191, 192 (note). 
 
 E 
 
 Emerson, Ralph Waldo 
 
 his optimism, 281-2, 288, 338. 
 
 compared with Browning's, 303-4. 
 Epictetus 
 
 on things indifferent, in. 
 
 benefits derivable from external evil, 117-18, 122-3. 
 
 doctrine of God, 134-5. 
 
 legitimacy of suicide, 136. 
 
 on divination, 166-7-8. 
 Epicureans, conception of chief good, 107. 
 Ethical movement, the 
 
 its origin and aim, 395-99. 
 
 its value, 398. 
 
 cannot long remain merely ethical, 399-403. 
 Euripides 
 
 attitude towards mythology, 68. 
 
 doctrine of Nemesis, 71. 
 
 his alleged scepticism, 92. 
 
 proofs of his religious convictions, 93-4. 
 
 theory of self-sacrifice, 95-100. 
 
 compared with that of ^Eschylus, 96. 
 importance of this theory, 100. 
 
 his dualism, 102. 
 
 on divination, 146, 150. 
 Evil and Evolution 
 
 the author's dualism, 320-8. 
 
 his theory of Satan, 323-8. 
 
 criticism of the theory, 328-37. 
 Evolution in future life, 309-11. 
 
 Forsyth, Peter Taylor, on revelation in nature, 348-9-50. 
 Froude, James Anthony, on the Book of Job, 207, 208. 
 
INDEX 423 
 
 G 
 
 Gordon, Dr. George 
 
 his views on immortality, 305-7. 
 identical with Browning's, 307. 
 
 estimate of his views, 307-9. 
 
 on Huxley's pessimism, 339. 
 
 on the authority of the Church, 361. 
 Grant, Sir Alexander 
 
 on the origin of Stoicism, 104. 
 
 translation of Cleanthes quoted, 138. 
 Greek mythology, 66. 
 Greek Tragedians 
 
 their religious creed, 67. 
 
 combination of mythology and religion, 67. 
 
 their themes, 73. 
 
 their strength and weakness, 386-7. 
 Guyau, M. 
 
 necessity for divine inspiration, 403. 
 
 practical power of Christ's teaching, 407-8. 
 
 on socialism, 412. 
 
 H 
 
 Hagio-theism, 45. 
 Haigh, Arthur Elam 
 
 attitude of Greek Tragedians towards myth, 70. 
 
 on ^Eschylus quoted, 75-76. 
 
 Hardy, R. Spence, on Buddhist doctrine of Karma, 15. 
 Harnack, Adolf, on Persian dualism, 57 (note). 
 Haug, Martin, on origin of Zoroastrianism, 36. 
 Hebrew Prophets 
 
 their relation to divination, 174. 
 
 contrast between prophet and diviner, 175-6. 
 
 substitutes for diviners, 177. 
 
 their characteristics, 177-9. 
 
 their belief in creed of Moses, 178-9. 
 
 their ideas as to connection between lot and conduct, 181, 186. 
 
 their religious thought, its profoundly ethical character, 182. 
 
 their passion for righteousness, 185. 
 
 views of earlier and later prophets compared, 187-93. 
 
 Isaiah, oracle of the Suffering Servant of God, 191-5. 
 
 Jeremiah, oracle of the New Covenant, 197-8. 
 
4 2 4 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Hebrew Prophets 
 their defects : 
 
 (1) exaggerated idea of connection between physical and 
 
 moral order, 199-202. 
 
 (2) one-sided emphasis on punitive action of divine provi- 
 
 dence, 202-3. 
 
 (3) outward good and ill overestimated, 203-4. 
 
 the service they rendered to higher interests of humanity, 205-6. 
 
 their strength and weakness, 388-90. 
 Hegel, G. W. F., on Persian dualism, 57 (note). 
 Hippolytus, on diviners, 164. 
 Huxley 
 
 analogy between Karma and heredity, 14. 
 
 Nirvana and apatheia of Stoics compared, 109-10. 
 
 an exponent of agnostic dualism, 314-15. 
 Hyde, W. De Witt, on Kidd's views, 372. 
 
 I 
 
 Immortality 
 
 Browning's belief in, 303. 
 Dr. George Gordon on, 305-7* 
 reasonableness of idea of, 307-8. 
 
 James, W., on revelation in nature, 349-50. 
 Job, Book of- 
 its raison. d'ttre, 208. 
 
 its date, 209-10. 
 
 relation of author to opening and closing sections, 211-1*. 
 
 analysis of, 212-28. 
 
 progress in Job's theology, 228-31. 
 
 didactic significance of, 233-36. 
 
 rationale of the suffering of the good, 237. 
 
 attitude of author to the views expressed, 238-42. 
 
 traces of doctrine of vicarious suffering, 242. 
 Jones, Professor Henry 
 
 on Emerson's optimism, 281. 
 
 on Browning's optimism, 298. 
 
INDEX 425 
 
 K 
 
 Kalpa, definition of, 20. 
 Kant, Immanuel 
 
 Karma equivalent to his Deity, 17. 
 
 on the Divine Moral Governor, 356. 
 Karma 
 
 what it is, 13. 
 
 an isolated entity, 16. 
 
 endowed by the Buddhist with power of physical causation, 16. 
 
 equivalent to Kant's Deity, 17. 
 
 creates succession of worlds, 20. 
 Kautzsch, Emil, on Book of Job, 238 (note). 
 Kidd, Benjamin 
 
 reason anti-social, 368. 
 
 statement of his views, 368-9. 
 
 criticism of his position, 371-9. 
 
 on Socialism, 413-14. 
 
 Koeppen, Carl Friedrich, on Buddhism, 7, 10, 17. 
 Kunala, story of, 12. 
 
 L 
 Lang, Andrew 
 
 dualism in primitive religion, 39, 40. 
 
 distinction between mythical and religious elements in belief, 66. 
 
 on the Prometheus myth, 82. 
 Leclercq, A. Bouche" 
 
 on divination quoted, 142-3, 170. 
 Lightfoot, Bishop 
 
 6n origin of Stoicism, 104-5. 
 
 contradictions of Stoicism, 106. 
 
 M 
 
 Manichaeism, its relation to Zoroastrianism, 6l. 
 Mansel, Dean, on revelation, 354*5- 
 Mill, John Stuart 
 
 his dualism, 316-19. 
 
 a modified dualism, 335*6, 337 
 Mills, L. H. 
 
 on date of the Gathas, 34. 
 
 separation of Buddhism and Zoroastrianism, 36. 
 
 estimate of value of Gathas, 55. 
 
426 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Moberly, R. C. 
 
 reason and morality inseparable, 358-9. 
 
 antithesis between reason and morality unknown to Scripture, 
 367-8. 
 
 on Kidd's views, 370. 
 Modern thought, optimistic or dualistic, 3. 
 Mommsen, Christian Matthias Theodor, on Cato quoted, 129. 
 Moral Order 
 
 consensus gentium for, 3801. 
 
 root of faith in, 381. 
 
 theological position not indifferent, 382. 
 
 faith in, associated with conflicting judgments about human life, 
 
 383. 
 
 Buddhist belief in, its strength and weakness, 384-5. 
 Zoroastrian do., do. do., 385-6. 
 
 Greek do., do. do., 386-7. 
 
 Stoic do., do. do., 387-8. 
 
 Hebrew do., do. do., 388-90. 
 
 Christ's doctrine summarised, 390-93. 
 
 progress for future must lie along line of Christ's teaching, 393. 
 three new programmes : 
 
 (1) the ethical movement, 395-99. 
 
 (2) non-rational religion, 403-6. 
 
 (3) acceptance of Christianity of Christ, 406-10. 
 bearing of Christ's teaching on Socialism, 410-11. 
 modern estimates of Socialism, 411-13. 
 
 Muir, John (D.C.L.), translation from Rig- Veda quoted, 17. 
 
 N 
 Nagelsbach, Karl Friedrich 
 
 /Eschylus an original moral thinker, 74 (note). 
 
 on augury, 149. 
 
 on haruspicy, 152. 
 Nemesis 
 
 in Greek Tragedians, 66. 
 
 ^Eschylean doctrine, 71 ; in individual experience, 76, 81, 82-84* 
 
 doctrine of Sophocles, 71, 86. 
 
 doctrine of Euripides, 71. 
 Newman, Cardinal, on revelation in nature, 349. 
 Nirvana 
 
 doctrine of, 18. 
 
 compared with Stoic apathtia, 109-110. 
 
INDEX 427 
 
 Ogereau, F., materialism of Stoics, 113-4. 
 Optimism 
 
 Christ's, 255-61. 
 
 modern, compared with Christ's, 279. 
 
 tone and tendency of modern, 281-2. 
 Ormuzd 
 
 place in Gathas, 38. 
 
 Ethical Deity, 41. 
 
 character of, 43. 
 
 originator of cosmic and moral order, 46. 
 
 his power over evil, 53. 
 
 Parker, Theodore, his optimism, 281. 
 Paul, his dualism, 339-40. 
 Plato, his dualism, 313, 339, 341 (note). 
 Plumptre, Edward Hayes 
 
 translation of ^Eschylus quoted, 76, 77. 
 
 translation of Sophocles quoted, 86, 87, 88, 90, 
 Plutarch, on cessation of oracles, 156-7. 
 Prometheus, cp. ^Eschylus. 
 
 R 
 
 Reason 
 
 capacity of, to appreciate revelation, 352-3. 
 causes of antithesis between reason and faith : 
 
 (1) artificial view of substance of revelation, 354-7 
 
 (2) disparagement of reason, 357. 
 reason, morality, and religion inseparable, 358. 
 authority of the Church, 361-3. 
 
 criticism of theory that influence of reason as compared with 
 
 authority insignificant, 363. 
 
 antagonism between reason and authority non-scientific, 364. 
 evils of trusting too much to authority, 365-6. 
 Kidd's theory that reason anti-social, 368-9. 
 criticism of this theory, 371-9. 
 
428 THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Renan, Ernest 
 
 on Satan, 63. 
 
 the genius of the Book of Job, 233. 
 Kendall, Gerald Henry, attitude of Stoics to outward good or evil, 
 
 1 10. 
 
 S 
 
 Satan- 
 Hebrew doctrine of, 62, 341-2. 
 
 how far Hebrew doctrine derived from Persia, 62-5. 
 
 in the Gospel narratives, 271-2. 
 
 theory of author of Evil and Evolution, 323-8. 
 criticism of theory, 328-37. 
 
 Paul's belief in, 339-40. 
 
 havoc produced by assigning whole moral evil to, 344. 
 Seneca 
 
 on the chief good, 107. 
 
 on things indifferent, 121. 
 
 on moral uses of adversity, 123-4. 
 
 the wise man, 126. 
 
 evil bias in human nature, 133. 
 
 legitimacy of grief, 133-4. 
 
 legitimacy of suicide, 136. 
 Sheldon, W. L. 
 
 duty the supreme fact of human life, 397-8. 
 
 the bias on the side of goodness, 400. 
 
 on Socialism, 412. 
 Socialism 
 
 bearing of Christ's teaching on, 410-1 1. 
 
 modern estimates of, 411-13. 
 Sophocles 
 
 attitude towards mythology, 68. 
 
 doctrine of Nemesis, 71, 86. 
 
 changefulness of life, 87-8. 
 
 suggestions of an evil order in the world, 89. 
 
 traces of idea of vicarious atonement, 91. 
 
 on diviners, 146. 
 
 Spencer, Herbert, his agnosticism, 356. 
 Stephen, Leslie 
 
 his agnosticism, 356. 
 
 a morality independent of religion, 397, 406* 
 
 on facts and theories in morals, 399. 
 
 on Socialism, 411-12. 
 
INDEX 429 
 
 Stobaeus, Joannes 
 
 Ecloga of, quoted on views of early Stoics, 109, 147. 
 Stoicism 
 
 its moral distinction, 103. 
 
 its origin, 104. 
 
 at once ethical and individualistic, 105. 
 
 on the chief good, 107. 
 
 place of pleasure in, 108. 
 
 doctrine of apatheia, 109. 
 
 compared with Nirvana, no. 
 
 its theology, 111-12. 
 
 its materialism, 113. 
 
 relation of theology to ethics, 114-16. 
 
 its contribution to doctrine of Providence, 1 1 6- 1 8. 
 
 criticism of, 1 18-22. 
 
 later views on ethics of suffering, 122-4. 
 
 its ideal Wise Man, 126-7. 
 
 its moral ideal criticised, 129-30. 
 
 modifications of original system, 131. 
 
 influence of Roman thought on, 132-4. 
 
 defects of the Roman type of, 135-6. 
 
 on the future life, 136. 
 
 appreciation of, 137-9. 
 
 its attitude towards divination, 140-1. 
 
 its strength and its weakness, 387-8. 
 Suicide. See under Marcus Aurelius, Epictetus, Seneca. 
 Symonds, John Addington 
 
 progression in art in Greek poets, 68-70. 
 
 comparison of ^Eschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, 70. 
 
 on Prometheus Bound quoted, 79. 
 
 on Erinnyes quoted, 83 (note). 
 
 translation of Sophocles quoted, 89, 95. 
 
 on the * pluck ' of Greek men and women, ioa 
 
 Tacitus, on diviners, 164. 
 Thompson, D'Arcy 
 
 translation of Sophocles quoted, 86, 88, 89. 
 
 translation of Euripides quoted, 93, 102. 
 
43P THE MORAL ORDER OF THE WORLD 
 
 Tiele, Professor C. P. 
 
 tendency of the reason of the Aryan race, 360. 
 
 on the necessity of Theism, 402 (note). 
 Transmigration 
 
 its place in Buddhism, 9. 
 
 explanation of its origin, 9-10, 
 
 its analogy to heredity, 14. 
 
 not identical with heredity, 15. 
 Tylor, Edward Burnet 
 
 on transmigration, 10, II. 
 
 on dualism in primitive religion, 39. 
 
 u 
 
 Ur-Buddha, a postulated divine head of all Buddhas, 24. 
 
 V 
 
 Vedic Indians 
 
 their religion, 4. 
 
 dualism of, physical not ethical, 40. 
 Verrall, Arthur Woolgar 
 
 attitude of Greek Tragedians towards mythology, 701 
 
 Euripides' view of legend of Alcestis, 99. 
 
 W 
 
 Wallace, Professor William, on social nature of reason, 372 (note). 
 Watson, Professor John 
 
 Euripides' doctrine of self-sacrifice, 101. 
 
 on Christ's teaching on Providence, 245. 
 Way, Arthur S., translation of Euripides quoted, 94, 99, 102. 
 Whitman, Walt, his optimistic audacity, 282. 
 Wodhull, Michael, translation of Euripides quoted, 99. 
 
 Zeller, Eduard, Stoics' attitude to outward goods, 109. 
 Zoroaster 
 
 date of, 34. 
 
 links with Buddha, 35. 
 
INDEX 431 
 
 Zoroaster 
 
 theories of separation from Buddhism, 35. 
 
 relation to Vedic worship, 36. 
 
 Ormuzd, controller of natural and moral order, 38. 
 
 dualism of, 39. 
 
 his dualism ethical, 40. 
 
 importance of his ethical conceptions, 41. 
 
 his belief in conversion, 50-1. 
 
 merits of his religion, 54. 
 
 purity of his theology, 55. 
 
 criticism of his dualism, 56-9. 
 
 historic influence of his religion, 60. 
 
 strength and weakness of his religion, 385-6. 
 
 
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 TEMPTATION AND 
 DEVELOPMENT. 
 
 THE HUMILIATION OF CHRIST 
 IN ITS OFFICIAL ASPECT. 
 
 APPENDIX. 
 
 VII. 
 
 " These lectures are able and deep-reaching to a degree not often found in the relig- 
 ious literature of the day ; withal they are fresh and suggestive. . . . The learning 
 and the deep and sweet spirituality of this discussion will commend it to many faithful 
 students of the truth as it is in Jesus." Congregationalist. 
 
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