The Last Word. 217 



formed that I can see, nor are they actuated in such wise 

 that one may surely say k It is not Mind that moves 

 them from within." What difference there is, it seems to 

 me, is in degree, and not in kind, and if they think on 

 such matters, doubtless they are quite certain that the 

 world exists for their behoof and not at all for ours. If 

 so, they show their likeness to the folk that prayed the 

 locusts from the earth they had no business on. This 

 may seem to some irreverent, but it is hardly a match for 

 the brazen impiety of those that tacitly declared that God 

 had grown old and forgetful, and needed to be reminded 

 from time to time of what his duties were. 



I am no critic of the universe. So far as I can com- 

 prehend, it seems to me to be quite sensible. It is not 

 a pretty, ice-cream soda, sentimentalistic sort of place at 

 all, but one where everything must get a living somehow. 

 The insects that earn it honestly, whose products we can 

 use, seem to us praiseworthy. Those that live by murder 

 and rapine we fear unless they kill our foes. Then we 

 bless them. Those that deadhead their way, the para- 

 sites, we detest and loathe, and yet it must be that in the 

 larger view of Him that made them, there is neither 

 praise nor blame, loving nor loathing. What operates 

 in our minds and makes us call one action good and an- 

 other bad is an impulse that makes as surely for the 

 preservation of the race as that which prompts the wasp 

 to tweak the stung and palsied caterpillar's hair to see if 

 life still lingers. Truly, oh, truly, is it written, " As right- 

 eousness tendeth to life : so he that pursueth evil pursueth 

 it to his own death." 



But though the creatures I have here written of are not 

 to be to us an ensample of godly living, yet the study of 

 them cannot but make for our betterment in body and in 

 mind. If we are to make this world a place to live in it 



