88 EvohUion and its Consequences 



principle apportioning after death rewards and punishments, 

 according to a standard of virtue, necessarily involves the 

 existence of an entity, which, as being most powerful, inteUi- 

 gent, and good, is virtually, and logically, a personal God, 

 whatever be the name habitually applied to it. 



I do not know what precise meaning Professor Huxley 

 would give to the word religion. He speaks of ' worship, " for 

 the most part of the silent sort," at the altar of the Unknown 

 and the Unknowable,' but he has not (as far as I recollect) 

 explained to us as yet the full and exact nature and tenets of 

 that religion the ritual of which is thus hinted at. Mr. 

 Darwin's conception of religion is, however, sufficiently 

 definite. He tells us i that it consists ' of love, complete sub- 

 mission to an exalted and mysterious superior, a strong sense 

 of dependence, fear, reverence, gratitude, hope for the future, 

 and perhaps other elements.' 



Let us apply this to the Unknown and the Unknowable. 

 ' Love ' for that of which we can by no possibility know any- 

 thing whatever, and to which we may as reasonably attribute 

 hideousness and all vileness, as beauty and goodness ! 

 ' Dependence ' on that of which treachery and mendacity may 

 be as much characteristics as are faithfulness and truth ! 

 •' Reverence ' for an entity, whose qualities, if any, may 

 resemble as much all we despise as all we esteem, and which, 

 for all we know, may be indebted to our faculties for any 

 recognition of its existence at all ! ' Gratitude ' to that which 

 we have not the faintest reason to suppose ever willingly did 

 anything for us, or ever will ! ' Hope ' in what we have no 

 right whatever to believe may not, with equal justice, be a 

 legitimate cause for despair as pitiless, inexorable, and 

 unfeeling, if capable of any sort of intelligence whatever ! 



This is no exaggeration. Every word here put down is 

 strictly accurate, for if that which underlies all things is to us 

 ^ Descent of Man, vol. i. p. 68. 



