252 HUMANISM xiv 



unfortunately, it is necessary to carry the case to the 

 supreme court of metaphysics in order to enforce the due 

 respect for an ethical postulate. Moreover, it is only the 

 discussion of its metaphysical value that gives the ethical 

 argument any direct bearing on the question, not here to be 

 discussed as such, whether there is immortality as a 

 matter of fact. 



Let us take up, then, the first question, whether 

 immortality is an ethical postulate. What can be urged 

 in favour of this view ? The argument for it is exceedingly 

 simple : it consists in showing that without immortality it 

 is not possible to think the world as a harmonious whole, 

 as a moral cosmos. To show this, one has not to appeal 

 to anything more recondite than the fact that in our present 

 phase of existence the moral life cannot be lived out to 

 its completion, that it is not permitted to display its full 

 fruitage of consequences for good and for evil. When 

 ever Might triumphs over Right ; whenever the evildoers 

 succeed and the righteous perish ; whenever goodness is 

 trampled under foot and wickedness is exalted to high 

 places ; nay, whenever the moral development of character 

 is cut short and rendered vain by death, we are brought 

 face to face with facts which constitute an indictment of 

 cosmic justice, which are inconsistent with the conception 

 of the world as a moral order. Unless, therefore, we can 

 vindicate this order by explaining away the facts that 

 would otherwise destroy it, we have to abandon the 

 ethical judgment of the world of our experience as good 

 or bad ; we have to admit that the ideal of goodness is 

 an illusion of which the scheme of things recks not at all. 



But if we refuse to do this (and whether we are not 

 bound to refuse to abandon our ideals at the first show of 

 opposition will presently be considered), how shall the 

 ethical harmony be restored if not by the supposition of 

 a prolongation and perfection of the moral life in the 

 future ? Only so can character be made of real signifi 

 cance in the scheme of things ; only so is it something 



