ACCEPTING THE UNIVERSE 



accept the universe, have come frankly to ac- 

 cept that first verdict pronounced upon creation, 

 namely, that it is very good — good in its sum 

 total up to this astronomic date, whatever phases 

 it may at times present that lead us to a contrary 

 conclusion. 



Not that cold and hunger, war and pestilence, 

 tornadoes and earthquakes, are good in a positive 

 sense, but that these and kindred things are vastly 

 overbalanced by the forces and agencies that 

 make for our well-being, — that "work together for 

 good," — the sunshine, the cooling breezes, the 

 fertile soil, the stability of land and sea, the gentle 

 currents, the equipoise of the forces of the earth, air, 

 and water, the order and security of our solar sys- 

 tem, and, in the human realm, the good-will and 

 fellowship that are finally bound to prevail among 

 men and nations. 



In remote geologic ages, before the advent of 

 man, when the earth's crust was less stable, when 

 the air was yet loaded with poisonous gases, when 

 terrible and monstrous animal forms held high 

 carnival in the sea and upon the land, it was not in 

 the same sense good — good for beings constructed 

 as we are now. In future astronomic time, when the 

 earth's air and water and warmth shall have dis- 

 appeared — a time which science predicts — and 

 all life upon the globe fails, again it will not be good. 

 But in our geologic, biologic, and astronomic age, 



4 



