ACCEPTING THE UNIVERSE 



lis. In the second case it is a duality that leaves 

 half of the world to the Devil. 



We select what we call the divine and stand con- 

 fused and abashed before the residue. We must 

 either change our notion about the power we call 

 God and make it all-inclusive, embracing evil as 

 well as good, or else we must change our notion 

 about Nature and see no evil in her. God and Nature 

 are one. If they are two, who or what is the second? 



How can we fail to see that all the shaded part 

 of the picture is necessary to the picture — that all 

 high lights would not make a picture, but only a 

 daub; and that all that we call good would not make 

 a world in which men could live and develop? Life 

 goes on under conditions more or less antagonistic. 

 The antagonism gives the power ; the friction de- 

 velops electricity. The vices and crimes and follies 

 and excesses of society are the riot and overflow of 

 the virtues. The pride of the rich, the tyranny of 

 power, the lust of gain, the riot of sensuality, are 

 all a little too much of a good thing — a little too 

 much heat or light or rain or frost or snow or food 

 or drink. There can be no perversions till there is 

 something good to pervert, no counterfeits till there 

 is first the genuine article. 



The currents of wild life get out of their banks 

 and we have, for example, a plague of locusts or 

 moths or forest worms, but the natural check surely 

 comes. The military spirit of Germany, which 



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