314 EVOLUTION AND MAN S PLACE IN NATURE 



this inquiry, as heredity bears on thought concerning a 

 future state. A wasted organism is in any case a sad 

 dening sight; but all organism is doomed to decay. 

 Death is as constant in its appearance as Life. It makes 

 an immense difference, however, for the history of a 

 human life, whether the body is worn out by vice, or 

 has had its resources exhausted by virtuous labour. 

 Physical results in these cases bear witness to things 

 spiritual, bad and good, telling of the character of the 

 inner life, which is truly the life itself. For we are 

 dealing not with the outward man, but with the in 

 ward, which is the true self and concernment of a 

 man/ 1 Though all life ends in death, in the case of each 

 human life, the character of this end is to be judged by 

 the moral standard which has been the test of conduct 

 throughout its course. So far as a man is true to 

 virtue, to veracity and justice, to equity and charity, 

 and the right of the case, in whatever he is concerned, 

 so far he is on the side of the Divine administration 

 and co-operates with it. 2 It is this truth which has 

 ruled human thought concerning the Future. All see 

 rewards and penalties in the present ; we expect them 

 in the future state. Our inference is drawn from 

 the present order of things, from the course itself 

 of events, which lies open to every one s inquiry and 

 examination. We contemplate Conscience with its 

 testimony for the ideal ; self-criticism with its praise 

 and blame of our own conduct ; indignation with evil 

 doers who inflict wrong on their fellows ; and the force 

 of moral sentiment, the persistence of moral feeling, 

 that internal sense or feeling, which, Hume says, 



1 Plato s Republic, Book iv. p. 443, Jowett s Translation. 



2 Butler s Analogy, Pt. I. chap. iii. 



