100 EVOLUTION AND ETHICS n 



being distinct from God, as well as from the laws of 

 nature and things perceived by sense, I must confess 

 that word is to me an empty sound, without any 

 intelligible meaning annexed to it.] Nature in this 

 acceptation is a vain Chimc&ra introduced by those 

 heathens, who had not just notions of the omni 

 presence and infinite perfection of God.&quot; 



Compare Seneca (De JJeneficiis, iv. 7) : 



&quot; Natura, inquit, hiBc mihi pnestat. Non intelligis 

 te, quum hoc dicis, mutare Nomen Deo ? Quid enim 

 est aliud Natura quam Deus, et divina ratio, toti 

 mundo et partibus ejus inserta 1 Quoties voles tibi 

 licet aliter hunc auctorem rerum iiostrarum coin- 

 pellare, et Joveni ilium optimum et maximum rite 

 dices, et tonantem, et statorem : qui non, ut historic! 

 tradiderunt, ex eo quod post votum susceptum acies 

 Romanorum fugientum stetit, sed quod stant beneficio 

 ejus onmia, stator, stabilitorque est : hunc eundem et 

 fatum si dixeris, non mentieris, nam quum fatum 

 nihil aliud est, quam series implexa causarum, ille est 

 prima omnium causa, ea qua creterae pendent.&quot; It 

 would appear, therefore, that the good Bishop is 

 somewhat hard upon the heathen, of whose words 

 his own might be a paraphrase. 



There is yet another direction in which Berkeley s 

 philosophy, I will not say agrees with Gautama s, but 

 at any rate helps to make a fundamental dogma of 

 Buddhism intelligible. 



* I find I can excite ideas in my mind at pleasure, 

 and vary and shift the scene as often as I think fit. 

 It is no more than willing, and straightway this or 

 that idea arises in my fancy : and by the same power, 



