THE PATH OF EVOLUTION 



to know what God can do or cannot do ; but 

 the observation of his works shows that he does not 

 alter the workings of his laws. To believe that the 

 order of existence should be different from what we 

 know it is, because man's judgment might deem it 

 better to be so, may be very natural ; but it is the 

 judgment and the wisdom of Ignorance. We know 

 but little of life on this globe and nothing of life else- 

 where. All we do know is that all things are gov- 

 erned by the struggle between opposite tendencies and 

 forces that work for the general good ; the power 

 therein is limited by its own acts that which is best 

 to do has been done and must be done, though the in- 

 dividual may suffer. 



He who is conversant with the phenomena of Na- 

 ture, whoever has read the slight description in these 

 pages of the Path of Evolution, must be conscious of 

 the manner in which each phenomenon is interwoven 

 with and dependent upon other phenomena of wider 

 and deeper generalization. Thus one of the possibil- 

 ities of life rests upon the indispensable presence of 

 liquid water. This can exist as such only within 

 narrow ranges of temperature, and, though it remains 

 in mass unmoved from its ocean bed, is yet carried in 

 vapor in the shape of clouds, that turn to rain, and is 

 scattered over the thirsty land to give life's blood to 

 the growing plants. By properties peculiar to it and 



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