274 HEREDITY AND CHRISTIAN PROBLEMS 



the environment of God that purity and virtue, 

 Hght and love, may grow as naturally and surely 

 from the evil conditions of their lives as lilies and 

 roses from the soil of their gardens. Nature is 

 beneficent, and all her laws are ministers of love 

 — this is the gospel which is written so clearly 

 in the history of the race that all who will may 

 read. 



In the Vatican Gallery in Rome is the famous 

 antique group, Laocoon and his sons in the coils 

 of the serpents. The awful agony of the men, 

 depicted in the straining and protuberant muscles, 

 the look of despair, the futile fight against the 

 inevitable, the slimy folds and hissing tongues of 

 the monsters, are real as life and terrible as death. 

 This group has been and by many is still regarded 

 as a true symbol of human existence. To them 

 the serpents which have come up out of the sea 

 of unfathomable mystery which surrounds our 

 mortal life are the two great facts of heredity and 

 environment, and in their silent and remorseless 

 embrace, with griefs, struggles, agonies, despairs 

 unutterable, millions yearly are crushed, and 

 crushed at length to death ; and still the slimy 

 folds coil on and on through the centuries, stain- 

 ing the earth with tears and blood. 



Such is life to those who never look beyond the 



