INVOLUTION 437 



less a doctrine than a light ; it is a light revealing 

 in the chaos of the past a perfect and growing 

 order, giving meaning even to the confusions of the 

 present, discovering through all the deviousness 

 around us the paths of progress, and flashing its 

 rays already upon a coming goal. Men begin to 

 see an undeviating ethical purpose in this material 

 world, a tide, that from eternity has never turned, 

 making for perfectness. In that vast progression 

 of Nature, that vision of all things from the first 

 of time moving from low to high, from incom- 

 pleteness to completeness, from imperfection to 

 perfection, the moral nature recognizes in all its 

 height and depth the eternal claim upon itself. 

 Wholeness, perfection, love — these have always been 

 required of Man. But never before on the natural 

 plane have they been proclaimed by voices so 

 commanding, or enforced by sanctions so great and 

 rational. 



Is Nature henceforth to become the ethical 

 teacher of the world ? Shall its aims become the 

 guide, its spirit the inspiration of Man's life? Is 

 there no ground here where all the faiths and all 

 the creeds may meet — nay, no ground for a final 

 faith and a final creed ? For could but all men see 

 the inner meaning and aspiration of the natural 

 order should we not find at last the universal 



