COSMIC PHILOSOPHY 



of equilibration. No amount of repentance for 

 lying can deprive lies of their tendency to 

 weaken the mutual confidence of men and thus 

 to dissolve society. The lie once told must 

 work its effects, as surely as the stone dropped 

 into water must give forth its arrested motion 

 in rippling circles. No penance or priestly ab- 

 solution can do away with the persistence of 

 force. 



Obedience to the so-called " laws of nature/* 

 which are the decrees of God, is therefore the 

 fundamental principle of religion viewed prac- 

 tically. And as was hinted at the close of the 

 twenty-second chapter of Part II., religion, as 

 thus interpreted, has a wider meaning than mo- 

 rality. For as we saw, in the chapter referred to, 

 that a philosophy of hedonism has for its sub- 

 ject matter the principles of action conducive 

 to the right living of the individual so far as his 

 own happiness is concerned, and that a philoso- 

 phy of morality has for its subject matter the 

 principles of action conducive to the right living 

 of the individual so far as the well-being of the 

 community is concerned ; so a philosophy of 

 religion has for its subject matter the relations 

 of the individual to the Inscrutable Power man- 

 ifested in the universe, and the principles of 

 action conducive to his right living considered 

 as a part and parcel of the universe. To live 

 in conformity to Nature's decrees is to live mor- 



