COSMIC PHILOSOPHY 



at the expense of the absolute subversal and 

 denial of the faith that had gone before it. If I 

 could not now perceive that what was once true 

 to me, and true to the world, was true forever, 

 in relation to what had to come after it, I do 

 not deny to myself that I should inevitably fall 

 away to cease believing at all henceforth both 

 in myself and in the world. Yes : if I could 

 not see in relation to Christianity, just as truly 

 as was seen by the master spirits of that religion 

 in relation to Judaism, that neither of this later 

 form of realization 'can one jot or tittle pass 

 away, until all be fulfilled ' in the newly arriving 

 doctrines of General Religion, — never, I am 

 convinced, could the latter take any real hold 

 upon me : never, in fact, could it I^e a religion 

 to me." ^ 



To those who still adhere to the sharp dis- 

 tinctions characteristic of the statical view of 

 things, who carry into their estimate of religious 

 opinions the conception of fixity of species, it 

 may seem absurd or sophistical in us to assim- 

 ilate with Christianity a system of thought which 

 has entirely thrown off the mythologic symbols 

 wherein Christianity has hitherto been clothed 

 and whereby it is customarily recognized as 

 possessing an individuality of its own. To such 

 it naturally seems that the giving up of the 

 symbol is the giving up of the reality, and that 

 ^ Miss Hennell, Present ReligioTiy pp. 50, 51. 



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