REBIRTH AND HEREDITY 125 



that was not subservient to bodily existence ; but as it is 

 the law of nature to go from one extreme to another, as 

 opposite forces expend themselves in their fight for supre- 

 macy, to evolve a concurrent force out of their joint actions 

 which cease to be a disturbing force as the antagonistic forces 

 become more temperate by intermingling and exhaustion, so in 

 mental evolution we find the same rule applies. In like 

 manner as the superhuman or psychical forces of nature and 

 God's Trinity evolve new impetuses and inspirations in the 

 minds of men, his beliefs start in a variety of confused ideas 

 which gradually mingle together to produce an understand- 

 able whole as one imperfect ideal is influenced by other 

 incomplete ideals from the abstract imaginations that combine 

 to produce its creation and existence. 



We now find that the ideas of rebirth carried to extremes 

 by the religions of antiquity, particularly in Egypt, where 

 the bodies of the dead are embalmed and sometimes even 

 encased in pyramids to ensure the future return to mortality, 

 which is only an imperfect idea of immortality, when they 

 hoped to outshine in social pre-eminence those who were not so 

 carefully preserved.. In the same way every religion has, 

 and will till man has evolved a perfect understanding, capable 

 of knowing what is right from what is wrong, and a more 

 perfect will capable of doing what is right for the good of 

 others, rather than selfishly making charity begin, instead of 

 end, at home, and learns to do the will of God because it is 

 that alone he was created for, and therefore is his duty. He 

 will continually distort all revelations to suit the particular 

 fanaticisms, aims and objects of the age of evolution in which 

 he lives. Without these fanaticisms as a means of organiza- 

 tion, it would have been impossible in the past to have or- 

 ganized virtuous minorities in a sufficiently efficient manner 

 for them to have become powerful enough to have overcome 

 the vicious majorities which the degeneration of past ideals of 

 lower orders of virtue gave birth to. 



Thus various forms of rebirth and reincarnation have 

 been invented in the past to suit the different phases of 

 evolution. I am not trying to argue for or against any one 

 form of rebirth or religion, nor do I wish the reader to con- 

 sider that I am laying down the one herein exemplified as 

 proved or demonstrated. I am only placing before him for 



