156 THE PORTAL OF EVOLUTION 



majority of existing cases in the present age, time and moment, 

 it would be impossible to arrive at a true conception of what 

 is the truth that lies at the bottom of the ever-changing phases 

 of evolution in human laws, religious rules and social customs 

 and fashions. This is why I have deemed it necessary to 

 reduce so many subjects to their most abstract interpretation, 

 that the reader may form an unbiassed estimate of the im- 

 portance of the extraordinary Hypothesis that is the base of 

 this treatise, yet which, nevertheless, I feel convinced when 

 better understood by the aid of future study and research will 

 be the foundation on which will be built an edifice of more 

 perfect understanding of right and wrong, a more perfect form 

 of government, and a wiser system, not for the punishment, 

 but for the prevention of crime and the reward of virtue. 

 Hence the sins which are conducive to the virtues of 

 our state of life will go unpunished . in our lifetime, but will 

 possibly have to be atoned for by some of our children, and 

 our virtues, in the same manner, will produce greater 

 virtues in our children and raise some if not all of 

 them to a higher standard of virtue and a higher stan- 

 dard in the social scale, either in their lifetime or in the 

 lifetime of their children's children, and vice versd. So the 

 good we perform in God's eyes will either raise us in social 

 advancement, add to our happiness and increase our wealth 

 and comfort, or else confer the like blessings on our children 

 and their children should these blessings not be conducive to 

 our own good. So even though they may be unknown to the 

 world, our virtues and sins, according to how they appear in 

 God's eyes, bring their rewards of wealth and health, joy and 

 happiness, or their punishments of poverty, ill-health, intem- 

 perance and insanity, and damnation or extinction of our 

 souls as well as of our bodies if we err, and the reward of 

 immortality if we do what God most requires of us ; and also 

 make this life on earth a heaven or a hell according to how 

 we make the best use of our time or how we waste it. This 

 is one of the reasons why we should be far and away more 

 careful and considerate than we are as to how we find fault 

 with our neighbour's sins, for we know not if they are for the 

 public good or ill, or if they are sent to him to make his life 

 more perfect in virtues, the possibility of the attainment of 



