158 THE PORTAL OF EVOLUTION 



And where he rises victorious from the fray, 

 Well tried and strengthened to hereafter win 

 A fiercer fight some other day, 

 In dust and dirt and dire disgrace 

 You'd be left writhing on your face. 



Therefore the only correct definition of crime and virtue 

 must be that Crime is sin carried by misjudgment, intemper- 

 ance or hate to the height of folly, for all crime is folly ; and 

 Virtue is sin carried by Charity, Love and Humility to the feet 

 of Wisdom, for wisdom is the height of virtue. It matters not 

 if the crime in itself be a virtuous act or not, God will only 

 judge it by its effect upon or for the good of others, not by the 

 perfection the performer sees in it ; thus we see many goody- 

 goody persons whose extreme zeal for virtue leads them to 

 perform acts virtuous in themselves that are obnoxious and 

 sometimes injurious to others, and which thereby, despite 

 their zeal for good, instead of being an example to be willingly 

 followed by all good people, they degenerate into bores that 

 are shunned by all, and their highly decorated virtues are 

 only vices in peacock's feathers. Virtue in the abstract is any 

 act or combination of acts (for one wrong act may produce a 

 more valuable result than a combination of three good acts of 

 less value, and may so merit reward, not punishment) which 

 produce more good than harm to our neighbour or our off- 

 spring, and so merit reward, not punishment. I have pur- 

 posely left self out of consideration, because God rewards our 

 actions, not by the good or harm they do to ourselves, but by 

 the good or harm they do to the community or to others, for 

 it is only our conceit that makes us think that we are indi- 

 vidually of more value than a snail or a fly. 



I do not wish this chapter to be taken in its concrete sense, 

 only in the abstract, as illustrating how Good or Evil has to 

 be viewed from the standpoint of evolution, so that we may 

 get a clearer and better understanding in the manner in which 

 we ought to apply past knowledge, so as to evolve the greatest 

 benefit from it in the future. Now, so long as we remember 

 that veneration to God and Religion are essential factors in 

 the true realisation of the laws of nature, and must overrule 

 all scientific knowledge, it is possible to produce good concrete 

 results from abstract evils. But lose sight of the predominant 



