Time and Consequence 115 



little evil effect. If the errors are great the effects are great 

 in proportion. If the conduct is successful it produces profit, 

 and if more successful, more profit, or of longer continu- 

 ance, so it is not for the present to definitely state what is 

 beneficial or good conduct and what bad; it can only be 

 decided by results which are often too remote to be visible. 

 The general definition of good conduct, as that which pro- 

 duces benefit, is enough to become the text for an inquiry 

 whether there is a law or system by which such conduct 

 can be studied, and especially whether such a system con- 

 tains anything to confirm the instinctive separation of con- 

 duct into two kinds, one kind impelled by a lower volition 

 of selfish character, and the other by a higher impulse 

 founded in morality. 



Already it appears that such a compensating system has 

 in it the potency of automatic operation. Its provisions are 

 carried out and its laws enforced without new external im- 

 pulse or control, that is to say without the need of any pater- 

 nal supervision, or of the intervention of any higher authority 

 to maintain the course of Nature as originally impelled. 



There is also becoming apparent the inevitableness of 

 these consequences. There can be no evasion. There is 

 strictly no penalty. The consequences are not punishments ; 

 they are rewards in less or greater values. Inactivity simply 

 encounters inconsequence and nothing; and nothingness is 

 the end; while any sufficient degree of activity secures its 

 corresponding extent of advantage, and thus it continues 

 with all possibilities. 



It becomes evident that as was premised goodness and 

 badness of conduct are relative terms ; the badness is simply 



