242 The Morality of Nature 



of dictionaries or a priest, tend now as before, to develop 

 too much faith in the codes he has made or adopted, so that 

 he refuses to beHeve them imperfect or transient. All re- 

 ligions visibly tend, in cultivation, toward elaborate theolo- 

 gies, devised in the effort to defend indefinitely, and 

 maintain perpetually, precepts which are properly of fugitive 

 value, and must in time need regeneration. 



This tendency to fossilize in structure is not peculiar to 

 any age or to any cult. It is seen in philosophy as in religion, 

 and is equally evident in the civil law. It is clearly a failing 

 of humanity at large, and may well be attributed to the same 

 natural necessities which establish death and re-birth in all 

 forms of Hfe. 



It appears therefore, natural and normal, that rigidity 

 which has so long persisted in control of the moral codes, 

 now needs readjustment almost amounting to reconstruction ; 

 and calls for eradication of error which almost threatens 

 collapse. 



The saving factors are however powerful for reconstruc- 

 tion. There is still alive the persistent aspiring faith which 

 revives in new form with better ideals when imperfect ones 

 expire ; there is the instinct for altruism which is the funda- 

 mental virtue of the morality of evolution; and is the same 

 altruism which was imparted to humanity in the greatest 

 faith known to the world. It has preserved its essence in 

 reverence through all vicissitudes; and now holds to it un- 

 swervingly while forms and doctrines fall to pieces. The 

 instinctive sacrifice of love, which is greater if forbidden, 

 continues to attach itself to its old ideals, and to reach out 

 for new interpretations, and to achieve its own reward. 



