278 The Morality of Nature 



relationship of successive lives leads to the perception of 

 their real identity, and thus a view of continuous life in 

 many successive generations is seen, and suggests a solution 

 of the problem of the law of conduct. The life which ap- 

 parently begins and ends without logical completeness, and 

 without justice or sequence, is seen to be but a fragment of 

 a greater life in which all these qualities appear. We there- 

 fore proceed to examine more deeply this new aspect of man- 

 kind. To understand human conduct we must understand 

 humanity physically as well as psychologically, and the in- 

 quiry extends into that wide field of biological science in 

 evolution, where the unit of activity is a race or species, and 

 the terminable life time is an era. 



Here we find life to be potentially immortal in actual 

 material continuity, and we find its immortality to be the 

 consequence or reward of certain conduct which we call 

 right conduct. But we find much more. It becomes clear 

 that life, thus continued in right living, reaches into higher 

 and always higher physical phases, and with each phase 

 becomes eligible for further promotion. 



This revelation can be found and read without any in- 

 spired assistance. It stands in the natural world as the 

 essence of its life's normal function, independent of any 

 supernatural force, unless we so call the original and con- 

 tinuing fiat of life. 



In Evolution nature writes the open book in which the 

 physical element of this knowledge appears. The evolution 

 of life-forms is the repeated adoption, by an undying living 

 substance, of changed organizations and capacities, suited 

 to changing conditions, and their retention in apparent sta- 



