232 INDOOE STUDIES 



the cruelties, the waste, the slaughters of history. 

 Think of that mad carnival of lust and power which 

 the history of the Eoman Empire alone shows. 

 The past of the race is knee-deep with blood, largely 

 innocent blood, and the past of nature is black with 

 convulsion and struggle. Admitted that good has 

 come out of it all, yet how unlike has been the 

 method to anything we know as goodness or benevo- 

 lence ! Good has come out of it because our consti- 

 tutions are adapted to it. To us it is good; to dif- 

 ferently constituted beings it might be bad. The 

 principle or power which underlies all things is like 

 the principle of gravitation, which is exerted equally 

 in all directions, and which spares no crashing or 

 crushing, no floods of water or downfall of moun- 

 tains, or subsidence of continents, in bringing about 

 the equilibrium which we behold. Some things 

 sink and some things swim; but whichever it be, 

 gravity has its way. There is no waste in nature; 

 waste in nature is but taking out of one pocket and 

 putting into the other. 



Prayer is practically a belief in miracles or special 

 providences, — a belief that the world is governed, 

 not by immutable law, but by a being whose favor 

 may be won, whose anger may be appeased, or 

 whose purpose may be changed, like that of a great 

 monarch or king. "Most men, in their prayers," 

 says Turg&ef, "ask God that two and two may not 

 make four." "The best prayers," says Joubert, 

 " are those which have nothing distinct, and which 

 thus partake of adoration. God listens but to 



