236 LIFE OF PROFESSOR HUXLEY chap, xvi 



such a system is indispensable to practical morality. I believe 

 that both these dogmas are very mischievous lies. 



With respect to the first, I am no optimist, but I have the 

 firmest belief that the Divine Government (if we may use such 

 a phrase to express the sum of the "customs of matter") is 

 wholly just. The more I know intimately of the lives of other 

 men (to say nothing of my own), the more obvious it is to me 

 that the wicked does not flourish nor is the righteous punished. 

 But for this to be clear we must bear in mind what almost all 

 forget, that the rewards of life are contingent upon obedience 

 to the whole law — physical as well as moral — and that moral 

 obedience will not atone for physical sin, or vice versa. 



The ledger of the Almighty is strictly kept, and every one 

 of us has the balance of his operations paid over to him at the 

 end of every minute of his existence. 



Life cannot exist without a certain conformity to the sur- 

 rounding universe — that conformity involves a certain amount 

 of happiness in excess of pain. In short, as we live we are paid 

 for living. 



And it is to be recollected in view of the apparent discrep- 

 ancy between men's acts and their rewards that Nature is juster 

 than we. She takes into account what a man brings with him 

 into the world, which human justice cannot do. If I, born, a 

 bloodthirsty and savage brute, inheriting these qualities from 

 others, kill you, my fellow-men will very justly hang me, but 

 I shall not be visited with the horrible remorse which would 

 be my real punishment if, my nature being higher, I had done 

 the same thing. 



The absolute justice of the system of things is as clear to me 

 as any scientific fact. The gravitation of sin to sorrow is as 

 certain as that of the earth to the sun, and more so — for experi- 

 mental proof of the fact is within reach of us all — nay, is before 

 us all in our own lives, if we had but the eyes to see it. 



Not only, then, do I disbelieve in the need for compensation, 

 but I believe that the seeking for rewards and punishments out 

 of this life leads men to a ruinous ignorance of the fact that 

 their inevitable rewards and punishments are here. 



If the expectation of hell hereafter can keep me from evil- 

 doing, surely a fortiori the certainty of hell now will do so ? If 

 a man could be firmly impressed with the belief that stealing 

 damaged him as much as swallowing arsenic would do (and it 

 does), would not the dissuasive force of that belief be greater 

 than that of any based on mere future expectations ? 



