Are we going to lose the sense of righteousness which is the very heart
of religion? There never was a time since the world began when the
average man cared so much for righteousness, when he laid so much
emphasis on human conduct, on kindness, on help, on all those things
that make this life of ours desirable and sweet. The ideal of character
and behavior has risen step by step from the beginning, and is higher
to-day than it ever was before. Not because men fear a whipping, not
because they are threatened with hell in another world, not because a
God of vengeance is preached to them, because they have grown to see
the beauty of righteousness, because they know that obedience to the
laws of God means health, means sanity, means peace, means prosperity,
means well-being, means all high and good and noble things. This
righteousness is not driven into one by blows from outside: it blossoms
out from the intellect and the conscience and the heart, as the
recognized law of all fine and desirable and human living.
What are we losing, then, as the result of this growth of the world in
accordance with the law of evolution? Are we losing our hope of the
future? The form of that hope is passing away. We no longer believe in
an underground world of the dead, as the Hebrews did. We no longer
believe in a heaven just above the blue, as Christendom has believed
for so long. We no longer believe in a heaven where all struggle and
thought and study and growth are left out, where there is to be only a
monotonous enjoyment that would pall upon any living rational soul.
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