If there is one fact in nature upon which science has laid greater stress than any other, it is the absolute omnipotence and universality of law. Science is forcing its way into every department of life and existence, and wherever its light is turned law is revealed. Facts apparently the most diverse and contradictory have been collected and correlated, and from this wider standpoint a definite law and order shown to prevail.
The Theory of Evolution is the last step taken in this direction and has established the universal sovereignty of law beyond the possibility of dispute. Step by step science has traced life back through all its forms, no matter how complex or varied until at last it reaches an undifferentiated substance so dead and nebulous as scarcely to be called matter. With a logical clearness that cannot be gainsaid it has shown that all life, all the present universe is the result of law acting on, and working through, this primordial matter; that through process of law this ethereal, unconscious substance is gradually condensed and vivified: that simple cells become complex organisms, the unconscious forms most keenly conscious; all by process of law entering into the heart of matter, forming, evolving, vivifiying, ennobling it. Science has proved that in all this there can be no break nor lack of continuity, "no point where it could be said 'This is a natural process, the result of law, and this is not;' " but that from beginning to end there is one unbroken chain of cause and effect; that every present state is, and must be, the logical result of all previous states, and the no less logical cause of all succeeding ones. It has shown existing nature, the "fixed, the everlasting hills" to be neither fixed nor everlasting, but of their very nature transitory; that which is permanent to be not this or that form but the cosmic process, the process of law, of which these are the ever changing expression. Through the doctrine of the survival of the fittest — not of the strongest — it has shown that only those forms survive which are in harmony with this cosmic growth; that in nature all things are ranked by this; — the degree to which they are at one with her, the degree to which they are conscious of, to which they express, this cosmic law of growth. To nature good and evil are only that which is in harmony and that which is in discord, and discord means death. Everywhere and throughout all, from the highest form of conscious life to the lowest atoms of nebulous matter, law is ever present and omnipotent.
What then is law? What this creative guiding potency that rules so absolutely, that ennobles all it touches, and raises dead matter to consciousness, consciousness of self and of law? All around us we see its results but of itself we think little. We "live and move and have our being" so much in matter, it forces itself so much upon us through our senses, that we are given to thinking of law, if we think of it at all, as some quality, some attribute of matter; and in this view we are strengthened by seeing that matter is never unaccompanied by law.
Yet even at a most superficial examination such an opinion is seen to be untenable. For by the study of matter itself, which materialistic science today considers so all important — and perhaps rightly so — we are forced to the conclusion that we know nothing of it save as the vehicle of law; that when we say we know this or that form of life or matter we mean we know more or less imperfectly the law of its being. Though we cannot conceive of matter as apart from law we can conceive of law as apart from matter, the whole science of mathematics stands witness thereto; matter cannot have an independent existence, law can. Hence of the two it is matter not law that is attribute. Thus we see that law is not of matter, nor attribute of matter, but lies far back of it, and though causing, is itself at the opposite pole from the material universe. For law is of its very essence spirit, not spiritual, but Spirit.
With this in mind if we look again at the law of evolution it is as though there were implanted in the heart of each monad of matter a germ of spirit, containing in potentiality the whole universe; as though law were the nearest possible expression of the nature of this germ; evolution its expansion and growth, the manifestation little by little of its potentiality; the law of evolution, the law of its growth.
From this standpoint there open out on every side such wide vistas of thought that we scarcely know where first to turn our eyes. All life takes on a new and deeper meaning. We are too apt in thoughtless life to look no deeper than the lighter ripples of seeming chance which play upon the surface of our lives and say there is no meaning, no deeper current, that can be known and studied. But now we see that within all life, from the highest solar system to the lowest cell, there is a deep, a profound meaning, for there spirit lies revealed. There, if we would but look, the soul's nature may be known and studied and when so studied the deep purposeful current seen.
Law then becomes the expression of spirit in matter; the law of evolution becomes the order and form of its manifestation; and the present universe represents the extent to which such manifestation has taken place. Within the propositions of science wrested with such toil from manifested nature we see far reaching spiritual truths. Far reaching? Nay rather universal. For as science taught the universality and omnipotence of Law so now, far beyond theology's widest conceptions, does it show the universality and omnipotence of spirit; more it shows the unity of spirit; that every monad of matter is a potential universe, that the essence of all things is, and must be, the same.
The absolute continuity of evolution that science has so strenuously maintained, now becomes even more pronounced. What is true of the general current of nature must be equally true of the countless evolutionary streams which compose it, and we see that in the life and development of spirit in matter there can be no break nor cessation. The evolutionary flow may be a spiral one and indeed must be so; for nature moves in cycles. All around us this is shown — as day fallows night and night again puts out the light of day, so must periods of unmanifestation follow those of manifestation. Hybernation is a universal fact, but hybernation is not discontinuity. The evolutionary stream must be continuous because it is one. The unbroken flow from source to goal, the essential unity of all successive evolutionary lives along one line, their coordination into one distinct individuality, the thread upon which all these lives like beads are strung, is an inevitable consequence.
From this there flows another thought, that the only true life, the only permanency is this evolving spiritual essence that grows, but is not born, not changed nor dies, throughout the ages. As science tells us, that which is permanent is not this or that form but is that cosmic process of which these are the ever changing manifestation, and this cosmic process is spirit.
It were as well here to remember that no theory, no matter how old, (nor new for that matter) no matter how profound in its simplicity or fascinating in its universality is of value save as it explains the facts with which it deals and is in accord with the general spirit of nature. Man has within him two faculties capable of judging of these two requirements, the first his mind, the second his heart. Deep seated in the heart of man is the conviction that love and mercy are facts lying very close to spirit and should be the law; that "Compassion is the law of laws"; and that the universe rests on
"A love so limitless, deep
and broad,
That men have renamed it
and called it God."
To me it seems that the convictions of the human heart are not lightly to be set aside, (and surely if our mind has led us right this must be true, for the heart lies closest to spirit); that his ideals are the surest knowledge any man has of the great guiding power and essence of nature; that through the heart we partake of that essence and are at one with it; and that in fact as well as in metaphysics perfect knowledge is perfect union. It were well then to look deep into the facts of nature, to examine well this theory to which our mind has led us, to see if it conforms to the convictions of the heart as well as to the reasonings of the brain. For while the brain alone is satisfied we can at best be in possession of but half a truth. Pain does exist and agony and despair, and their existence is a mystery so deep that the brain of man turns shuddering from it. Their purpose can be felt, but rarely told. Yet few who have ever truly drunk the cup of sorrow and bitterness to the dregs, ever suffered unto death, but knew the meaning and the purpose of it, few would barter what they found therein for ought of joy they had known before. Law is merciful and even the brain will have to see its meaning.
If then evolution is the expanding and manifestation of a single spiritual essence, manifesting throughout successive lives, growing by reason of the expansive force of its own being, we must realize that the true identity of each life is the spiritual essence manifesting in it. The true life is the evolving germ, the single essence through all its forms and lives rather than the particular shape it is temporarily occupying. The heart and essence of each bead must be the thread upon which all are strung. Therefore to rightly judge any life it is necessary to consider it as the result of, the expression of, the entire evolutionary ray of which it is the present manifestation. More than that, as the cause of the future direction of that ray, the determinator of all future states or lives. For we must remember that cause and effect are one and inseparable, and that it is through this law that all growth, all evolution, is accomplished. "As we act today so will we be tomorrow." "As the twig is bent the tree's inclined," are proverbs where the truth lies so near the surface that we are blind to it. From this standpoint pain, misery, anguish, all are merciful. They are the hedge of thorns between the pathway of life and the precipice of death. They drive those back who, blindly bent upon destruction turn from the path. For destruction would await those who rush from the path of cosmic evolution. What is the doctrine of the survival of the fittest but this; that the law of life is harmony and the law of death is discord.
Again it should be remembered that this pain and anguish are not of law. They serve a purpose in the law truly, but they are the results of thwarting law, evolution misdirected. Regain the path and both the purpose and the pain disappear. Both pain and pleasure are no more than the guardian angels of life, they are the growth by the wayside, a stimulus and a warning. The way, the way itself is life and life is real and holy — but to return.
So science herself, unconsciously it is true, but none the less surely, points to the existence of spirit pervading all matter. But having proved beyond a shadow of doubt the omnipotence and universality of law and so of spirit, in all kingdoms up to that of man, she leaves us there unaided to apply what she has told us as best we may. There somehow her voice is dumb. She no longer sees law save obscurely in the dead matter of man's body. Surely it would seem as though somehow in man law was not as all pervading as before; as though here a new and disturbing element had entered, an element capable of perverting law, or what we have seen to be the same thing hindering the natural expression of spirit. It would seem as though each man had that within him capable of hindering, diverting or aiding spirit in its appointed course of evolution in matter; as though man partook of that wondrous quality of spirit and could himself guide evolution; as though in him spirit had so wrought consciousness into matter that he as a conscious whole so partook of its nature as to have that guiding and creative faculty one aspect of which we call free will. Man now has the power of thwarting spirit for the reason that he is spirit. He is differentiated from the lower kingdoms far more by this than by the attribute of his reason.
All around us is artificial, the result of the will of man. Our animals, trees, fruits and flowers are all the result of man's will. Herein man becomes the guide of evolution and is responsible therefor. Spirit has so far expressed itself in him that he now not only has the guiding of his own life but that of all around him. More and more the course of evolution is flowing through him. More and more as it expresses itself in him does he become responsible for its trend. Little by little all below him in the scale of consciousness becomes dependent upon him more and more for the development of their lives, and we can see before us man's future taking shape not only as the guide and master of his kind and those below him, but as one shaping worlds and universes to his will.
Through this power uncontrolled, only half realized, man still bound and blinded by matter, mistakes it, the expression, for his true being, and sacrifices the essence to the manifestation, the end to the means.
Blindly, fondly, eagerly he pursues the flying phantom. Ever when thought caught, it turns to dust. Disappointment, pain, tragedy follow his steps. The tragedy of long strife, long sacrifice, attainment, but to find it bitter, bitter past endurance. Man is but the fable of Phaeton driving the horses of the Sun. It is this that makes the hard and bitter pain and agony, makes men turn and swear there is no spirit, no law, no mercy, nought but cruel sport of crueller fate with helpless puppets.
Finally, from the depths of his great despair, knowledge comes to him. He sees, or perhaps more truly feels, the true course of the life current in him; that current which has its source and goal in spirit matter ceases to blind him. He finds his peace. Spirit and Law once more become omnipotent. The Drop is merged into the Ocean.