Speaker 1: Conquest, not resignation. He who has undertaken the sublime task
of overcoming himself does not resign himself to anything that
is evil. He subjects himself only to that which is good.
Resignation to evil is the lowest weakness. Obedience to good
is the highest power. To resign one's self to sin
and sorrow, to ignorance and suffering is to say, in effect,
I give up. I am defeated. Life is evil, and
I submit. Such resignation to evil is the reverse of religion.
It is the direct denial of good. It elevates evil
to the position of supreme power in the universe. Such
submission to evil shows itself in a selfish and sorrowful life,
a life devoid of strength against temptation and that of
joy and calm, which are the manifestation of a mind
that is dominated by good. Man. Is not framed for
perpetual resignation and sorrow, but for final victory and joy.
All the spiritual laws of the universe are with the
good Man. For good preserves and shields. There are no
laws of evil. Its nature is destruction and desolation. The
consciousness modification of the character away from evil and towards
good forms. At present no part in the common course
of education. Even our religious teachers have lost this knowledge
and practice, and cannot therefore instruct concerning it. Moral growth
is so far in the great mass of mankind unconscious,
and is brought about by the stress and struggle of life.
The time will come, however, when the conscious formation of
character will form an important part in the education of youth,
and when no man will be able to feel the
position of preacher and lets does he be a man
of habitual self control, unblemished integrity, and exalted purity, so
as to be able to give sound instruction in the
making of character, which will then be the main feature
of religion. The doctrine herein set forth by the author
is the doctrine of conquest over evil, the annihilation of sin,
and necessarily the permanent establishment of man and the knowledge
of good, and in the enjoyment of perpetual peace. This
is the teaching of the masters of all religions in
all ages. Howsoever it may have been disguised and distorted
by the unenlightened. It is the doctrine of all the
perfect ones that were and will be the doctrine of
all the perfect ones that are to come. It is
the doctrine of truth. And the conquest is not of
an evil without, not of evil men, or evil spirits,
or evil things, but of the evil within, of evil thoughts,
evil desires, evil deeds. For when every man has destroyed
the evil within his own heart, to where in the
whole vast universe will any one be able to point
and say there is evil? In that great day, when
all men have become good within, all traces of evil
will have vanished from the earth, Sin and sorrow will
be unknown, and there will be universal joy for evermore