e more we understand, the less can
feeling sway us; we know that all things are what they are, because they
are so constituted that they could not be otherwise, and we cease to be
angry with our brother, because he disappoints us; we shall not fret at
calamity, nor complain of fortune, because no such thing as fortune
exists; and if we fail it is better than if we had succeeded, not
perhaps for ourselves, yet for the universe. We cannot fear, when
nothing can befall us except what God wills, and we shall not violently
hope, when the future, whatever it be, will be the best which is
possible. Seeing all things in their place in the everlasting order,
Past and Future will not affect us. The temptation of present pleasure
will not overcome the certainty of future pain, for the pain will be as
sure as the pleasure, and we shall see all things under a rule of
adamant. The foolish and the ignorant are led astray by the idea of
contingency, and expect to escape the just issues of their actions; the
wise man will know that each action brings with it its inevitable
consequences, which even God cannot change without ceasing to be
himself.

In such a manner, through all the conditions of life, Spinoza pursues
the advantages which will accrue to man from the knowledge of God, God
and man being what his philosophy has described them. His practical
teaching is singularly beautiful; although much of its beauty is perhaps
due to associations which have arisen out of Christianity, and which in
the system of Pantheism have no proper abiding place. Retaining, indeed,
all that is beautiful in Christianity, he even seems to have relieved
himself of the more fearful features of the general creed. He
acknowledges no hell, no devil, no positive and active agency at enmity
with God; but sees in all things infinite gradations of beings, all in
their way obedient, and all fulfilling the part allotted to them.
Doubtless a pleasant exchange and a grateful deliverance, if only we
could persuade ourselves that a hundred pages of judiciously arranged
demonstrations could really and indeed have worked it for us; if we
could indeed believe that we could have the year without its winter, day
without night, sunlight without shadow. Evil is unhappily too real a
thing to be so disposed of.

But if we cannot believe Spinoza's system taken in its entire
completeness, yet we may not blind ourselves to the disinterestedness
and calm nobility which pervades hi