pose of destroying his work, and let
him have his own way and time, they would save themselves much trouble.

THE CREATOR.

God--the all-creative Spirit--is the most positive element, or force in
nature, and nothing is or can have existence in the external world that
is not conceived and formed first in the matrix of the spirit. So it
is in the realm of the invisible that the law of progress, of unending
evolution takes its rise and becomes operative. Still, however clearly
defined may be a truth, a law in the mentality of the higher powers, it
can only be externalized to the degree comprehended by the mind through
which it is given to the world. All that saves this world from being
in a state of utter darkness is the fact that from its very beginning
there have been souls capable of being illuminated by the light from
the higher life, spirits so grounded in a faith in its certainties that
they have shone out upon the stern and awful path trod by the human
race like beacon lights above a stormy sea, or beaming stars shedding a
calm radiance upon a trackless waste.

RETRIBUTIVE JUSTICE.

We know so little of the mysteries of occult, divine law, and yet
taking thought of the entire history of the human race, such as we
have, and our own personal experience and observation, we must
recognize that there are certain fixed principles, certain laws,
indicating the undying value of right living. To understand and apply
these laws to the all around conduct of life, to the practical affairs
of human effort, is in its highest, its spiritual sense the real
business of earthly existence. Those religious teachers who have had a
degree of spiritual enlightenment have wrapped up their perceptions of
moral law, and disguised them with creeds and dogmas, and have used
them to further their personal ambitions, and to hold their power over
such people as they have been able to hypnotize into believing in them
as the vice-gerents of the Most High. All this has been going on for
long, and has been handed down through unnumbered generations until it
has crystallized into forms and ceremonies, and unmoral
conventionalities which stultify the race. "Dead loads" of good people
believe they are doing God's service in trying to live up to these,
never knowing how much they are the result of fanaticism and ignorance,
and the concentrated intention of every sort of priests to keep their
power over unthinking minds. Here and t