4

The time must come, sooner or later, when our morality will have to
conform to the probable mission of the race; when the arbitrary, often
ridiculous restrictions whereof it is at present composed will be
compelled to make way for the inevitable logical restrictions this
mission exacts. For the individual, as for the race, there can be but
one code of morals--the subordination of the ways of life to the
demands of the general mission that appears entrusted to man. The axis
will shift, therefore, of many sins, many great offences; until at last
for all the crimes against the body there shall be substituted the
veritable crimes against human destiny; in other words, whatever may
tend to impair the authority, integrity, leisure, liberty, or power of
the intellect.

But by this we are far from suggesting that the body should be regarded
as the irreconcilable enemy which the Christian theory holds it. Far
from that, we should strive, first of all, to endow it with all
possible vigour and beauty. But it is like a capricious child:
exacting, improvident, selfish; and the stronger it grows the more
dangerous does it become. It knows no cult but that of the passing
moment. In imagination, desires, it halts at the trivial thought, the
primitive, fleeting, foolish delight of the little dog or the negro.
The satisfactions procured by the intellect--the comfort, security,
leisure, the gladness--it regards as no more than its due, and enjoys
in fullest complacency. Left to itself, it would enjoy these so
stupidly, savagely, that it would very soon stifle the intellect from
which it derived these favours. Hence there is need for certain
restrictions, renouncements, which all men must observe; not only those
who have reason to hope, and believe, that they are effectively
striving to solve the enigma, to bring about the fulfilment of human
destiny and the triumph of mind over insensible matter, but also the
crowds in the ranks of the massive, unconscious rearguard, who placidly
watch the phosphorescent evolutions of mind as its light gleams on the
world's elementary darkness. For humanity is a unique and unanimous
entity. When the thought of the mass--that thought which scarcely is
thought--travels downwards, its influence is felt by philosopher and
poet, astronomer and chemist; it has its pronounced effect on their
character, morals, ideals, their sense of duty, habits of labour,
intellectual vigour. If the myriad, uni