agnostic or an atheist than to worship a devil--to have no standard than to
say: "Evil be thou my good."

[Footnote A: Lecky's "History of European Morals." Chap. V.]

And I believe that the tendency to reject all moral standards is largely
due to the refusal of an older generation to examine and to justify its own
standard. To refuse to discuss or defend it--to affirm that it is beyond
debate and not to be questioned without depravity is merely to produce the
impression that it is beyond defence and impossible to justify. It is not
surprising that people begin to say: "Let us eat and drink, for to-morrow
we die. Let us experience all we desire. Let us act like the normal healthy
creatures that we are. Let us ignore the flimsy barriers a corrupt and
imbecile moral code would erect between us and what we desire."

That is the point of view of many men and women to-day. That is what the
absence of a just and reasoned moral code has led to. And I am prepared,
in spite of all protests, to affirm that it is not a step backward, but
forward; that promiscuity is not as vile as prostitution--a prostitution
which has been accepted, which has been _defended_ by Christian people! It
is less horrible for a human being to have the morals of an animal than the
morals of a devil. We have to begin by rejecting the morality of fiends,
and we begin, even if the immediate effect is more terrifying to the
moralist than the old hidden-up devilry that lent itself to an easier
disguise.

So I believe. And so the present chaos, though it has its elements of
anxiety and its obvious dangers, leaves me unafraid. I am utterly persuaded
that we shall win through to solid ground.