knowledge is that Life is the essential Being of God, and that each
individual intelligent outcome of Life is deathless as God Himself.

The 'Wilderness' is wide,--and within it we all find ourselves,--
some wandering far astray--some crouching listlessly among shadows,
too weary to move at all--others, sauntering along in idle
indifference, now and then vaguely questioning how soon and where
the journey will end,--and few ever discovering that it is not a
'Wilderness' at all, but a garden of sweet sights and sounds, where
every day should be a glory and every night a benediction. For when
the veil of mere Appearances has been lifted we are no longer
deceived into accepting what Seems for what Is. The Reality of Life
is Happiness;--the Delusion of Life, which we ourselves create by
improper balance and imperfect comprehension of our own powers, must
needs cause Sorrow, because in such self-deception we only dimly see
the truth, just as a person born blind may vaguely guess at the
beauty of bright day. But for the Soul that has found Itself, there
are no more misleading lights or shadows between its own
everlastingness and the everlastingness of God.

All the world over there are religions of various kinds, more or
less suited to the various types and races of humanity. Most of
these forms of faith have been evolved from the brooding brain of
Man himself, and have nothing 'divine,' in them. In the very early
ages nearly all the religious creeds were mere methods for
terrorising the ignorant and the weak--and some of them were so
revolting, so bloodthirsty and brutal, that one cannot now read of
them without a shudder of repulsion. Nevertheless, from the very
first dawn of his intelligence, man appears always to have felt the
necessity of believing in something stronger and more lasting than