Inhaltsangabe
This historic book may have numerous typos, missing text, images, or index. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. 1878. Not illustrated. Excerpt: ... has thus been formed in the mind as the moral conscience. The "evolution of morality" may be explained then as the gradual formation of conscience as the result of the activity of consciousness in relation to the experiences of the social life. The soul, that which displays its activity in consciousness, being, however, derived from God himself, not as having been made in his image, but as an evolutional product of his own essence, the development of the soul's faculties display the unfolding of the divine nature in man. Viewed in this light, the conscience may be described as the expression in the human soul of the divine consciousness, which becomes revealed as an instinct of moral propriety, as the soul's experiences are enlarged and the intellectual faculties become perfected in their operation. The divine origin of the soul here supposed has something in common with the ancient belief expressed in the dogma of the descent and ascent of souls. It has, however, one point of superiority. That dogma was founded on the idea of the impurity of matter, which was thought to have attracted the soul, imprisoning it in the body, by escape from which alone could it hope to attain to the proper exercise of its faculties. This notion is exactly opposite to that on which the evolution of morality is founded. According to this view, the body, so far from being an incumbrance, is really an aid to the soul, and is, in fact, absolutely necessary to the development of its powers and faculties. The body is just as much a part of the man as the soul itself, and instead of the former being a source of impurity, its intervention is required that the latter may attain to the knowledge which can alone fit it for existence in a higher sphere. Unless, however, the soul itself...
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