er this question otherwise than by recognizing
the law of life in love to men and in the service of them, this being for
our time the only rational answer as to the meaning of human life; and
this answer nineteen hundred years ago has been expressed in the
Christian religion and is likewise known to the vast majority of all
mankind.

This answer in a latent state lives in the consciousness of all men of
the Christian world of our time; but it does not openly express itself
and serve as guidance for our life, only because, on the one hand, those
who enjoy the greatest authority, so-called scientists, being under the
coarse error that religion is a temporary and outgrown step in the
development of mankind and that men can live without religion, inculcate
this error to those of the masses who are beginning to be educated; and,
on the other hand, because those in power, sometimes consciously, but
often unconsciously (being under the error that the Church faith is
Christian religion), endeavor to support and excite in the people crude
superstitions given out as the Christian religion. If only these two
deceptions were to be destroyed, then true religion, already latent in
men of our time, would become evident and obligatory.

To bring this about it is necessary that, on the one hand, men of science
should understand that the principle of the brotherhood of all men and
the rule of not doing unto others what one does not wish for oneself is
not one casual idea out of a multitude of human theories which can be
subordinated to any other considerations, but is an incontestable
principle, standing higher than the rest, and flowing from the changeless
relation of man to that which is eternal, to God, and is religion, all
religion, and, therefore, always obligatory.

On the other hand, it is necessary that those who consciously or
unconsciously preach crude superstitions under the guise of Christianity
should understand that all these dogmas, sacraments, and rites which they
support and preach are not only, as they think, harmless, but are in the
highest degree pernicious, concealing from men that central religious
truth which is expressed in the fulfilment of God's will, in the service
of men, and that the rule of acting toward others as one would wish
others to act toward oneself is not merely one of the prescriptions of
the Christian religion, but is the whole of practical religion, as indeed
is stated in the Gospels.

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