Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER IV THE ART OF LIFE Man is born into a world of good and evil; and unlike the beasts of the field, he has been given the Power to choose the good and destroy the evil. But until he can distinguish between good and evil, he can neither profit by the one nor escape the other. The Bible deals only with moral good and moral evil. But physical good and physical evil do as much to make human happiness and human un- happiness as moral. They do indeed perhaps more, because it is more difficult for a man who is hungry and cold to be moral than for one who is warm and comfortable. The New Dispensation therefore deals with physical good and evil as well as moral. Wisdom is the Knowledge of good and evil, and the Power to do good and eschew evil. No man who has this Knowledge and this Power can do evil or endure it; for evil is unhappiness. It is because man has not this knowledge and power that he continues to do evil. Learn, then, the difference between good and evil, for it is this knowledge alone that can set you free. Man can mould the environment, not only as regards climate and material things, but also as regards morality and things spiritual. The beasts of the field act only according to their instinct or habit ; they cannot resist instinct or overcome it. Man can act against his instinct according to a Higher Law ; he can resist his instinct and overcome it. You have heard this Higher Law called Religion. But it is also Wisdom, for it involves the knowledge of good and evil The nearer man attains to Wisdom, the more he resists instinct and governs conduct according to the Higher Law. And a wise man does this not to appease a jealous God, not to escape the punishment of God ; he does this for one end only : to be happy. Man ha... --This text refers to the Paperback edition.