We can recognise that our evil impulses are the natural remnant of bestial ancestry, and need not be due to diabolical promptings. An animal, though perhaps innocent from lack of knowledge, is bound and enslaved by its instincts; for instance, the apparently intelligent and social bee is driven by racial instincts into a prescribed course of action; a cat can no more refrain from trying to catch a bird than a man of high nature can allow himself to commit a crime.
The weak man often allows his brute nature to get the upper hand and enslave his higher self, and he hates himself afterwards for the degradation so caused; but the strong and free man takes control, and dominates his animal nature.
“If my body come from brutes, tho’ somewhat finer than their own,
I am heir, and this my kingdom. Shall the royal voice be mute?
No, but if the rebel subject seek to drag me from the throne,
Hold the Sceptre, Human Soul, and rule thy Province of the brute.”
IV
DUTY AND SERVICE
Q. 4. What is the duty of man?
A. To assist his fellows, to develop his own higher self, to strive towards good in every way open to his powers, and generally to seek to know the laws of Nature and to obey the will of God; in whose service alone can be found that harmonious exercise of the faculties which is identical with perfect freedom.