Page:Tolstoy - Essays and Letters.djvu/328

 312 ESSAYS AND LETTERS

Reason is the power which enables men to define their relation to the universe^ and as all men stand in one and the same relation to the universe, it follows that religion — which is the elucidation of that relation — unites men. And union among men aiFords them the highest attainable welfare, both physical and spiritual.

Complete union with the highest and most perfect reason, and therefore complete welfare, is the ideal towards which humanity strives ; and all religions unite people, by supplying identical answers to all men of any given society when they ask what the universe is, and what its inhabitants are ; and by uniting them it brings them nearer to the attainment of welfare. But when reason, diverging from its natural function (that of determining man^s relation to God, and what his activity should be, conformably to that relation), is used in the service of the flesh, and for angry strife with other men and other fellow-creatures, and when it is even used to justify this evil life, so contrary to man^s nature and to the purpose for which he is intended — then those terrible calamities result, under which the majority of men are now suflFering, and a state is reached that makes any return to a reasonable and good life seem almost impossible.

Pagans united by the crudest religious teaching are far nearer the recognition of truth than the pseudo- Christian nations of our day, who live without any religion, and among whom the most advanced people are themselves convinced — and suggest to others — that religion is unnecessary, and that it is much better to live without any.

Among the pagans men may be found who, recog- nising the inconsistency of their faith with their increasing knowledge, and with the demands of their reason, produce or adopt a new religion more in accord with the spiritual condition of their nation, and accept- able to their compatriots and co-believers. But men of our world — some of whom regard religion as an instru- ment wherewith to keep common folk in subjection, while others consider all religion absurd, and yet others