'The Supreme Power on this petty earth can be nothing else but the
Humanity, which, ever since fifty thousand--it may be one hundred and
fifty thousand--years has slowly but inevitably conquered for itself
the predominance of all living things on this earth, and the mastery of
its material resources. It is the collective stream of Civilization,
often baffled, constantly misled, grievously sinning against itself
from time to time, but in the end victorious; winning certainly no
heaven, no millennium of the saints, but gradually over great epochs
rising to a better and a better world. This Humanity is not all the
human beings that are or have been. It is a living, growing, and
permanent Organism in itself, as Spencer and modern philosophy
establish. It is the active stream of Human Civilization, from which
many drop out into that oblivion and nullity which is the true and only
Hell.'--F. HARRISON, _Creed of a Lagman_, p. 72.
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