In contrast to these monistic-pantheistic world-views we find dualistic ones in the religion of Zarathustra (sixth century B.C.), in that of the Jewish prophets (from the eighth century B.C. onwards), and in those of Jesus and Mohammed, this last, however, showing itself to be in [pg 028] all points unoriginal and decadent. These religious thinkers do not start from an investigation of the existence which manifests itself in the universe, but from a view of the ethical which is quite independent of it. They put it in opposition to natural happenings. Accordingly they assume the existence of two world-principles, the natural and the ethical. The first is in the world, and has to be overcome; the other is incorporated in an ethical personality which is outside the world and has been given the final authority in this sphere. If among the Chinese and the Hindus the basic principle of morality was life in harmony with the world-will, so among dualists it is an attempt to be something different from the world in harmony with an ethical divine personality which is outside and above the world. The weakness of dualistic religions is that their world-view, because it rejects every kind of nature-philosophy, is always naïve. Their strength lies in the fact that they have the ethical within themselves, directly present and with undiminished force. They have no need to strain it and explain it, as monists have to, so as to be able to conceive it as an effluence from the world-will which reveals itself in nature. The world-views of the dualistic world-religions, taken as a whole, are optimistic. They live in the confident belief that ethical force will prove superior to natural, and so raise the world and mankind to true perfection. Zarathustra and the older Jewish prophets represent this process as a kind of world-reform. The optimistic element in their world-view asserts itself in a quite natural way. They have the will, and the hope of being able to transform human society and to make the races of the world fit for their higher destiny. Progress in any department of life means for them something gained, for they think of inward and outward civilization together. With Jesus the value of the optimistic element in his world-view is impaired by the fact that he looks forward to the perfected world as a result of a catastrophic end to the natural one, and while with Zarathustra and the older [pg 029] Jewish prophets the Divine intervention is to a certain extent only the completion of the human activities which have been directed to the perfecting of the world, it is with Jesus the only thing which has to be taken into account. The kingdom of God is to appear in a supernatural way; it is in no way prepared for by any effort made by mankind to attain to civilization.