In the new light that has come to him, the world and society have been transformed to his view and understanding. He discovers goodness in many places where his teachers had denied its existence, and its definition has become so changed, under his broader vision, that humanity seems teeming with it everywhere, and is ruled by it, and those departments of it most affecting society he observes to be increasing, and that instead of like an exotic in uncongenial soil, hard to be retained by mankind, it is perpetuated and cherished by natural human impulses. He finds, also, that the sum of badness in the world has been greatly exaggerated by his teachers, and that those branches of it most interfering with the welfare of society are gradually being lessened, and are likely to work out their extinction by the penalties of public disapproval. These convictions make the world seem a brighter and better dwelling place. They reveal to him the possibilities of its future, and tend to divert his higher aims from the obscure paths where tradition had been leading them, into more fruitful channels. The truth will have at last dawned upon him, bearing evidences in this age that none but the unenlightened can doubt, that superstition, during many of the centuries past, has belittled the world, and has discouraged humanity in improving it, under the mistaken assumption of the world’s small comparative importance in the great outcome; the circumstantial particulars, of which, it pretends to hold by divine revelation. Having rid himself of these beliefs by a process of reasoning, and the assistance of the available knowledge of his time, he arrives at the conclusion that the best work of humanity is not, altogether that taught by the creeds, and that its most divinely inspired motives are those which tend to increase the knowledge of worldly things, those which add to the sum of goodness in society by exhibiting its practical effect toward happiness, and those also which assist in the great end of equalizing the burdens and enjoyments of life among all.