“What do believers in the Absolute mean by saving that their belief affords them comfort? They mean that since in the Absolute finite evil is ‘overruled’ already, we may, therefore, whenever we wish, treat the temporal as if it were potentially the eternal, be sure that we can trust its outcome, and, without sin, dismiss our fear and drop the worry of our finite responsibility. In short, they mean that we have a right ever and anon to take a moral holiday, to let the world wag in its own way, feeling that its issues are in better hands than ours and are none of our business.”
“To perceive the world differently, we must be willing to change our belief system, let the past slip away, expand our sense of now, and dissolve the fear in our minds,”
“...our moral and practical attitude....impulses, inhibitions.... how it contains and moulds us by its restrictive pressure almost as if we were fluids pent with the cavity of a jar.... It becomes our subconscious. [p. 287]”
“When we decide what to do, we in effect proclaim our wish that our conduct be made into a "universal law." Therefore when a rational being decides to treat people in a certain way he decrees that in his judgement, this is the way people ought to be treated. Thus if we treat him the same way in return we are doing nothing more than treating him as he has decided people are to be treated.”
“When once a decision is reached and execution is the order of the day, dismiss absolutely all responsibility and care about the outcome.”
“It does not follow, because our ancestors made so many errors of fact and mixed them with their religion, that we should therefore leave off being religious at all. By being religious we establish ourselves in possession of ultimate reality at the only points at which reality is given us to guard. Our responsible concern is with our private destiny, after all.”
“Why may we not be in the universe, as our dogs and cats are in our drawingrooms and libraries?”