it would be knowledge of a world in which all was evil or all was good.
On the other hand, valid knowledge of a world in which good and evil are
in conflict, and in which the former is realized through victory over
the latter, would not destroy morality. What is inconsistent with the
moral life is the conception of a world where there is no movement from
evil to good, no evolution of character, but merely the stand-still life
of "Rephan." But absolutely certain knowledge that the good is at issue
with sin in the world, that there is no way of attaining goodness except
through conflict with evil, and that moral life, as the poet so
frequently insists, is a process which converts all actual attainment
into a dead self, from which we can rise to higher things--a self,
therefore, which is relatively evil--would, and does, inspire morality.
It is the deification of evil not negated or overcome, of evil as it is
in itself and apart from all process, which destroys morality. And the
same is equally true of a pantheistic optimism, which asserts that all
things _are_ good. But it is not true of a Christian optimism, which
asserts that all things are _working together for_ good. For such
optimism implies that the process of negating or overcoming evil is
essential to the attainment of goodness; it does not imply that evil, as
evil, is ever good. Evil is unreal, only in the sense that it cannot
withstand the power which is set against it. It is not _mere_ semblance,
a mere negation or absence of being; it is opposed to the good, and its
opposition can be overcome, only by the moral effort which it calls
forth. An optimistic faith of this kind can find room for morality; and,
indeed, it furnishes it with the religious basis it needs. Browning,
however, has confused these two forms of optimism; and, therefore, he
has been driven to condemn knowledge, because he knew no alternative but
that of either making evil eternally real, or making it absolutely
unreal. A third alternative, however, is supplied by the conception of
moral evolution. Knowledge of the conditions on which good can be