6 EVOLUTION AND ETHICS 



cosmic strife. In the case of mankind, the self-assertion f 

 the unscrupulous seizing upon all that can be grasped, 

 the tenacious holding of all that can be kept, which 

 constitute the essence of the struggle for existence, 

 have answered. For his successful progress, as far 

 as the savage state, man has been largely indebted to 

 those qualities which he shares with the ape and 

 the tiger ; his exceptional physical organization ; his 

 cunning, his sociability, his curiosity and his imitat- 

 iveness ; his ruthless and ferocious destructiveness 

 when his anger is roused by opposition. 



But, in proportion as men have passed from 

 anarchy to social organization and in proportion as 

 civilization has grown in worth, these deeply ingrained 

 serviceable qualities have become defects. After the 

 manner of successful persons, civilized man would 

 gladly kick down the ladder by which he has climbed. 

 He would be only too pleased to see ' the ape and 

 tiger die.' But they decline to suit his convenience ; 

 and the unwelcome intrusion of these boon companions 

 of his hot youth into the ranged existence of civil life 

 adds pains and griefs, innumerable and immeasurably 

 great, to those which the cosmic process necessarily 

 brings on the mere animal. In fact, civilized man 

 brands all these ape and tiger promptings with the 

 name of sins ; he punishes many of the acts which 

 flow from them as crimes ; and, in extreme cases, he 

 does his best to put an end to the survival of the 

 fittest of former days by axe and rope. 



I have said that civilized man has reached this 

 point ; the assertion is perhaps too broad and general ; 



