162 THE WHENCE AND THE WHITHER OF MAN 



t 



the dog, these bones and muscles would long ago have 

 carried ine to Megara or Bocetia, moved by my opin- 

 ion of what was best, if I had not thought it more 

 right and honorable to submit to the sentence pro- 

 nounced by the state than to run away from it. To 

 call such things causes is absurd. For there is a great 

 difference between the cause and that without which 

 the cause would not produce its effect." 



If there is no intelligence or love of truth in the 

 cause, how can there be anything higher in the effect ? 

 And if Socrates had been only bone and muscle, he 

 ought to have run away. 



Our problem stands somewhat as follows : We have 

 given protoplasm, a strange substance of marvellous 

 capacities, which we call functions, and possessing a 

 power of developing into beings of ever higher grades 

 of organization. Environment proves to be a combi- 

 nation of forces working for the higher development 

 of functions in a certain orderly sequence. And every 

 lower function in the ascending line demands the de- 

 velopment of the next higher. Digestion demands 

 muscle, and muscle nerve, and nerve brain. We 

 shall soon see that mammalian structure had to 

 culminate in the family, and the family demands un- 

 selfishness and obedience. Environment therefore 

 proves from the beginning to have been unceasingly 

 working for the highest end ; never, even tempora- 

 rily, merely for the lower. For we have seen that 

 environment works most unsparingly against those 

 who, having taken certain of the steps in the ascend- 

 ing path, fail to continue therein. 



But in order to attain this highest end for which it 

 has always been working, an immense number of sub- 



