220 THE WHENCE AND THE WHITHER OF MAN 



an environment of which the lower animal is as uncon- 

 scious and ignorant as we of a fourth dimension of 

 space. He has the knowledge of abstract truth and 

 goodness, of certain standards outside of mere appetite 

 and desire, and feels and acknowledges, however dimly, 

 the requirement and the ability to conform his life to 

 these standards. He alone can say " I ought," and 

 answer " I can and will." And hence man alone actually 

 lives in an environment of the laws of reason, responsi- 

 bility, and personality. Whatever germs of these 

 higher powers the animal possesses are means to mate- 

 rial ends, to the physical life of the animal. In man the 

 long and slow evolution has ended in revolution, the 

 material and physical have been dethroned, and truth 

 and goodness reign supreme as ends in them- 

 selves. 



But, you may object, this definition of man may be 

 true ideally, certainly it is not true actually. Where 

 are the high ideals of truth and goodness in the sav- 

 age ? and are these the supreme ends of even the 

 average American of to-day? But allowing all weight 

 to this objection, does it not remain true that a being 

 who never says " I ought," who acknowledges and 

 manifests no responsibility, to whom goodness does not 

 appeal, and in whom these feelings cannot be awak- 

 ened, is either not yet or no longer man ? But far 

 more than this, if the character of the individual is to 

 be judged by his tendency more than his present con- 

 dition, by the way in which he is going more than his 

 momentary position, is not the race to be judged and 

 defined by a tendency, gradually though very slowly 

 becoming realized, and a goal, toward which it looks 

 and which it is surely attaining, rather than by its 



