6o8 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



done in the way of disturbing and distorting and repressing, by poli- 

 cies carried out in pursuit of erroneous conceptions." Indifferent 

 comfort, this, for the friends of humanity ; but it is all Mr. Spencer 

 has to offer. He adds " a few words," however, " to those who think 

 these general conclusions discouraging. Probably the more enthusi- 

 astic, hopeful of great ameliorations in the state of mankind, to be 

 brought about rapidly by propagating this belief or initiating that 

 reform, will feel that a doctrine negativing their sanguine expecta- 

 tions takes away much of the stimulus to exertion. If large advances 

 in human welfare can come only in the slow process of things, which 

 will inevitably bring them, why should we trouble ourselves ? " A 

 very natural question. And what is Mr. Spencer's answer ? Simply 

 that on visionary hopes rational criticisms cannot but have a de- 

 pressing influence. But "it is better," he adds, "to recognize the 

 truth." 



Doubtless " it is better to recognize the truth ; " but before accept- 

 ing as true a doctrine admittedly so depressing, carrying with it such 

 " seemingly awkward corollaries," it will, at least, be well to subject 

 it to a somewhat careful examination. And, in the first place, there is 

 tins remark to be made, that no verification whatever has yet been 

 offered, or, so far as I know, attempted, of the theory of social evolu- 

 tion set forth with so much appearance of scientific authority. It 

 represents a speculation transferred from the domain of physiology 

 and zoology into that of social inquiry, and the speculation, so trans- 

 ferred, is applied, without question or scruple, to the interpretation of 

 human affairs ; no attempt having been made to ascertain how far the 

 course of these affairs hitherto has corresponded with the doctrine 

 thus formulated. The range of human history now covers upward of 

 3,000 years, and presents, in a very incomplete and imperfect manner, 

 no doubt, the phenomena of moral, intellectual, religious, and other 

 evolution in numerous societies of men. Surely, before propounding 

 his speculation as a law of human society, from which he is at once 

 justified in deducing consequences of the largest kind bearing upon 

 human conduct, Mr. Spencer was bound to consider what amount of 

 countenance or support it received from the evidence derivable from 

 such fields of research ; but from the application of this test he has 

 wholly abstained. Will it be said that our knowledge of past history 

 is so exceedingly slight and untrustworthy as to be unfit to furnish a 

 datum for social speculation, and that verification had thus to be dis- 

 pensed with as impracticable? Such a defense, it seems to me, is 

 scarcely available in the present instance; for, while it is true that 

 about particular events in history there is, in general, much room for 

 doubt and for difference of opinion, this is not the case, or is in a very 

 slight degree the case, with regard to certain broad generalizations 

 which come out with considerable distinctness from the study of the 

 past, and which are, in effect, the very generalizations needed in order 



