PROGRESS, BIOLOGICAL AND OTHER 55 



More to our present purpose is the reply that, whereas 

 in all these ways the inherent capabilities have not 

 increased, yet the opportunities of realizing these 

 capabilities have for the bulk of the population in- 

 creased — in particular, for instance, of gratifying the 

 more complex and the more intellectual emotions, 

 with the multiplication of theatres, of books, of 

 pictures, of concerts. Here, for once, the average 

 has advanced more than the upper level. Whatever 

 overstress and maladjustment the complexity of mod- 

 ern civilization has brought with it, it has certainly 

 made it easier for more men and women to realize 

 more of their potentialities now than a thousand 

 years ago, and far more than a hundred thousand 

 years ago. 



There are, then, these facts to set on the credit 

 side of Progress' balance-sheet. It is easy enough 

 to see items on the debit side, and indeed to be so 

 horrifiedly fascinated by it as not to have eyes for 

 anything else. Human history is in one view but a 

 long record of suffering, oppression, and folly. Slav- 

 ery, torture, religious persecution, war, pestilence 

 and famine, the greed of those who possess power, 

 the dirt and sloth and ignorance of those who do 

 not — the elements of the picture^ keep on recurring, 

 if not in the old forms, then in new ones. Pain, 

 disease, disappointment, and death are inevitable. 

 Even when a civilization seems to be progressing, 

 there always comes a time when it passes its zenith 

 and topples through decay or defect to ruin. How 



