MIND IN EVOLUTION 



them. It is not easy for me to put it clearly or for my reader 

 to understand. But let us both do our best. 



What seems to be common to all events, no matter what 

 may be their specific character, is that which may be called 

 passage. They pass from one phase or stage to the next. 

 And the passage is accordant with some general method or 

 plan which we can more or less definitely formulate. We 

 should realize that even what we commonly call "things" 

 are relatively persistent clusters of events in passage. They 

 have been likened to eddies in the stream of events, or to a 

 waterfall, where the water flows on but the cascade is perma- 

 nent. What persists is some state of flowing events. 



Suppose, then, that we are dealing with atoms, molecules, 

 organisms, minds, social institutions. In all of them there 

 is passage of events. In each there are relatively persistent 

 states, which characterise the several members of the group 

 — characterise each atom, or crystal, or organism, or mind. 

 But in any given group the individual members are not 

 all alike. Molecules are not all alike; nor are organisms 

 or minds all alike. And we commonly say that some of 

 them stand at a higher level, some of them stand at a lower 

 level than others. Thus man is at a higher level and a 

 monkey at a lower level than an ape. If we speak of the 

 level at which any member of a group stands as its status 

 then a man has a higher status than an ape, an ape has a 

 higher status than a monkey, and a monkey a far higher 

 status than an amoeba. 



Of course, we have in some way to define what we mean 

 by "higher" and "lower." We may say — to select one 

 character — that what is more complex is higher and what 

 is less complex is lower. Then in this respect within each 

 group the members may be arranged in order from the 

 lowest to the highest. And the groups also — the atoms, 



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