EVOLUTION AND RELIGION 



ultimately attain the level of the best individuals of 

 the past ages is a different thing from the claim that 

 society will progress indefinitely. Knowing the best 

 characteristics of the past we would know the goal 

 towards which man moves even though the goal to- 

 wards which all creation moves is still shrouded in 

 mystery. 



Let us examine this idea of evolutionary progress 

 by natural causes a little more closely. We have seen 

 that Buckle tried to explain why a certain few primi- 

 tive stocks developed an early civilization and why 

 European culture was late in beginning but was not 

 so soon exhausted. It was shown, I think, conclusive- 

 ly that the natural causes he advanced were quite in- 

 adequate to tell us why some stocks advanced and 

 others did not. We might add to the illustrations al- 

 ready given, that the Athenians became so superior a 

 people that their influence is still woven into all our 

 modern thought and yet the peoples just north of 

 them remained almost stagnant; or we could cite the 

 Romans who created one of the great empires of the 

 world while none of their immediate neighbors were 

 capable of showing this initiative. How can we lay 

 such inequalities to environmental causes'? No, the 

 best we can say is that certain of these primitive 

 stocks possessed the innate ability to grow and could 

 adapt themselves to favourable conditions on the one 

 hand and overcome unfavourable conditions on the 

 other hand. 



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