THE DOGMA OF EVOLUTION 



the Hindus and the vanished societies of Mesopo- 

 tamia. The Malaysian peoples of the Pacific Islands 

 give no contribution. Lastly, in Europe, the Greeks 

 showed certainly that they possessed the almost 

 unique power of continued self -development. There 

 have been various attempts to show from what stock 

 they descended ; they undoubtedly sucked inspiration 

 from their neighbours but they so quickly surpassed 

 all others that it was their ideas which prevailed and 

 spread. The rest of the European peoples, from what- 

 ever stocks they may have arisen, owe their civiliza- 

 tion to the Greeks. The one possible exception is the 

 Romans; yet their power is so bound up with Greek 

 culture that, although they became the dominating 

 power of Europe, we may say they were rather the 

 instrument for the spread of civilization than its 

 originator. There is an analogy between the later civ- 

 ilization of the Gauls, Teutons, Celts, and others, and 

 that of the Greeks similar to Darwin's classification 

 of the evolution of domesticated animals by artificial 

 selection and of those, in the wild state, by natural 

 selection. In the one case, variation is directed and 

 constrained to follow certain lines by a superior di- 

 recting power ; in the other case we can find no cause 

 directing the fluctuating variations due to hereditary 

 changes. 



The most we can say of the European stocks is that 

 they had the ability to receive, and perhaps to im- 

 prove, the Greek culture which the Romans impressed 



C 370 2 



