456 ANNUAL REPOBT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1932 



whose evolution it recapitulates; and that both evolve in the same 

 kind of way, from simple to complex. In both, too, the most impor- 

 tant fresh starts originate not from the most advanced members but 

 from those which have not sacrificed their primitive plasticity to 

 premature and excessive specialization. It was the Nordic bar- 

 barians on the fringe of the Koman world who initiated the modern 

 phase ; they were in touch with Roman civilization but not part of it. 

 The classical phase was started by barbarians from central Europe, 

 in touch with the ^gean world but not of it. The last great ad- 

 vance in evolution was made by an insignificant little creature whose 

 very existence was probably unknown to the reptilian overlords it 

 eventually superseded.^'^ 



Looking at the process as a whole it would seem that life evolves 

 in a spiral. It begins with a single cell. After countless ages of 

 complex development an organism is evolved which becomes in its 

 turn the unit of another cycle. We are back where we started, but 

 on a higher plane. The human being becomes the unit of organized 

 society, and this, we must suppose, will evolve till it, too, in turn 

 becomes the single complex unit or individual of yet another cycle. 

 Clearly this process foreshadows the ultimate achievement of a single 

 world state, in which the whole human race shall be organized as a 

 single social organism. This need not necessarily imply that every 

 existing race and society will be at once incorporated in the world 

 state. When the last new start was made with the formation of 

 human society, other forms of life, represented by other species of 

 animals and plants, were not ail caught up into the new organism, 

 but only such as were of use to it and which could find a place in it, 

 and those but gradually. Domestic animals and, later, plants — 

 dogs, cats, horses, cattle, sheep, goats, pigs: Corn, palms, olives, 

 vines — were adopted and are still an essential element in human 

 society; they therefore survive. Those animals which do not, 

 or which are definitely antagonistic to it, having refused to become 

 incorporated, tend to become extinct. There were many more spe- 

 cies in paleolithic and even in neolithic times than there are to-day, 

 and the extinction of the larger fauna is now proceeding with great 

 rapidity. 



We may therefore expect that those human societies and races 

 which can not be assimilated by the world state will eventually 

 die out. 



This world state is also foreshadowed by the international char- 

 acter of science. The growth of the conception of a pool of world 

 knowledge would be interesting to trace. There is now coming into 



" Smith, Prof. G. Elliot, presidential address, section H, British Assoc. Adv. Sci. 

 (Dundee). Report, pp. 575-598, 1912. 



