52 TRANSACTIONS OF THE 



were either unobserved or early obliterated through the operation 

 of competition. 



Passing over the wide domain of biology, which affords so many 

 instances of this complexity of natural action, illustrations of the 

 same law were sought in the domain of anthropology. The ad- 

 vent of man, and his means of progress, affords such examples. 

 The development of the inventive faculty, as the distinguishing char- 

 acteristic of mind, caused a modification of the old plan of pro- 

 gress by natural selection. Instead of being himself modified by 

 nature, as hitherto, man began to act upon nature, both organic 

 and inorganic, and to modify it to his needs, as Mr. Ward has 

 pointed out. Henceforth natural selection affected only mental 

 and ethnic qualities, through modification of nervous structure. 

 Physical modification ceased to any important extent. Instead of 

 developing weapons, man constructed extraneous ones for his use. 

 With these he conquered competition and removed the rivals 

 most cognate to himself. Militarism ensued, and resulted in high 

 specialization. 



Differentiation, however, soon reaches its highest results in this 

 direction, and obstructs further progress. An apparent discon- 

 tinuity occurred in the rise of industrialism out of the humbler ele- 

 ments of society, through the germination of inventions, beginning 

 with the rediscovery of gunpowder, which was the commence- 

 ment of the downfall of militarism. The tool-making and tool- 

 using faculty came into prominence. Peaceful arts began to flourish, 

 man s condition became ameliorated, and a new progress supervened. 

 The new direction of evolutionary development was adverted to. 

 Man, having ceased to evolve by physical selection, evolves by ex- 

 traneous organs. Weapons and tools were the beginning of these, 

 but he has also now enormously developed his means of loco- 

 motion, as well as his organs of special sense and expression. 

 His eye is reinforced by the telescope and microscope and any op- 

 tical device he needs ; his ear by the telephone. The products of 

 artistic industry furnish him with means for unlimited gratification 

 of the aesthetic faculty in decoration. The culinary art relieves 

 him from some of the burdens of digestion and increases his 

 range of nutriment. All these extraneous means constitute a de- 

 parture from the old law of development of the individual by 

 selection. 



Moral and ethical development have not made a parallel advance 



