836 Causes and Course of Organic Evolution 



ing Backward" excited only the ridicule or irony of the above 

 type of reactionary. 



But, a])art from the moral or higher cogitic and the religious 

 or spiritic advances, that phase of future human progress 

 that will result from the more keen realization of the general 

 cogitic or mental activity deserves consideration. Nearly 

 three years ago (1909) the writer wrote: 



" It is recognized that the one organism man possesses, dom- 

 inates, and will still more fully dominate the earth, so that 

 Man's evolution is now the great and central problem of the 

 system that Darwin, Spencer, Wallace, and Haeckel have 

 established. His world-wide advance and occupancy may 

 seem to be checked at one time by selective survival of the 

 Russian thistle, at another by the insidious relation and ac- 

 tion of the mosquito, in one place by the temporary fertility 

 of the rabbit, in another by * plague' of divers sorts. But 

 the 19th century, the evolutionary century, has included the 

 year of his 'coming of age.' Man now no longer sees with 

 the eyes of the individual; he penetrates the past, the present, 

 the future with the compound eyes of 'Society as an Organ- 

 ism.' Nationality counts now for little, and will count for 

 less in the future. World problems are before us, for man's 

 exploitation of the world is becoming increasingly easy. 



" WTiether, therefore, it be an international study of infection 

 by mosquito or by tuberculosis germ; of selective breeding 

 along exact lines, for production of the best races of plants or 

 animals; of the acclimatization and adaptation of useful forms; 

 of the reclamation and the enrichment of the earth; of the 

 y)est devices for man's mental and ethical improvement; the 

 })onds of municipality, of state, of nationality can no longer 

 fetter or limit. 



" Such questions do not concern only sociologists, economists, 

 or moralists. They are Biological Questions. And every hu- 

 man being is a biologist. For, though each may not be trained 

 in this or that laboratory so-called, each daily experiences and 

 is affected by environmental agents, to which response is made. 

 Each records also, if in the least degree thinking and reflect- 



