BENEVOLENCE AND DISCIPLINE 137 



of years to produce the kinds of things to which they 

 belong. 



Why is there such an enormous difference between 

 the time required to produce a particular kind, or 

 class, of animals or plants, in the first place, and the 

 time required for that class to reproduce itself? 



The difference undoubtedly lies in the starting 

 points; in the fact that one had to create its own means 

 and to find out the right ways. The other had its 

 means given to it ready made; its ways were so pre- 

 scribed, so directed, and so enclosed, it was compelled 

 to follow them. This means that life is able to con- 

 serve its ways and means of living, and to make its 

 discoveries and inventions in constructive Tightness an 

 accumulative property, a material, or structural en- 

 dowment and a guiding hand to a future life. This 

 rhythmic parental egoism and altruism is a basic form 

 of benevolence. 



Life, like science, literature, and art, creates for 

 posterity an ever growing heritage which gains in sta- 

 bility as it gains in Tightness. It creates an essentially 

 immortal endowment of physical properties and di- 

 rective discipline which insures the progress and con- 

 tinuity of life, despite the death of its producer. Indi- 

 vidual life uses these endowments as stepping stones, 

 or as advanced points of departure for the creation of 

 a new life on a higher level. By means of these im- 

 mortal endowments, the constructive processes of life 

 make their permanent gains over the destructive pro- 

 cesses of death. On these permanent foundations are 

 erected the super-structures which make for progress 

 and immortality. 



