COMPULSION OF NATURE-ACTION 303 



man has ever feared the actual tiger and the storm less 

 than the unknown menace behind them. 



Man's impulse was primarily to avoid; then to con- 

 quer or to destroy either by the display of force or by 

 the application of force; that unavailing, he endeav- 

 ored by gifts, supplications, or education to modify or 

 reform these obstacles to his purpose. Failing in that, 

 and his failures were ever competent to make him pli- 

 able, his last resort was to reform himself; to learn 

 the will, the ways or the purpose, of these mysterious 

 forces, the better to obey them. 



I. The Compulsion of Intelligence 



This desire to understand, the better to obey, is a 

 self-saving impulse common to all phases of science, 

 religion, and philosophy. When man does under- 

 stand, the truth thus revealed to him then becomes a 

 new leader and a new instrument to his compulsion. 

 He may resist an unwelcome truth, or he may not im- 

 mediately honor it by responsive action; but he can- 

 not evade his own convictions. He cannot escape the 

 compulsion of the truth he has discovered, whether he 

 would or no. Its ultimate triumph over him is cer- 

 tain. 



With the recognition of acquisition and obedience 

 as primal necessities, came man's recognition of free- 

 dom and compulsion; of impulse from within and re- 

 straint from without, and of right and wrong. With 

 them developed his power of self-control, or his power 

 of adaptive self-inhibition and self-acceleration, which 

 in turn was expressed in his conduct, his social laws 

 and customs. These laws and customs, written or 



