THE ARREST OF THE BODY. 103 



But has not Man to make his tools, and will not 

 that induce the development of the Hand to an as yet 

 unknown perfection? No. Because tools are not 

 made with the Hand. They are made with the Brain. 

 For a time, certainly. Man had to make his tools, and 

 for a time this work recompensed him physically, and 

 the arm became elastic and the fingers dexterous and 

 strong. But soon lie made tools to make these tools. 

 In place of shaping things with the Hand, he invented 

 the turning-lathe ; to save his fingers he requisitioned 

 the loom ; instead of working his muscles he gave out 

 the contract to electricity and steam. Man, therefore, 

 from this time forward will cease to develop materi 

 ally these organs of his body. If he develops them 

 outside his body, filling the world everywhere with 

 artificial Hands, supplying the workshops with fingers 

 more intricate and deft than Organic Evolution could 

 make in a millennium, and loosing energies upon them 

 infinitely more gigantic than his muscles could gener 

 ate in a lifetime, it is enough. Evolution after all is a 

 slow process. Its great labor is to work up to a point 

 where Invention shall be possible, and where, by the 

 powers of the human mind, and by the mechanical 

 utilization of the energies of the universe, the results 

 of ages of development may be anticipated. Further 

 changes, therefore, within the body itself are made 

 unnecessary. Evolution has taken a new departure. 

 For the Arrest o.f the Hand is not the cessation of 

 Evolution but its immense acceleration, and the re 

 direction of its energies into higher channels. 



Take up the functions of the animal body one by 

 one, and it will be seen how the same arresting finger 

 is laid upon them all. To select an additional illus- 



