THE EVOLUTION OF MORALITY 



Accepting, then, the view that life, mind, and 

 morals are natural products of nature, it behooves 

 us, in the study of the last as of the others, to seek 

 origins. 



In this search we are encouraged to go far back 

 by a general consideration of the facts of organic 

 life and especially of general physiology. For we 

 find, for instance, that all animal life depends upon 

 vegetable life ; without the green matter of the leaf 

 there could be neither mollusc nor mammal. We 

 find, also, that without the agency of the ubiquitous 

 bacteria of putrefaction, scorned though they be, 

 all life upon the earth would shortly cease, for 

 their activities prevent the earth from rapidly 

 becoming little better than a charnel - house or 

 dung-heap. Again we observe that sequence of 

 vital events which has been called the cycle of life : 

 that the body of the dead animal is used by the 

 plant for the formation of those nutritive com 

 pounds without which the living animal must die. 

 We find, in a word, that the dependence of each 

 upon all is the cardinal fact of the organic world; 

 or, as I have elsewhere said, that altruism is a law 

 of nature. If the word altruism, as indicating a 

 conscious attitude or inclination, be objected to, 

 and if &quot;mutual aid&quot; be similarly criticised, we 

 may at any rate employ such a phrase as organic 

 interdependence. The Italians have a proverb 

 that not even a queen can do without her neigh 

 bors. It is, then, a fact which preceded not only 

 the evolution of self-conscious man, but that of the 



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