en. xxii.] GENESIS OF MAN, MORALLY. 331 



It would seem, therefore, that the class of cases upon which 

 Hamilton relied will justify an interpretation much deeper 

 than the one which he proposed for them. They will appa 

 rently justify us in asserting that pleasure is a state of con 

 sciousness accompanying modes of activity which tend to 

 increase the fulness of life of an organism, while pain is a 

 state of consciousness accompanying modes of activity which 

 tend to diminish the fulness of life. Before considering the 

 objections to this doctrine, which, though at first sight 

 formidable, will disappear on further analysis, let us note, 

 with Mr. Spencer, that, on the theory of evolution, &quot; races of 

 sentient creatures could have come into existence under no 

 other conditions.&quot; Omitting the cases which, in human 

 psychology, are complicated by the foresight of remote or 

 inconspicuous consequences, Mr. Spencer observes that 

 Pleasure is &quot;a feeling which we seek to bring into con 

 sciousness and retain there,&quot; while Pain is &quot; a feeling which 

 we seek to get out of consciousness and to keep out.&quot; Hence 

 it follows that &quot;if the states of consciousness which a creature 

 endeavours to maintain are the correlatives of injurious 

 actions, and if the states of consciousness which it endeavours 

 to expel are the correlatives of beneficial actions, it must 

 quickly disappear through persistence in the injurious and 

 avoidance of the beneficial.&quot; In other words, even supposing 

 a race of animals could come into existence, which should 

 habitually seek baneful actions as pleasurable, and shun 

 useful actions as painful, natural selection would immediately 

 exterminate it. Our supposition is therefore a hibernicism : 

 under the operation of natural selection no such race could 

 wer come into existence. Only those races can exist whose 

 reelings, on the average, result in actions which are in 

 harmony with environing relations. Accordingly we may 

 rest upon a still deeper and firmer basis our doctrine of 

 pleasure and pain, and assert that Pleasure is a state of 

 Consciousness accompanying the relatively complete adjust- 



