404 COSMIC PHILOSOPHY. [FT. m, 



finished projects, and frequent failure in the ever-renewed 

 strife between good and evil inclinations. So penetrated are 

 the noblest careers by the leaven of selfish folly, that the 

 conscientious biographer is too often constrained to adopt the* 

 tone of apology, mingling condemnation with approval. Side 

 by side with deeds of heroism and sympathetic devotion, his 

 tory is ever recording deeds of violence and selfish oppres 

 sion. Undisciplined and conflicting desires are continually 

 coining to fruition in hateful and iniquitous actions. The 

 perennial recurrence of war and persecution, the obstinate 

 vitality of such ugly things as despotism, superstition, fraud, 

 robbery, treachery, and bigotry, show how chaotic as yet is 

 the distribution of moral forces. While the prevalence, here 

 and there, of ignorance and poverty, disease and famine, shows 

 how imperfect as yet is our power to adapt ourselves to the 

 changes going on around us. 



That this state of things is temporarily necessitated by the 

 physical constitution of the universe and by the process of 

 evolution itself, may readily be granted. 1 The physical ills 

 with which humanity is afflicted are undoubtedly consequent 

 upon the very movement of progress which is bearing it on 

 ward toward relative perfection of life, and moral evils like 

 wise are the indispensable concomitants of its slow transition 

 from the primeval state of savage isolation to the ultimate 

 state of civilized interdependence. They are not obstacles to 

 any scientific theory of evolution, nor do they provide an 

 excuse for gloomy cynicism, but should rather be viewed 

 with quiet resignation, relieved by philosophic hopefulness, 

 and enlightened endeavours to ameliorate them. But though 



1 In treating of the special-creation hypothesis (Principles of Biology, 

 partiii.) Mr. Spencer calls attention to the numerous cases in which the 

 higher life is sacrificed, without compensation, to the lower, as for example in 

 the case of parasites. This is a formidable objection, not only to the doctrino 

 ef special creations, but to anthropomorphic theism in general. But for my 

 present purpose it is quite enough to point out that the constitution of the 

 world is such that even the genesis of higher life involves an enormoua in 

 fliction of misery upon sentient creatures. 



