Darwinism in Ethics. 143 



from the simian species must be the products 

 of the same process. As natural selection has 

 endowed all beings with the constitutions and 

 habits and faculties which they actually possess 

 the eagle with his eye, the bee with her sting, the 

 lion with his rage and strength so must natural 

 selection have endowed man, not only with an 

 erect attitude, but also with a reason that looks ^ 

 before and after and a conscience that responds | 

 to right and wrong. The mental and moral fac- { 

 nl ties are both reduced to the rank of natural 

 phenomena. Indeed, to express their essentially 

 derivative and, as it were, accidental character, 

 a new word has been coined, and intelligence is 

 described as an &quot; epiphenomenon.&quot; By this term 

 is meant that consciousness is a merely accessory 

 aspect of the human automaton, a psychological 

 index of corporeal movements which are the 

 prime reality, a reflex of mechanism which would 

 go on all the same without any reflex, just as an 

 engine would move along the rails if it did not 

 whistle, or a bird fly if it cast no shadow. But 

 if the school interprets consciousness as an acci 

 dent of the human automaton, it makes conscience 

 an accident of this accident. First mechanism 

 realizing itself in certain relations (by means of 

 natural selection), then consciousness of these 



