336 Social Evolution 



out reason who is selfish and unscrupulous ; but the 

 same is true of the man of vast bodily strength. He 

 has power to do greater harm to himself and to 

 others; but, because of this, to speak of bodily 

 strength or of reason as in itself "profoundly anti- 

 social and anti-evolutionary" is foolishness. Mr. 

 Kidd, as so often, is misled by a confusion of names 

 for which he is himself responsible. The growth 

 of rationalism, unaccompanied by any growth in 

 ethics or morality, works badly. The society in 

 which such a growth takes place will die out, and 

 ought to die out. But this does not imply that other 

 communities quite as intelligent may not also be 

 deeply moral and be able to take firm root in the 

 world. 



Mr. Kidd's definitions of "supra-natural" and 

 "ultra-rational" sanctions, the definitions upon which 

 he insists so strongly and at such length, would ap- 

 ply quite as well to every crazy superstition of the 

 most brutal savage as to the teachings of the New 

 Testament. The trouble with his argument is that, 

 when he insists upon the importance of this ultra- 

 rational sanction, defining it as loosely as he does, 

 he insists upon too much. He apparently denies 

 that men can come to a certain state at which it will 

 be rational for them to do right even to their own 

 hurt. It is perfectly possible to build up a civiliza- 

 tion which, by its surroundings and by its inheri- 

 tances, working through long ages, shall make the 

 bulk of the men and women develop such character- 

 istics of unselfishness, as well as of wisdom, that it 



