Social Evolution 337 



will be the rational thing for them as individuals to 

 act in accordance with the highest dictates of honor 

 and courage and morality. If the intellectual de- 

 velopment of such a civilized community goes on at 

 an equal pace with the ethical, it will persistently 

 war against the individuals in whom the spirit of 

 selfishness, which apparently Mr. Kidd considers 

 the only rational spirit, shows itself strongly. It will 

 weed out these individuals and forbid their prop- 

 agating, and therefore will steadily tend to produce 

 a society in which the rational sanction for progress 

 shall be identical in the individual and the State. 

 This ideal has never yet been reached, but long steps 

 have been taken toward reaching it; and in most 

 progressive civilizations it is reached to the extent 

 that the sanction for progress is the same not only 

 for the State but for each one of the bulk of the in- 

 dividuals composing it. When this ceases to be the 

 case progress itself will generally cease and the com- 

 munity ultimately disappear. 



Mr. Kidd, having treated of religion in a pre- 

 liminary way, and with much mystic vagueness, then 

 attempts to describe the functions of religious belief 

 in the evolution of society. He has already given 

 definitions of religion quoted from different authors, 

 and he now proceeds to give his own definition. But 

 first he again insists upon his favorite theory, that 

 there can be no rational basis for individual good 

 conduct in society, using the word rational, accord- 

 ing to his usual habit, as a synonym of selfish ; and 

 then asserts that there can be no such thing as a 

 15 VOL. I. 



