340 Social Evolution 



tion would apply to certain members of the horse 

 family, but would not apply to that animal which 

 we ordinarily mean when we talk of a horse; and, 

 moreover, it would still be sufficiently loose to in- 

 clude two or three entirely distinct species. This 

 is precisely the trouble with Mr. Kidd's definition 

 of religion. It does not define religion at all as the 

 word is ordinarily used, and while it does apply to 

 certain religious beliefs, it also applies quite as well 

 to certain non-religious beliefs. We must, there- 

 fore, recollect that throughout Mr. Kidd's argument 

 on behalf of the part that religion plays he does not 

 mean what is generally understood by religion, but 

 the special form or forms which he here defines. 



Undoubtedly, in the race for life, that group of 

 beings will tend ultimately to survive in which the 

 general feeling of the members, whether due to 

 humanitarianism, to altruism, or to some form of 

 religious belief proper, is such that the average in- 

 dividual has an unselfish what Mr. Kidd would 

 call an ultra-rational tendency to work for the 

 ultimate benefit of the community as a whole. Mr. 

 Kidd's argument is so loose that it may be construed 

 as meaning that, in the evolution of society, irra- 

 tional superstitions grow up from time to time, 

 affect large bodies of the human race in their course 

 of development, and then die away; and that this 

 succession of evanescent religious beliefs will con- 

 tinue for a very long time to come, perhaps as long 

 as the human race exists. He may further mean 

 that, except for this belief in a long succession of 



