EVOLUTION THE MASTER-KEY 



for instance, thought the solar system to be stable 

 and permanent, calculated to last forever. 1 Men 

 spoke of the "fixed stars," as many of us still do, 

 and regarded them as eternal. The author of 

 the doctrine of universal evolution could not concur 

 in these views, and time has proved him right. 

 Similarly the belief in the ultimate "elements" of 

 matter was universally held. It was thought that 

 an atom of carbon or iron had been an atom of 

 carbon or iron since the creation, and would be 

 until the sound of the last trumpet. Spencer 

 could not accept this view; and again the verdict 

 of time is on his side. When we turn from physics 

 to biology, we find again that the authority of the 

 time was totally opposed to the idea of evolution in 

 the realm of living matter. The first independent 

 thinker to declare that the facts pointed to evo- 

 lution and not to special creation was Herbert 

 Spencer. The essay of 1852 attests to that fact. 

 In psychology, again, mind has always been treated 

 as a permanent and special creation, as witness the 

 familiar and hope - confounding lie, still current, 

 that "human nature is the same in all ages." It 

 remained for Spencer to inaugurate a new era by 

 regarding mind as an evolution; by refusing to 

 confine himself, as all his predecessors without a 

 single noteworthy exception had done, to the study 

 of the adult Caucasian consciousness; and by 

 correlating with this familiar study that of the 



1 Cf. the second paragraph of Sartor Resartus. 

 62 



