264 THE STRUGGLE FOE THE LIFE OF OTHERS. 



of it. The processes of Evolution evolve as well as 

 the products ; evolve with the products. In the 

 Environments they help to create, or to make avail- 

 able, they find a field for new creations as well as 

 further reinforcements for themselves. With the 

 creation of human children Altruism found an area 

 for its own expansion such as had never before existed 

 in the world. In this new soil it grew from more to 

 more, and reached a potentiality which enabled it to 

 burst the trammels of physical conditions, and over- 

 flow the world as a moral force. The mere fact that 

 the first uses of Love were physical shows how per- 

 fectly this process bears the stamp of Evolution. The 

 later function is seen to relieve the earlier at the 

 moment when it would break down without it, and 

 continue the ascent without a pause. 



If it be hinted that Nature has succeeded in 

 continuing the Ascent of Life in Animals without 

 any reinforcement from psychical principles, the 

 first answer is that owing to physiological con- 

 ditions this would not have been possible in the case 

 of Man. But even among animals it is not true that 

 Reproduction completes its work apart from higher 

 principles, for even there, there are accompaniments, 

 continually increasing in definiteness, which at least 

 represent the instincts and emotions of Man. It is no 

 doubt true that in animals the affections are less 

 voluntarily directed than in the case of a human 

 mother. But in either case they must have been 

 involuntary at first. It can only have been at a late 

 stage in Evolution that Nature could trust even her 

 highest product to carry on the process by herself. 

 Before Altruism was strong enough to take its own 



