346 INVOLUTION. 



development, social, moral, spiritual, which is going 

 on around us, is as real an evolutionary movement 

 as any that preceded it, and at least as capable of 

 scientific expression. A system founded on Self- 

 Sacrifice, whose fittest symbol is the Leaven, whose 

 organic development has its natural analogy in the 

 growth of a Mustard Tree, is not a foreign thing to the 

 Evolutionist ; and that prophet of the Kingdom of God 

 was no less the spokesman of Nature when he proclaimed 

 that the end of Man is " that which we had from the 

 beginning, that we love." 



In the profoundest sense, this is scientific doctrine. 

 The Ascent of Man and of Society is bound up hence- 

 forth with the conflict, the intensification, and the 

 diffusion of the Struggle for the Life of Others. This 

 is the Further Evolution, the page of history that lies 

 before us, the closing act of the drama of Man. The 

 Struggle may be short or long ; but by all scientific 

 analogy the result is sure. All the other Kingdoms 

 of Nature culminated; Evolution always attains; 

 always rounds off its work. It spent an eternity over 

 the earth, but finished it. It struggled for millen- 

 niums to bring the Vegetable Kingdom up to the 

 Flowering Plants, and succeeded. In the Animal 

 Kingdom it never paused until the possibilities of 

 organization were exhausted in the Mammalia. Kindled 

 by this past, Man may surely say, "I shall arrive." 

 The Further Evolution must go on, the Higher King- 

 dom come — first the blade, where we are to-day ; then 

 the ear, where we shall be to-morrow ; then the full 

 corn in the ear, which awaits our children's children, 

 and which we live to hasten. 



FINIS. 



