734 



NATURE 



[August 12, 1920 



civilised races. It does not follow as a matter 

 of course that such a development means the 

 movement of man to a desirable goal. But (as 

 Prof. Bury reminds us) Darwin, after pointing 

 to the fact that all the living forms of life are 

 lineal descendants of those which lived long 

 before the Silurian epoch, argues that we may 

 look with some confidence to a secure future of 

 equally immeasurable length; and, further, that, 

 as natural selection works solely by and for the 

 good of each being, all corporeal and mental en- 

 dowments will tend to progress towards perfec- 

 tion. Darwin was a convinced optimist. 



Equally so was Spencer. According to him, 

 change is the law of all things, and man is no 

 exception to it. Humanity is indefinitely variable, 

 and perfectibility is possible. All evil results from 

 the non-adaptation of the organism to its con- 

 ditions. In the present state of the world men 

 suffer many evils, and this shows that their char- 

 acters are not yet adjusted to the social state. 

 Now the qualification requisite for the social state 

 is that each individual shall have such desires only 

 as may fully be satisfied without trenching upon 

 the ability of others to obtain similar satisfaction. 

 This qualification is not yet fulfilled, because 

 civilised man retains some of the characteristics 

 which were suitable for the conditions of his 

 earlier predatory life. He needed one moral con- 

 stitution for his primitive state; he requires quite 

 another for his present state. The result is a 

 process of adaptation which has been going on for 

 a long time, and will go on for a long time to 

 come. Civilisation represents the adaptations 

 which have already been accomplished. Progress 

 means the successive steps of the process. (There 

 we have the scientific definition of human progress 

 according to the apostle of evolution.) The ulti- 

 mate development of the ideal man by this process 

 (says Spencer) is logically certain — as certain as 

 any conclusion in which we place the most implicit 

 faith : for instance, that men will all die. Pro- 

 gress is thus held by Spencer to be not an acci- 

 dent, but a necessity. In order that the human 

 race should enjoy the greatest amount of happi- 

 ness, each member of the race should possess 

 faculties enabling him to experience the highest 

 enjoyment of life, yet in such a way as not to 

 diminish the power of others to receive like 

 satisfaction. 



Let me say, in order to avoid misapprehension, 

 that in what follows I am not citing Prof. Bury, 

 but stating my own opinions and suggestions. 

 NO. 2650, VOL. 105] 



It has been urged in opposition to the optimistic 

 doctrine of Darwin and Spencer that it is a pro- 

 minent fact of history that every great civilisation 

 of the past progressed to a point at which, instead 

 of advancing further, it stood still and declined. 

 Arrest, decadence, decay, it is urged, have been 

 the rule. This, however, is but the superficial 

 view of the historian who limits his vision to the 

 last four or five thousand years of man's develop- 

 ment. It is not confirmed when we trace man 

 from the flint-chippers of 500,000 years ago tO' 

 the present day. 



Naturalists are familiar with the phenomenon' 

 of degeneration in animal descent. Higher, more 

 elaborate forms have sometimes given rise to 

 simplified, dwindled lines of descent, specialised 

 and suited to their peculiar environments. The 

 occasional occurrence of such development in the 

 direction of simplification and inferiority, and 

 even the extinction of whole groups or branches 

 of the genealogical tree of organisms, endowed 

 with highly developed structural adaptations, and 

 the survival of groups of extreme simplicity of 

 structure, does not invalidate the truth of the con- 

 clusion as to a vast and predominating evolution 

 — with increase of structure and capacity — of the 

 whole stock of animal and vegetable organisms. 

 A similar line of argument applies to the long 

 and extended history of mankind. 



The conclusion adverse to the reality of the 

 evolutional progress of mankind which is held by 

 those who declare that the ancient Greeks and 

 other products of human evolution of like age had 

 developed a degree of artistic execution and feel- 

 ing, of devotion to intellectual veracity and ideal 

 justice, to which more modern civilisation has not 

 attained, is a fanciful exaggeration in which it 

 pleases some enthusiasts to indulge. But an 

 examination of the facts makes it abundantly clear 

 that the conclusion is altogether erroneous. 



Another attempt to discredit the belief in pro- 

 gress consists in an ambiguous use of the word 

 "happiness" when it is declared that the teem- 

 ing millions of China or even the herds of sheep 

 browsing on our hill-sides are "happier" than 

 the civilised peoples of Europe and America. 

 Spencer's definition of the goal of human progress, 

 as determined by the general laws of organic 

 evolution should lead in this discussion either to 

 the abandonment of the use of the vague term- 

 "happiness," or to a critical examination of the 

 state of feeling which it implies, and of the causes, 

 to which they are specifically related. 



