CH. XIX Influence of Habits and Surroundings 319 



saturated with healthful influence during the periods in 

 which it is most susceptible. The efforts of Social Unions, 

 Kyrle Societies, Verschonerungs-Vereine, and the like, are 

 justified not only by their results,^ but by the biological 

 facts on which they more or less unconsciously depend. 

 There would be more progress and less invidious com- 

 parison of ameliorative schemes, if we realised more vividly 

 that the Fates are three. Though it is not easy to appre- 

 ciate the three sides of a prism at once, of what value is 

 liberty on an ash-heap, or equality in a hell, or fraternity 

 among an overpopulated community of weaklings ? Organ- 

 ism, function, and environment must evolve together, and 

 surely they shall. 



Poets have often compared human beings to caterpillars ; 

 it may be that no improvement in constitutions, functions, 

 or surroundings will make us winged Psyches, yet it may be 

 possible for us to be ennobled like those creatures which in 

 gilded surroundings became golden. Surely art is warranted 

 by the results of science, as these in time may justify them- 

 selves in art. 



* Ideally stated in Emerson's well-known poem of "Arf." 



