CHAPTER XII 



THE LAWS CONTKOLLING HUMAN SOCIAL 

 HEREDITY AND EVOLUTION 



From all that has preceded it has appeared that 

 human social evolution has been brought about by a 

 different set of conditions from those which have 

 produced animal evolution. Since the guiding prin- 

 ciple has been social rather than organic heredity, 

 we are prepared to believe that the laws controlling 

 human evolution may be different from those at 

 work elsewhere. The evolution of animals in gen- 

 eral, according to our present knowledge, appears to 

 have been brought about by the accumulation of con- 

 genital characters alone. Whether the variations 

 which constitute the stepping-stones of advance have 

 been slight ones (diversities) or large and sudden 

 ones (mutations) may not be yet fully settled; but 

 whatever they are, they have from the first been fixed 

 in the germ substance and handed on by organic 

 heredity. Then by the action of natural selection 

 some have been preserved and others eliminated, the 

 total result being progress and evolution. In certain 

 respects man must have been subjected to these same 

 forces, since he too is an animal. But since social 

 evolution stands upon a different footing, we may 

 naturally expect that it may have been brought 

 about by different forces which may have had little 

 or no part in the evolution of the lower animals, 

 where social inheritance is practically lacking. In 

 this chapter we will briefly consider some of the 



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