4 EVOLUTION AND RELIGION 



APPARENT HELPLESSNESS 



Man is born one of the weakest of all the animals. 

 Physically, he has no weapons of offense or defense 

 worth considering, when compared with the jaws of 

 the lion, the claws of the tiger, the tusks of the elephant, 

 the fore-arms of the gorilla, the poison fangs of the 

 cobra, or the purely defensive armor of so inoffensive 

 an animal as the armadillo. Yet through that same 

 divine spark of intelligence within his brain, he fashions 

 tools and weapons which make him more than a match 

 for these formidable competitors in the race for life. 



PROLONGED INFANCY 



His period of infancy, again, far outlasts theirs. Their 

 term of helplessness at the farthest seldom exceeds a 

 year or two. His is at least seven times as long. Yet 

 during this long period of apprenticeship he is slowly 

 but surely ripening that god-like faculty which in the 

 end will give him the mastery over them. Nay, more, 

 the imperative conditions of this prolonged period of 

 comparative helplessness are the very factors which 

 will develop within him, against his will or not, the 

 sense of gregariousness, race solidarity, sympathy, love; 

 qualities against which the inferior sense, developed 

 similarly in the lower animals during their shorter 

 term of helplessness in their family life, has proved 

 utterly powerless. 



