THE WOMAN OF EVOLUTION AND PESSIMISM. 



329 



cation vital. Folly and weakness are as harmful in the 

 home as in the state. That which is to-day in the home 

 to-morrow will be in the state. The wise woman, mother 

 of wise men, may not be seen of the world, but her in- 

 fluence for good is none the less potent. 



Where the home is not sound the state is insecure. 

 The coming man must spring from the home. The 



child of a homeless race can not corn- 

 Evolution of wkh him There is no fact0f in 



the home. . . 



evolution more sure to survive m life 



struggles than the instinct to care for the young. Al- 

 truism prevails because it is useful, and this form of 

 altruism is potent above all else. Care for the young 

 makes the home. It binds the parents together. It 

 ennobles the sex relation and makes its impulses worthy 

 the name of love. John Fiske has maintained that the 

 prolonged infancy of man was the primary factor in his 

 separation as a higher type from the brute creation. 

 This prolonged infancy demanded a mother's care and 

 a father's support. In these arose the home. Even in 

 nomadic life the family kept together, and the relations 

 of the food-winning father and the protecting mother 

 were equal in value from the standpoint of race evolu- 

 tion. From the home the school is a natural extension. 

 It is a further prolongation of infancy with a view to 

 a higher ultimate development. 



But all this food-winning and child-helping is a bur- 

 den to the individual. The wise man, Schopenhauer 

 tells us, hesitates to sacrifice his free- 

 dom in equal union with woman. His 

 freedom for what ? Who is he that he 

 should be so occupied with his own affairs ? Is it pleas- 

 ure that he seeks pleasure for pleasure's sake ? art for 

 art's sake? rest for rest's sake? In the process of evo- 

 lution there will be no place for him. Nature asks her 



