THE LONG ROAD 



countries we still see these barbarous people which 

 man in his progress has left behind. Our civiliza- 

 tion is like a field of light that fades off into shadows 

 and darkness. There is this margin of undeveloped 

 humanity on all sides. Always has it been so in 

 the animal life of the globe; the higher forms have 

 been pushed up from the lower, and the lower have 

 remained and continued to multiply unchanged. 



It seems as if some central and cherished impulse 

 had pushed on through each form, and by suc- 

 cessive steps had climbed from height to height, 

 gaining a little here and a little there, intensifying 

 and concentrating as time went on, very vague and 

 diffuse at first, embryonic so to speak, during the 

 first half of the great geologic year, but quickening 

 more and more, differentiating more and more, 

 delayed and defeated many times, no doubt, yet 

 never destroyed, leaving form after form unchanged 

 behind it, till it at last reached its goal in man. 



After evolution has done all it can do for us toward 

 solving the mystery of creation, much remains un- 

 solved. 



Through evolution we see creation in travail- 

 pains for millions of years to bring forth the varied 

 forms of life as we know them; but the mystery of 

 the inception of this life, and of the origin of the 

 laws that have governed its development, remains. 

 What lies back of it all? Who or what planted the 

 germ of the biological tree, and predetermined all 



37 



