1 8 SCIENCE AND MORALS 



race in good breeding, kindness, and the substantial 

 virtues.' l Or again, heat instead of cold may 

 drive man to the utmost limit of his natural 

 affections. In the deserts of Central Australia, 

 where the native is ever threatened by a scarcity 

 of food, his constant preoccupation is not how to 

 prey on his companions. Rather he unites with 

 them in guilds and brotherhoods, so that they 

 may feast together in the spirit, sustaining them- 

 selves with the common hope and mutual sugges- 

 tion of better luck to come. But there is no need 

 to go so far afield for one's proofs. I appeal to 

 those who have made it their business to be in- 

 timate with the folk of our own countryside. Is 

 it not the fact that unselfishness in regard to the 

 sharing of the necessaries of life is characteristic 

 of those who find them most difficult to come by ? 

 The poor are by no means the least ' rich towards 

 God.' At any rate, if poverty sometimes 

 hardens, wealth, especially sudden wealth, can 

 harden too, causing arrogance, boastfulness, and 

 the bullying temper. ' A proud look, a lying 

 tongue, and the shedding of innocent blood ' 

 these go together." 



On the whole, then, we may perhaps conclude 

 that the natural bias of mankind is towards kind- 

 ness to his neighbour, however much the brute in 

 him may sometimes impel him to uncharitable 

 words or actions. And certainly this natural 

 bias is intensified and made into a binding law by 

 the teachings of Christ. But there is the other 

 1 My Life with the Eskimo (1913), p. 188. 



