DARWINISM AND POLITICS. 57 



or the result of hasty observation. If we go on 

 to think about this opinion, we have to question 

 it, to examine it, and unless we come to a 

 standstill at the stage of doubt or criticism, we 

 go on to form some more adequate opinion, 

 which may indeed be only the old opinion in a 

 better form or may be something very different. 

 But this new opinion may in its turn be ques- 

 tioned in order to be corrected, and so on, for 

 the truth always proves itself more complex 

 than at first appeared : and, unless we lazily 

 acquiesce in dogmatic solutions, we cannot 

 cease from the labour of thinking;. It might 

 indeed be more prudent to avoid mentioning 

 Hegel's name ; but this very commonplace pro- 

 cess is his " dialectic method " in its simplest 

 and most familiar form. This "advance by 

 negation" is the way we have to think about 

 everything. And if we apply this dialectic 

 method to society, what does it suggest ? That 

 we cannot rest in the critical or negative stage 

 of modern individualism. But does that imply a 

 .return to the mediaeval type of society ? to " the 

 ; good old days " of aristocratic and ecclesiastical 

 domination ? By no means. It implies an 

 .advance to a stage in which all that is most 



