DARWINISM AND EVOLUTION 189 



all the other innumerable applications of the evolution- 

 ary method, in the domains of psychology, sociology, 

 philology, political thought, and ethical science. Hence 

 the immediate and visible results of its promulgation 

 have been far more striking, noticeable, and evident than 

 those which followed the establishment of the evolution- 

 ary conception in the astronomical and geological 

 departments. It was possible to accept cosmical evolu- 

 tion and solar evolution and planetary evolution, without 

 at the same time accepting evolution in the restricted 

 field of life and mind. But it was impossible to accept 

 evolution in biology without at the same time extending 

 its application to psychology, to the social organism, to 

 language, to ethics, to all the thousand and one varied in- 

 terests of human life and human development. Now, most 

 people are little moved by speculations and hypotheses 

 as to the origin of the milky way or the belt of Orion ; 

 they care very slightly for Jupiter's moons or Saturn's 

 rings ; they are stolidly incurious as to the development 

 of the earth's crust, or the precise date of the cretaceous 

 epoch ; but they understand and begin to be touched 

 the moment you come to the practical questions of man's 

 origin, nature, and history. Darwinism compelled their 

 attention by its immediate connection with their own 

 race ; and the proof of this truth is amply shown by the 

 mere fact that out of all the immense variety of Charles 

 Darwin's theories and ideas, the solitary one which 

 alone has succeeded in attaching to itself the public 

 interest and public ridicule is the theory of man's 

 ultimate descent from a monkey-like ancestor. Popu- 

 lar instinct, here as elsewhere profoundly true at core 

 in the midst of all its superficial foolishness, has 



