1 30 Some Implications of the Incarnation [CH. 



Their freedom is not impugned. They must claim the 

 gift by the free action of their individual wills. There- 

 fore, we need not consider the race as a whole only 

 the individual. But nevertheless the individual is 

 subject to the disability of racial misdirection; he is not 

 exempt from the consequences of ' original sin.' Through 

 it the race is evolving along a path that can never lead 

 to perfection ; through it any individual member of the 

 race is misdirected in his own evolution. This point we 

 did not make quite clear in our discussion in Evolution 

 and the Need of Atonement. Individual as well as racial 

 evolution has to be considered, when once we begin to 

 deal with beings who are self-conscious, and are passing 

 into personal transcendence. Owing partly to the cessa- 

 tion of selection due to sin, the race is evolving along 

 wrong lines. But we believe that the destiny of all 

 individuals is the same union with God. Each indi- 

 vidual, being an eternal spirit, is himself to reach the 

 very goal. The goal of the race is the goal of its indi- 

 vidual members. In this the process has got beyond the 

 stage that obtains for the lower organisms, as far as we 

 can comprehend it. There, it seems as if the individual 

 but hands on the torch and itself drops by the way. 

 The human individual lights the torch of another, runs 

 by his side a little way, and then drops to rest. But he 

 picks himself up again and runs another stage, and per- 

 haps another and another, until he himself at length 

 arrives at the throne of God. Death does not end his 

 course. None are necessarily destined never to reach 

 that goal pace John Calvin and the Predestinarians. 

 Life may be a lottery, but no one draws a blank. 



But if this is the case the misdirection of the race 

 becomes the misdirection of the individual. If the whole 

 race has got on to a wrong line of development, each 

 component individual must likewise be on the wrong 

 line; for the progress of a race of self-conscious beings 



