IV 



THE EVOLUTION OF ORGANISMS 



The General Idea of Evolution. — In human affairs 

 what seems to the careless to be quite rovel is often 

 revealed to the careful student as the natural out- 

 come of processes which have their origin in an- 

 tiquity. We see the gradual growth of social 

 organizations, the natural transition from one es- 

 tablished order of things to another slightly diffei^ 

 ent position of temporary equilibrium, the trans- 

 formation of one institution into another, and — 

 apart from any philosophy of history — we sum up 

 what we observe in the general concept of social 

 evolution. It was, indeed, in relation to human 

 affairs that the evolution-formula first became a 

 useful organon, and it is an oft-told tale how it 

 was gradually applied to the heavens above and 

 to the earth beneath and to animate nature in 

 general.^ Thence, improved by the using, the 

 formula has returned for reapplication to human 

 history. Now, although there are noteworthy 

 differences between the making of the solar sys- 

 tem, the differentiation of the earth, the evolution 



^ See the author's " Progress of Science." 

 135 



