Sept. U, 1883.J 



* KNOWLEDGE 



L67 



be better than those of a carnivore of the same race who 

 killed whenever he got the chance. It would be more the 

 interest of other creatures (as for instance those who wanted 

 the same sort of food) to eliminate the carnivore of the 

 latter sort, than to remove the more prudent member of the 

 race. In the long run this would tell even among the 

 lower animals. But as we approach the relations of men 

 to men and men to animals, we see more oljviously how 

 conduct in which the interests or the wants of others are 

 considered is safer in the long run, more conducive (in 

 inindreds of ways more or less complex) to prolonged 

 existence, than conduct in which those interests and wants 

 are neglected. Hence there will be a tendency, acting 

 slowly but surely, to the evolution of conduct of the former 

 kind. More of those whose conduct is of that character, 

 or approaches that character, will survive in each genera- 

 tion, than of those whose conduct is of an opposite cha- 

 racter. The difference may be slight, and therefoie the 

 effect in a single generation, or even in several, may also be 

 slight ; but in the long run the law must tell. Conduct 

 of the sort least advantageous will tend to die out, 

 because those showing it will have relatively inferior life 

 chances. 



Mr. Spencer seems to me to leave his argument a little 

 incomplete just here. For though he shows that conduct 

 avoiding harm to others, in all races, must tend to make 

 the totality of life larger, this in reality is insufficient. He 

 is dealing with the evolution of conduct. Now, to take a 

 concrete example, those of the hawk tribe who left little 

 birds alone, except when they had no other way to keep 

 themselves alive but by capturing and killing them, would 

 help to increase the totality of life, by leaving more birds 

 to propagate their kind than would l)e left if a more whole- 

 sale slaughter were carried out. But this of itself would 

 not tend to develop that moderation of hawk character 

 which we have imagined. The creatures helped in the life 

 struggle would not he the hawks (so far as this particular 

 increase in the totality of life was concerned) but the small 

 birds ; and the only kind of moderation or considerateness 

 encouraged would be shown in a lessening of that extreme 

 diffidence, that desire to withdraw themselves wholly from 

 hawk society, which we recognise among small birds. But 

 if it be shown that the more wildly rapacious hawks stand 

 a greater chance of being destroyed than those of a more 

 moderate character, then we see that such moderation and 

 steadine.ss of character is likely to be developed and finally 

 established as a characteristic of the more enduring races 

 of hawks. And similarly in other such cases. 



It is, however, in the development of conduct in the 

 higher races only, that this comparatively elaborate law of 

 evolution is clearly recognised. Among savage races we 

 still see apparent exceptions to the operation of the rule. 

 Individuals and classes and races distinguished by ferocity 

 and utter disregard of the " adjustments " of others, 

 whetlicr of their own race or of different races, seem to 

 thrive well enough, better even than the more moderate 

 and considerate. Forces really are at work tending to 

 eliminate the more violent and greedy ; but they are not 

 obvious. As society advances, however, even this seeming 

 success of the rapacious is found to diminish, though as 

 yet there has been no race or society from which it has been 

 actually eliminated. Conduct which is imperfect, conduct 

 characterised by antagonisms between groups and antago- 

 nisms between members of the same group, tends to be 

 more and more reduced in amount, by the failure or by the 

 elimination of those who exhibit such conduct. What is 

 regarded as gallant daring in one generation is scorned as 

 ferocity in a later one, resisted as rapacious wrong-doing 

 yet later, and later still is eliminated cither by death or 



nearly as effectually (when indirect as well as direct conse- 

 quences are considered) by imprisonment.* 



As violence dies out, and as war diminishes, — which 

 usually is but violence manifested on a larger scale, — the 

 kind of conduct towards which processes of evolution 

 appear to tend, " that perfect adjustment of acts to ends 

 in maintaining individual life and rearing new individuals, 

 which is effected by each without hindering others from 

 effecting like perfect adjustments," will be approached. 

 How nearly it will ever be attained by any human race — 

 Qnien sabe ? 



One further consideration, and we have done with the 

 evolution of conduct, the right understanding of which is 

 essential to the scientific study of conduct. The members 

 of a society while attending to adjustments necessary for 

 their wants or interests, may not merely leave others free 

 to make their adjustments also, but may help them in so 

 doing. It is very obvious that conduct thus directed must 

 tend" to be developed. As IMr. Spencer says, such conduct 

 facilitates the making of adjustments by each and so in- 

 creases the totality of the adjustments made and serves to 

 render the live of all more complete. But besides this (as 

 he should also have shown, since it is an essential part of 

 the evolution argument), it tends to its own increase : 

 for, being essentially mutual, conduct of this kind is a 

 favourable factor in the life struggle. 



We have next to consider what, seeing thus the laws 

 according to which conduct is evolved, we are to regard 

 as good conduct and bad conduct. 



(To be continued.) 



"The world embraces not only a Newton, but a Shake- 

 speare — not only a Boyle, but a Raphael — not only a Kant, 

 but a Beethoven — not only a Darwin, but a Carlyle. Not 

 in each of these but in all, is human nature whole. They 

 are not opposed, but reconcilable^not mutually exclusive, 

 but supplementary." — John Tyndall. 



" When the Hebrew prophet declared that ' by him 

 were laid the foundations of the deep,' but reminded us, 

 ' Who by searching can find him out 1 ' he meant pretty 

 much what Mr. Spencer means when he speaks of a power 

 that is inscrutable in itself, yet is revealed from moment 

 to moment in every throb of the mighty rhythmic life of 

 the universe." — John Fiske. 



" Joyfully accepting modern science, and loyally follow- 

 ing it without the slightest hesitation, there remains ever 

 recognised still a higher ilight, a higher fact, the eternal 

 soul of man, (of all else, too,) the spiritual, the religious, 

 which is to be the greatest office of scientism, in my 

 opinion, and of future poetry also, to free from fables, 

 crudities and superstitions, and launch forth in renewed 

 faith and scope a liundred-fold. ... To me the crown 

 of savantism is to be, that it surely opens the way for a 

 more splendid theology and for ampler and diviner songs." 

 Walt Whitman. 



The Tricycle.— The article on " High Wheels v. Low 

 Wheels" referred to by Mr. John Browning in this week's 

 Knowledge appeared in No. 8, Vol. II., of G. L. Hillier's 

 Journal. 



* JIany overlook the bearing of imprisonment on the evolution 

 of conduct,— its influence (when long terms are considered) in 

 diminishing the numerical increase of particular types of character 

 and therefoi-o in diminishing the quantity of particular forms of 



conduct. 



