THE WONDERS OF LIFE 



first to nourish and protect itself in virtue of its instinct of self- 

 maintenance. But soon the magic of the instinct for the main- 

 tenance of the species works in it; it feels the sex-impulse, and 

 thinks it is only satisfying its egoistic lust in yielding to it. 

 In this it is wrong; it is not really serving itself, but the whole, 

 the species, the genus. The ardor of love burns in it; and how- 

 ever sensual this love is at first, the new feeling is undeniably a 

 feeling of belonging to another and of mutual consideration, 

 looking not only to itself, but to another; not only to its own 

 good, but to that of another, and finding its own good only in 

 that of the other. And though this feeling at first only unites 

 the two parents, it enlarges when children enter into life, and 

 is extended to them in the form of parental love. Thus, out of 

 the sex-impulse of the maintenance of the species, with its strong 

 physical and psychic roots, is developed the love of spouses, of 

 parents, of children, and of neighbor. Disinterested egoism 

 goes even to the extent of sacrificing its own life for its young; 

 in this organic and natural family love, and in the sense of the 

 family that comes of it, we find the roots of all sympathetic and 

 really ethical altruistic feelings; from this it widens out to larger 

 spheres. Hence, the family is rightly held to be the chief source 

 of all real moral feeling and life, not only in the human, but also 

 in the animal world. 



The further ennoblement of family life in the advance 

 of civilization will give fresh proofs of the truth of this 

 appreciation. 



We now turn to consider the advantages that modern 

 civilization offers in the way of movement in contrast to 

 the simple methods of locomotion of the savage. We 

 may point out first that the earliest men, like their 

 ancestors, the anthropoid apes, lived in trees, and only 

 gradually began to run on the ground. Some of the 

 higher savages began to use the horse for riding and to 

 tame it. Many inhabitants of the coast or islands be- 

 gan at an early period to make boats. Later the bar- 

 baric tribes invented the wagon, and much later again 

 streets were paved and vehicles improved by civilized 

 races. But the nineteenth century brought the invalu- 

 able means of rapid and convenient travelling by means 



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