MENTAL AND SOCIAL EVOLUTION 139 



physical, or material. The two obvious factors are 

 the inorganic and the organic. The latter includes 

 "social existence" as mentioned by Marx. As this 

 "social existence" includes the psychical phenomena of 

 mankind, by which society in all its forms is created 

 and sustained, it is, in the latter evolution of man, the 

 predominant factor. But consciousness is the trans- 

 formed image in the brain of man, of his entire environ- 

 ment. 



MISCONCEPTIONS. The misconceptions of the prin- 

 ciple of the survival of the fittest in all nature, and 

 its application to society by the writers of current 

 periodical literature, is most astonishing in many 

 instances. For instance, says one "Here" (in human 

 society) "it means that the mass of men must consent, 

 in the interests of progress, to be driven to the wall, 

 in order that a few more excellent individuals may be 

 selected to rule society and keep it at the maximum 

 of efficiency. ' ' This is a misconception of the principle. 

 It does not require the assent of man in any respect ; but 

 of course, the men who are "driven to the wall" 

 because they are not fit, would never consent to such 

 a procedure, and the working of natural selection does 

 not wait for them to either assent or dissent. Evidently 

 the writer of the above quotation does not believe that 

 natural selection operates in society. Then why do so 

 many forms of society "go to the wall?" Because, he 

 may say, the reason of man, which makes society, 

 fails to work out the proper organization. But then, in 

 that case, it is the working of natural selection in letting 

 them fail. That psychic function called reason, as said 

 before, is simply the result of the fusion of certain 

 images in the brain cortex, by which something un- 



