MENTAL AND SOCIAL EVOLUTION 143 



found, that is the end of organic life. No one can 

 reasonably conclude, that the inequalities in the indi- 

 viduals who make up society, form a desirable condi- 

 tion. We never can be satisfied to have a large num- 

 ber ""constantly pushed to the- wall" by power of greed, 

 and selfishness. If there is a way to prevent this, that 

 will be successful, the great majority of mankind 

 would certainly be glad to adopt it. But, as yet, 

 neither religion, nor reason, has been equal to the task, 

 and they both have been tried for centuries. There is 

 no doubt it is a problem that man himself must work 

 out, for if there is other power, personal, or abstract, 

 with that purpose in view, it certainly would have 

 solved it before this. If natural selection, in the sur- 

 vival of the fittest, can do it, or if it is designed for 

 this purpose, then Darwin is nearer in his contention 

 of the slowness of the process, than DeVries is in its 

 quickness of mutation. 



REASON, A PRODUCT OF EVOLUTION. Reason itself, 

 being an evolution, whatever it is able to accomplish, 

 must be in accordance with the laws of evolution. It 

 is not likely that reason is a creative, but a directive 

 power. It may be able, in -a limited way, to direct 

 further human sociological evolution, along the natural 

 lines that all evolution has so far taken, but not out- 

 side of these lines. Those methods have been by 

 a change of forms; by dissolution, of tried and una- 

 dapted forms, and the integration of those better 

 adapted. Has reason so far invented a better process, 

 or can it do so ? If the present form of society is una- 

 dapted, what can reason do to improve it, except to 

 change its form to one better adapted to man's natu- 

 ral place in nature? It could not be a change 

 to an unnatural place in nature. This is what 



