422 THE ASCENT OF MAN 



only say one thing with certainty, that it must be 

 theological." 



The fallacy of the merely quantitative theory 

 of Evolution is apparent. To interpret any 

 organism in terms of the organism solely is to 

 omit reference to the main instrument of its 

 Evolution, and therefore to leave the process, 

 scientifically and philosophically, unexplained. It 

 is as if one were to construct a theory of the 

 career of a millionaire in terms of the pocket- 

 money allowed him when a schoolboy. Disregard 

 the fact that more pocket-money was allowed the 

 schoolboy as he passed from the first form to the 

 sixth; that his allowance was increased as he came 

 of age ; that now, being a man, not a boy, he was 

 capable of more wisely spending it; that being wise 

 he put his money to paying uses ; and that in- 

 terest and capital were invested and re-invested as 

 years went on — disregard all this and you cannot 

 account for the rise of the millionaire. As well 

 construct the millionaire from the potential gold 

 contained in his first sixpence — a sixpence which 

 never left his pocket — as construct a theory of 

 the Evolution of Man from the protoplasmic cell 

 apart from its Environment. It is only when 

 interpreted, not in terms of himself, but in terms 

 of Environment, and of an Environment increas- 



