\\vii HUMAN PROGRESS: PAST AND FUTURE 495 



about as much as our race is above that of the African 

 negro." ] 



There is, therefore, some reason to think that the intel- 

 lectual high-water level of humanity has sunk rather than 

 risen during the last two thousand years ; but this is not 

 absolutely incompatible with the elevation of the mean 

 level of the human ocean both intellectually and morally. 

 We must, therefore, briefly consider the various agencies 

 that have been at work, some tending to raise others to 

 depress this level ; and by balancing the one against the 

 other, and taking account of certain modern developments 

 of human nature in civilized societies, we may be able to 

 arrive at an approximate conclusion as to the final result. 



During the whole course of human history the struggle 

 of tribe with tribe and race with race has inevitably 

 caused the destruction of the weaker and lower, leaving 

 the stronger and higher, whether physically or mentally 

 stronger, to survive. Another, and perhaps not less potent 

 cause of the destruction of lower tribes is the greater 

 vital energy and more rapid increase of the higher races, 

 which crowds the lower out of existence even when no 

 violent destruction of life takes place. To this latter 

 cause quite as much as to actual warfare must we ascribe 

 the total disappearance of the Tasmanians, and the con- 

 tinuous diminution of population among the Maoris of 

 New Zealand and the inhabitants of the Eastern Pacific 

 Islands, as well as of the Red Indians of the North 

 American continent. Here we see survival of the fittest 

 among competing peoples necessarily leading to a con- 

 tinuous elevation of the human race as a whole, even 

 though the higher portion of the higher races may remain 

 stationary or may even deteriorate. 



But a similar and even more complex process is ever 

 going on within each race, by the survival of the more fit 

 and the elimination of the less fit under the actual 

 conditions of society. On the whole, we cannot doubt 

 that the prudent, the sober, the healthy, and the virtuous, 

 live longer lives than the reckless, the drunkards, the 

 unhealthy, and the vicious ; and also that the former, on 



1 Htreditary Geniua, p. 342. 



