68 SYMBIOSIS 



adequate recognition of the profound integrative and quasi- 

 genetic role played by food in the evolutionary process. 

 To him, food plays a subordinate, passive or static role. True, 

 he sees a sequence between the solitary life and habituation to 

 flesh-food. But he looks upon it all from the narrow point of 

 view of individual " profit " accruing to the predatory organism 

 from solitariness unmindful of the Ruskinian admonition, 

 which I regard as the general law even in matters biological, 

 namely, that " it is only in labour that there can be profit." 



Spencer does not see that the bonds of social union must 

 snap asunder from dire " nihilistic " necessity rather than from 

 choice, as soon as in a species life becomes habituated to depre- 

 dation, which means irregular and inferior food -supplies. " An 

 animal of the predatory kind," he says, " which has prey that 

 can be caught and killed without help, profits by living alone." 

 (Principles of Psychology.) 



Amongst herbivorous animals, he thinks, gregariousness is 

 general for the reason that the distribution of food is not such 

 as would make isolation decidedly advantageous, whilst certain 

 benefits arise from living together ; more especially the benefit 

 that the eyes and ears of all members of a herd are available 

 for detecting danger. 



With Spencer, therefore, food at best only permits associa- 

 tion in special cases, subordinate to the requirements the 

 " profits " in view at the moment. Ignoring Symbiosis, he does 

 not recognise that the right food imparts harmonious, and the 

 food of dishonesty disruptive effects. In his Principles of 

 Psychology, the great synthetic philosopher recognises, at any 

 rate in the case of man, that predatory activities have retarded 

 the growth of Sympathy throughout its whole range of evolution. 

 No doubt the suspicion, expressed by him in the same volume, 

 that there is still too much predatoriness in the human race, 

 is only too well justified. As a result of this lingering predatori- 

 ness, our sympathies, and likewise our reasoning faculties, .are 

 often deleteriously affected. 



A brief examination of some of the data of modern Psycho- 

 logy will enable us to understand more fully the important con- 

 nections between Psychology and Bio-Economics, which require 

 to be elucidated before we can progress very far with Evolutional 

 Psychology. Attention might first be directed to the familiar 

 phenomenon of the concomitance and co-variation of psychic 



