ON THE EVOLUTION MATERIALISM AND THEOLOGY. 319 



in particular social morality, or morality proper, implied 

 in our obligation to our fellows, is to be traced to the 

 former. Morality is a necessary corollary from the 

 instinct to live, so much so that, being given three, 

 or even two, social, not to say human, beings agreeing 

 to live together in any kind of union, however loose, 

 morality of some degree and amount, however slight, 

 must result. Three men, three ants, could not live and 

 labour together without manifesting the essential ele- 

 ments of morality. Union, besides allaying mutual fear 

 and distrust, secures certain evident advantages : two 

 can obtain by their united labours more than double the 

 amount of food and raiment that each working separately 

 could procure. Here the self-preserving instinct comes 

 into play. But they could not have the advantages of 

 union unless there was mutual trust, a fair division 

 of labour and of its acquisitions ; and here we have the 

 essential germs of truth and justice. Further, if in a 

 primitive tribe of men, as in a colony of ants, there was 

 not some zeal in individuals for the common good, the 

 society, as a whole, would not flourish, and the indi- 

 viduals themselves would be the losers. So surely, in 

 fact, as the primitive units in a state of isolation, under 

 the instinct of self-preservation, must act in ways that 

 we could generally predict in pursuit of food, so surely 

 when they come together, though still at first under the 

 guidance of this instinct of self-preservation, or self- 

 advancement, they will observe, in their mutual inter- 

 course, a rudimentary moral behaviour, which will in 

 time become customs and then recognized laws, with a 

 power lodged somewhere to enforce them. 



All else follows in the natural course of evolution : 

 the gradual improvement of morality will be accomplished 

 by natural selection favouring those tribes or groups in 



