210 FROM COMTE TO BENJAMIN KIDD PART in 



count for much more in the result than the indirect 

 force of natural selection which co-operates with it. 

 Nevertheless, natural selection must be producing 

 some effect, if any process for the evolution of species 

 is going on. 



If use-inheritance is working for evolution, natural 

 selection will back it up in two ways, distinguishable 

 from each other if not objectively distinct. Cases of 

 relapse by " Atavism," below the standard already 

 reached, will be wiped out ; natural selection will be 

 a safeguard or rear guard to the process of evolution 

 (Natural Selection B). And secondly, in proportion 

 as the competition is keener, natural selection will do 

 more and more to accelerate the process in a positive 

 sense. As between the fuller and the less full 

 instances of use-inheritance the greater and less 

 reproduction of serviceable " acquired qualities " 

 natural selection will (cceteris paribus) steadily award 

 the prize to those specimens which most fully repre- 

 sent the working of use-inheritance (Natural Selec- 

 tion C in the proper sense). 



Another question might be asked here. Can we 

 have Natural Selection A and Natural Selection C as 

 distinct co-operating agencies ? Can natural selection 

 in Darwin's favourite sense work as a part of the 

 evolving forces in addition to its effect in the way of 

 accelerating some other force ? Surely this can only 

 be the case if in part of the field it is the only force ; 

 i.e. if certain qualities are exempt from the operation 

 of the more powerful co-operating evolutionary force. 

 Even if you can imagine non-serviceable variations 

 being presented along with others, the fruit of a dis- 

 tinct evolutionary force, which are serviceable from the 



