214 FROM COMTE TO BENJAMIN KIDD PART in 



It looks like a question of figures. Are there can- 

 didates enough ? Is the " pluck " sufficiently severe ? 

 You may get enough of your chosen sort out of 

 any random bunch of samples if it is big enough. 

 That is one view. Others again might affirm 

 that the question is not one of numbers but of 

 time. In (almost) endless time, any bunch that is 

 regularly furnished will grow big enough by accu- 

 mulation. 



Here Mr. Sutherland gives us one shred of evi- 

 dence; and perhaps we may be able to make use 

 of it even if we do not dogmatically decide to re- 

 gard natural selection as "a question of figures." 

 The evidence is this, that the higher races in nature, 

 when they produce offspring, follow a method of 

 quality, not quantity. That implies that, in the 

 higher races, natural selection, even if not sus- 

 pended, has at least incomparably less room to 

 work in. Yet evolutionary advance has certainly 

 not been slower in these, the characteristically 

 highest forms ! This fact does not seem very 

 favourable to what is claimed for natural selection 

 A, that we ought to regard it as a reality, and 

 perhaps as the dominant reality in evolution. For 

 either 



(1) Though natural selection was predominant 

 lower down, some new mysterious force has now 

 been disengaged, which [more than ?] replaces it. 

 A has become C ; or else 



(2) If, where the best evolutionary results are 

 gained, natural selection cannot do much, we may 

 hesitate to believe that it produces much effect at 

 any part of the process. There must be other 



