268 FROM COMTE TO BENJAMIN KIDD PART iv 



or his tribe ; instinct might have led the ape to make 

 the sacrifice automatically. Reason thus tends to 

 make man purely selfish ; and sometimes the ten- 

 dency has its full effect. After all selfishness is the 

 only reasonable behaviour. If indeed reason can be 

 controlled, it promises of great social advance through 

 the superior cleverness which it imparts ; but in itself 

 it is a purely anarchical force. De Maistre or New- 

 man could not have spoken more severely of it. 



Let us recall here what we have learned from other 

 evolutionists regarding the advent of reason. It has 

 arrested the evolution of the body (Drummond, etc.). 

 It has wrapped mankind round in a mantle of law, 

 custom, and institution, capable of intellectual not 

 physical inheritance (e.g. Mr. L. Stephen). It has 

 largely substituted imitation or conversion for rivalry 

 to the death (Bagehot). And now Mr. Kidd tells us 

 that reason abruptly closes so far as its influence 

 extends the process of upward social evolution. 

 Does not all this support the conclusion that reason 

 is something quite different from a mere colourless 

 medium or calculating machine ? One fully agrees 

 with Mr. Kidd that reason checks the automatic work- 

 ing of instinct. Where reason appears, systematic 

 selfishness and sin become possible as they never 

 were before. But unselfishness too becomes possible 

 as it never was before ; it has a new significance. 

 Reason has broken up the unity of the life of sense. 

 Does it do nothing except break it up ? At the low- 

 est, is reason not shrewd enough to perceive the un- 

 happiness of a selfish life, the greater gain to oneself 

 of a life animated by unselfish and far-reaching 

 interests ? 



