GREAT PAGAN RETROGRESSION 53 



They all represent historic efforts in one form or 

 another to present what is essentially Darwin's 

 science of the individual animal as the science 

 of civilization. The task is in the nature of things 

 impossible, for it represents a fundamental con- 

 fusion of individual efficiency in the animal with 

 social efficiency in civilization, of the non-moral 

 with the moral, of the pagan ethics of primitive 

 man with the advanced ethics of civilization, of the 

 standards of the jungle with those of evolving 

 humanity. The elemental extravagances involved 

 reveal themselves, therefore, at every step, as 

 almost the whole of civilization is gradually brought 

 under the influence of these attempts. 



It was Prussia first, and then the whole of 

 Germany, which became the seat of this develop- 

 ment. The centre of Darwinism in Germany was 

 in the writings of Haeckel. But Darwin's theories 

 and Haeckel's ideas were absorbed and utilized by 

 a most powerful group of authors and men of action 

 who, from various standpoints, perceived how 

 closely the Darwinian doctrines of efficiency re- 

 sembled the doctrines of efficiency resting on 

 force, in which they had for long endeavoured to 

 embody their own conceptions of the national policy 

 of modern Germany. It was from this intellec- 

 tual ferment that there gradually spread throughout 



