22 Evolution and Religion 



without whom the world would apparently quickly 

 disintegrate in moral chaos. The same fundamental 

 idea seems to pervade them all, viz., the imperative 

 necessity of subordinating self to the general welfare, 

 of sacrificing a personal, present, tangible advantage 

 to some possible, nay doubtful, future benefit for family, 

 clan, or nation. Do you maintain that all love, too, 

 the self-sacrificial love of a mother for her children, 

 of a father for his family, of a soldier for his country, 

 of a philanthropist for his race, is based in its ultimate 

 analysis upon an enlightened selfishness? Then all 

 honor to the power which, starting with so humble and 

 lowly a form in the evolutionary scale of morals as 

 personal selfishness, has been able to evolve through 

 the natural conditions of life such higher, nobler forms 

 of enlightened selfishness as these. And in such case, 

 you must also be prepared to concede to the lower 

 animals an almost equal degree of enlightenment and 

 of selfishness with man. 



So-Called Lower Animals 



For you will notice that this sentiment of loyalty to 

 family, tribe, or race is not confined by any manner 

 of means to man alone. Many of the animals of the 

 jungle appear to have it as well, some possibly even 

 more highly developed than man. Subordination of self 

 to the good of the general pack seems to be common to 

 baboons, wild dogs, wolves, and other beasts of prey on 

 the one hand, to insects like ants and bees on the other. 1 

 1 The Descent of Man, vol. I. p. 72. 



