248 EVOLUTION 



struggle and development to species-main- 

 taining ends. The ideal of evolution is thus 

 no gladiator's show, but an Eden; andJiLQiigh 

 competition can never be wholly eljrpinatprl 

 of progress j,s thus no fftrnight lin? 

 an asymptote it is mufch for our 

 pure natural history to see no longer struggle, 

 but love as "creation's final law." 



Natural selection ^remains still a yera. causa. 

 in the origin oJL species; but the function 

 ascribed to it is practically reversed. It 

 exchanges its former supremacy as the 

 supposed sole determinant among practically 

 indefinite possibilities of structure and func- 

 tion, for the more modest position^ simply 

 accelerating, retarding nr 



prfl pp ffi q nf ^"h^rwii qp _j[gtgrrnined change. It 

 furnishes the brake rather than the" steam or 

 the rails for the journey of life; or in better 

 metaphor, instead of guiding the ramifica- 

 tions of the tree of life, it would, in Mivart's 

 excellent phrase, do little more than apply 

 the pruning-knife to them. In other words, 

 its functions are mainly those of the third 

 Fate, not the first ;^of Siva, not of Brahma. 



