150 THE EVOLUTION OF MAN 



Every one knows that water will not run uphill; yet in the 

 societal realm there have been plenty of well-meaning people, 

 through the ages, who have worn out and wasted their lives 

 in unhappiness, trying ineffectually to overcome a societal 

 tendency and law which are equally inevitable. If an ignora- 

 mus plays about in a chemical laboratory, we keep our dis- 

 tance, for we expect trouble as a result of ignorance of chemical 

 substances and laws. Knowledge of the experimenter's good 

 intentions or orthodoxy does not reassure us at all. But we 

 easily permit the uninformed meddler to prowl about the 

 structure of society, poking and tinkering, apparently in the 

 belief that, provided his intentions are good, nothing but 

 human weal can result. We are bound to learn, sometime, 

 that powerful forces are at work within the societal range, and 

 that ignorant tampering is even more dangerous here than 

 elsewhere because so many more people have to endure the 

 consequences. Then we shall want more knowledge of these 

 forces, that we may adjust to them. 



Intelligent adjustment to the known inevitable is as rare 

 on earth as automatic adjustment to the unknown inevitable 

 is common. But the former is an abridged and less painful 

 process. Adaptation is sure, because it is the condition of 

 comfort and of life itself. Adaptability is that which hurries 

 and eases the process. Of all earthly things that which pos- 

 sesses the supreme capacity for swift adaptation is the human 

 mind. But that capacity is undeveloped, fettered in its action 

 by pseudo-knowledge, bias, caprice, and sentimentality except 

 where tests and verification are immediate and conclusive, and 

 where, therefore, knowledge is almost automatically acquired. 

 Nowhere is real knowledge and science so little in intelligent 

 demand as in the societal realm, for the latter is self-sown to 

 whims and dreams of all varieties. It is thought that man can 

 here have his own will; here, at last and at least, he is lord. 

 He senses no elemental powers in the field. Here, of all places, 



