CHAPTER VI 



CAIN AND ABEL 



BEFORE tracing the course of Evolution further, I will point 

 out how its course here coincides with the biblical account of 

 Cain and Abel, after which I will proceed to show how the 

 course of this age demonstrates the dawn of Comprehension 

 and the conception of Religion in the mind of man. 



Now, the best interpretation I can put on the biblical account 

 of Cain and Abel is that they personify the two great divisions 

 of mankind during the Stone Age the Aryan and Mongolian 

 Races. Abel apparently represents the great Alpine and 

 Aryan Migration, which, preferring a nomadic life, pushed 

 forward north as far as Iceland. As they were huntsmen and 

 shepherds, they shared the proceeds of the chase in common, 

 combining together to be able the better to hunt and to protect 

 their flocks, which they also shared in common. This, added 

 to the fact that they led a life more closely in touch with 

 nature, made them less selfish, more energetic and inclined to 

 kill only in self-defence or under provocation ; so they evolved 

 higher ideals of justice, co-operation, unity and mercy, and 

 were not inspired to destroy towns, arts and civilised customs 

 as were their Mongolian competitors. The Mongolian Races 

 personified by Cain cultivated habits of horticulture and agri- 

 culture, and the result of this distinction was that the Mon- 

 golian developed more largely the power of skill and manu- 

 facture and so evolved greater powers of Imagination and 

 construction at an earlier age than the Aryan Races. 



This led to their being the first to evolve a primitive 

 form both of civilisation and of religion. But both these were 

 of the most material description. As hinted in the last chapter, 

 one of the results was that of the private ownership of property, 

 which gave rise to more selfish ideals and to the crimes of 

 robbery and murder, for civilisation is conducive to crime in 

 its early stages of evolution. But in the space I intend to 

 devote to side issues in this treatise I cannot go fully into 



