176 ORGANIC EVOLUTION 



Are there among us to-day men of keener inventive genius 

 than the one who first used fire, or the inventor of the lever 

 or of the wheel, or than the man who first made bronze or 

 smelted ore? Our modern engines have been invented 

 screw by screw by successive builders, each building upon 

 the others' work. Have we to-day men of much larger legal 

 and social understanding than the ancient lawgivers who 

 forged the legal systems which still are the basis of our most 

 enlightened governments ? Have we poets whose genius 

 greatly transcends that of Homer or of the authors of the 

 books of Job and Ruth ? In aesthetic appreciation and in 

 the power of artistic expression in sculpture and architecture 

 we are degenerate compared with the Greeks. 



Even in innate moral character have we greatly advanced ? 

 We are learning the lesson of altruism, but are we born with 

 a sturdier moral sense ? If we could take a hundred thousand 

 infants from London or Chicago and, turning back the wheel 

 of time, place them in the homes of ancient Babylon, would 

 they reach a higher standard of righteousness or of altruism 

 than their neighbors ? How little evidence we have of real 

 evolution of mankind since the first emergence of the race 

 from the darkness of prehistoric times ! 



Whether or not we believe that man has advanced in 

 innate character during the last five or ten thousand years, 

 we can certainly say that the advance has not been rapid. 

 The zoologist thinks of the problems of evolution in periods 

 of geologic time, not in years. He sees decided change in 

 the ancestors of the horse, when he compares the Eocene 

 and Miocene fossil faunas. He would hardly expect to find 

 great progress in evolution indicated in the fossils found in 

 the last few feet, say, of the Miocene strata, which would 



