34 THE SCIENCE OF THE FUTURE : 



of objects and forces, more or less orderly and distinct from man, in the 

 midst of which man is placed the purpose and tendency of his life being 

 " adaptation to his environment." To understand this we may imagine 

 Mrs. Brown in the middle of Oxford Street. 'Buses and cabs are running 

 in different directions, carts and drays are rattling on all sides of her. 

 This is her environment, and she has to adapt herself to it. She has to 

 learn the laws of the vehicles and their movements, to stand on this side 

 or on that, to run here and stop there, conceivably to jump into one at a 

 favorable moment, to make use of the law of its movement, and so get 

 carried to her destination as comfortably as may be. A long course of 

 this sort of thing " adapts" Mrs. Brown considerably, and she becomes 

 more active, both in mind and body, than before. That is all very well. 

 But Mrs. Brown has a destination. (Indeed how would she ever have got 

 into the middle of Oxford Street at all if she had not had one? and if she 

 did get there with no distinction at all, but merely to skip about, would 

 there be any Mrs. Brown left in a short time ?) The question is, " What 

 is the destination of Man ? " 



About this last question unfortunately we hear little. The theory is 

 (I hope I am not doing it injustice) that by studying your environment 

 sufficiently you will find out that is, that by investigating Astronomy, 

 Biology, Physics, Ethics, &c., you will discover the destiny of man. But 

 this seems to me the same as saying that by studying the laws of cabs and 

 'buses sufficiently you will find out where you are going to. These are 

 ways and means. Study them .by all means, that is right enough ; but 

 do not think they will tell you where to go. You have to use them, not 

 they you. 



In order therefore for the environment to act, there must be a destina- 

 tion. This I suppose is expressed in the biological dictum, "organism 

 is made by function as well as environment." What then is the function 

 of Man ? And here we come back again to the meaning of the word 

 "I." 



Notwithstanding then the prevalence of the foot regime, and that the 

 heathen so furiously rage together in their belief in it, let us suggest that 

 there is in man a divine consciousness as well as a foot-consciousness. 

 For as we saw that the sense of taste may pass from being a mere local 

 thing on the tip of the tongue to pervading and becoming synonymous 

 with the health of the whole body ; or as the blue of the sky may be to 

 one person a mere superficial impression of color, and to another the 

 inspiration of a poem or picture, and to a third as to the "god-intoxi- 

 cated " Arab of the desert a living presence like the ancient Dyaus or 

 Zeus ; so may not the whole of human consciousness gradually lift itself 

 from a mere local and temporary consciousness to a divine and universal ? 

 There is in every man a local consciousness connected with his quite ex- 

 ternal body ; that we know. Are there not also in every man the makings 

 of a universal consciousness ? That there are in us phases of conscious- 



