44 EVOLUTION AND ETHICS. i 



nature, their dose of original sin, is rooted out by 

 some method at present unrevealed, at any rate 

 to disbelievers in supernaturalism, every child born 

 into the world will still bring with him the in- 

 stinct of unlimited self-assertion. He will have 

 to learn the lesson of self-restraint and renuncia- 

 tion. But the practice of self-restraint and re- 

 nunciation is not happiness, though it may be 

 something much better. 



That man, as a " political animal," is suscep- 

 tible of a vast amount of improvement, by edu- 

 cation, by instruction, and by the application of 

 his intelligence to the adaptation of the condi- 

 tions of life to his higher needs, I entertain not 

 the slightest doubt. But so long as he remains 

 liable to error, intellectual or moral; so long as 

 he is compelled to be perpetually on guard against 

 the cosmic forces, whose ends are not his ends, 

 without and within himself; so long as he is 

 haunted by inexpugnable memories and hopeless 

 aspirations; so long as the recognition of his intel- 

 lectual limitations forces him to acknowledge his 

 incapacity to penetrate the mystery of existence; 

 the prospect of attaining untroubled happiness, 

 or of a state which can, even remotely, deserve the 

 title of perfection, appears to me to be as mislead- 

 ing an illusion as ever was dangled before the eyes 

 of poor humanity. And there have been many of 

 them. 



That which lies before the human race is a 



