II EVOLUTION AND ETHICS. 61 



tlement should ever take place. Arrears might 

 stand over as a sort of " hanging gale "; a period 

 of celestial happiness just earned might be suc- 

 ceeded by ages of torment in a hideous nether 

 world, the balance still overdue for some remote 

 ancestral error. ^ 



Whether the cosmic process looks any more 

 moral than at first, after such a vindication, may 

 perhaps be questioned. Yet this plea of justifica- 

 tion is not less plausible than others; and none 

 but very hasty thinkers will reject it on the ground 

 of inherent absurdity. Like the doctrine of evo- 

 lution itself, that of transmigration has its roots 

 in the world of reality; and it may claim such 

 support as the great argument from analogy is 

 capable of supplying. 



Everyday experience familiarizes us with the 

 facts which are grouped under the name of he- 

 redity. Every one of us bears upon him obvious 

 marks of his parentage, perhaps of remoter rela- 

 tionships. More particularly, the sum of tenden- 

 cies to act in a certain way, which we call " char- 

 acter," is often to be traced through a long series 

 of progenitors and collaterals. So we may justly 

 say that this " character " — this moral and in- 

 tellectual essence of a man — does veritably pass 

 over from one fleshly tabernacle to another, and 

 does really transmigrate from generation to gen- 

 eration. In the new-born infant, the character of 

 the stock lies latent, and the Ego is little more 



