II EVOLUTION AND ETHICS. 81 



bier and humbler organisms, until the " fittest " 

 that survived might be nothing but lichens, di- 

 atoms, and such microscopic organisms as those 

 which give red snow its colour; while, if it became 

 hotter, the pleasant valleys of the Thames and 

 Isis might be uninhabitable by any animated 

 beings save those that flourish in a tropical jungle. 

 They, as the fittest, the best adapted to the 

 changed conditions, would survive. 



Men in society are undoubtedly subject to the 

 cosmic process. As among other animals, multi- 

 plication goes on without cessation, and involves 

 severe competition for the means of support. The 

 struggle for existence tends to eliminate those less 

 fitted to adapt themselves to the circumstances 

 of their existence. The strongest, the most self- 

 assertive, tend to tread down the weaker. But 

 the influence of the cosmic process on the evolu- 

 tion of society is the greater the more rudimen- 

 tary its civilization. Social progress means a 

 checking of the cosmic process at every step and 

 the substitution for it of another, which may be 

 called the ethical process; the end of which is not 

 the survival of those who may happen to be the 

 fittest, in respect of the whole of the conditions 

 which obtain, but of those who are ethically the 

 best.20 



As I have already urged, the practice of that 

 which is ethically best — what we call goodness or 

 virtue — involves a course of conduct which, in all 

 218 



