Aspiration in Evolution is Morality 377 



individuals in concerted action. Much of the heredity of 

 an individual is, in fact, seen to be, not to the individual 

 advantage; and this is the apparent inconsistency of the 

 scheme of life justice. It compels a morality which may 

 demand self-sacrifice often, and even self-immolation at 

 times, in order that a benefit may accrue to the larger unit 

 represented in the lineage, the family, the nation or the race. 

 That is to say there arise circumstances when the reserve of 

 inherited power with which a creature is endowed, — that 

 power which he received by no individual merit, but out of 

 the ancestral and collective strength, and which he holds 

 only as a trustee of the lineage in collective strength, — this 

 reserve is demanded of him, and he gives it upon demand. 

 But he who gives is the ego of lineal life, acting in the 

 individual who seems to be sacrificed. 



The birthright of every creature above the scale of the 

 protoplasmic unit, represents a bestowal of something upon 

 the individual, which is the gift of individual life, of the 

 fundamental privilege; and it represents also a secondary 

 trust gift of heredity; a gift accumulated by all the ancestors 

 of this creature, not for his sole use, but for the use of all 

 of their descendants. Therefore if the normal individual is 

 to be considered as a conduct unit, he receives this gift of 

 heredity as a thing to be dutifully enjoyed, and transmitted 

 not smaller than received, but greater by his added experience 

 and conduct. 



The unconscious performance of this duty of added pro- 

 gress as it is shown in lower life, reveals its essential import- 

 ance. The self-conscious life of humanity perceives this 

 law not with any emancipation from it, and not as a permis- 



