MORALITY 



of education, commerce, legislation, and so on. The 

 ideal in all departments of life is pure reason ; but it has 

 to struggle long against the current prejudices and cus- 

 toms, which find their chief support in the superstitions 

 of the Church and the conservative tendencies of the 

 state. In this state of Byzantine immorality, decorat- 

 ing itself so often with the mantle of piety, practical 

 materialism flourishes, while monism, or theoretical ma- 

 terialism, is thrust aside. 



If we sum up all that monistic science has taught us 

 as to the origin and development of morality, we may 

 put it in the following series of propositions: i. By 

 adaptation to different conditions of life the simple plasm 

 of the earliest organisms, the archigonous monera, under- 

 goes certain modifications. 2. As the living plasm reacts 

 on these influences, and the reaction is often repeated, a 

 habit is formed (as in the catalysis of certain inorganic 

 chemical processes. 3. This habit is hereditary, the 

 repeated impressions being fixed in the nucleus (or 

 caryoplasm) in the case of the unicellulars. 4. When 

 hereditary transmission lasts through many generations, 

 and is strengthened by cumulative adaptation, it be- 

 comes an instinct. 5. Even in the protist coenobia (the 

 cell - communities of the protophyta and protozoa) 

 social instincts are formed by association of cells. 6. 

 The antithesis of the individual and social instinct, or of 

 egoism and altruism, increases in the animal kingdom 

 in proportion to the development of psychic activity and 

 social life. 7. In the higher social animals definite cus- 

 toms arise in this way, and these become rights and 

 duties when obedience to them is demanded by the 

 society (herd, flock, people) and the breach of them 

 punished. 8. Savage races at the lowest stage, without 

 religion, are not differently related to their customs than 

 the higher social animals. 9. The higher savages de- 

 velop religious ideas, combine their superstitious prac- 



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