MAN 221 



present realization ? As we rise higher in the animal 

 kingdom the characteristics of the successive higher 

 groups are more and more slow of attainment and dif- 

 ficult of realization, just because of their grander pos- 

 sibilities. And this is true and important above all in 

 the case of man. His possibilities are beyond our 

 powers of conception, for, if you will, man is yet only 

 larval man. 



We have followed the sequence of functions to its 

 culmination in a miud completely dominated by right- 

 eousness and unselfishness, however far above our 

 present attainments this goal may be. We have found 

 that all attempts to reverse this sequence end in death 

 or degeneration. Failure to advance, especially in 

 higher forms, results in extinction or retrogression. 

 We cannot stand stiU. Each higher step is longer and 

 more important than any preceding ; each last step is 

 essential to life. Bighteousness in the wiU is the last 

 step essential to man's progress. And if a sound 

 mind in a sound body is important or necessary, a 

 sound will, resolutely set on right, is absolutely essen- 

 tial. Failure to attain this is ruin. 



And man can to a great extent place himself 

 so that his surroundings shall aid him to take this 

 last, essential, upward step. He does this by the 

 choice of his associates. If he associates himself 

 with men who are tending upward, he will rise ever 

 higher. If he choose the opposite kind of associ- 

 ates he must sink into ever deeper degradation ; he 

 has thereby chosen death. For his associates, once 

 chosen, make him like themselves. And thus natural 

 selection makes for the survival of those men who 

 resolutely choose life. And thoughtless or careless 



