242 DEVELOPMENT AND HEREDTTY. 



own life, is the exercise of "intelligence," and 

 varies with the fineness and perfection of the 

 organisation. To realise the instinctive character 

 of the great mass of human action, we have only 

 to look at a large collection of mankind as a 

 whole, and notice the monotonous sameness in 

 their actions from year to year, as shown by statis- 

 tics of birth, marriage, pauperism, crime, illegiti- 

 macy, commerce, and manufacture. 



The intelligent human action and the simplest 

 process of growth are thus alike the necessary 

 result of the stimuli which are momentarily acting, 

 and those which have acted upon the organism 

 through its racial and individual existence. This 

 is the logical outcome from the doctrine of the 

 conservation of energy. The evidence is such that 

 we cannot escape the conclusion. We must accept 

 it in spite of the serious problems which it raises 

 in regard to free will and moral responsibility ; the 

 solution of the paradox thus raised seems to lie 

 in the proper conception of Being, and the relation 

 of its parts. 



The view that mind has developed according to 

 the principles of the theory here explained, will, 

 I think, simplify and elucidate some of the prob- 

 lems of psychology. At a glance one can see how 

 far Locke was correct in this theory of the mind 



