Biological Foundations of Ethics 445 
differentiate the moral conduct of men from the social behaviour of 
animals (to which some such term as “pre-moral”’ or “quasi-moral ” 
may be applied), still the fact remains that, as Darwin showed, there 
is abundant evidence of the occurrence of such social behaviour— 
social behaviour which, even granted that it is in large part intelli- 
gently acquired, and is itself so far a product of educability, is of 
survival value. It makes for that integration without which no 
social group could hold together and escape elimination. Further- 
more, even if we grant that such behaviour is intelligently acquired, 
that is to say arises through the modification of hereditary instincts 
and emotions, the fact remains that only through these instinctive 
and emotional data is afforded the primary tissue of the experience 
which is susceptible of such modification. 
Darwin sought to show, and succeeded in showing, that for the 
intellectual and moral life there are instinctive foundations which a 
biological treatment alone can disclose. It is true that he did not in 
all cases analytically distinguish the foundations from the super- 
structure. Even to-day we are scarcely in a position to do so 
adequately. But his treatment was of great value in giving an 
impetus to further research. This value indeed can scarcely be 
overestimated. And when the natural history of the mental opera- 
tions shall have been written, the cardinal fact will stand forth, 
that the instinctive and emotional foundations are the outcome of 
biological evolution and have been ingrained in the race through 
natural selection. We shall more clearly realise that educability 
itself is a product of natural selection, though the specific results 
acquired through cerebral modifications are not transmitted through 
heredity. It will, perhaps, also be realised that the instinctive 
foundations of social behaviour are, for us, somewhat out of date 
and have undergone but little change throughout the progress of 
civilisation, because natural selection has long since ceased to be the 
dominant factor in human progress. The history of human progress 
has been mainly the history of man’s higher educability, the products 
of which he has projected on to his environment. This educability 
remains on the average what it was a dozen generations ago; but 
the thought-woven tapestry of his surroundings is refashioned and 
improved by each succeeding generation. Few men have in greater 
measure enriched the thought-environment with which it is the aim 
of education to bring educable human beings into vital contact, than 
has Charles Darwin. His special field of work was the wide province 
of biology ; but he did much to help us to realise that mental factors 
have contributed to organic evolution and that in man, the highest 
product of Evolution, they have reached a position of unquestioned 
supremacy. 
