Mental Evolution. 50 1 



It may, however, be maintained that there is no con- 

 clusive proof that the mean intellectual level of Englishmen 

 to-day is any higher than it was in the days of the Tudors. 

 If so, of course, my argument falls to the ground. I have 

 no desire to dogmatize on the subject. I merely set down 

 the reasons, such as they are, and for what they are worth, 

 which lead me to entertain a general belief that the 

 intellectual progress of Englishmen during the past three 

 hundred years has been in part due to the inheritance of 

 individually acquired faculty. 



Mental evolution, then, is the metakinetic equivalent of 

 interneural, or, in us vertebrates, brain-evolution. The 

 brain forms a kinetic system in some sense independent of, 

 and yet in constant touch with, the kinetic system of the 

 world around. Its kineses, though they do not resemble, 

 yet more or less accurately represent or symbolize, the 

 kineses of the surrounding universe. As the kineses of 

 the world around are interdependent and harmonious, so 

 are the neural kineses of the brain interdependent and 

 harmonious. And no modification of this kinesis which is 

 out of harmony with the kinetic system already established 

 in the brain can be incorporated with that existing system. 

 Such attempted modification is eliminated through in- 

 congruity. 



Associated with this brain-kinesis, and forming its 

 inner aspect, is a metakinetic system in which the higher 

 manifestations rise to the level of full consciousness ; others 

 form sub-conscious states ; others are unconscious. But 

 the whole form a coherent system answering to the coherent 

 kinetic system. 



Consciousness is thus associated only with the pheno- 

 mena of that kinetic microcosm which we call the brain 

 (or other interneural system). Obviously, therefore, 

 it does not and cannot deal directly with anything 

 outside the brain. Its knowledge is solely and entirely 

 a knowledge of the representative occurrences of the 

 interneural system. But out of these occurrences a sur- 



