CHAPTER VIII.

THE LAW OF NATURAL SELECTION.
Darwinism is no longer disputed in so far as the logic of actual physical facts is concerned. The physical evolution of man from lower forms is the generally adopted theory — of phys- ical evolution.
While that elaborate system contains philosophic errors, its recorded facts constitute one of the great steps in the higher intellectual evolution of man. Through Darwin's noble life work the common intelligence is familiarized with the idea of evolution, if not with all of its facts and principles.
The world, however, has been unduly impressed and de- pressed by the Darwinian doctrine itself, by those mere theories by which Darwin accounted for the physical facts he brought to light. The world somehow gives that great scientist credit for furnishing the facts as well as his opinions concerning their origin.
Nature, it must be remembered, furnishes these facts. Mr. Darwin only discovered them to the world.
More than this, Darwin discovered but a limited range of data. He was not in a position to demonstrate all of the facts of the evolution of man. His theories, therefore, as to the factors and causes of evolution, are of no greater value than those of any other intelligent reasoner having the same physical facts before him. It seems inevitable, however, that the public once having ac- cepted the tangible evidences discovered by a man, will accept his opinions also.
Darwinism forcibly illustrates this. For years his opinions filled the world with consternation. It requires considerable re-
143
144 HARMONICS OF EVOLUTION.
flection to see that a physical fact of Nature is one thing, and a theory explaining that fact is quite another.
It requires a certain amount of independence to declare that Darwinism does not account for man as he really is, an intelli- gent and moral being, as well as a physical one.
In this connection it will be recalled that Alfred Russel Wal- lace wholly dissents from Darwin's theories. Mr. Wallace, the co-worker with Mr. Darwin for thirty years, and his collaborator in "The Descent of Man," yet disagrees with the doctrines of physical materialism. During his entire life of investigation as a physical scientist Mr. Wallace was investigating another line of phenomena than those attaching to the physical evolution of man. For fifty-three years he has been investigating modern spiritualism. In this investigation he brought to bear all of the tests and experiments known to physical science. He also brought to bear the cold rational judgments of a man trained in the practical methods of that school.
The result is that Alfred Russel Wallace declares that the phenomena of spiritualism are not demonstrable under physical laws, nor according to physical methods of analysis. He de- clares, therefore, that Nature has a super-physical, or spiritual side which demands the best efforts of science. "The Descent of Man" stands for half the life work of this profound student of Nature. His late work, however, "Miracles and Modern Spirit- ualism/' stands for judgment rendered after a lifetime of in- vestigation.
Thus, it appears that the two men who were co-workers in the same field of science and discovered the same physical facts, have reached diametrically opposite conclusions as to the mean- ings of those facts. This demonstrates, perhaps, more clearly than any other well-known example, the value of mere opinion.
Mere protest, however, against Darwinism, is no proof of its fallacy or insufficiency. To protest against, or to deny that elaborate array of fact and theory, is quite another thing from disproving either part of it. Mere intuition and faith in super-
THE LAW OF NATURAL SELECTION. H5
physical phenomena prove nothing. There is but one clais of proof that can be brought to bear in refutation of physical mate- rialism. That proof is simply a personal and exact knowledge of the spiritual side of Nature and the persistence of life after physical death.
While Darwin's doctrine contravenes Nature, its apparently solid basis of fact renders disproof extremely difficult.
This detracts from Mr. Wallace's judgments. Valuable as have been his observations and significant as are his conclusions, they are, nevertheless, only observations and conclusions as far as the public is concerned. Mr. Wallace merely reports those phenomena which are visible and tangible to the physical senses, He is not himself a demonstrator of the spiritual side of Nature. He is not personally able to analyze or to control spiritual ele- ments and forces. He is not in a position to either see or hear the sights and sounds belonging to the spiritual plane. He is not in a position to communicate independently with spiritual people. He is not in position to analyze spiritual material, nor to exercise his psychical powers upon the spiritual plane.
Mr. Wallace is simply a physical scientist reporting the phys- ical effects of unseen, unanalyzed and unconquered spiritual principles, elements and forces. For this reason his carefully col- lated evidences can have but a limited value. He does not say, "I know." He says, "I believe thus and so." He does not say, "I have traveled in that country; I report the evidences of my own spiritual senses. I know whereof I speak."
Even the higher science cannot furnish, by publication, what is meant by "proof," nor does it undertake such a task. It pre- tends to do no more than science does everywhere by publica- tion, viz., to report what has been proved by scientific methods. It adopts the usual and only method that any science can pursue by publication, viz.:
(i) It presents an array of scientifically demonstrated facts of Nature. 10
146 HARMONICS OF EVOLUTION.
(2) It refers each inquirer to Nature itself if he demands actual proof of the statements made.
This is all that any student or any specialist or any school of science can do by mere publication.
There is but one known way of proving anything in Nature. It does not matter whether the thing to be proved belongs to the physical or to the spiritual plane. Actual proof rests upon per- sonal investigation and personal demonstration of each particular fact.
For illustration: No man can prove the science of numbers without acquainting himself with the rules and practice of arith- metic, algebra, etc. He may, through hearsay, believe in mathe- matics. Proof, however, is self-demonstration.
The world at large has accepted the doctrine of evolution upon its faith in the integrity of Darwin and faith in his report upon Nature. The average Darwinian is no more prepared to prove the facts set forth by Darwin than the theologian is pre- pared to demonstrate the fact of life after physical death.
After all, public education is conducted mainly by faith. The average mind accepts as truth that which it believes emanates from sane and truthful teachers and investigators. Nor is the world mistaken in it's faith. Experience shows that men do riot knowingly riof "knavishly "propound false systems of "religion or philosophy or "science*. "The intention" of intellig'e'nce and the trend of development are ever toward the truths in Nature.
In this respect the higher science looks to public faith in its integrity just as physical science does. It can do no more than to state facts of Nature and challenge the world to an investi- gation.
Darwinism is something more than a scientific treatise. It is also a system of philosophy. The skillfulness with which the bare, tangible, physical facts of Nature are interwoven with Dar- win's theoretical factors and causes, renders criticism difficult. This Darwinian doctrine is nothing more than the best inter- pretation which Mr. Darwin could put upon the actual, tangible
THE LAW OF NATURAL SELECTION. 147
facts which he discovered. Those theories are ingenious. They are not, however, so broad as those of Mr. Wallace. The one propounds a theory which might account for the evolution of the physical body, while the other suggests laws and forces which might account for the higher phenomena of intelligence, morality and love. The one insists that all phenomena are based upon physical laws and forces, while the other holds that spiritual phenomena have super-physical causes.
The Darwinian theory is well summed up in that now famous proposition which reads, "The Struggle for Nutrition compels Natural Selection with Reproduction as a consequence, entail- ing divergence of character and extermination of less improved Species."
This proposition which is set forth as the unalterable fiat of Nature is, instead, but an assumption of Mr. Darwin himself. It is merely the summing up of his individual opinion as to the factors and causes of evolution.
According to Darwin, this law of natural selection includes that multiplicity of acts and expedients to which all living things are driven by reason of a struggle for nutrition in the midst of a hostile environment. As will be seen, this law rests upon the assumption that the primary cause of all struggle on the part of a living entity is a demand for food. It assumes that there are no other principles involved than the preservation of physical life. According to this law, all that a man is or can become is referable to the original hunger of the original life cell, and the hostile environment which compels a struggle for nutrition.
This theory rests upon two assumptions, viz.:
(1) That of physical hunger as a compelling motive for action.
(2) That Nature, so prolific in the generation of life and so lavish in nutriment of life, is yet hostile to life.
With this construction put upon Nature, the law of natural selection becomes a law of self-defense. The selections dealt with are simply alternatives and -expedients to which animals -and
148 HARMONICS OF EVOLUTION.
men are driven in the struggle for nutrition. This view of life and the progress of life excludes any principle of a really natural selection. It excludes the operation of an individual will and desire on the part of an entity to do thus or so. According to this doctrine progress is effected, not by any innate impelling principle, but is compelled by exterior conditions which force the individual in this or that direction.
This is all that Darwinian doctrine means when one accepts feeding as the original and only necessity and hostility as a com- pelling principle. This reading of Nature leaves no place for natural selection, that is, for acts and accomplishments brought about through the uncompelled choice of an organized intelli- gence. When we say of an organized intelligence that it does thus or so naturally, we mean that it responds voluntarily to a natural and innate impulse. It is meant that an intelligent en- tity, either animal or man, voluntarily seeks an individual satis- faction in this or that direction. We do not mean that it does thus or so because it is driven into a corner by hostile environ- ment and compelled to make this or that selection in self-defense.
For example, take cattle that are grazing in a meadow which adjoins a field of corn. The cattle, barred from the corn, are feeding upon the grass. In this act of feeding we see the strug- gle for nutrition. In that the field of corn is fenced, we note the hostile environment which, in this case, is an artificial environ- ment, erected by superior intelligence. If, however, the bars are let down, the cattle at once abandon the grass for the corn. They refuse to feed upon grass.
Why is this? How does Darwin's "law of natural selection" explain this simple act? How does it account for that instant, intelligent and voluntary choice and discrimination as between foods? How is this act explained by a struggle for nutrition in the midst of a hostile environment? In what sense was this preference for corn compelled by the struggle for nutrition?
Does it not rather indicate an innate power of selection in the animal which expresses itself as an individual choice?
THE LAW OF NATURAL SELECTION. 149
A horse would possibly feed upon potatoes should food be scarce, that is, should conditions be hostile. This would be selection in accordance with Darwin's theory of selection, a choice compelled by hostile environment. No one doubts but the horse would return to oats on the first opportunity, with every sign of approval. This last act of voluntary selection is one, however, which Darwinism does not explain.
Indeed, physical science fails to explain the law which gov- erns the selection and discrimination as to foods, on the part of animals as well as men. Attention to this one phenomenon alone would break down the theory of selection by compulsion, or evolution by hostile physical circumstance. It would be discovered that organized intelligence selects its foods in con- formity to the law of vibration. Such investigation would dis- close another principle of selection, viz., that of affinity, rather than that of hostility.
Darwin's law of natural selection is, in reality, a theory of unnatural selections. It is one that leaves organized intelligence the mere puppet of blind physical forces and of hostile physical conditions. Natural selection under this theory might well be likened to the natural selection a condemned criminal would make if given the choice of death by the rope or the guillotine.
Instead of natural selections Darwin's theory imposes a series of evils from which the victim, animal or man, must make choice or die. His law of natural selection involves simply:
(1) Blind mechanical forces.
(2) Hunger.
(3) Organs of digestion.
(4) Hostile conditions of Nature.
(5) Repeated processes of feeding and breeding.
In the light of such assumptions man is the automatic result of mechanical principles, blind physical demands, hostile condi- tions and competitive processes. He comes to be what he is solely through physical re-enforcement from without and by compulsory selections brought about by hostile environment.
150 HARMONICS OF EVOLUTION.
He is simply an effect of the digestive organs. He is a mass of inherited impulses, passions and sensations, acted upon by exter- nal physical forces and held together through processes of diges- tion.
This is a theory which precludes the idea that an organic entity is an individual operated by an individual and intelligent Will and Desire.
The famous Darwinian proposition, already quoted, could well be paraphrased to express yet another view of this "Law of Natural Selection." The struggle for nutrition means, of course, the struggle for physical life, from which may be derived another proposition laying down self-preservation as the first law of life. Darwin would be fairly stated if one were to say: "The struggle for self-preservation compels a battle of the physically strong against the physically weak, with survival of the physically fittest as a consequence, entailing the supremacy of the physically strong and extermination of the physically weak and incompetent."
Physical science, relying upon its "Law of Natural Selection/' must also rest upon this correlated proposition which declares that self-preservation is the first law of being. By "self-preserva- tion," physical science always means the self-preservation of physical life. With this as an underlying motive of all struggle, the "battle of the physically strong against the physically weak, witti" survival of the fittest, becomes the natural and only mode of progress. By "fittest" it must be remembered, physical sci- ence always means the physically fittest.
There is but one flaw in this otherwise perfect theory, viz., Nature refutes it.
Science shows that this planet of ours passed from a stage of non-life to life. How? By hostility to life, or by hospitality to life? It shows that the simpler forms appear first. It reveals a steady ascent from lower to higher forms, from simple to com- plex. It reveals the extinction of certain forms of life.
Does it, however, show extermination or even diminution of the lower forms or of the physically weak? On the contrary,
THE LAW OF NATURAL SELECTION. 151
does science not discover an increase of life in its simple and weaker forms? The earth, air and water teem with life in its very lowest form. The earth is simply alive with animalculae. A whole world of this infinitesimal life feeds upon the blood and tissue of the physically strong. Indeed, the physically strong are the store-houses for the physically weak.
If competition instead of co-operation were really the funda- mental principle in Nature, this solid earth had not been crys- tallized, the vegetable kingdom had not appeared, animal life would not have been a possibility, human civilization could not have been accomplished. If life from the beginning were a battle of the physically strong against the physically weak, the weaker insects and animals could not survive and multiply, nor would insect life feed upon the stronger animals and thus breed and multiply.
If evolution really meant a survival of the physically strong- est, mastodons would occupy the place of mosquitoes. In truth, however, the mastodon is extinct while the mosquito survives in great abundance. If evolution were a survival of merely the fit- test physically, lions and tigers and the strong rapacious ani- mals would have rendered human life an impossibility. If Na- ture were, indeed, hostile to life, this planet had not progressed from its original state of non-life to this prodigious, multiplication of life. When we consider the extinction of the mastodon and the persistence of the mosquito, is there not something absurd in this theory of the battle of the strong against the weak?
In the same way exception must be taken to the theory that self-preservation of physical life is the fundamental law of life. This is another of those "universal laws" which history and ex- perience, as well as the higher science, contravene.
Love of life is a universal passion.
This, however, is not saying that the preservation of physical life is the first law of being. If so, what about the law which im- pels a widowed bird to refuse to eat, to droop and to die? What of the law which impels a dog to starve upon. its master's .graye?
152 HARMONICS OF EVOLUTION.
If preservation of physical life be the first law of life, how shall we account for the fact that men risk death in every conceivable form, too often for causes that are trivial and unnecessary?
The history of man is the history of war, of life risked in bat- tle. If self-preservation of physical life were the fundamental law of life there had never been war, nor deeds of daring and courage, nor heroes, nor sacrifice even down to death. There had never been suicide, nor suicidal neglect of physical life. There had not been a vast army of religious martyrs.
Darwin's law of natural selection covers also what he terms sex selections. Sex, in its physical and functional capacities, receives minute analysis. Sex selections, however, are inter- preted to meet the requirements of the general law of natural se- lection, or selection by compulsion. Primarily, sex is considered purely as a physical desire for reproduction. Sex attraction is in- terpreted as something compelled by and dependent upon biolog- ical need for reproduction. While the value of sex selection is admitted, the sex relation itself is construed to meet the theory of evolution by necessity. Indeed, sex passion and sex love are de- fined as a "procreative mania," by force of which organic in- telligences are driven into obeying "Nature's first command — reproduction."
Thus, even that profound and voluntary bond between the two great powers in Nature is construed as a relation compelled and forced upon animal and man by a gross physical passion, which amounts to a "mania." Sex, according to Darwin, has no other uses than the physical. Those uses are solely in the interests, not of the individual, but of species. When it has thus analyzed sex it is done with it. Anything higher, by way of in- tellectual or moral necessity, is undreamed of.
The force and value of physical breeding are exhaustively treated by Darwin. The numerous phases of heredity are noted. He claims, however, that all variety in traits or conditions are but the effects of repeated processes of feeding or of repeated ex- periments in breeding.
THE LAW OF NATURAL SELECTION. 153
This is a theory of the evolution of man and the uses of sex in Nature, which is fairly logical as long as we consider the phys- ical organism only. When we come, however, to questions re- lating to increase of intelligence and the origin and develop- ment of love and altruism, the theory hopelessly fails. Intelli- gence is so distinctly super-physical that it refuses to be accounted for by the automatic operations of the digestive organs. Love is so distinctly a super-physical phenomenon that no amount of physical fact nor ingenious theory can explain it as a mere efflorescence of a "procreative mania." Sex passion, considered by itself, scarcely suggests to intelligence what intelligence ob- serves and feels and knows as sex love. Lust without love everywhere recognized as the most selfish of human passions; whereas, love, including physical passion, is the most unselfish sentiment known in this world. Mere physical sex passion and pure sex love are so unlike in their nature and expression as to appear the very reverse of each other.
t While Darwin refers sex love to the physical passions, he escaped the embarrassment of seeking to account for morality and altruism. He is satisfied that the personal love relations of human life are the outgrowth of the procreative tyranny. When he comes, however, to that class of ethical phenomena which we know as morality and altruism, he avoids the issue by defining them as "abnormal." Finding no logical cause for such phe- nomena in the battle of the strong against the weak, they are dismissed as unnatural, and therefore unaccountable in science. Having decided, according to the law of compulsory selection, that Nature sought the survival of the physically fittest, Darwin condemns philanthropy. He condemns it first, because it is un- natural, and next, because it cares for the unfit and incompetent children of men.
y Physical materialism thus sets up standards of life and con- duct which are worthy of savagery. It inculcates principles which would destroy civilization.
Nobody believes that Mr. Darwin really wanted to check
154 HARMONICS OF EVOLUTION.
philanthropy or to exterminate the weak and incompetent. That, however, is his doctrine. The probabilities are that Dar- win himself was a philanthropist. His personal life undoubtedly contradicted his own theory. He probably cared as tenderly for his own family, when weak or incompetent, as would the reader. It is likely that he would have been the first to protest had Eng- land passed a law to kill all of the weak and unfit subjects of that realm. This barbarous suggestion, which nobody has ever thought of applying to society, simply illustrates how far a man's theories may contradict the common impulses and the common sense of mankind. r>
This is an interpretation of man and his evolution which fails to satisfy human intelligence. The best intelligence of the age insists that whatever is, is natural. It insists that whatever ex- ists as universal phenomena is susceptible of analysis and dem- onstration under natural law. It insists that phenomena, uni- versally attaching to organic life under given conditions, must be natural. This includes phenomena which are intellectual and ethical as well as physical and material. It holds that no doc- trine of evolution is complete until it accounts for man as he is, an intelligent and moral being, inhabiting a physical body.
Intelligence claims that there can be no "law of natural se- lection" except at the same time it is a natural law of selection, viz., a law of selection whereby the intelligent selector voluntar- ily chooses to do or not to do a given thing. These are the claims of intelligence. These claims constitute a demand upon science. This is a task for which physical science is not equipped. It is one which the higher science undertakes.
A fundamental error of Darwinism has become a fundamental error of physical science in general, viz., the suppression or ob- scuration of the individual.
The effect of Darwinism upon the uninformed mind is uni- versally the same. It leaves the individual reader profoundly im- pressed with the utter insignificance of individual life, aspira- tion and effort. On the other hand, it advances species to
THE LAW OF NATURAL SELECTION. 155
formidable proportions. Nature appears an insatiate monster, engaged in grinding out species at the expense of every individual. There are no forces but mechanical ones, no prin- ciples except compulsory ones, no environment that is not hos- !tile. There are no processes except those oi battle and compe- tition. There are no motives except selfish ones. There are no rewards for intelligence except physical and material benefits. There is no future for the individual intelligence except as he physically contributes to species.
There is no escape from these conclusions when once the mind accepts the Darwinian theory as to the factors and causes of evolution.
Darwinism is the effort to analyze and account for species. It does not undertake a study of the individual as an individual. ^To determine the causes which differentiate and improve species is the motive of Darwin's effort. This complete absorption in species almost entirely obscures the individual. The origin and development of species overshadow the life and the purposes of the individual. Absorbed in the study of aggregates, the units lose their value, except as an integral part of the whole. The in- dividual has no place in Nature, except as he conserves or con- tributes to the whole ; that is, to the sum of physical life.
The effect of this doctrine upon the human mind is de- plorable. When applied to animals the theory seems rather plausible, for the lives and the employments of animals appear very gross to us. We have little sympathy with the struggles of the individual animal. When we come to man, however, it is very different. Here we protest against any science or any phi- losophy which wipes out the value of individual life and effort.
History, experience and intuition unite in disclaiming these deductions of physical materialism. They unite in proclaiming the value of the individual, both to himself and to the world.
In still another respect the individual suffers in both Darwin- ian science and theory. Whatever attention he does receive in the study of species is attention confined to the operation of his
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physical functions. How and why it feeds, how and why it breeds, are the only questions put to the individual by physical science. Nothing is considered except that which an organism absorbs and digests, or that which it absorbs and reproduces. Living itself is ignored. Neither animal nor man is considered apart from the physical functions. Life is ignored for that which sustains life, and for that which perpetuates life.
Even in the sex relation the individual plays only a phys- ical part. He is simply the victim of a "procreative mania" which compels sex selection. He is never seen as the volun- tary co-operator with another individual for the attainment of an individual object. Physical science discovers nothing in sex but its physical uses and purposes. A particular, intellectual and moral purpose, it has never yet perceived.
The relation of man and woman is held to be the same rela- tion as that which obtains between animals, vizv a physical one for the purposes of procreation. No higher implications as to sex have ever been discovered by physical science. No higher purpose has been seen in that universal cleavage and attraction between Nature's positive and receptive powers.
So completely has this unfortunate doctrine fastened itself upon modern science that one eminent specialist* publicly de- plores our monogamous system of marriage. Instead, he gravely advocates a practically free selection with children reared by the state.
So continually has this erroneous sex doctrine been exploited by physical science that a new moral philosophy is based upon the theory that sex is but a "physical device for reproduction" and that sex love is "essentially lust."
This degenerate view of the sex relation and office is the in- evitable result of a science which deals with the physical side of Nature only. This is the inevitable doctrine of a school which subordinates the mental and moral development of the
*Letorneau.
THE LAW OF NATURAL SELECTION. 157
individual to the physical improvement and preservation of species.
Physical science has never yet undertaken to define the sex principle. Indeed, sex has never yet been analyzed, as a prin- ciple, to modern intelligence. It has been taught by science in its physical, functional capacity alone. This is an error of science which is reflected back upon society through false liter- ary and social doctrines involving sex questions and relations.
"The Ascent of Man," already quoted as the exponent of a new moral philosophy, falls a victim to these scientific errors of the modern school.
The life and the profession of the author of this new moral philosophy satisfied him that morality, love and altruism are per- fectly natural phenomena. His observation and experience among men satisfied him that these are legitimate facts in life, resultant from natural causes. His determination to seek the cause and to explain the process of the moral order in Nature is commendable. His attempt, however, based as it is upon the assumptions of physical materialism, necessarily proves a failure.
In accepting Darwin's "physical basis of evolution," he ac- cepts the "law of natural selection" with scarcely a qualifying clause. That is to say, he agrees that everything that is in the physical world came to be through compulsions or enforced se- lections. The moralist goes even further than does physical science. The Darwinian is content to say that everything phys- ical and intellectual was evolved by the operation of a law of self- defense.
The moralist not only admits this assumption, but he goes so far as to say that everything moral was evolved by a law of self- sacrifice imposed upon the female in Nature. Physical science is satisfied to say that physical and intellectual phenomena arise by compulsions. The moralist, however, insists in so many words that love also came into the world "at the point of the sword."
"The Ascent of Man," therefore, practically agrees with the
158 HARMONICS OF EVOLUTION.
principles laid down in "The Descent of Man." The moralist enlarges the view of Nature only by the introduction of a second class of physical compulsions and a different line of effects which have been overlooked by physical materialism. The moralist simply turns from a consideration of enforced physical competi- tions to enforced physical sacrifices. He merely insists that the reproductive function equals that of nutrition in power and effect. In both systems the individual is equally the victim of Nature. In both systems the law of selection is a law of compulsion.
The agreement of the moralist with physical materialism is disclosed in the following statement:* "What controls it (life)," says Mr. Drummond, "are its functions. These and only these "determine life; living out these is life. * * * The rationale "of living is revealed for us in protoplasm. Protoplasm sets life "its task. * * * The activities even of the higher life * * * "are determined by these same lines."
The differences indicated here, as between the theories of the moralist and those of the materialist, are differences without dis- tinctions. The materialist simply centers upon nutrition as the cause of physical and intellectual phenomena. The other selects reproduction as the cause of all ethical phenomena. Thus, the moralist admits what the skeptic claims, viz., that the evolution of man has a basis in the physical functions and is governed by hostile environment. The skeptic evolves a physical and intelli- gent being out of the universal struggle for nutrition in the midst of a hostile environment, while the theologian evolves a moral being out of the struggle for reproduction as made by the female in the midst of a hostile environment.
Thus, observing those two bright intellectual stars, Darwin and Drummond, from the same point of view, there is no par- allax.
It will be remembered that the moralist sets out to show that love comes into the world by reason of the physical sacrifices im- posed upon the female half. To do this, it must be proved that
*"The Ascent of Man," pp. 14-15.
THE LAW OF NATURAL, SELECTION. 159
sex plays no part in the evolution of life. It must be demon- strated that sex love is a biological need. It must be demon- strated that sex is simply and solely a physical device for repro- duction. The author begins his arraignment of sex by saying:* "It (sex) may be the physical basis of a passion which is fre- "quently miscalled love, but love itself, in its true sense as self- "sacrifice * * * has come down a wholly different line."
However, before the moralist can clear the ground for his theory as to the origin of love, he is forced to meet and dispose of this obtrusive sex question. His review of sex, in this connec- tion, is remarkable as an exhibition of human reason bewildered at every point by spiritual intuitions. His line of reason, based upon physical science, had been carefully marked out. When he began to talk of sex he had intended to show that no natural relationship existed between sex attraction and love.
How well he kept to his carefully prepared line of reasoning may be determined from his own words. Those visions of the sex principle as perceived intuitionally by the learned Doctor, might well stand as the literary effort of some enthusiastic stu- dent of Natural Science.
At the very outset the moralist confesses his total inability to grapple with the profound mystery of sex. Astounded by its universal sympathies, he confesses his ignorance of its ultimate meaning and purposes. He does not realize that a few pages further on he is to forget this confession and drag down his sub- lime mystery to a physical "device for reproduction."
No more graphic vision of the sex principle was ever recorded than is contained in the following quotations:
f"Realize," says the moralist, "the novelty and originality of "this most highly specialized creation, and it will be seen at once "that something of exceptional moment must lie behind it. Here "is a phenomenon which stands absolutely alone on the field of "Nature. There is not only nothing at all like it in the world, but
*Page 224. tPagc 245.
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"while everything else has homologues or analogues somewhere "in the cosmos, this is without parallel. Familiarity has so ao "customed us to it that we accept the sex separation as a matter "of course; but no words can do justice to the wonder and nov- "elty of this strange line of cleavage which cuts down to the "very root of being in everything that lives. No theme of equal "importance has received less attention than this from evolution- "ary philosophy. * * * How deep down, from the very "dawn of life, this rent between the two sexes yawns is only now "beginning to be seen. Examine one of the humblest water "weeds — the spirogyra. It consists of waving threads or neck- laces of cells, each plant to the eye the exact duplicate of the "other. Yet, externally alike as they seem, the one has the "physiological value of the male, the other of the female. * * * "When we reach the higher plants the differences of sex become "as marked as among the higher animals. Male and female "flowers grow upon separate trees, or live side by side on the "same branch, yet so unlike one another in form and color that "the untrained eye would never know them to be relatives. * * * "Sex separation, indeed, is not only distinct among flowering "plants, but is kept up by a variety of complicated devices, and "a return to hermaphroditism is prevented by the most elabo- "rate precautions. When we turn to the animal kingdom again, "the same great contrast arrests us. Half a century ago, when "Balbiani described the male and female elements in microscopic "infusorians, his facts were all but rejected by science. But "further research has placed it beyond all doubt that the begin- "nings of sex are synchronous almost with those shadowings in "of life. From a state marked by a mere varying of the nuclear "elements, a state which might almost be described as one ante- "cedent to sex, the sex distinction slowly gathers definition, and "passing through an infinite variety of forms, and with countless "shades of emphasis, reaches at last the climax of separateness "which is observed among birds and mammals. "Through the whole wide field of Nature, then, this gulf is fixed.
THE LAW OF NATURAL SELECTION. 161
"Each page of the million-leaved Book of Species must be, as it "were, split in two, the one side for the male, and the other for the "female. Classification naturally takes little note of this distinc- tion; but it is fundamental. Unlikenesses between like things "are more significant than unlikenesses of unlike things. And the "unlikenesses between male and female are never small, and al- "most always great. * * * What exactly maleness is, and "what femaleness, has been one of the problems of the world. At "least five hundred theories of their origin are already in the "field, but the solution seems to have baffled every approach. "Sex has remained almost to the present hour an ultimate mys- "tery of creation, and men seem to know as little what it is as "whence it came."
It was known to the date growers in Egypt years ago that they must go to the deserts, secure branches of wild palm and wave them over the flowers of the date palm. This had to be done to insure a date crop. Modern science has explained this peculiar custom. Palm trees, like human beings, are male and female.
The garden date bearing palms were females. The wild palm was male. The waving branches transferred the fertilizing pollen from male to female.
Continues Mr. Drummond: "Now consider, in this far away "province of the vegetable kingdom, the strangeness of this "phenomenon. Here are two trees living wholly different lives, "separated by miles of desert land ; they are unconscious of one "another's existence; yet so linked that their separation is a "mere illusion.
"Physiologically they are one tree; they cannot dwell apart. "It is nothing to the point that they are neither dowered with "locomotion nor the power of conscious choice. The point is "that there is that in Nature which unites these seemingly dis- "united things, which effects combinations and co-operations "where one would least believe them possible, which sustains by 11
162 HARMONICS OF EVOLUTION.
"arrangements of the most elaborate kind interrelations be- tween tree and tree.
"By a device the most subtle of all that guard the higher "evolution of the world — the device of Sex — Nature accomplishes "this task of throwing irresistible bonds around widely separate "things, and establishing such sympathies between them that "they must act together or forfeit the very life of this kind. Sex "is a paradox; it is that which separates in order to unite. The "same mysterious mesh which Nature threw over the two sepa- "rate palms, she threw over the few and scattered units which "were to form the nucleus of mankind."
Thus, the moralist, diverted from his rational purpose, prac- tically disposes of his own theory.
Diverted but momentarily from the compulsions and sacri- fices of reproduction to the co-operations and fulfillments of sex, he states the love principle in Nature without knowing it.
It will be observed that at one moment he terms sex "the ultimate mystery of creation," and again "the paradox of Na- ture." Is it not singular that in his very next lesson he defines sex as a "physical device for reproduction?" He nowhere ex- plains how he becomes informed in the interval of those facts which explain sex as simply a physical device for reproduction.
It must, therefore, be clear to the reader that neither scien- tific skepticism nor theological speculation has discovered the true law of natural selection. Neither has set forth the true fac- tors and causes of the evolution of a physical, intelligent and moral being. Neither has solved the problem of human life nor of human love.
It is almost unbelievable that physical science, familiar with the universal affinities of the positive and receptive energies in Nature, yet fails to discover a principle of co-operation or a law of selection by natural affinity. It is almost unbelievable that a teacher of ethics, conversant with Nature and Revelation, could yet seek a physical basis for love in the enforced sacrifices of the weaker half of all living things.
THE LAW OF NATURAL SELECTION. 163
This is one of the paradoxes of human reason.
There is a science, however, which enjoys a broader acquaint- ance with Nature than physical science. There is a philosophy which interprets life and love from higher points of vantage than those upon which the churchman stood. This higher science operates upon two planes of matter, life, intelligence and love. This higher philosophy takes into account the spiritual and psychical principles of sex as well as its physical functions. This philosophy also takes into account, not only maternity, but pa- ternity, in both worlds of life.
To this science and to this philosophy we must look for ex- planation of morality, love and altruism, according to the true law of natural selection. This is a science which explicitly denies the materialist's compulsory law of natural selection. This is a phi- losophy which clearly refutes the moralist's compulsory law of love. On the contrary, our science demonstrates a really natural principle of selection, and our philosophy elucidates a voluntary principle of love.
To this higher science the world must look for discovery of a struggle in Nature which is infinitely greater than either the struggle for nutrition or the struggle for reproduction. To the higher philosophy it must look for illustration of a principle that is far more potent in character and effect than either competition or sacrifice.
In short, the higher science and the higher philosophy, founded upon Nature, physical, spiritual and psychical, refute all theories of "Natural Selection," governed by compulsions.
They declare, instead, that there is a natural law of selection which is neither compulsory nor competitive. They declare that there is a natural law of love which is neither compulsory nor sacrificial.