The Whence and the Whither of Man Part 16

There are plenty of churches of Laodicea to-day. May you be delivered from them. But, thank G.o.d, there are also churches of Philadelphia and Smyrna. May you be pastors of one of the latter. It will not pay you a very large salary, for Demas has gone to the church of Laodicea, because the minister of the church of Smyrna was not orthodox, or not sufficiently spiritually minded--meaning thereby that he rebuked the sins of actual living men in general, and of Demas in particular--or preached politics, and did not mind his business. And your church may be small. For many of the congregation have gone to the church around the other corner, which is mainly a cl.u.s.ter of a.s.sociations, having excellent names, and useful for almost every purpose except building up a manly, rugged, heroic, G.o.dlike character. The minister there, they will tell you, preaches delightful sermons. They make you "feel so good." He annihilates pantheism, and his denunciations of materialism are eloquent in the extreme. But his incarnations of materialism are Huxley and Darwin, and to the uncharitable he seems to almost carefully avoid any language which might seem to reflect upon the dollar- and place-wors.h.i.+p of some of the occupants of his front pews. Now, I am not here to defend Mr. Huxley or Mr. Darwin.

Withstand them to the face wherever they are to be blamed. And for some utterances they are undoubtedly to be blamed, honest souls as they were. But I for one cannot help feeling that there is among the "dwellers in Jerusalem" a materialism of the heart which is indefinitely worse than any intellectual heresy. When you hit at the one heresy strike hard at the other also.

Many will have left your little church of Smyrna. It had to be so.

For the divine sifting process, which is natural selection on its highest plane, has not ceased to work. It must and shall still go on; it cannot be otherwise. Has the great principle ceased to be true in modern history that "though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved?"

But do not be discouraged. Preach Christ and a heroic Christianity.

Do not be afraid to demand great things of your people. Remember that Ananias was encouraged to go to Paul because the Lord would show Paul how great things he should suffer for the name of Jesus.

This is what appeals to the heroic in every man, and we do not make nearly enough use of it. And the heroic Christ and his heroic Christianity will draw every heroic soul in the community to himself. They may not be very heroic looking. You may be in some hill town in old Ma.s.sachusetts "Nurse of heroes." Pardon me, I do not intend to be invidious. Heroism is cosmopolitan. One of the pillars of your church may be the school-teacher of the little red school-house at the fork of the roads, in the yard ornamented with alders, mulleins, and sumachs. She boards around, and is clad in anything but silks and sealskins. But she trains well her band of hardy little fellows, who will later fear the mult.i.tude as little as they now mind the Berks.h.i.+re winds. And from the pittance she receives for training these rebellious urchins into heroic men she is supporting an old mother somewhere, or helping a brother to an education. And your deacon will be some farmer, perhaps uncouth in appearance and rough of dress, and certainly blunt in his scanty speech. He'll not flatter you nor your sermons; and until you've lived with him for years you will not know what a great heart there is in that rugged frame, and what wealth of affection in that silent hand-shake. And there is his wife. She is round and ample, and certainly does not look especially solemn or pious. She is aunt and mother to the whole community, the joy of all the children, nurse of the sick, and comfort of the dying. She is doing the work of ten at home, and of a host in the village. And your right-hand man is great Onesiphorus from the mill down in the valley, fighting an uphill battle to keep the wolf from the door, while he and his wife deny themselves everything, that their flock of children may have better training for fighting G.o.d's battles than they ever enjoyed.

I cannot describe these men and women. If you have lived with them, you will need no description, and would resent the inadequacy of mine. If you have never had the good fortune to live with them, it is impossible to make you see them as they are. When you once have thoroughly known them, language will fail you to do them justice, and you will prefer to be silent rather than slander them by inadequate portrayal. They are at first sight not attractive-looking. If you stand outside and look at them from a distance their lives will appear to you very humdrum and prosaic.

But remember that for almost thirty years our Lord lived just such a life in Nazareth, making ploughs and yokes; and then, when the younger brothers and sisters were able to care for themselves, s.n.a.t.c.hed three years from supporting a peasant family in Galilee to redeem a world. And who was Peter but a rough, hardy fisherman?

Now a Paul, trained at the feet of Gamaliel, was also needed; and the twelve did not come from the lowest ranks of society. But they were honest, industrious, practical, courageous, hardy, common people. And single-handed they went out to conquer empires. And they succeeded through the power of G.o.d in them.

Who knows the possibilities of your little church in the hilltown of Smyrna? These men and women are the pickets of G.o.d's great host.

They are scattered up and down our land, fighting alone the great battle, unknown of men and sometimes thinking that they must be forgotten of G.o.d. And the picket's lonely post is what tries a man's courage and strength.

Take your example from Paul's epistle. Greet Phebe, the schoolmistress, and Aquila and Priscilla on their rocky farm on the mountain-side, and greet the burden-bearing Onesiphorus. And give them G.o.d's greeting and encouragement, for he sends it to them through you. Show them the heroism which there is in their "humdrum"

lives; and cheer them in the efforts, of whose grandeur they are all unconscious. Bid them "be strong and of a very good courage." For in the character of these people there is the granite of the eternal hills, and in their hearts should be the suns.h.i.+ne of G.o.d. Do not be ashamed of your congregation. Their dimes or dollars may look pitifully small and few on the collector's plate; only G.o.d sees the real immensity of the gift in the self-denial which it has cost.

Your people will take sides with the cause of right, while it is still unpopular. They have furnished the moral backbone and unswerving integrity of many of your great business houses in this city to-day. From those families will go forth the men whom the good will trust and the evil fear. The power for good proceeding from your church will be like the floods which Ezekiel saw pouring out from beneath the threshold of the Lord's house.

For these common people, whom "G.o.d must have loved because he made so many of them," are the true heirs to the future. And wealth and culture, art and learning, are to burn like torches to light their march. Finally, my young brothers, do not be bitterly disappointed if you are not "popular preachers." Do not let too many people go to sleep under your preaching, even if one young man did go to sleep under one of Paul's sermons. But if now and then someone is angry at what you have said, do not worry too much over it. Preach the truth in love. If Elijah and John the Baptist, and Peter and Paul, were to preach to-day I doubt greatly whether they would be popular preachers. I cannot find that they ever were so. They would probably be peripatetic candidates, until someone supported them as independent evangelists. After their death we would rear them great monuments, and then devote ourselves to railing at Timothy because he was not more like what we imagine Paul was.

Even Socrates found that he must bid farewell to what men count honors, if he would follow after truth. You may have the same experience. You will have to champion many an unpopular cause, and your people will not like it. They will say you lack tact. Now Paul was a man of infinite tact. Witness his sermon on Mars' Hill. But if his letters to the church in Corinth were addressed to most modern churches, they would soon set out in search of a pastor of greater adaptability.

If you play the man, and fight the good fight of faith, I do not see how you can always avoid hitting somebody on the other side. And he will pull you down if he can; and will probably succeed in sometimes making your life very uncomfortable. Remember the teaching of scripture and science, that the upward path was never intended to be easy. The scriptural pa.s.sages to this effect you can find all through the gospels and epistles, and I need not quote them to you.

I will, however, tell you honestly that many are of the opinion that these pa.s.sages are now obsolete, being applicable only to the first centuries, or to especially critical times in the history of the church. I cannot share that view, but, lest I seem too old-fas.h.i.+oned, will merely quote the ringing words of our own Dr.

Hitchc.o.c.k, that "no man ever enters heaven save on his s.h.i.+eld." And allow me to quote in the same connection the testimony of that prince of scientists, Professor Huxley, in his lecture on "Evolution and Ethics:"

"If we may permit ourselves a larger hope of abatement of the essential evil of the world than was possible to those who, in the infancy of exact knowledge, faced the problem of existence more than a score of centuries ago, I deem it an essential condition of the realization of that hope that we should cast aside the notion that the escape from pain and sorrow is the proper object of life.

"We have long since emerged from the heroic childhood of our race, when good and evil could be met with the same 'frolic welcome;' the attempts to escape from evil, whether Indian or Greek, have ended in flight from the battle-field; it remains to us to throw aside the youthful over-confidence and the no less youthful discouragement of nonage. We are grown men, and must play the man

"... 'strong in will To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield,'

"cheris.h.i.+ng the good that falls in our way and bearing the evil in and around us, with stout heart set on diminis.h.i.+ng it. So far we all may strive in one faith toward one hope:

"'It may be that the gulfs will wash us down, It may be we shall touch the Happy Isles.

"... but something ere the end, Some work of n.o.ble note may yet be done.'"

We must be strong and of a very good courage. While the avoidance of pain and discomfort, or even happiness, cannot be the proper end of life, it is not a world of misery or an essentially and hopelessly evil world. There is plenty of misery in the world, and we cannot deny it. Neither can we deny that G.o.d has put us in the world to relieve misery, and that until we have made every effort and strained every nerve as we have never yet done, we, and not G.o.d, are largely responsible for it. But behind misery stand selfishness and sin as its cause. And here we must not parley but fight. And the hosts of evil are organized and mighty. "The sons of this world are for their own generation wiser than the sons of light." And we shall never overcome them by adopting their means. But we can and shall surely overcome. For he that is with us is more than they that be with them. "The skirmishes are frequently disastrous to us, but the great battles all go one way." And we long for the glory of "him that overcometh." But the victor's song can come only after the battle, and be sung only by those who have overcome. And we would not have it otherwise if we could. The closing words of Dr.

Hitchc.o.c.k's last sermon are the following:

"It is one of the revelations of scripture that we are to judge the angels, sitting above them on the s.h.i.+ning heights. It may well be so. Those angels are the imperial guard, doing easy duty at home. We are the tenth legion, marching in from the swamps and forests of the far-off frontier, scarred and battered, but victorious over death and sin."

CHAPTER X

PRESENT ASPECTS OF THE THEORY OF EVOLUTION

In all our study we have taken for granted the truth of the theory of evolution. If you are not already persuaded of this by the writings of Darwin, Wallace, and many others, no words or arguments of mine would convince you. We have used as the foundation of our argument only the fundamental propositions of Mr. Darwin's theory.

But while all evolutionists accept these propositions they differ more or less in the weight or efficiency which they a.s.sign to each.

In a sum in multiplication you may gain the same product by using different factors; but if the product is to be constant, if you halve one factor, you must double another. Evolution is a product of many factors. One evolutionist lays more, another less, emphasis on natural selection, according as he a.s.signs less or more efficiency to other forces or processes. Furthermore, evolutionists differ widely in questions of detail, and some of these subsidiary questions are of great practical importance and interest. It may be useful, therefore, to review these propositions in the light of the facts which we have gathered, and to see how they are interpreted, and what emphasis is laid on each by different thinkers.

The fundamental fact on which Mr. Darwin's theory rests is the "struggle for existence." Life is not something to be idly enjoyed, but a prize to be won; the world is not a play-ground, but an arena.

And the severity of the struggle can scarcely be overrated. Only one or two of a host of runners reach the goal, the others die along the course. Concerning this there can be no doubt, and there is little room for difference of interpretation.

The struggle may take the form of a literal battle between two individuals, or of the individual with inclemency of climate or other destructive agents. More usually it is a compet.i.tion, no more noticeable and no less real than that between merchants or manufacturers in the same line of trade.

The weeds in our gardens compete with the flowers for food, light, and place, and crowd them out unless prevented by man. And when the weeds alone remain, they crowd on each other until only a few of the hardiest and most vigorous survive. And flowers, by their nectar, color, and odor, compete for the visits of insects, which insure cross-fertilization. And fruits are frequently or usually the inducements by which plants compete for the aid of animals in the dissemination of their seeds. So there is everywhere compet.i.tion and struggle; many fail and perish, few succeed and survive.

In a foot-race it is often very difficult to name the winner. Muscle alone does not win, not even good heart and lungs. Good judgment, patience, coolness, courage, many mental and moral qualities, are essential to the successful athlete. So in the struggle for life.

The race is not always to the swift, nor the battle to the strong.

The total of "points" which wins this "grand prize" is the aggregate of many items, some of which appear to us very insignificant. Hence, when we ask, "Who will survive?" the answer is necessarily vague. Mr. Darwin's answer is, Those best conformed to their environment; and Mr. Spencer's statement of the survival of the fittest means the same thing.

The judges who p.r.o.nounce and execute the verdict of death, or award the prize of life, are the forces and conditions of environment. We have already considered the meaning of this word. Many of its forces and conditions are still unknown, or but very imperfectly understood. But known or unknown, visible or invisible, the result of their united action is the extinction or degradation of these individuals which deviate from certain fairly well-marked lines of development. We must keep clearly before our minds the fact that the world of living beings makes up by far the most important part of the environment of any individual plant or animal. Two plants may be equally well suited to the soil and climate of any region; but if one have a scanty development of root or leaf, or is for any reason more liable to attacks from insects or germs, other things being equal, it will in time be crowded out by its compet.i.tor. Worms are eaten by lower vertebrates, and these by higher. An animal's environment, like that of a merchant or manufacturer, is very largely a matter of the ability and methods of its compet.i.tors. And man, compelled to live in society, makes that part of the environment by which he is most largely moulded.

This process of extinction Mr. Darwin has called "natural selection." Natural selection is not a force, but a process, resulting from the combined action of the forces of environment. It is not a cause in any proper sense of the word, but a result of a myriad of interacting forces. The combination of these forces in a process of natural selection leading directly to a moral and spiritual goal demands an explanation in some ultimate cause. This explanation we have already tried to find.

It is a process of extinction. It favors the fittest, but only by leaving them to enjoy the food and place formerly claimed, or still furnished, by the less fit. In any advancing group, as the less fit are crowded out, and the better fitted gain more place and food and more rapid increase, the whole species becomes on an average better conformed. More abundant nourishment and increased vigor seem also to be accompanied by increased variation. And by the extinction of the less fit the probability is increased that more fit individuals will pair with one another and give rise to even fitter offspring, possessing perhaps new and still more valuable variations.

But if, of a group of weaker forms, those alone survive which adopt a parasitic life, those which in adult life move the least will survive and reproduce; there will result the survival of the least muscular and nervous. This degeneration will continue until the species has sunken into equilibrium, so to speak, with its surroundings. Here natural selection works for degeneration. Sessile animals have had a similar history. But these parasitic and sessile forms had already been hopelessly distanced in the race for life.

Their presence cannot impede the leaders; indeed their survival is necessary to directly or indirectly furnish food for the better conformed. In the animal and plant world there is abundant room and advantage at the top.

Once more, natural selection works as a rule for the survival of individuals, only indirectly for that of organs composing, or of species including, these individuals. It may work for the development of a trait or structure which, while of no immediate advantage to the individual, increases the probability of its rearing a larger number of fitter offspring. Thus defence of the young by birds may be a disadvantage to the parent, but this is more than counterbalanced in the life of the species by the number of young coming to maturity and inheriting the trait. Even here natural selection favors the survival of the trait indirectly by sparing the descendants of the individual possessing it. Natural selection may always work on and through individuals without always working for their sole and selfish advantage.

In human society we find the selection of families, societies, nations, and civilizations going on, but mainly as the result of the survival of the fittest individuals.

There may very probably be a struggle for existence between organs or cells in the body of each individual. The amount of nutriment in the body is a more or less fixed quant.i.ty; and if one organ seizes more than its fair share, others may or must diminish for lack. But the limit to this usurpation must apparently be set by the crowding out of those individuals in which it is carried too far. Natural selection, so to speak, leaves the individual responsible for the distribution of the nutriment among the organs, and spares or destroys the individual as this usurpation proves for its advantage or disadvantage.

It makes its verdict much as the judges at a great poultry or dog show count the series of points, giving each one of them a certain value on a certain scale, and then award the prize to the individual having the highest aggregate on the whole series. Any such ill.u.s.tration is very liable to mislead; I wish to emphasize that fitness to survive is determined by the aggregate of the qualities of an individual.

But an animal having one organ of great value or capacity may thus carry off the prize, even though its other organs deserve a much lower mark. This is the case with man. In almost every respect, except in brain and hand, he is surpa.s.sed by the carnivora, the cat, for example. But muscle may be marked, in making up the aggregate, on a scale of 500, and brain on a scale of 5,000, or perhaps of 50,000. A very slight difference in brain capacity outweighs a great superiority in muscle in the struggle between man and the carnivora, or between man and man.

The scale on which an organ is marked will be proportional to its usefulness under the conditions given at a given time. During the period of development of worms and lower vertebrates much muscle with a little brain was more useful than more brain with less muscle. Hence, as a rule, the more muscular survived; the brain increasing slowly, at first apparently largely because of its correlation with muscle and sense-organs. At a later date muscle, tooth, and claw were more useful on the ground; brain and hand in the trees. Hence carnivora ruled the ground, and certain arboreal apes became continually more anthropoid. At a later date brain became more useful even on the ground, and was marked on a higher scale, because it could invent traps and weapons against which muscle was of little avail. Just at present brain is of use to, and valued by, a large portion of society in proportion to its efficiency in making and selfishly spending money. But slowly and surely it is becoming of use as an organ of thought, for the sake of the truth which it can discover and incarnate.

Natural selection works thus apparently for the survival of the individuals possessing in the aggregate the most complete conformity to environment. Let us now imagine that an animal is so constructed as to be capable of variation along several disadvantageous or neutral lines, and along only one which is advantageous. The development would of course proceed along the advantageous line. Let us farther imagine that to the descendants of this individual two, and only two, advantageous lines of variations are allowed by its structure. Then natural selection would probably favor the decidedly advantageous line, if such there were. But as long as the structure of the animal allows variation along only a few lines, the two advantageous variations would, according to the law of probabilities, frequently occur in the same individual. The eggs and spermatozoa of two such individuals might not infrequently unite, and thus in time the two characteristics be inherited by a large fraction of the species.

And now let me quote from Mr. Spencer:

"But in proportion as the life grows complex--in proportion as a healthy existence cannot be secured by a large endowment of some one power, but demands many powers; in the same proportion do there arise obstacles to the increase of any particular power, by 'the preservation of favored races in the struggle for life.' As fast as the faculties are multiplied, so fast does it become possible for the several members of a species to have various kinds of superiorities over one another. While one saves its life by higher speed, another does the like by clearer vision, another by keener scent, another by quicker hearing, another by greater strength, another by unusual power of enduring cold or hunger, another by special sagacity, another by special timidity, another by special courage; and others by other bodily and mental attributes. Now it is unquestionably true that, other things equal, each of these attributes, giving its possessor an extra chance of life, is likely to be transmitted to posterity. But there seems no reason to suppose that it will be increased in subsequent generations by natural selection. That it may be thus increased, the individuals not possessing more than average endowments of it must be more frequently killed off than individuals highly endowed with it; and this can happen only when the attribute is one of greater importance, for the time being, than most of the other attributes. If those members of the species which have but ordinary shares of it, nevertheless survive by virtue of other superiorities which they severally possess, then it is not easy to see how this particular attribute can be developed by natural selection in subsequent generations.

The probability seems rather to be that, by gamogenesis, this extra endowment will, on the average, be diminished in posterity--just serving in the long run to compensate the deficient endowments of other individuals whose special powers lie in other directions, and so to keep up the normal structure of the species. The working out of the process is here somewhat difficult to follow; but it appears to me that as fast as the number of bodily and mental faculties increases, and as fast as the maintenance of life comes to depend less on the amount of any one, and more on the combined action of all, so fast does the production of specialties of character by natural selection alone become difficult. Particularly does this seem to be so with a species so mult.i.tudinous in its powers as mankind, and above all does it seem to be so with such of the human powers as have but minor shares in aiding the struggle for life--the aesthetic faculties for example."--Spencer, "Principles of Biology," -- 166.