Page:Philosophical Review Volume 19.djvu/444

430 more developed by the less developed." the complex in terms of the simple, the higher in terms of the lower. Evolution, however, signifies essentially continuity, a continuity such that the 'higher' may be exhibited as structurally and functionally continuous with the 'lower;' but the conception that the higher has developed out of the lower, or that the lower has evolved with constant reference to a higher, is relative to our purpose merely. We have now to consider the bearing which the above conception of environment has for the determination of ethical criteria within the field of evolutional ethics. B. "The law of nature has but one precept, 'Be strong,' "says Stephen, and this may be taken as fairly representative of the concepts which emerge in the development of evolutionist ethical theory. Strength, courage, prudence and other aggressive or self-assertive qualities, are given not only genetic primacy but ethical priority. Life, health, efficiency, fitness for survival, become the criteria by reference to which the priority of ethical virtues may be discovered. If natural selection be given place in ethical theory, the standard which it provides must also be accepted, and whatever other principles come into play, that conduct must be judged morally right which is determined by the principle of survival. Two problems are here suggested: (1) Is survival a sufficient criterion of moral value? (2) Does the acceptance of natural selection in morals require the admission of the above criteria of evolutional ethics? The second of these problems we may consider first.

(1) Now if natural selection is relative merely, signifying relationship to environment, those groups of causes summarized by the term, natural selection, must so operate as to 'select' those characters which secure the conformity of the individual to the actual dynamic environment in which he lives. Thus, in modern human society, those qualities are selected which secure the individual's adaptation to the complex social environment in which he lives and acts. His existence, not, to be sure, as regards mere tenure of life, but as a member of society organic to the whole, is dependent upon his possession of those qualities which are essential