Page:The Scientific Monthly vol. 3.djvu/201

 SERVICE IN EVOLUTION 195

compulsory service^ there was evolved a voluntary service; minute in kind and amount at firsts it has finally come in the nobler members of mankind to dwarf the former by comparison into insignificance. Pre- Paleozoic time and the long Paleozoic era stand for low types of 00m- pnlBory service; the Mesozoic for higher kinds of compulsory service with a definite beginning of voluntary service, while during the Ceno- 2oic this latter lype increased in amount until at present in man it far overshadows the service of compulsion.

Evolution as we see it upon this earth has thus occurred through

each successively higher group, taking more and more from others,

especially from parents, and giving more and more in return, especially

to ofbpring; the service rendered is passed on, not returned. When,

however, a plant or animal group takes more and more from others

without giving aditional service in return, we have parasitism, and

parasites are not now, nor were they in the distant past, in evolving

lines. Parasites whether plant, beast or human are degenerate; the

individuals become weaker and weaker and finally the life ends in death.

The trend of evolution has thus been from compulsory service to

voluntary, from an enforced aid to others to help given because of love

for others. Those lives develop most rapidly and nobly which most

nearly conform to this trend.

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