Page:The World's Most Famous Court Trial - 1925.djvu/340

336 pink tea. Barbarism is the only process by which man has ever organically progressed, and civilization is the only process by which he has ever organically declined. Civilization is the most dangerous enterprise upon which man ever set out. For when you take man out of the bloody, brutal, but beneficent hand of natural selection you place him at ounce in the soft, perfumed, daintily gloved, but far more dangerous hand of artificial selection. And, unless you call science to your aid and make this artificial selection as efficient as the rude methods of nature, you bungle the whole task."

This aspect of evolution may amaze some of the ministers who have not been admitted to the inner circle of the iconoclasts whose theories menace all the ideals of civilized society. Do these ministers know that "evolution is a bloody business"? Do they know that "barbarism is the only process by which man has ever organically progressed"? And that "civilization is the only process by which he has ever organically declined"? Do they know that "the bloody, brutal hand of natural selection" is "beneficent"? And that the "artificial selection" found in civilization is "dangerous"? What shall we think of the distinguished educators and scientists who read the manuscript before publication and did not protest against this pagan doctrine?

To show that this is a world-wide matter, I now quote from a book issued from the press in 1918, seven years ago. The title of the book is "The Science of Power," and its author, Benjamin Kidd, being an Englishman, could not have any national prejudice against Darwin. On pages 46 and 47, we find Kidd's interpretation of evolution:

"Darwin’s presentation of the evolution of the world as the product of natural selection in never-ceasing war—as a product, that is to say, of a struggle in which the individual efficient in the fight for his own interests was always the winning type—touched the profoundest depths of the psychology of the west, surviving and propagating their kind." Could any doctrine be more destructive of civilization? And what a commentary on evolution! He wants us to believe that evolution develops a human sympathy that finally becomes so tender that it repudiates the law that created it and thus invites a return to a level where the extinguishing of pity and sympathy will permit the brutal instincts to again do their progressive (?) work.

Let no one think that this acceptance of barbarism as the basic principle of evolution died with Darwin. Within three years a book has appeared whose author is even more frankly brutal than Darwin. The book is entitled, "The New Decalogue of Science" and has attracted wide attention. One of our most reputable magazines has recently printed an article by him defining the religion of a scientist. In his preface he acknowledges indebtedness to twenty-one prominent scientists and educators, nearly all of them "doctors" and "professors." One of them, who has recently been elevated to the head of a great state university, read the manuscript over twice "and made many invaluable suggestions." The author describes Nietzsche who, according to Mr. Darrow, made a murderer out of Babe Leopold, as "the bravest soul since Jesus." He admits that Nietzsche was "gloriously wrong," not certainly,""certainly," [sic] but "perhaps," "in many details of technical knowledge," but he affirms that Nietzsche was "gloriously right in his fearless questioning of the universe and of his own soul."

In another place, the author says, "Most of our morals today are jungle products," and then he affirms that "it would be safer, biologically, if they were more so now." After these two samples of his views, you will not be surprised when I read you the following (see page 34):

"Evolution is a bloody business, but civilization tries to make it a