The modern doctrine of evolution can only render the world
more intelligible, can only develop into a philosophy of evo-
lution, by showing that there is evolution and not merely
change, and this it can only do by {310} giving a rational
basis for the belief that some forms of existence are higher
than others. To put the matter bluntly, why is a man higher
than a horse, or a horse than a sponge? Answer that, and
you have a philosophy of evolution. Fail to answer it, and
you have none. Now the man in the street will say that
man is higher than the horse, because he not merely eats
grass, but thinks, deliberates, possesses art, science, reli-
gion, morality. Ask him why these things are higher than
eating grass, and he has no answer. From him, then, we
turn to Spencer, and there we find a sort of answer. Man is
higher because he is more organized. But why is it better
to be more organized? Science, as such, has no answer. If
pressed in this way, science may of course turn round and
say: “there is in the reality of things no higher and no lower;
what I mean by higher and lower is simply more and less or-
ganized; higher and lower are mere metaphors; they are the
human way of looking at things; we naturally call higher
what is nearest ourselves; but from the absolute point of
view there is no higher and lower.” But this is to reduce
the universe to a madhouse. It means that there is no pur-
pose, no reason, in anything that happens. The universe,
in this case, is irrational. No explanation of it is possible.
Philosophy is futile, and not only philosophy, but morality
and everything else. If there is really no higher and lower,
there is no better and no worse. It is just as good to be a
murderer as to be a saint. Evil is the same as good. Instead
of striving to be saints, statesmen, philosophers, we may as
well go and play marbles, because all these values of higher
and lower are mere delusions, “the human way of looking
at things.”{311}Spencer then has no answer to the question why it is better
to be more organized. So we turn at last to Aristotle. He
has an answer. He sees that it is meaningless to talk of
development, advance, higher and lower, except in relation
to an end. There is no such thing as advance unless it is an
advance towards something. A body moving purposelessly
in a straight line through infinite space does not advance. It
might as well be here as a mile hence. In either case it is no
nearer to anything. But if it is moving towards a definite
point, we can call this advance. Every mile it moves it
gets nearer to its end. So, if we are to have a philosophy of
evolution, it must be teleological. If nature is not advancing
towards an end, there is no nearer and further, no higher
and lower, no development. What then is the end? It is the
actualization of reason, says Aristotle. The primal being is
eternal reason, but this is not existent. It must come to
exist. It first enunciates itself vaguely as gravitation. But
this is far off from its end, which is the existence of reason,
as such, in the world. It comes nearer in plants and animals.
It is proximately reached in man, for man is the existent
reason. But there is no question of the universe coming
to a stop, when it reaches its end—(the usual objection to
teleology). For the absolute end, absolute form, can never
be reached. The higher is thus the more rational, the lower
the less rational. Now if we try to go on asking, “why
is it better to be more rational?” we find we cannot ask