the whole truth? Evolution is a radical process, but we must
never forget that it is also, and at the same time, exceedingly
conservative. The cell was the first invention of the animal
kingdom, and all higher animals are and must be cellular in
structure. Our tissues were formed ages on ages ago; they have all
persisted. Most of our organs are as old as worms. All these are
very old, older than the mountains, and yet I cannot doubt that they
must last as long as man exists. Indeed, while Nature is wonderfully
inventive of new structures, her conservatism in holding on to old
ones is still more remarkable. In the ascending line of development
she tries an experiment once exceedingly thorough, and then the
question is solved for all time. For she always takes time enough to
try the experiment exhaustively. It took ages to find how to build a
spinal column or brain, but when the experiment was finished she had
reason to be, and was, satisfied. And if this is true of bodily
organs we should expect that the same law would hold good when the
animal development gradually passes over into the spiritual. And
what is human history but the record of moral and religious
experiments, and their success or failure according as the
experimenters conformed to the laws of the spiritual forces with
which they had to do?

We need not fear that our old fundamental beliefs will be lost.
Their very age shows that they have been thoroughly tested in the
great experiment of human history and found sure. Modified they may
be; they will be used for higher purposes and the building of better
characters than ours. They will not be lost or discarded. We too
often think of nature as building like man, with huge scaffoldings,
which must later be torn down and destroyed. But in the forest the
only scaffolding is the heart of oak.

We have seen that the sequence of functions in animal development
has culminated in man's rational, moral nature. He alone has the
clear perception of the reality of right, truth, and duty. The
pursuit of these has made him what he is. His advance, if there is
any continuity in history, depends upon his making these the ruling
motives and aims of his life. He must continually grow in
righteousness and unselfishness, if he is not to degenerate and give
place to some other product of evolution. Moreover, as these moral
faculties are capable of indefinite, if not infinite, development,
they must dominate his life through a f