to men
of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all" (Eccles. viii.
14; ix. 11). It is this element of chance that threatens to make a
mockery of effort, and sometimes seems to make life but a travesty.
The terrible feature of Tennyson's description of Arthur's last, dim
battle in the west is not the "crash of battle-axe on shattered
helm," but the all-engulfing mist.

Perhaps this is all intended to teach us that riches and favor, and
even bread, are not the essentials of life, and that failure to
attain these is not such ruin as we often think. But no man ever
struggled for wisdom, righteousness, unselfishness, and heroism
without attaining them; even though the more he attained the more
dissatisfied he became with all previous attainment. And if our
slight attainments in wisdom and knowledge always brought wealth and
favor, we might rest satisfied with the latter, instead of clearly
recognizing that wisdom must be its own reward. Uncertainty and
deprivation are the best and only training for a hero, not sure
reward paid in popular plaudits.

Political economists speak of the productiveness and prospectiveness
of capital. We may well borrow these terms, using them in a somewhat
modified sense. In our sense capital is productive in so far as it
gives an immediate return; it is prospective in proportion as the
return is expected largely in the future. A "pocket" may yield an
immediate very large return of gold nuggets at a very slight expense
of labor and appliances, but it is soon exhausted. In a mine the ore
may be poor near the surface, but grow richer as the shaft deepens;
the vein is narrow above, but widens below. The returns are at first
small, its inexhaustible richness becomes apparent only after
considerable time and labor. The value of the "pocket" is purely
productive, that of the mine largely or purely prospective. Indeed
it may be opened at a loss. But even a rich mine may be worked
purely for its productive value; it may be "skinned."

Let us apply this thought to the development of a species; although
what is true of the species will generally be true of the individual
also, for the development of the two is, in the main, parallel. In
the animal all functions are to a certain extent productive, and all
directly or indirectly prospective. When we examine the sequence of
functions we cannot but notice how largely their value is
prospective. As long as a lower function is rising to supremacy in