The Doctrine of Evolution

o the point where we must deal frankly and squarely with the insistent questions arising on all sides as to the way that mankind is involved in the vast mechanism of nature's order. These questions have been ignored heretofore, in order that the natural history of animals in general might be discussed without any interference on the part of purely human interest and concern. It now becomes our privilege, and our duty as well, to employ and apply the principles we have learned in order to understand more completely the origin of the human body as an organic type, the history of human races, the development of human faculty and of social institutions, and the evolution finally of even the highest elements of human life. These are scientific problems, and if we are to solve them we must employ the now familiar methods of science which only yield sure results. We must not underestimate the many difficulties to be encountered, for the field before us is a vastterritory of complex human life and of manifold human relations. Without prolonged exercise in scientific methods, it is impossible to view our own kind impersonally, as we do the creatures of lower nature. Furthermore it seems to many that an analysis of human life and biological history, even if it is possible, must alter or degrade mankind in some degree; this is no more true than that a knowledge of the principles of engineering according to which the Brooklyn Bridge has been constructed renders that structure... --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.