The course of social evolution is not a steady, uniform onward movement, as many erroneously believe; it is rather a series of alternating phases, epochs of rapid progress succeeded by periods of comparative stagnation and even retrogression.
In this rhythmic advance, the present time exhibits all the characteristics of a positive
stage. The feverish activity, the universal unrest, the searching criticism of established values,
all reveal the painful process of social readjustment. Forms held in reverence a generation ago
are now subjected to merciless revaluation. Religious, political, industrial institutions are
thrown in the balance and threatened with destruction or at best reconstruction.
Nor does the movement of reform spare our ethical conceptions. "Now that moral
injunctions are losing the authority given by their supposed sacred origin, the secularization
of morals is becoming imperative", wrote Herbert Spencer barely a generation ago. Many still
cling to the older forms with the grim allegiance of despair, but on all sides people are seen
cutting themselves loose from the wreck and striking out for shore.
Among the problems coming under the jurisdiction of ethics, the one dealing with sex
relations, always important, has in our own day assumed gigantic dimensions. From stage and
from pulpit, in novels and in scientific works, in the periodical press and even in the daily
papers, a lively discussion is in progress which testifies to the deep seated vital interest in this
aspect of human conduct.
Unfortunately, the utterances heard on both sides are more frequently the crude offspring
of prejudice, intolerance and hypocrisy, than the expression of sound thinking and feeling.
Despite the widespread conquests made by the evolutionary philosophy, we are assailed on
all sides by opinions which proceed from the navest assumptions. People seem to have an
unwavering faith in the efficiency of logical argumentation. They believe it is only necessary
to demonstrate the correctness of their own attitude in order to shape the conduct of their
opponents accordingly.
This confidence in reasoning is exhibited by the ignorant in common
with the cultured, tho surely the latter ought to realize that it is not by abstract ideas, but by
sentiments, feeling, emotion, that human conduct is governed everywhere and eminently so
within the sphere of sex relations. "It is never the knowledge which is the moving agent in
conduct, but it is always the feeling which goes along with that knowledge or is excited by it"
(Spencer).
Despite innumerable experiences showing how people habitually act at variance with
their knowledge as long as it remains a dead letter, we read and hear continually that
extension of knowledge is the only means of insuring rational thinking and ethical behavior.
Now, were opinions and convictions actually based solely on logical evidence, how would
it be possible for men possessing vast knowledge to profess beliefs so radically different and
even mutually destructive? Having access to the same sources of information, and endowed
with a trained intellect, they, nevertheless, arrive at widely divergent conclusions.
With the same data before them, Prof. Lowell argues that Mars is inhabited, while the venerable
Wallace demonstrates that only the earth can support life. Pointing to the same economic
facts, the republican politician advocates protective tariffs, while his democratic rival pleads
for free trade. The same evils of civilization that make the anarchist denounce all authority,
call forth the socialist's demand for more government.
In all these and similar instances, it is the bias of heredity and education and environment
that determines the attitude. When men go to war and spill their blood in the struggle
over a principle, a mere theoretical disagreement is never the moving power behind them;
if lives are to be sacrificed, the profoundest sympathies must be enlisted in the cause. The
same truth becomes apparent on contemplating certain other familiar occurrences.
Take an orator, for example, who pleads diligently and marshals abundant evidence, yet somehow
leaves us cold, while another, without any display of erudition, succeed's in carrying his
audience away by the sheer force of his aplomb. The former addresses himself to our intellect;
the latter chooses the shorter route leading thru the emotions and wins. Invariably the appeal
to feeling is more effective than the appeal to reason, as illustrated by the daily spectacle of
eloquence overruling evidence in the courtroom and on the political platform.