and freedom of action are restricted to a sphere where they do not interfere with the happiness and freedom of others; the common weal becomes an essential part of individual welfare.  In short, even if under the most perfect conditions “Witless will always serve his master,” man aims to escape from his place in the animal kingdom, founded on the free development of the principle of non-moral evolution, and to establish a kingdom of Man governed upon the principle of moral evolution.  For society not only has a moral end, but in its perfection social life is embodied morality.  Moral purpose is “an article of exclusively human manufacture—­and very much to our credit.”

To society, then, its members owe a vital debt; for society, the work of the ethical man, has slowly and painfully built up around us a fabric of defence against barbarism, the work of the non-ethical man.  This debt we are bound to repay by furthering in ourselves the good work of human fellowship, and by striving to improve the conditions of our social life; and the means thereto are self-discipline, self-support, intelligent effort, not unreasoning violence with its disruption of the defences against anarchic barbarism.

Yet if society, in making life easier, multiplies the species in excess of the means of subsistence, it raises up within itself, in the intensest form, the unlimited struggle for existence.  “This is the true riddle of the Sphinx, and every nation which does not solve it will, sooner or later, be devoured by the monster itself has generated.”

Improvement there has been during the historical period:  with goodwill and clear thought Huxley looked for ever-accelerating improvement, though contemporary civilizations seemed neither to embody any worthy ideal nor even to possess the merit of stability.  In the atmosphere of plain verity, where, as he said, “my business is to teach my aspirations to conform themselves to fact, not to try and make facts harmonize with my aspirations,” he confidently looked for the hopes of the future; but were it not so, he solemnly declared—­

If there is no hope of a large improvement of the condition of the greater part of the human family; if it is true that the increase of knowledge, the winning of a greater dominion over Nature which is its consequence, and the wealth which follows that dominion, are to make no difference in the extent and the intensity of want, with its concomitant physical and moral degradation among the masses of the people, I should hail the advent of some kindly comet which would sweep the whole affair away as a desirable consummation.

In the matter of personal conduct he rejected the notions that the moral government of the world is imperfect without a system of future rewards and punishments, and that such a system is indispensable to practical morality.  “I believe,” he said, “that both these dogmas are very mischievous lies.”