But soon natural selection ceases to select on the ground of brute force. After a time environment proves to be a power making for shrewdness. And when the mammal has appeared the resultant of the forces of environment impels more and more toward unselfishness, and when man has appeared environment proves to be a "power, not ourselves, that makes for righteousness." But what shall we say of an environment which unmasks itself at last as a power making for intelligence, unselfishness, and righteousness? Someone may answer it is a host of chemical and physical forces bringing about very high ends. That is very true, but is it the whole truth? The thinking man must ask, How did it come about, and why is it that all these forces work together for such high moral and intelligent ends?
We face, therefore, the question, Can an environment which proves finally and ultimately to be a power not ourselves making for righteousness and unselfishness be purely material and mechanical? Or must there be in or behind it something spiritual? Shall we best call environment, in its highest manifestation, "it" or "him?"
The old argument of Socrates, as on the last day of his life he sits discoursing with his friends, still holds good. He is discussing the same old question, whether there is anything more than force, material, mechanism in the world. He says that one might assign as "the cause why I am sitting here that my body is composed of bones and muscles; that the bones are solid and separate, and that the muscles can be contracted and extended, and are all inclosed in the flesh and skin; and that the bones, being jointed, can be drawn by the muscles, and so I can move my legs as you see; and that this is the reason why I am sitting here. But by the dog, these bones and muscles would long ago have carried me to Megara or Booetia, moved by my opinion of what was best, if I had not thought it more right and honorable to submit to the sentence pronounced by the state than to run away from it. To call such things causes is absurd. For there is a great difference between the cause and that without which the cause would not produce its effect."
If there is no intelligence or love of truth in the cause, how can there be anything higher in the effect? And if Socrates had been only bone and muscle, he ought to have run away.