EVOLUTION AND INVOLUTION.
BY H. A. FREEMAN.
Metaphysically considered, evolution is Nature's process of unfolding and bringing about her changes and developments. It goes on its way irresistibly and taken as a whole moves in orderly routine. This is not always obvious, but the exceptions are only apparently such. The fault lies in our lack of ability to observe all the facts and conditions. If we could investigate fully we should find that all apparent hitches are balanced or offset by an advance in some other direction and that there has been and can be no check or disorder in the process of evolution.
Whatever deflects the course or changes the character of an evolution does not necessarily hinder it, and if it seems to stop still that is only a question of the point of view.
The people of a race, or nation, or a community may deteriorate physically, intellectually, or in their commercial activity, but that does not prove that their development has come to an end. It only marks a cessation of progress along certain special lines. The American Indians are practically extinct, and it may appear that their race evolution has stopped. But that would be taking note of only one aspect of their condition. If we observe that they have decreased in ferocity, diminished in numbers and sunk to the commonplace grade of hard working farmers we must agree that their evolution does not proceed along romantic lines as it did in the days of Fenimore Cooper. But the few that remain may be more useful for the world's upbuilding than were all the savage hordes that ever started out on the war path to exterminate each other.
Numbers are not essential to a healthy evolution. China with its starving myriads is not a high example of progress.
The variations and fluctuations that make themselves visible in evolution are like ripples. We should never notice them if we took a broader view.
Evolution does not go stiffly and solidly forward like a self-propelled wall of masonry. It is more like the resistless ebb and flow of the incoming tide.