Note 1057 — Chapter II · THE ROMAN EMPIRE UNDER ANASTASIUS: THE INHERITANCE OF JUSTINIAN (continued 2)

Accepting the identity of the evolutionary process at all grades of its prepotency, we may suppose that future advancement will be the result of deliberate effort; and that the more determinate such effort, the more rapid must be the progress. While the aptitude of our faculties must be increased by their being constantly exercised in study and research, the knowledge attainable by such work may ultimately win for us some controlling influence over our physiological constitution. The wild dreams of mediaeval alchemists now seem to us less unreal since we have had experience of the properties of radium; and the vision of an elixir vitae, which illuded those investigators, appears more realizable in the light of recent research. The arrest of senility may come within the range of the future therapeutist; and a new Demeter may subject the modern Triptolemus to some alchemical fire, to render him proof against mortality. Less remotely, the systematic administration of sexual associations would exert a powerful influence over mental and bodily development; and it would be physiologically correct if famous stallions should stand to cover brood mares in the human as well as in the equine world. The Spartans realized something of this in practice; Plutarch, Lycurgus. The tendency to equalization of the sexes which has been growing of late years, is undoubtedly a forward movement on the path of evolution. The possibility of man in the future being endowed with greatly increased intellectual power must not be lost sight of. Exceptional gifts of genius, in some cases uniquely manifested, and the occurrence of “prodigies,” especially in relation to mathematics, music, and art, teach that the mental faculties of the human race may yet be evolved in a much higher degree. The limitations imagined by Greg, which are, perhaps, generally entertained, must now be contemplated with suspended judgement: “Two glorious futures lie before us: the progress of the race here, the progress of the man hereafter. History indicates that the individual man needs to be translated in order to excel the past. He appears to have reached his perfection centuries ago.... What sculptor has surpassed Phidias? What poet has transcended Homer?” etc.; Enigmas of Life, 1891, p. 177. This is an evident misconception of the pace at which evolution moves; such short periods count for nothing. In evolutionary time, Homer and Phidias are our contemporaries. We know nothing of the final state of such beings as ourselves after they have passed through some millions of years, to which most probably the life of this planet must extend. They may well attain to some condition resembling that of the “gods” of Epicurus, who existed with a “quasi corpus, quasi sanguis,” etc. The chemist and biologist have a wide field before them in which they will yet make many conquests.