The birth-hour of conscience is the time when, through the difference between ideal and actuality, a certain feeling arises. Its death-hour would be the instant in which the difference forever disappeared. Such a disappearance might occur in two ways, either through the conquest of the ideal by actuality or through that of actuality by the ideal. The objection has been made to the theory of evolution that it fulfilled the first of these possibilities, and so left no room for Ethics. But the very fact of the existence of ethical impulses as the actual result of evolution would seem to belie this theory. And indeed, we see that evolution is not physical growth alone, but mental as well; and that the important feature of man's development consists in his aspiration through desires and impulses, which act as moving forces in his life. Aspiration is necessary to his evolution, and indifference and lack of sensibility an obstacle to it. The theory of evolution leads directly to Ethics, in that it shows that the struggle for existence becomes, in its higher forms, a common struggle for the continuance and development of human life. The theory of evolution takes us, indeed, not only to, but beyond, Ethics; for, according to Spencer, the ethical sense is but an intermediate condition in a development toward a state of "organic morality," where right-doing will be involuntary and natural, and a special ethical sense no longer existent or necessary. Such a state would constitute the realization of the second alternative mentioned above, with which Ethics would come to an end. This state is conceivable, and Ethics could have no objection to offer to it. Yet we are still far from such a condition, and though we may strengthen our courage and hope with the thought of a continual progress of human nature, yet the assumption of such an end to evolution cannot have an essential influence upon the method of Ethics. We must, in fact, suppose that progress will bring us new problems and new ideals, that, as the Ethics of the civilized man includes whole provinces unknown to the savage, so many relations will certainly present themselves in the future whose ethical significance our present thick-skinned condition, our ignorance and egoism, prevent us from comprehending.