If, then, it is by the perpetual and strenuous exercise of all its powers that an organism achieves the degree of superiority which is its contribution to the universal work of progress, it follows that "the performance of every function is, in a sense, a moral obligation," and that "the moral man is one whose functions are all discharged in degrees duly adjusted to the conditions of existence." Here, as elsewhere, the individual, to exist, must comply with the conditions of existence; and progress consists in more perfect compliance with the conditions. There is, however, a difference between the highly evolved organism, man, and the less complex organisms; between animal and human evolution; between biological and moral progress. In the case of the lower and simpler organisms, the creature is prompted simply and safely by its emotions to the performance of those functions on which its existence and the evolution of its species depend. But the evolution of man has been so rapid in its later stages, the social environment which he has himself created is so different from the circumstances in which he originally found himself, that his adjustment to his environment has become, so to speak, much looser, and consequently it is now no longer the case that actions in themselves pleasant are also necessarily beneficial in their consequences to the individual and to society. Moral progress, therefore, will manifest itself in the readjustment of man to his altered conditions. The consequence of that adjustment, when complete, will be that actions which are right--that is, are beneficial to the individual and to society--will always be pleasurable, not only in their consequences, but also immediately and in themselves. To this ideal, when all men will delight always in the thing that is right, and when all have attained to a height of morality now reached only by the few, man is being slowly but surely urged by the force which is the motive power of all evolution, the struggle for existence, regulated by the law which directs all progress, that of the survival of the fittest. Here, then, we have the reason of the hope that is characteristic of our generation; here the foundation of the calm confidence with which we count on the continuance of progress as a thing assured us. It is not merely that progress has been made in the past, that the gale hitherto has steadily blown us on a favourable course. We have learnt that it must of necessity always blow from the same quarter. Man's course is not dependent on man's fitful will: the wind and waves obey not him, but the Power which directs all evolution, and "our strength in ages past" is shown by science to be "our hope in years to come." II. ILLUSION