Page:Mind (New Series) Volume 6.djvu/74

58 HENRY RUTGERS MARSHALL: THE RELIGIOUS INSTINCT. vironmental condition, using the term in its widest sense, then typical reactions may be the very ones which will lead to destruction ; and, on the other hand, in variations from typical reactions may appear our only hope of prosperity or persistence. But what I hold is that, so far as we can see, the growth of social aggregation in quasi-organic forms has been depen- dent in the past upon the subordination of variant influences, and therefore that unless we are convinced that the condi- tions of biological development are changing in important directions we are bound to hold that, in general, variance from typical forms should not be undertaken without this serious consideration viz., that in acting contrary to these typical forms we are acting in opposition to the experience of the race from which we are descended, which experience has left its mark in us in the establishment of these very instincts which call upon us to live as our ancestors have lived. On the other hand, however, if after full consideration we become convinced that conditions have thus changed, then it seems to me equally clear that we are bound to take the risk involved in action in opposition to instinct, although this action be opposed to the experience of our race as ingrained in us ; and we are bound to take this dangerous risk in the interests of the progress of our race in its effort to accommodate itself in the best -possible manner to an environment which is never stable, which is daily altering in minor details, and which perchance may at any moment have come to differ in certain directions from that environ- ment which in the past has determined the formation of the impulses which guide us to-day.