Windows of Love

conclusion is exactly the opposite one from the conclusion now beingforced upon men of science by a study of the biological andpsychological elements in this very complex problem of heredity. So farfrom considering love as a ‘foolish idea,’ opposed to the best interestsof the race, I believe most competent physiologists and psychologists,especially those of the modern evolutionary school, would regard itrather as an essentially beneficent and conservative instinct developedand maintained in us by natural causes, for the very purpose of insuringjust those precise advantages and improvements which Sir George Campbellthinks he could himself effect by a conscious and deliberate process ofselection. More than that, I believe, for my own part (and I feel suremost evolutionists would cordially agree with me), that this beneficentinherited instinct of Falling in Love effects the object it has in viewfar more admirably, subtly, and satisfactorily, on the average ofinstances, than any clumsy human selective substitute could possiblyeffect it.

In short, my doctrine is simply the old-fashioned and confiding beliefthat marriages are made in heaven: with the further corollary thatheaven manages them, one time with another, a great deal better than SirGeorge Campbell.

Let us first look how Falling in Love affects the standard of humanefficiency; and then let us consider what would be the probable resultof any definite conscious attempt to substitute for it some moredeliberate external agency.

Falling in Love, as modern biology teaches us to believe, is nothingmore than the latest, highest, and most involved exemplification, in thehuman race, of that almost universal selective process which Mr. Darwinhas enabled us to recognise throughout the whole long series of theanimal kingdom. The butterfly that circles and eddies in his aerialdance around his observant mate is endeavouring to charm her by thedelicacy of his colouring, and to overcome her coyness by the display ofhis skill. The peacock that struts about in imperial pride under theeyes of his attentive hens, is really contributing to the future beautyand strength of his race by collecting to himself a harem through whomhe hands down to posterity the valuable qualities which have gained theadmiration of his mates in his own person. Mr. Wallace has shown that tobe beautiful is to be efficient; and sexual selection is thus, as itwere, a mere lateral form of natural selection–a survival of thefittest in the guise of mutual attractiveness and mutual adaptability,producing on the average a maximum of the best properties of the race inthe resulting offspring. I need not dwell here upon this aspect of thecase, because it is one with which, since the publication of the’Descent of Man,’ all the world has been sufficiently familiar.

In our own species, the selective process is marked by all the featurescommon to selection throughout the whole animal kingdom; but it is also,as might be expected, far more specialised, far more individualised, far