ARE WE GETTING BETTER?

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXIV, Issue XVIII, 5 May 1900, Page 843

ARE WE GETTING BETTER?

YES, BY ZOLA, BOUGET, AND MAX NOKDAU. Is the human race advancing' ’? is a question which M. Zola. M. Paul Bouget. and Max Nordau have set themselves to answer. It is very satisfactory to find that they all agree that human nature is improving'. M. Zola believes that, looking' at the race as a whole, there can be no doubt that we arc improving'. He says : 'Taking - into consideration the number of hospitals, orphanages, workhouses. pious foundations, red cross societies, benevolent organisations, and similar associations, then I say that human nature is most certainly improving'. In spite of contrary cur rents, sometimes local, sometimes national. I see a more accurate and a more acute sense of justice than in the distant past. 'This, too, is an evidence that human nature is improving'. I firmly believe that the very worst rabble of Paris and London today are better than that of ancient Greece and Koine. What the rabble of Nineveh may have I ecu we have no means of knowing. But very prob ably there was more crim l , more cheating, more egotism, and less chari tv than there is to-day. M. Paul Bouget is even more opti mistic. He too thinks that we are decidedly better than our grandfathers : — There is probably more capacity for rascality nowadays than ever before. But there is also more power of selfrepression. Capacity and actuality are very different things. 'The alarmist of to-day finds out every villainy too easily. He has only to read the big newspapers. 'They tell of good deeds, too. for very few things, whether good or evil, if worth chron icling. escape the eye of the vigilant modern newspaper. But the alarmist lights with unerring instinct upon evil. Phi therniore. in making our estimate it must not In* forgotten that until recent times the people had no oppor tunity of knowing how bad the everyday world was. 'The human race is less cruel than in the past. Filial respect is more widespread than ever before. So is ethical leaching. Near ly all the great newspapers of to-day are teachers of public ethics. Except in war. there is more respect for life than in the past. There is more respect for property. In our day, too,

there is more respect for woman than at any other period in history. Higher ideals are more widespread than in the past, ami theie is a great deal of spirit and of zeal and of eonti dvnee in the world to-day. Max Nordau naturally dwells upon the gloomy side of modern life, but <‘ven he is compelled to take a m derately hopeful view of human progress, lie believes that mankind is at lasi waking* from its lethargy and preparing to improve. He sees light ahead, and is even hopeful that the new century may see the furling of the battle flags for ever. At present, however, he declares, though we arc always talking about our love of peace, the nations were never more warlike than they are to-day.