It is
certainly obvious that some change in the mental association of symbol and
object has been brought about, and to this extent there has been mental
evolution.
* * * * *
Passing now to other departments of human culture, we must deal in the
next place with the basic "arts of life"; that is, the modes of conducting
the necessary activities of every day. All men of all times, be they
civilized or savage, are impelled like the brutes by their biological
nature to seek food and to repel their foes. The rough stone club and ax
were fashioned by the first savage men, when diminishing physical prowess
placed them at a disadvantage in the competition with stronger animals.
Smoother and more efficient weapons were made by the hordes of their more
advanced descendants, some of whom remained in the mental and cultural
condition of the stone age like the Fuegian, until the white travelers of
recent centuries brought them newer ideas and implements. In Europe and
elsewhere the period of stone gave place to the bronze and iron ages, and
throughout the changing years human inventiveness improved the missile and
weapon to become the bow and arrow of medieval civilization and recent
African savagery.
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