_The Universal Kinship_ means the kinship of all the inhabitants of
the planet Earth. Whether they came into existence among the waters
or among desert sands, in a hole in the earth, in the hollow of a
tree, or in a palace; whether they build nests or empires; whether
they swim, fly, crawl, or ambulate; and whether they realise it or
not, they are all related, physically, mentally, morally—this is
the thesis of this book. But since man is the most gifted and
influential of animals, and since his relationship with other
animals is more important and more reluctantly recognised than any
other, the chief purpose of these pages is to prove and interpret
the kinship, of the human species with the other species of animals.
The thesis of this book comes pretty squarely in conflict with
widely-practised and highly-prized sins. It will therefore be
generally criticised where it is not passed by in silence. Men as a
rule do not care to improve. Although they have but one life to
live, they are satisfied to live the thing out as they have started
on it.
Enthusiasm, which in an enlightened or ideal race would be devoted
to self-improvement, is used by men in weaving excuses for their own
inertia or in singing of the infirmities of others.
_But there is a Future_. And the creeds and ideals, men bow down to
to-day will in time to come pass away, and new creeds and ideals
will claim their allegiance. Shrines change as the generations come
and go, and out of the decomposition of the old comes the new. The
time will come when the sentiments of these pages will not be hailed
by two or three, and ridiculed or ignored by the rest; _they will
represent Public Opinion and Law_.
M.
Chicago, 1905