The Descent of Man

oons appear to have been acquired by the males
as weapons for sexual strife, but they are
used in defence of the herd or troop. In regard
to certain mental powers the case, as we shall
see in the fifth chapter, is wholly different; for
these faculties have been chiefly, or even exclusively,
gained for the benefit of the community,
and the individuals thereof have at the same
time gained an advantage indirectly.
It has often been objected to such views as the
foregoing, that man is one of the most helpless
and defenceless creatures in the world; and that
during his early and less well-developed condition,
he would have been still more helpless.
The Duke of Argyll, for instance, insists (96.
'Primeval Man,' 1869, p. 66.) that "the human
frame has diverged from the structure of brutes,
in the direction of greater physical helplessness
and weakness. That is to say, it is a
divergence which of all others it is most impossible
to ascribe to mere natural selection." He