We often do not give sufficient thought to the colossal task which evolution has to accomplish. It represents a rise from the earth to the sky. A clod of earth has to gain the power of thinking, of awakening to the knowledge of itself and then of the universe round it. A handful of insensitive matter has to win a state of awareness where it can mingle with a consciousness which pervades the universe, from a handful of dust to be one with the All. It is a stupendous transformation, a mighty drama which only an absolute power could design, stage and play.
We are born to underestimate the inconceivably vast dimensions of creation and the stupendous proportions of the power of it because our mind and senses, like the brain and the eyes of an ant on a tree floating upon the surface of an ocean are not able to register our own insignificant position compared with the titanic forces by which we are encompassed.
We believe that the picture of the universe presented to us by the mind and intellect is all that there is, and we start to speculate how the entity we picture could have come into existence. We never expand our thinking to be conscious of the fact that we are staring at an infinity through a pinhole and that there are countless other pinholes in other planes of creation through which this infinity can be viewed.
In countless different ways each pinhole presents a different image of it. The colossal nature consciousness begins to dawn only when the human limit of perception is exceeded through the grace of the still partially hidden biological mechanism responsible for evolution. For the attainment of a trans-human dimension of consciousness, the evolution of morals is as much, if not more, necessary than the evolution of the intellect. A monkey who knows how to ignite the fuse leading to a store of gun powder cannot be expected to be nice about it when his instinct drives him to set fire to it.
Modern man, with the power to use the awful force of nuclear fusion for destructive purposes, is hesitant to employ it partly because of moral scruples and partly because of the equally terrible retaliatory action that would follow. But he has certainly not attained to the moral stature yet when the very idea of using such a weapon either for offense or for defense would be repugnant to him.
Wars can be fought even without the use of instruments that can annihilate the whole of mankind and even wipe off life from earth. He has also not attained to the moral height where the massacre of defenseless and innocent men, women and children, not involved in actual fighting, would be repellent to his mind. The fact that both these moral considerations were thrown to the winds in the wars fought during this century is a clear indication of the fact that moral evolution has not kept pace with the evolution of the intellect.