The Universal Kinship
By
J. Howard Moore
Instructor in zoology,Crane Manual Training High School, Chicago
‘A Sacred Kinship I would not forego
Binds me to all that breathes.’
— Boyesen.
Chicago
Charles H. Kerr & Company
56 Fifth Avenue
1906
To
my dear mother and father
who have done so much for me in the long years
that are past and gone
Preface
The Universal Kinship means the kinship of all theinhabitants of the planet Earth. Whether they came into existenceamong the waters or among desert sands, in a hole in the earth, inthe hollow of a tree, or in a palace; whether they build nests orempires; whether they swim, fly, crawl, or ambulate; and whetherthey realise it or not, they are all related, physically, mentally,morally—this is the thesis of this book. But since man is the mostgifted and influential of animals, and since his relationship withother animals is more important and more reluctantly recognisedthan any other, the chief purpose of these pages is to prove andinterpret the kinship, of the human species with the other speciesof animals.
The thesis of this book comes pretty squarely in conflict withwidely-practised and highly-prized sins. It will therefore begenerally criticised where it is not passed by in silence. Men as arule do not care to improve. Although they have but one life tolive, they are satisfied to live the thing out as they have startedon it.
Enthusiasm, which in an enlightened or ideal race would bedevoted to self-improvement, is used by men in weaving excuses fortheir own inertia or in singing of the infirmities of others.
But there is a Future. And the creeds and ideals, menbow down to to-day will in time to come pass away, and new creedsand ideals will claim their allegiance. Shrines change as thegenerations come and go, and out of the decomposition of the oldcomes the new. The time will come when the sentiments of thesepages will not be hailed by two or three, and ridiculed or ignoredby the rest; they will represent Public Opinion andLaw.
M.
Chicago, 1905