SOCIAL SUSTENANCE. 623 



effective, but it also opens the way, so far as specialization can help us 

 on toward that end. 



But it can do so only when it crowds the world with people who 

 have the means and the inclination to purchase the services or the 

 wares of the specialist. A given specialty can be earlier divided into 

 sub-specialties in a rich than in a poor community of the same numer- 

 ical population. Hence, the circumstance which promotes sustenance is 

 likely to promote specialization. And since specialization promotes 

 sustenance, it promotes itself. It is a case of " to him that hath shall 

 be given." It is a case where two and two make more than four. 



It follows, in turn, that what promotes specialization is likely to 

 promote social sustenance. We have spoken of density of popula- 

 tion. Let us analyze this expression. What do we mean by saying 

 that population is dense ? The answer is extremely obvious, but for 

 the sake of the argument let us treat it as if it needed to be given. 

 We mean that our human beings are close together. World-crowding 

 is the only way to get them close together in person while occupying 

 all the soil and mines. 



Nevertheless, there is another way to accomplish the same practi- 

 cal object. If we can not bring them together in person, we can bring 

 their products together. We can remove the obstacles to their com- 

 munication with one another. The railroad, the steamship, the tele- 

 graph, the organization of carriage and commerce, have all helped to 

 bring people together just as effectually, in an economic sense, as 

 world-crowding does. Facile communication has ceased to depend 

 wholly on density of population ; facile communication means facile 

 specialization, and it also means more beneficent specialization. 



World-crowding was Nature's first crude and cruel method of 

 bringing her highest creatures together, and specializing and civilizing 

 them. Once acquired, the habit of specialization has been facilitated 

 and its field extended by the more kindly method of commerce. The 

 cruel and the kindly method have co-worked to stimulate industry. 

 Whether the cruel process will go on when it is no longer needed, and 

 partially rob us of the fruits of the kindlier process, is a question 

 which we may leave to the prophets and to the future. In any case, 

 what we of the nineteenth century are permitted to witness is proba- 

 bly only the infancy of specialization. 



Meantime, let us turn to its other form the creation of new 

 specialties. Much of what we have already said applies here with 

 equal force. Still, it may be worth our while to reflect that, besides 

 dividing up the old work, we may, by searching, find out new work. 

 Is it likely that all the ways of catering to the wants of society have 

 been found and utilized ? There is room here for the inventive fac- 

 ulty. A few generations ago the now highly-specialized profession of 

 journalism did not exist at all, even in its simplest form. It has been 

 but a few years since the specialties of making and attending to tele- 



