The Management of Life 83 



living things would soon so choke the world that none 

 could live. 



The problem of conduct, of what is to be done, 

 must then find solution in some other direction than 

 in promoting life for all types. There must be found 

 some principle of selection among the existing types 

 and individuals. This principle of selection must be 

 consistent with the general principle that life is to be 

 promoted, that its fulness and adequacy are the 

 object of effort. 



Such a principle of selection is found in the fact 

 that great differences in the grade of development 

 that life has reached are found among the many types 

 that are striving to live. In some, life is fuller, more 

 complex, more diversified, more adequately corre- 

 lated with the rest of the universe — in a word, higher 

 — than in others. In deciding what is to be done, the 

 principle that life is to be promoted is to be followed 

 for another step. The fuller, more adequate life — the 

 higher life — is to be given preference over the lower 

 and simpler. Since some representatives of life must 

 give away to others, it is the lower that must 

 give way to the higher. 



This principle leads to many difficult questions, 

 each of which has to be settled for itself on the basis 

 of the precise given situation. It does not imply that 

 the welfare of lower forms is to be disregarded. It 

 does not logically lead to callousness and cruelty. It 

 is life that is to be promoted ; the lower life if it does 

 not stand in the way of the higher ; the higher life if 

 one must give way to the other. As between man and 



